One town's local GameStop has decided to forego Halloween decorations and has put up a Day of the Dead altar in honor of fictional characters from games and anime instead. The Day of the Dead, or Dia de Muertos, is a Spanish holiday in November where families put up altars to help guide the spirits of the dearly departed back to their loved ones. These altars usually include pictures of the deceased along with their favorite items and foods.Ahead of the holiday, it seems that a GameStop has used some of its store shelving to feature an altar of its own. While it doesn't pay tribute to any real people, it instead features characters that customers are sure to recognize. A picture of the altar has been shared by Twitter user @monabun_x, who calls it "unhinged;" likely due to which characters the store picked.The Day of the Dead altar features framed pictures of Joel from The Last of Us, Rengoku from Demon Slayer, Final Fantasy 7's Aerith and Zack, Jiraya from Naruto, Nina and Alexander from Fullmetal Alchemist, Red Dead Redemption 2's Arthur Morgan, and the Pokemon Phantump. It seems that the characters selected were in good humor, but some fans are concerned about the potential spoilers.
In the comments, fans are reacting mourning some characters and laughing at others. Some fans have questioned why Pokemon's Phantump was included for @monabun_x to use Pokedex entries from numerous games to explain why. Phantump are Pokemon said to be born from spirits of children who get lost in the woods that possess tree stumps. With this in mind, Phantump's inclusion on the altar is rather sweet, as it seems the GameStop employee who included it just wanted the lost child to be brought back home.
However, some fans are also wondering what it would be like to walk into that GameStop and pick up The Last of Us Part 2 or Red Dead Redemption 2 only to see Joel and Arthur included on the way out. In that regard, this altar may spoil people about a key moment of those games. On the other side of the coin, others are laughing at the inclusion of Aerith and Zack, who are such prolific deaths in video game history that it's hard to find someone who doesn't know they died. While the location of this GameStop was not shared, it's very clear that the employees who put it together knew what they were doing.