I know there's probably some market research indicating why a generic render of the (male) main character with a gun or a sword, or maybe a character facing away from the viewer, on the front cover of a game will sell more copies, but I still think it's bullshit whenever I look back at box art from the 16-bit era and earlier. It's almost like the further you go back the more box art was just straight-up florid-ass paintings.
I think this was most common with space and fantasy games. Maybe back in the day they were just borrowing from the tradition of sci-fi and fantasy book covers (the same thing kinda happened to those too when you think about it). That's what was cool about it though. I feel like it honestly helped justify the cost of the games.
Two really small examples I can point out are the box arts for Gradius and Phantasy Star II. I think PSII is an interesting example of the differences between western and Japanese box arts. These kinds of painted box arts were definitely more common in Japan -- I don't even know if they still are, though really it went back and forth. Maybe the Japanese box art would be some cute anime shit while the wester one would be like a Frank Frazetta or Boris Vellajo painting. I think both the PSII box arts are good examples of both sides. There was another Genesis or SNES or whatever game that was like that too, but I can't remember what it's called.
Honestly back then looking at some painting of four dudes taking up a tiny corner of the cover facing a dragon that took up the entire rest of the cover, or a lush landscape with a castle in the background, made me wanna buy that game because I wanted to go there. Paintings of space battles with lasers all over the place and big-ass battleships in the background looked exciting as shit.
Then obviously you have stuff like all Tomb Dubois' box arts, and really everything Konami did probably through the PS2 era. Maybe the starkest example within one franchise was Metal Gear. Up until MGS3 it was simple -- just throw some dope Yoji Shinkawa art up there. From the PSP games onward it was generic CG. WTF happened? Even if you have to have a generic dude with a gun on the front, does it HAVE to be a generic CG render? Metal Gear had 2D painted character art right there, why not just put it on the front cover?
Sometimes these days you might get elaborate 2D painted art in a flip cover or a limited edition but it feels like that's not even really common anymore. Some weird exceptions are some of the box arts for Final Fantasy XIV, and the deluxe edition of FFXV. For some reason only then did Square Enix decide to just let Amano go ham.
Y'know what genre still seems to be allowed to do this a lot? Strategy games. Just go look at Total War Three Kingdoms or ROTK XIV. It's one of the only genres I don't really care about, bot the covers are one of the main reasons I sometimes think about playing them. It just adds to the production value if you ask me.
I think this was most common with space and fantasy games. Maybe back in the day they were just borrowing from the tradition of sci-fi and fantasy book covers (the same thing kinda happened to those too when you think about it). That's what was cool about it though. I feel like it honestly helped justify the cost of the games.
Two really small examples I can point out are the box arts for Gradius and Phantasy Star II. I think PSII is an interesting example of the differences between western and Japanese box arts. These kinds of painted box arts were definitely more common in Japan -- I don't even know if they still are, though really it went back and forth. Maybe the Japanese box art would be some cute anime shit while the wester one would be like a Frank Frazetta or Boris Vellajo painting. I think both the PSII box arts are good examples of both sides. There was another Genesis or SNES or whatever game that was like that too, but I can't remember what it's called.
Honestly back then looking at some painting of four dudes taking up a tiny corner of the cover facing a dragon that took up the entire rest of the cover, or a lush landscape with a castle in the background, made me wanna buy that game because I wanted to go there. Paintings of space battles with lasers all over the place and big-ass battleships in the background looked exciting as shit.
Then obviously you have stuff like all Tomb Dubois' box arts, and really everything Konami did probably through the PS2 era. Maybe the starkest example within one franchise was Metal Gear. Up until MGS3 it was simple -- just throw some dope Yoji Shinkawa art up there. From the PSP games onward it was generic CG. WTF happened? Even if you have to have a generic dude with a gun on the front, does it HAVE to be a generic CG render? Metal Gear had 2D painted character art right there, why not just put it on the front cover?
Sometimes these days you might get elaborate 2D painted art in a flip cover or a limited edition but it feels like that's not even really common anymore. Some weird exceptions are some of the box arts for Final Fantasy XIV, and the deluxe edition of FFXV. For some reason only then did Square Enix decide to just let Amano go ham.
Y'know what genre still seems to be allowed to do this a lot? Strategy games. Just go look at Total War Three Kingdoms or ROTK XIV. It's one of the only genres I don't really care about, bot the covers are one of the main reasons I sometimes think about playing them. It just adds to the production value if you ask me.
