And now we get really obscure....
Captain Quazar
Who the hell is this guy? Well, if the 3DO had taken off, this probably would have been the guy in the commercials for the system, and today we'd be playing Captain Quazar 7 and Captain Quazar Space Racers. Originally he was an exclusive for the 3DO and was being set up to be their Mario. Fortunately the system bombed and the world was spared.
Jack Frost
Jack Frost is Atlus' mascot and apparently in Japan he's huge. He shows up in all of the Persona and Persona spin-off games and is pretty much their cute signature monster. A colder and slightly more demonic Pikachu I guess you could say. Here's a fun fact, last year when Atlus gave me promotional materials to hand out at the horror convention I went to, I got Jack Frost keychains.
Bonk/PC Caveman/BC Kid
Seriously, how does a big headed little kid caveman not storm the world?? Bonk was a great idea, but was kind of a result of a giant videogame gang bang. He started out as a comic character, but in his way to becoming a video game character Hudson, SEC, and Atlus all had a hand in his creation, and went on to become the poster boy for the Turbo Graphx-16. He also had 3 separate names, it was clear from the get-go that no one was quite ready to get behind him with a single uniformed idea. Tough luck hid. But when you're in the same company with the Hudson Bee, you're not going to be the favorite.
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Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobile---
Tell me to get back to rewriting this site so it's not horrible on mobileJay signed a HUGE deal with 3DO and NBC at the same time. Little known fact, swear to god, check it yourself.
Pitfall Harry
These are better than most flagship mascots.
Except for the guy humping a tree.
Especially the guy humping a tree.*
Tree humpers are awesome mascots!
Bubsy
Four games were released in the series: Bubsy in Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind, Bubsy 2, Bubsy in: Fractured Furry Tales, and Bubsy 3D: Furbitten Planet. Though the games were platform games similar to Super Mario Bros. and Sonic the Hedgehog, the eponymous anthropomorphic bobcat never came close to the popularity level of the two bigger name mascots.
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Why is Bubsy so hated today? I don't remember him being so despised at the time.
I hated Bubsy back in the day too.
I never played any of the Bubsy games, but for some reason I hated him. I think video game magazines of the era taught us that he was evil.
Ravenprose said:I hated Bubsy back in the day too.
Yeah, but you grew up on tree humping man so your standards were higher than most.
Fucking Conker!
You gotta love Conker. He was kind of the anti-mascot. That interview with the former Rare guy somebody posted recently where he said they basically had all they needed for a sequel and decided to do the Xbox remake instead made Edge sad. 
Dvader said:Conker was in a childrens game first. Really weird what they did with him.
That game was never released though, (it turned into Bad Fur Day), though it was apparently almost complete itself. I have some preview shots of it in EGM with it looking like every other kiddy 3D platformer of the time.
From what I remember, Rare was concerned that Conker was too much like Banjo & Kazooie and Donkey Kong 64....AND Super Mario 64. So they wisely decided to come up with a totally new idea for him, which ended up being one of the most shocking and hilarious games ever made.
I never touched Conker either. I think I was just too confused why they took a regular mascoty type character and then made it vulgar. Just didn't seem like anything I wanted to play. Truth be told it still doesn't.
Inspired by Aspro's recent topic regarding video game mascots being a thing of the past, I've started thinking quite a bit about a lot of the older mascots that have come and gone. Aside from Sonic and Mario most of them really have fallen by the wayside, though I suppose Activision does get some credit for breathing a little life back into Spyro the Dragon thanks to the Skylander's series, even if Spyro is really now not much more than a supporting character. But let's take a moment to look at some of the lesser mascots who we used to enjoy.... and in some cases never even heard of:
Alex Kidd
Ahhhhhhh Alex Kidd.... Sonic's bastard predecessor of the Master System days. In many ways he did set the mold for Sonic or at least the modern day Sonic in that Alex couldn't string together 2 decent games in a row. Well maybe 2 but that was about it. He just never had the personality to sell systems, but this even more kid friendly version of the Monkey King than Goku started things off well enough for Sega, and deserves credit for a couple truly great games. We now he see him showing up in Sega Racing and Tennis, but his days as a starring character are likely good for good.
Karnov
Data East loved this bastard, though they never quite knew what to do with him. Sometimes he was a playable hero. Sometimes his was a mini-boss you fought against. And other times he was just a common thug that went down in one punch. But in the 80's and early 90's he seemed to be in every 2-D fighter that Data East put out. Sadly the world is not a kind place to large bald, slightly obsese men, and after Data East went bankrupt poor Karnov was never seen again.
The Hudson Bee
No Bomberman was not Hudson's mascot. Look at the logo and who do you see? It's the fucking bee and he was awesome. Far more than just a character with a series of platformers, the Hudson Bee was a power-up. In the Adventure Island games and Milon's Secret Castle if you found the bee, you were invisible. He was Mario's star, only with more panache and gravitas. He also showed up as an NPC in a few other Hudson games in the 8 and 16 bit era. Sadly with Hudson dead the greatest insect based power-up of all time is gone for good.
If anyone else would like to add to the archive, have at it!