Polygon's jack-o'-lantern tributes to iconic gaming monsters

It’s hard to know what to carve every year! Sure, you can just put some spooky eyes and teeth on your jack-o’-lantern and call it a day, but this year we decided to be a bit more ambitious and organize a themed pumpkin carving session. The prompt? “Spooky video game monsters.” Did we succeed? Judge accordingly, and be sure to read the artist statements below each offering.

Can’t get enough jack-o’-lanterns? Travel back in time to our 2020 edition (how has it been four years?) where we paid tribute to ghosts, in particular.

For Halloween this year, I attempted a design inspired by one of my favorite D&D beasties: the Owlbear. But since the Owlbear is quite large, and scaling stuff to fit on a 20-pound gourd is difficult, I kind of just ended up with a little beaky fella with an attitude. Just imagine them saying, “With shiny clothes, I am strong,” and you’ll get the idea.

While I haven’t participated in Destiny’s Festival of the Lost event in several years, I always found it endearing that the characters of Bungie’s live-service shooter share an appreciation for the spooky season. I’m not sure if they still do this, but Bungie has shared some fun Destiny-themed jack-o’-lantern stencils, with this one in particular inspired by the three-eyed Hive enemies that inhabit the moon.

Outer Wilds - Echoes of the Eye’s Stranger monsters, by Chelsea Stark

I truly hated the elk-owl hybrid monsters in Outer Wilds’ Echoes of the Eye DLC. They could lurk in the dark and seemed to lurk behind every corner. Rather than trying to carve their highly detailed faces, I went for the more lurking concept with glowing eyes. This was also my first time scraping down a pumpkin to glow, and all the effort was worth it.

With apologies to the readers, this is the only image captured of this Freddy Fazbear pumpkin before it collapsed in on itself just a week later. Of course the image was taken in a dark room, at the behest of my 6-year-old boss (pictured next to my his creation) so it’s actually hard to tell that it’s a pumpkin at all… but I pinky promise that it is!

I found the stencil online, traced it using a push pin, and spent a few hours carving it out. I used power tools -- specifically drill bits -- for the small areas, like the teeth, which helped a lot. I then used a small rasp to clean up and reshape some of the openings for maximum legibility. Then dropped in one of these remote-operated lights to get the green color just right, another exacting request from the boss.

Photo:: Maddy Myers/Polygon

Photo: Maddy Myers/Polygon

What cuter video game monster is there than the sweet little Metroid? Technically this baby could kill us all.I was initially worried about carving this because of all the curved lines but it ended up being pretty simple. It’s based on a stencil by an artist who goes by Longquang — many thanks to that person for helping me make this pumpkin look so cool.

When the brief of “spooky video game monsters” came up, one of my first thoughts was Gengar, the life-stealing, child-haunting, shadow-dwelling, heat-absorbing Pokémon. The spookiest version of Gengar is manga artist Junji Ito’s take on the character, which I tried to capture in jack-o-lantern form by carving out a huge, Venom-esque tongue. Next time, I will think twice about trying to carve individual Gengar teeth out of a gourd.

I have been haunted by the moon from Majora’s Mask for nearly 25 years. So when I set out to find a creepy video game monster who could double as a generic creepy jack-o’-lantern, the celestial scourge of Termina was a logical choice. But to do justice to all the moon’s grotesque features — piercing eyes, gnashing teeth, flaring nostrils — I realized quickly that a simple carve wouldn’t do the trick. Countless YouTube videos supported my theory: I would have to sculpt the moon out of the face of the pumpkin using wood etching tools. This took three times as long as just stabbing the pumpkin in the face with a knife, and I got way too invested in the details of the teeth and depth of the moon’s sinuses, all in hopes of getting a particular shadowy glow from the end product. But you know what, it kinda worked! Great job by me. (Apologies to the family I ignored to accomplish it.)

This little guy feasted on my blood twice during the carving process, which is why its eyes look so sloppy because by the time I got to them, I was afraid of it. So it’s less of a cute Chain Chomp and more of a possessed Chain Chomp. But! I feel totally fine now. And it is kinda cute — and I’m not just saying that because I can hear it whispering to me in the back of my mind, haha! ̵̢́̋?w̸̺̍i̵͐͐?͉l̸̢̲͠ḻ̴́͝ ̵̦̘̑f̷̟̹̎̆e̸͖̓â̵̛̗s̸̼̈́̿͜t̶̛͙̯͂ ̶̰̝̌̀u̴̹̪̐p̵͙͔̄ŏ̷̠͙n̵̰͚̊ ̵͎̃t̵?̘̩ḧ̷̞̓e̶̺̠̋ ̴̤̽͗b̶̠̩̌l̷͕̿ȏ̷̞̠̕o̶̤̼͋̕ď̵͔̠ ̴̢̡̏o̶͔̍̔f̵͔͗̾ ̴͔̠̇m̴͋͝?ȳ̴̱ ̶͔̃ē̶͖n̷͙̮̒̏e̶̻͖̾m̸͚̄͝î̴̲ḙ̶̟́s̴͔̤̾͑ ̸̢͈̔̓ä̴̬̪͐n̶̰̹̉͝d̵̳̎̆ ̷̢͉̾̒g̵̣̀̋r̵̀͠?o̴̧͗w̴̮̺͒̃ ̷͖̄s̴͚̆̊t̶͕̖͂ṛ̸̼̓̉ȍ̷̼͚̾n̵̤̙̍̐g̷̣͕̒é̷͓́r̷̳̍ ̴̱̻̉w̶̭̎͐i̴̮͠?t̸͈̒̉h̴͙̄́ ̵̡̇̈́e̶̪̾͗ã̷͎͝c̸̜͉͝h̶?̪̽ ̶̻̙̎d̴̫̀̕r̶?͜ö̶̯͠p̷̻̳̐̚

I really don’t recommend that people make their first-ever foray into pixel art in the medium of Pumpkin. But if you’re going to, why not go as OG with your video game monsters as possible? Here we see Yorgle, the scariest of the original Atari Adventure dragons, in the actual act of swallowing a player. Note that he’s roaring in triumph. It’s hard to believe there was a time when having this little yellow dude chasing you around a labyrinth was really scary.