A Thought on Box Art

This awesome and official minimalist box art by Olly Moss for Resistance 3 almost makes me want to buy the game just for that reason... but then I remembered it's Resistance 3.*

Either way, if it sells well, I hope more publishers go with 'Criterion' box art like this instead of the usual guy/girl front and center with big guns and/or muscles/boobs.

Class it up, game industry, class it up.

*I'm aware that Resistance has its fans, and that the games are well made. But from what I've experience from demos of the game, it's just not for me. And let's be honest, the boxart for Resistance 2 was pretty crap/generic when compared to the need-no-explanation photo cover used for the first game.

Greatest Boxart Ever?

This would have been posted this afternoon, had I not run into the Great VFH Destruction of 3/22/10 while looking for boxart... Anyways, I was browsing Nintendo's press site this afternoon, taking a look at this week's digital releases when I saw that Treasure's Sin & Punishment 2 (now called Sin & Punishment: Star Successor, ew...) was finally on the upcoming releases list. So I clicked, and what did I find? This beauty:

I might not be a fan of the name change, but hot damn, Nintendo at least got the boxart right. I honestly can't think of any games in recent memory that went the route of not slapping the lead character(s) in the center of the package, or using a color pallet of about four colors. This just goes completely against the norm and it's absolutely stunning.

Just to compare, here's a collection of boxart for top-notch games, with not so exciting boxart:

Just look at these for instance, all reasonably high-profile games, and yet all their boxart is either made up a limited color selection, or the main character is HUGE and generally in the center. And then Sin & Punishment: Star Successor shows up, comepletely breaking the formula, and it's gorgeous. As I lover of the first game (thank you Virtual Console) I look forward to the sequel when it releases this June.

Red Wii Packaging?

Spotted this on the Nintendo Press Room earlier... and it has me insanely confused and slightly bothered...

I have what's called "gamer OCD" sometimes even called "collector's OCD" in which I like having all my game and movie packaging to be uniform and sitting on my shelf in alphabetical order. It was bad enough when Player's Choice/Greatest Hits/Platinum Hits have their "sore thumb" packaging... but when new releases do it (like Sony has done with both PS3 and PSP packaging), it's unsettling because now I have no choice.

It's for that reason I haven't bought a LucasArts game on the Wii, because of their unnecessary yellow siding. Now Nintendo has an uncalled for red package? I sure hope there's at least a proper reason for the sudden color change...

I See What You Did There...

I heard that the LittleBigPlanet packages all formed together, so I went and save everyone the trouble by actually putting the box art next to each other... digitally of course.

The match up between the original LittleBigPlanet and the PSP one is pretty cool. But between the PSP one and the Game of the Year Edition, the effect is kind of lost. But, you've got to thank the design department at Media Molecule for even thinking of something that neat, as I've never really seen it done before. Regardless, I'll probably end up getting the PSP game, so maybe I'll do a real photo of this (and one year later, I'm sorry for never reviewing LBP) ...

The new PS3 box art

While many of you have probably already seen Playstation 3 games for the Japanese and European territories already receiving box art upgrades, there's yet to be any word of North America getting the same treatment... until now.

I'd say that's a pretty drastic change to make in a system's box art design roughly three years into its life cycle. Of course, this coincides with the release of the brand new slim model PS3, complete with its own re-branded logo; which is also incorporated into the new v3.00 firmware.

Personally, I kind of prefer the old design. It was different, and having the banner on the side made up for the Blu-ray keep-case's smaller size from that of standard DVD ones; it just looks kind of cramped now. Of course, I'm much happier with this change than say that of the original PlayStation, whose games went from being in huge box cases to the more efficient CD jewel-cases.

What are your thoughts on the new design? (And what will become of greatest hits titles that feature the old design when initially released?)

Guitar Hero World Tour Boxart

Here's the Xbox 360 boxart for Activision's Rock Band ... Guitar Hero World Tour. I can't help but think I've seen box art like this before, with the real silhouettes, but when I saw it last it was blue...

Huh, how'd that get there?

Banjoe-Kazooie Boxart!

Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts boxart?

Looks pretty nice in my opinion. Although I find it hard to believe my eyes... It's just so crazy, a 360 game... with colors? The background isn't even gray!

Although in all seriousness, I don't see nearly enough googly eyes to make this a true Banjo-Kazooie Game.