I recently noticed a c-blog post by a fellow who goes by the name
mcbennet. he observed the phenomenon of horrible video game box art. I would like to expand on that, starting with my comment on his entry:
"if you take a look at DVD covers you'll notice the same thing. covers are always plastered with pictures of the main characters. they want to say, "hey, look! it's a famous person!" i think game covers just copy off that. if you look at the promotional posters for movies, they often have awesome semi-minimalist designs, like those RE4 covers. then the actual box is just FACES OH BOY."
Take the Orange box, for instance. HL2 has the lambda symbol. Portal has the falling-into-portal figure. I'm not sure what TF2 has, but i'm sure they could think of something. Do they use those? Yes to Portal. But TF2 and HL2 have Freeman and Heavy Weapons Guy, two glaringly differently styled characters.
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You can't compare Half-Life's visual style to TF2's. That's like comparing Apples and dildos.
You can't.
i agree with gamegoblin.
it's like apple dildos.
You kids don't know how good you have it. Growing up in the 80's and 90's, I saw some box art that almost made me go blind.
This old 1up article on the worst of box art is pretty much a exclusive look at the 80's and 90's. And there is a reason for that. Not only did game developers assume back then that video games were exclusively for children 10 or younger, but they also assumed that we were all color blind.
And retarded.
So don't go complaining about The Orange Box's box art. Compared to Phalanx of Mega Man, it's a freaking masterpiece.
omg phalanx I remember that cover art that was amazing! hahaha
@Jonathan Holmes
dude...with...banjo?
wow. i think that actually goes so far into the "horrible" side of the line that it comes back around to the "amazing"
side.
most things in the eighties and nineties had horrible design. that whole two decades needed help, badly.
as for The Orange Box - i was mainly using it to illustrate my point of putting the faces on instead of something more aesthetically pleasing. and i just expect more from Valve, seeing as how the rest of the package is amazing.
in conclusion: for the most part, i concede your point, but no, that's not going to stop me from complaining. *blows raspberry*