The PlayStation Can Produce Mind-Boggling Effects

Submission 13,478

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About

The PlayStation Can Produce Mind-Boggling Effects refers to a photo from issue 61 of Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine (EGM) showing two simply animated skeletons from the PS1 era game King's Field overtop of the phrase, "The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects." The image became the subject of memes, including redraws and photoshops, throughout the 2020s for how perceivedly absurd it is to call the shown skeletons "mind-boggling" compared to modern day video game graphics. The phrase was written by video game producer Chris Johnston in 1994, when he worked at EGM.

Origin

In August 1994, issue 61 of EGM^[1] was released. On page 61, the price of the then-upcoming PlayStation console is discussed in the "Press Play" section of the magazine. The article features an image of two animated skeletons from the game King's Field to represent what the PS1 is capable of graphically, captioned, "The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects" (shown below, left). On March 5th, 2020, X,^[2] formerly Twitter, user @LostArkVG posted a close-up photo of the skeletons and the caption, garnering over 21,000 likes and 5,500 reposts in three years (shown below, right).

Spread

The image gained viral spread throughout the 2000s, also inspiring redraws, photoshops and memes referencing it. On March 17th, 2020, the image was shared to /r/psx,^[3] garnering over 500 upvotes in three years. On May 19th, X^[4] user @taptroupe posted fan art of the skeletons, writing, "drew the gay skeletons from king's field because The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects," garnering over 140 likes in three years (shown below). On October 9th, X^[14] user @scienceshitpost posted the meme, garnering over 100,000 likes in three years. On February 11th, 2021, a video of two similar skeletons titled "'The PlayStation can produce mind-boggling effects'" was posted to /r/ps1graphics,^[5] garnering over 460 upvotes in two years.

On April 19th, 2021, Instagram^[6] user supaidameme posted a photoshop of the image replacing the skeletons with rabbits from Runescape, which was reposted by Instagram^[7] user big_chungles on February 19th, 2022, garnering over 1,800 and 9,500 likes respectively in a two years (shown below, left). On October 20th, Facebook^[8] page Memes to satisfy the sophisticated gentleman reposted the original meme, garnering over 1,500 shares and 5,500 reactions in a year.

On April 8th, 2023, X^[9] user @superpac, aka Chris Johnston, posted the meme as a quote-repost to a link for an episode of the Max Frequency podcast,^[10] writing, "Listen to this episode of the Max Frequency podcast and hear the tale of working on my first issue of EGM back in 1994…where I (yes) wrote this caption that is now an oft-referenced meme," garnering over 1,100 likes in five months (shown below, right). Johnston discusses the meme around the 10:47 mark of the podcast.

On August 9th, the original image was posted to /r/gaming,^[11] garnering over 4,500 upvotes in a month. On September 6th, it was posted by Instagram^[12] user howitfeelstochewfivegum, garnering over 316,000 likes in six days. On September 11th, Tumblr^[13] user mokeonn posted a redraw of the meme, garnering over 2,400 notes in a day (shown below).