By: Colette Bennett

Entering the doors of Meltdown on Sunset Blvd, I suddenly found myself in the middle of a fumbling geek orgasm-toys, comics, figurines and t shirts as far as the eye could see. Never having been before, I was a bit overwhelmed by the desire to just hurl my wallet at the unsuspecting guy behind the register and run about whooping with delight.

As easy as it would have been to stand drooling and mesmerized before glass cases of Kubrick and Qee bears, I steadied my resolve and headed back to the gallery area to scope out the scene and hopefully chat it up with some equally game-friendly citizens. Walking in and hearing the DJ playing a remix of the Maniac Mansion theme song put a wry smile on my face. You know you're in the right place when you see people shaking ass to that shit.

The gallery itself is modest in size, with clean white walls and some fantastic Roman Dirge artwork hanging. Even distracted by all that goth creativity, I pretty much made a beeline for the tables set up for the event, as I wanted to get my hot little paws on the material in question ASAP. I'm happy to say the Nerdcore calendar itself looks good. Frankly, when I first saw posts about it, I had some qualms. Sure, naked girls rock. And I've been known to get hard nippled at the sight of a Power Glove myself, so I'm sure as hell not bitching about seeing all that peripheral goodness either. From my perspective though, something about it seemed a bit off. I wasn't sure I believed any of those girls would actually play those games, and while your average 16 year old isn't going to be remotely phased by that, it got me wondering if the concept could really be sexy in actual execution. I was pleasantly surprised. I'm no more convinced that these girls are real gamers than I was when I saw the original bloggings about the calendar, but the photos were sexy and tasteful enough to push my buttons just fine.

I did have the pleasure of chatting with the photographer, Cherie Roberts, a girl lovely enough to warrant a calendar of her own. Cherie's no stranger to photography-she's shot for the likes of Suicide Girls, not to mention maintaining her own website and writing for IGN Babes on the side. I would need two clones to achieve this, but somehow she makes it look effortless. She says the Nerdcore calendar was a project meant to combine the funky iconic look of retro gaming with the classic pin-up theme. Best of all, it peppers the usual calendar boredom of holidays no one's ever heard of with nerd-friendly movie releases, key anniversaries (Mega Man's 20th!), and conventions of interest. Coming soon: Nerdcore Special Edition Blackberry with HAL voice reminders! Ok, not really.

We hung out a while, chatted with the girls and enjoyed the spoils (free booze, always a delight.) It seemed the general consensus on the calendar was that it was a good idea and done well. I did hear a peep or two from a few of the attendees that while the girls looked great and the shots were well done, that they lacked the spark of a player actually enjoying the game. Well, I can't deny that myself-I certainly didn't believe any of these girls were firing up their PSPs in between shots, armed with Nintendogs or otherwise.

We mused at what a real game girl calendar would look like-perhaps still centerfold influenced, but replacing stats and measurements with favorite games and top scores? On the other hand, I'm unsure that even the hottest girl looks her best truly enjoying the game she's playing. She's likely in sweats with no makeup, having just rolled out of bed and tortured out of sleep by the fact that she can't quite beat the shit out of that kid in Bully. Less sexy....or more? Is it better than polished models posing with carefully selected arcade games? It's hard to say. Regardless, naked still sells-no matter what the consensus is in the end, you're likely to find the Nerdcore calendar hanging in the homes of at least a few of your friends by year's end. In the end, we're all still supporting games. Who wouldn't take all their clothes off for that cause?

Special thanks to Travis for the pics, including this one featuring him, Chobot and Pereira-bot

Contact information for this author is not available.