| Game Slave | |
| |
| Name | Game Slave |
| Type | Human Technology |
| Use(s) | Entertainment |
| Users | Gaz |
The Game Slave is a portable gaming system featured throughout the Invader ZIM series. It is a parody of various portable gaming systems of the time, such as the Game Boy. Occasionally, such as in the episodes Dark Harvest and Bestest Friend, the Game Slave is drawn so it resembles a 3 1/2 floppy disk. Gaz can be seen playing a similar, yet unnamed, handheld game system in the Pilot. This device strongly resembles the Game Boy, as it has a cartridge slot and cartridge. The Nanoship's controls resemble the GS1.
Description
The front of the GameSlave 1, featuring the typical D-pad and A/B buttons.
Gaz is best known for being a full-time gamer, and is rarely seen without it, thus making her social interaction remarkably low. She mainly plays the game Vampire Piggy Hunter. She destroyed her old Game Slave in the episode Game Slave 2 as a new Game Slave was to come out that night. However, she was later seen playing it in The Voting of the Doomed, chronologically coming after Game Slave 2. The system doesn't seem to have extensions for multiplayer peripherals, nor does it have any cartridge or disk slots, and so therefore the games appear to be integrated into the device, similar to the Game & Watch games and the Tiger Electronic games of the 1980s and 1990s.
Gameplay for the popular Vampire Piggy Hunter game includes a one-eyed person with a beam sword and fangs. He is attacking a legion of flaming vampire piggies and is eventually buried by them if the player loses. It parodies the manga Vampire Hunter D.
Sketches/concept art of the Game Slave 2
Game Slave 2
Gaz with a Game Slave 2.
The Game Slave 2 is the successor to the original Game Slave.
During development, the Game Slave 2 was initially going to be called the Game Slave Advance, as well as the episode. As the name was too similar to the Game Boy Advance, a recently released console at the time, Nintendo threatened to sue the creators of Invader ZIM if that name was used. As this happened, the second Game Slave was simply renamed the Game Slave 2, parodying the title of the PlayStation 2.
The GS2 has a more futuristic design and is purple-colored instead of red.
The episode Game Slave 2 revolved around this device, and Gaz's wrathful crusade to obtain it when an obnoxious, obsessive gamer made off with the last GS2 in stock that was rightfully hers.
In Ten Minutes to Doom, Zim took the GS2 from Gaz's pocket and told her that Dib planned to experiment on it, in an attempt to convince her to help him retrieve his PAK. However, it fell out of Zim's pocket sometime later. Angry at Zim for lying to her, she chases him in a rage, but he gives it back to her sometime afterwards.
In Issues 9 and 10 of the comic series, Gaz is shown to still play her Game Slave, while in other comics she's usually portrayed engaging in online or console games instead. She is also shown playing her Game Slave on the front covers of several of the trade paperbacks.