LAZY SUNDAY
The Fine Art of Game Covers
By Jamie Love - March 22nd, 2009
Admittedly, I am a wordy bastard. So it’s never hard for me to write endlessly on nearly any subject regardless of how ignorant about it I may be. I find the real challenge is in deciding what is or isn’t worth writing about. It’s a hard question, and one that was once the challenge of journalism – forced to make a decision about the importance of information because of the limited space available for those old methods of delivery. But today there is no end to news, and every piece of information is seen as relevant one way or another. So maybe I’m stressing over nothing.
EA recently showed off their fancy new cover art for the upcoming Pandemic title, The Saboteur. And I have to admit that it is probably one of the best I’ve seen in awhile. I’m not the first to suggest that game covers are generally terrible and unimaginative eye sores that meld into one hideous retina repulsing lump on the store shelf, and I won’t be the last. Since EA has contributed to this problem with some merriment over the years, it seems reasonable that they were about due for something worth praising. But I don’t really feel that I have anything relevant to add to this conversation, and so I was very unenthusiastic when asked to spin together an article about it. Ultimately there were two factors that changed my mind. The first, and most important, was that no one had signed my cheque yet this week. The second was that I came across another post, which claimed to list the forty best game covers of all time. That’s a pretty significant claim. But giving the list a once over, it seems to have been largely assembled by someone who went as far as the nearest GameStop and glanced around at the walls for twenty minutes.
So with that in mind, I figure I can put about as much effort into this by walking over to my own shelves to see what catches my eye today. Enticed? Read on!
Ghost in the Shell NTSC-J
Ghost in the Shell is one of THE most under-appreciated PSOne titles you’ve likely never played. Instead of sticking players into the role of “the major,” the game delved deeper into the manga that spawned it like few games ever have – including what amounts to an entire animated episode spread across the disc, courtesy of Production I.G. The Japanese release of the game offers a cover that really represents the effort put into the entire project. However the North American redesign of the cover is almost as shocking as the fact that it took THQ to bring the game across the ocean – especially considering who worked on it.
The WipEout Trilogy
There is no alternate reality in which the various covers from the original WipEout trilogy wouldn’t make this list. They remain a prime example of why employing designers is often a good and logical idea. Well known for album covers, and what many called anti-establishment aesthetics, The Designers Republic created works that continue to stand out from anything gamers can expect to encounter in a gaming aisle.
But it isn’t just a case of these designs proving unique, trendy, or intricately plugged into the the culture of a time and place. The designs created for these packages worked their way from the outside wrappings to the inner core of the games within. The in-game menus, team logos, and the larger world that WipEout presents, all of these are designed as one larger, natural and organic idea that isn’t confined to any single disc. WipEout as a game is inseparable from the work of The Designers Republic – an achievement of marketing and cultural manipulation that we can still learn a great deal from.
God Hand
Is there really truth in advertising? With God Hand, absolutely. Gamers can expect to see many fists smashing into many faces before completing this title.
What truly stands out is that the cover is every bit as confrontational as the game itself. Some might recall that this is the game reviewers simply couldn’t choke down even as core gamers applauded Clover’s latest, and unfortunately last release. God Hand pissed a lot of people off with its over-confident swagger, and the cover comes out swinging just as eagerly as the content within.
The straightforward layout compliments the faux simplicity of the game itself – though many of us know how much depth is waiting beneath the surface of this tricky and deceptive game. For instance, this cover would never lead you to believe that poison-chihuahua’s were waiting within – along with many other reasons why gaming needs a greater sense of humor.
ICO NTSC-J
Once again, there’s no argument that Japan gets treated to far greater cover designs than North America – but this is THE straw the broke the camel’s back. It utterly boggles the mind just how dramatically different the cover for ICO is.
The nature of this cover immediately conveys a sense of what this game is at the core – it prepares the player for a very different type of experience, one that I still find abstracted and hard to explain.
The fact that North American marketing zombies instead chose to retreat back to the warm womb habit of slapping the in-game rendered character on the box speaks to the fear that is ever present in offering a different experience. Instead of backing the bold departure this cover offers, that NA version was blanketed with a bland design that allowed the title to blend into the shelves with early and mediocre releases and along with a long of advertising enabled a true gem for the PSTwo to go unnoticed for quite sometime. Mind you, if you’re lucky enough to find the lesser covered version, I’d advise you to buy it all the same.
The Grand Theft Auto Series
In truth, I’m not a very hardened fan of this series. On the occasions I have played the various entries in the franchise, I tend to park the car and spend most of my time listening to the radio. But put the pitchforks and torches away, because that won’t stop me from acknowledging that the cover art for Grand Theft Auto continually manages to compliment the games and offer visual cues unique to this long-running series.
In the simplest terms, the panel design offers a glimpse of the variety each title brings to gamers. But it also speaks to the idea that while each subsequent entry follows a single protagonist, that these games are also made up of a larger narrative – one brought to players through the evolving introduction of a vast cast of characters with their own increasingly invested roles to play within these worlds.
Whether or not this is the closest contemporary gaming has come toward its own pop art styling is open to debate. But the idea that people who have never played these games are still likely to recognize this branding and style is assuredly a safer bet.
ChuChu Rocket!
This cover was a difficulty call. Ultimately I made the decision because I can never stop staring at it. On the one hand, it reinforces the habit of pasting character designs on the front. On the other hand, when you’ve managed to create such bizarrely iconic imagery for your game, maybe it should be flaunted openly and excessively.
Marketing a puzzle game has to be a continual frustration, but it wasn’t just the character designs that made me curious the first time I saw it on the shelf. There’s a spacial quality at work, and certainly an element of Japanese insanity that continues to appeal to me at the deepest levels of my subconscious.
Taiko Drum Master
Did I mention Japanese design insanity already? What other reason could I have for adding Taiko Drum Master to this list?
A tendency of granting life to inanimate objects, which in turn prove ridiculously happy for that precious gift, never fails at thinning my wallet.
I have absolutely no artistic argument to make here. This sizable box and its contents make me endlessly happy. To understand it on yet another level, you have to bring it home and hear your best girl “SQUEEEEEEEEEE” in excitement at the sight of it to fully appreciate the effect of this design.
Katamari Damacy
Maybe some art really doesn’t need any explanations. It either speaks directly and immediately to you, or alternatively there’s a long awkward silence until you walk away in utter confusion.
There’s no room for confusion with regards to Katamari Damacy. It’s easy to believe that Keita Takahashi wants us all to be very happy, and as long as he continues to make his mark on gaming, that should be fairly easy for anyone willing to surrender themselves to innate, natural fun.
So ends our exciting ride across the more notable contents of my game shelves, this is a lazy Sunday after all.
Honorable mentions go to the Metal Gear Essentials Collection for finally embracing its own art style more completely – and to the GCN version of Ikaruga (which would have been at the top of my list were it not hideously scarred by an IGN statement.)
