Creating brand new theme park badges for Wonder Eggs

Hello friends, I hope that you are doing well. Today I would like to share another art project come to life. If you remember earlier this year I mentioned the Wonder Eggs employee badge that I had won at auction. This was actually worn at the video game theme park built by Namco in Japan. It was in operation from 1992-2000. I had a number of retail items from the park, and was blessed to get something used by a staff member named “Suzuki.” In doing research on the park I discovered that the same pyrallis character was used on all the employee badges. This was the pink colored character named Ilinx. I wondered what it would have looked like if each pyrallis was used on the employee badges. Not only that if the two gray colored cyborg pyrallis from the Egg Empire had badges as well. At first I did illustrations of the badges, then I decided to go the extra step and get actual ones made from Vogesey.

The Pyrallis, the mascots of the park were based on philosopher Roger Caillois' book “Man, Play and Games.” The author explained that there were four types of play, Namco took those concepts and assigned them to mythological characters. Agon the green Pyrallis with a bow and arrow shaped tail, had a stubborn sense of justice, and represented Competition. Ilinx the pink Pyrallis with a propeller shaped tail, was cheerful, funny, and represented Dizziness. Mimicry the blue Pyrallis with a harp shaped tail was shy, gentle, and represented Simulation. Alea the violet Pyrallis with a three pointed pitchfork tail was free-spirited, carefree, and represented Chance. The cybernetic Pyrallis from the Egg Empire were gray colored but were never given names. I took two other concepts from Mr. Callois’ book and named them Tyche (Luck) and Moira (Destiny). I used the fictional language used at the park “Elds’ Character” and put the character names on each badge. At first I was simply going to have them have plain clear acrylic finishes, but then decided they would be more magical if they had hologram flakes instead.

I also created custom backs for the badges. The original badge had a safety pin, and clip over a plain white background. The new ones had the clip, and pin as well. I added the symbol of the fantastic Laperot Village, which Namco themed their park after. It was a detail that fans of the parks could appreciate. While I was working on the badges I got inspired to create badges for my wife, and I to celebrate the Pink Monorail podcast. But that would be a topic for a future blog. If you could have a badge from a real or fictional place what would you choose? Maybe a passkey for the Avengers Tower? Or a press pass for the Daily Bugle? Let me know about it in the comments section. As always if you enjoyed this blog, and would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!