Remember that trippy PS2 advertisement from way back in 2000 that was directed by David Lynch and looks like it could be an episode of Twin Peaks? If not, go watch it and then come back here, because there's a new Xbox commercial that's giving similar vibes in a refreshingly nostalgic way.
Of course, tonally nothing can compare to the direction of the late, great David Lynch, but legendary Fight Club director David Fincher does a great job capturing that same early-2000s era weirdness it feels like we haven't seen from a big game company in decades. It's not a trailer for any specific game, it's just an "Xbox 'Wake Up' Brand Trailer," which again, is something I feel like I should be watching on a tube TV waiting for the Rugrats to come back on.
The commercial follows a humanoid rat named Horatio who seems depressed with his life in the literal rat race as he rolls out of bed, trudges through a busy, dystopian city to work, punches in his time, and comes back home. Here and there he catches glimpses of normal, happy humans playing games on mobile devices, which seems to inspire him to bust out his Xbox controller with his little rat hands and play games including Indiana Jones and the Great Circle with his pudgy cat sitting next to him. Suddenly, he's transformed into a human with a big ol' happy gamer face. "Wake up the human inside," reads an on-screen banner.
While not as memorable to me personally, Xbox had its own share of bizarre console trailers back in the day, like the internet famous Standoff ad where everyone's shooting each other with imaginary finger guns, and the far, far more disturbing one (like, genuinely NSFW) where a baby shoots out of the womb and lives out an entire naked existence from adolescence to adulthood, all while rocketing through the sky, before crashing into a funeral casket. Yes, that really, really happened, and in the year of our lord 2025, Xbox says in a YouTube comment that it's "definitely channeling that vibe" of those early Xbox 360 ads. What a time.
Has there ever been a more appropriate time to share our guide to the best Xbox Series X games to play right now?
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