What? I don't remember that huge face on the left hand side of the Americunt box art...

Really Kobayashi?

I'm sure plenty of Japanese people have talked about 'new' Dragon Quest Games

Which one is which? I think they both suck.

yea if i knew nothing about Ico the art on the left would make me to check out the game while the right would just make me pass right by it.

What Niero said.

DanlHaas:

Its name is Handtoucan. Show some respect.

I think his point regarding "new" games is valid, though I don't understand why he thinks it's purely as issue with Western developers. Has he seen most of the new IPs coming out of Japan? Anime-inspired RPGs and Dynasty Warriors spin-offs... games like The Last Guardian are the exception to the trend, not the trend itself.

also, remember this? it was from the criterion collection mock-ups from awhile back:

i bought (european) ico because of it's awesome box art, so i totally agree with that chap.

living in aussie, when i first saw the games art-work (we have the Euro/Japan one) it instantly got my interest and ive been wanting to play it for years (still havent, played SotC though) since that point (but never had a ps2 or any console until recently)

I own the American box, I'm ashamed to admit. After playing the game I was disappointed in the lack of windmill bosses but enthralled with everything else.

Reminds me of main series Final Fantasies. In Japan and Europe, the box art is synonomous with the brand, it is always a plain white background, the title in black lettering imposed on top of the game's logo.

Now, for some reason, NA messes this up every time, and decideds that they gotta get busy on the cover, put on some awkward imagery, try to splice and cram multiple character images on their, make it an ugly forgetable cover instead of something instantly identifiable as the FF brand.

Psychonauts had alright box-art, and that game also performed poorly.

I think other things are involved here aside from just the box-art. I have a feeling word-of-mouth may be a stronger incentive to purchase a particular item in the Japanese market. Games with an indie feel, or games that take a chance, traditionally do better in Japan (think of titles like Pengel, Pikmin and Noby Noby Boy).
That may be starting to change with word-of-mouth gaining traction over the internet and downloadable indie titles proliferating over XBLA and Steam.
Then again, some titles that took a chance did well over here (e.g. Katamari Damacy). So, maybe it's just a question of how to market things after all...

I don't think that ICO would have sold much better with different box art. The content in ICO doesn't appeal to much. It's a niche game.

I wonder if it really would make a difference.
As it stands I don't think box art matters at all to Americans. Like has been pointed out , theres a long standing tradition of crap box art. Its like its just a way of taking up space around the title. No one looks at it anymore.

Yeah, I pretty much know what games I want before I even go into the store. It's pretty rare to come across a title I've never heard of, and, if I do, I'll usually go back and check the reviews rather than going for an impulse buy.

@solidus187 disagree i am sure some people like you or me rely on other means of information before making a buy however a big part of the consumer market actualy does make decisions based on what a cover looks like

It's been a busy day for the Toucan!

So who messed up with American cover(and how European is not Western?)? Can't you come over to America and fire that guy? It's not like it's published by third party in US

I'm still trying to figure out what the fascination Team ICO has with people(and animals) falling off things. Love those games though, terrible box art and all.

Most gamers don't purchase games because of box art - they purchase because of word of mouth. If more people had played the game, if it was publicized better, it would have sold. Perhaps it was too ahead of it's time - if it were released in the era of widespread high speed internet and flash video I bet gameplay alone would have put asses in gaming chairs.

I signed up for Destructoid exclusively to comment on this article.

When Ico came out I was a game buyer for a prominent retail chain and a very avid gamer. I knew that Ico was going to be big from the press surrounding it and from playing it at E3 that year.

At the time, we made our game decisions by council and I had pumped the shit out of this title to the group. When the Ico boxart arrived from Sony, I was the only one, out of eight, who was still interested. We brought in 2 units per store instead of the eight that we had originally allocated.

When I called our rep at Sony about this she said, "I cannot fucking believe the cover of this thing." She came from PR and was pushing this title too and knew that the boxart was going to be problematic for them. She understood that we had to cut our numbers on this title from 4500+ units to just over 1000 and said she'd relay this to her team. She even entertained having us put the Japanese boxart on our site to download for people who purchased this game.

The epilogue is that this title didn't even sell when we purchased just 2 units per store. Had this title had a more artistic, more 'cool' cover, there is no doubt we would have sold two units per store. Even the lowest performing crap during that year was turning 2-4 units (Fantavision would even sell out from time to time).

Seriously, if you don't think that boxart can make or break a game, I have seen that it can destroy even the greatest of game experiences first hand.

Thank you for the opportunity to share this story, Destructoid. Love the site, and keep up the great work with these articles ;)

Yeah I agree. I would never ever consider giving this game a go because of the ugly cover. It was until a friend lend it to me for no reason that got me into it.

I still remember when I first saw this game at Target or whatever giant stupid store I was in when I was younger. Looked at it and said "shit's fucking ugly" and kept on walking. How was I supposed to know it's an amazing game? The box art is down right repulsive. I'm almost sad I never looked at it.