Name me a person who doesn’t find regional box art comparisons fascinating. You can’t, can you? That’s because such a person doesn’t exist, and if one did exist, I wouldn’t feel right in calling it “human.”
For the past few months, former Dtoid editor Ashley Davis and sprite artist Diego Garcia have been curating a gallery of box art called BOX VS. BOX, with the intent of highlighting the often stark differences in designs from one country to the next. Art from Japan looks different than that of America, which in turn looks different than that of Europe. Sometimes the covers are identical, and sometimes the difference are extremely subtle.
I have been following BOX VS. BOX for quite some time now; I even contributed to a certain entry using a high-quality scan from my personal collection. As you flip through the archives, you’ll notice certain trends, like how covers from the 80s and early 90s would sport manga-inspired art in Japan but hyper-realistic fantasy art elsewhere. For instance, look at the covers for Kid Chameleon, which feature the same characters in the same poses only in different art styles. Remarkable.
BOX VS. BOX [Tumblr]
