Ten Better Geek Shoes than Nike’s Street Fighter Sneakers

I recently read about some new Street Fighter sneakers from Nike, only to be disappointed by how little the shoes seem to resemble the characters they’re supposedly “inspired” by. I can understand Nike’s desire to aim for subtlety rather than an out-and-out declaration of geekdom, since they could sell plenty of these shoes by “accident” and still probably hit a few sales among the Street Fighter fans, but that Chun Li shoe looks like it could have been sold by them for years and just decided to slap Chun Li’s name on the tag. BORING.

So here are ten cooler geek shoes.

Fan-Made
No matter how long I spend scouring the Internet for the fun and fannish, I always manage to be surprised by fans’ skills and willingness to spend time making stuff.

1. Custom Dalek Shoes
And they’re even trying to fight each other! Maybe one of them is from the older, “impure” generation of Daleks. Or maybe one of them is the doctor in disguise. Who knows?

2. Harry Potter Sneakers
Harry’s portrait might not be the best, but taken as a whole this pair of mismatched-but-themed sneakers is impressive, particularly the detail on the H and P on the heels.

3. Mario Hi-Tops
Raccoon Mario is just too cute to pass up. And thankfully these are available on Etsy, if you’re willing to spend some dough on ’em!

4. Auto-Lacing Shoes
Most of you will recognize these beauts as being an homage to Back to the Future– and they’re actually functional as well. Put the shoes on while the laces are loose and the motor will tighten them when you’re ready. Hopefully the guy will have enough money someday to make the second shoe so he has a pair.

Professionally-Made

These shoes are generally available to the public for a price, but may not be officially licensed. Specifically these shoes come from the site PunkYourChucks.com, which provides hand-painted Converse shoes and from which I probably could have found all 10 examples had I wanted. Instead I just picked two.

5. Legend of Zelda Custom Converses
As with Harry Potter, the Link who appears in these shoes may not be a complete masterpiece, but each shoe is hand-painted so they might come out better in person. But the detail on the logo is impressive!

6. Nintendo Custom Converses
Nintendo is much too big to make a claim like “the gang’s all here,” but with reps from Pokemon, Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, Kirby, and of course, the Super Mario Brothers, it’s hard to imagine anyone complaining. But it’s the tiny little depiction of Ness from Earthbound that really makes the shoe for me!

Official

And then, of course, sometimes even the copyright owners get into the shoe-making biz.

7. Star Trek Airwalks
The problem with officially-licensed products is that they tend to be expensive, but these Star Trek Airwalks were released last year exclusively at Payless and, as such were relatively affordable. Like the earlier-mentioned Street Fighter sneaks these lean more on the “subtle” side; the only real “Star Trek” reference in these shoes is the set of colors, but somehow the connection seems more obvious than the Chun Li and Ryu Street Fighter sneaks.

8. Vorpal Rabbit Slippers
The only non-sneaker on this list, but they will eternally hold a soft spot in my heart because they’re cute, geeky, hilarious, AND comfortable. That’s a hard combo to beat!

9. Limited-Edition Nintendo x Run Athletics Sneakers
The ultimate combination of “subtle enough for non-geeks, obvious for true geeks,” these Nintendo sneakers were sold at a 2007 party and only 400 pairs were made, so don’t go thinking you’re likely to lay your hands on them. But with the Mario “M” logo and and silver-and-white versions of the Invincibility Star, you’ll wish you could.

10. Star Wars x Adidas Collection
This year, Adidas released a whole line of Star Wars-inspired shoes, some more attractive than others. Pictured here are the best, in my opinion: the Darth Vader shoe. (The Yoda-inspired sneakers are pretty ugly.)

Gia Manry is a professional writer specializing in geek culture. She currently writes primarily for Anime News Network, but also likes being followed on Twitter. She can be contacted via her website.