2015 in silly back page jokes

Features
By published

Well, what else are you supposed to do with the back page of a mag?

March 2015: Just Cause 3

Chris: The key to producing an All Over in an hour and a half while Sam looks at you like he’s about to collapse inwards like a dying star is finding a joke that is basically just writing with one visual flourish. I had no idea how to make it look like there was a grappling hook flying towards a whiteboard that you could also read, but I asked our designer to do that anyway and they did. I quite like this one. 

April 2015: American Truck Simulator

Phil: What we've done here is create a pretty good pitch for a game.

Chris: Antarctica: the wacky continent that you can make jokes about because nobody is there.

Andy: When we came up with this joke, we thought, what would Euro Truck Simulator be like if it was, in fact, set in the Arctic? And then we made John mock it up in Photoshop. It really was that simple.

Chris: Slow down Andy you’ll ruin the magic.

May 2015: SteamVR

Tony: Making it look like a mocked-up desktop: always a sign of desperation.

Chris: I thought ‘mocked up magazine cover’ was the bigger sign of desperation. (This is both.) Also: first time I made a joke about Half-Life 3 on the back page, I got abuse from random people on Twitter and Reddit for a week and a half. I got no abuse this time, which I take as a sign that we weren’t baiting the internet hard enough.

Phil: At least it isn't 'found memo with a coffee stain on a desk,' which was roughly 80% of 2013's All Overs.

Chris: There’s literally a cup of coffee, though. The stain is implicit.

Andy: I don’t get it.

PC Gamer
PC Gamer

The collective PC Gamer editorial team worked together to write this article. PC Gamer is the global authority on PC games—starting in 1993 with the magazine, and then in 2010 with this website you're currently reading. We have writers across the US, UK and Australia, who you can read about here.