/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.9688539]

Man the US got fucking gipped with GBA boxes

[Anonymous No.9688543]

>>9688539
Be better if they all just uses cases.

[Anonymous No.9688569]

I like these boxes.

[Anonymous No.9688575]

Meanwhile in yurop

[Anonymous No.9688585]

>>9688539
nice colors

[Anonymous No.9688589]

>>9688575
...soul...

[Anonymous No.9688723]

>>9688575
Dunno what the fuck they were smoking starting with 2, at least 4 had the official artwork.

[Anonymous No.9688726]

>>9688723

[Anonymous No.9689386]

>>9688539
Famicom/NES era:
Japan - landscape orientation
West - portrait orientation

Super Famicom/SNES era:
Japan = portrait orientation
West = landscape orientation

Nintendo 64 era:
Japan = portrait
West = landscape

Game Boy (classic/color/advance):
Japan = square (classic), portrait (Color), landscape (Advance)
West = ALL SQUARES

Why are we never on the same page about this???

[Anonymous No.9689407]

US got gipped with all Nintendo cases. Have you seen the Gamecube cases? Fuck they're good

[Anonymous No.9689421]

>>9689386
>Super Famicom/SNES era:
>Japan = portrait orientation
Not always. They were all over the place with the Super Famicom.

[Anonymous No.9689426]

>>9688539
it's always the same. the golden rule of design is: less is more. edge to edge artwork works best, and makes the artwork look bigger. all kinds of stripes and frames are distracting, clashing, and make the artwork look crammed and small. this is why Super Famicom covers look so much bigger and better than SNES ones, for example.
but in the West, they always need to cut off a part of the box art with a stripe saying "GAMEBOY ADVANCE", because they think consumers are dumb and wouldn't understand otherwise. countless covers ruined. look at Genesis, GB, SNES, and so on. especially on GBA, the cover art is already small, and the huge stripe ruins the perfect square ratio.
and then they also had the gall to make different artwork, that looks like it was made in 2001 PhotoShop / Flash.

[Anonymous No.9689428]

>>9689407
hey, that's the same as the GameBoy Player disc holder

[Anonymous No.9689432]

>>9689407
I'm so glad they didn't do the cardboard slip cases over here though. Imagine trying to find complete copies? Fucking GameStop could barely be arsed to keep the inserts and manuals. The slip cover would add $40 to the already insane prices.

[Anonymous No.9689439]

>>9689426
It depends. While I think most people, myself included, prefers the original Genesis box art style, the uniformity Sega adopted across their platforms was pretty effective.

[Anonymous No.9689445]

>>9689426
>in the West, they always need to cut off a part of the box art with a stripe saying "GAMEBOY ADVANCE", because they think consumers are dumb and wouldn't understand otherwise
kids getting gifts of games for a system they didn't have was still relatively common, if that hadn't clearly labeled stuff it would've been a nightmare

[Anonymous No.9689451]

>>9689421
I don't like Square very much, but the way they used white space in their covers is unironically kino and could easily make it to design textbooks. lots of PS1 games did this too, but FF covers feel way more iconic.

[Anonymous No.9689472]

>>9689445
i kinda agree this is function vs aesthetic thing, but they surely ruined the latter. and of all things, did they NEED to have the genesis stripe red?
>>9689439
>uniformity
this is also true, but again, it's better uniformity, but ruined aesthetic. I could also slap a neon green frame on every cover, it'd also be easily recognizable and uniform—except I'd basically throw any sense of aesthetic out the window. uniformity can be achieved with many things—logos, box shape, and so on. just putting a genesis logo in the corner would be enough.
I still can't get over how shitty the MK art looks with that childish red stripe. it's too bright and only ever fits with cartoon games.

[Anonymous No.9689476]

>>9689451
I'm a sucker for that kind of cover where the characters are looking into the distance. Square did it with a few games and every single time it makes me want to play. I'm sure there's some marketing research that points to people being more drawn to generic close up shots of a guy's face but I was always way more drawn to stuff like this.

[Anonymous No.9689494]

>>9689472
I'd be willing to bet a lot of these decisions were made with retailer input. Stores get mad when things don't sit on shelves properly. They want to have a certain amount of product on display and if shit is all over the place in terms of size and shape then it creates a headache for organization. Then you get stores that put stuff behind the counter or in a glass case. A bright colored spine with "GENESIS" or "SUPER NINTENDO" written on it allows retailers the freedom to have a bit of security while also making it easy for customers to see what's for sale.

I remember back in the Funcoland days they had all the NES carts stacked flat against the wall behind the counter and I'd be asking the clerk if they had this game. And then if they had that game. And then another game. Sometimes they'd seem a bit exasperated but what am I supposed to do? I can't read the labels from 6 feet away. Imagine that on a grand scale during a Christmas rush for an actively supported console. It'd be madness.

[Anonymous No.9689528]

>>9689386
There are some Japanese Super Nintendo with landscape box art. The Romancing SaGa games immediately come to mind.

[Anonymous No.9690395]

>>9689528
I was about to say it must have been exclusively a Squaresoft thing but then remembered Konami did it too.

[Anonymous No.9690407]

>>9689407
I just realized I've never seen a Japanese GameCube case before. Huh.

[Anonymous No.9690421]

>>9690395
Slut!

[Anonymous No.9691527]

>>9689407
>>9688539
>gipped
Lol

[Anonymous No.9691538]

>>9690395
Sexiest slav woman

[Anonymous No.9691584]

>>9688569
Fusion cover is fantastic.

[Anonymous No.9691597]

>>9688539
>>9688726
>>9689386
I wonder why international boxes were made larger, even early CD games in US/PAL regions had those big ass cases before changing to the standard jewel cases.

[Anonymous No.9691604]

>>9691597
Pretty sure with CDs they were deliberately trying to make them look different from audio CDs, which probably made sense in the early 90s when people still associated "CD" exclusively with music.

[Anonymous No.9691615]

>>9691604
people just had all kinds of weird and costly ideas for manufacturing. that all settled down during the 90s. all the console manufacturers picked a standard and stuck to it unless it's some weirdo special edition that comes with box and other junk.

[Anonymous No.9691694]

>>9689407
Hell fucking no, the JP Gamecube cases are trash. Just look at the state of GBP disks if you want to see how American kids would handle an entire library of tiny game cases with paper slip covers. You'd never see a CIB copy of a Gamecube game in your life.

[Anonymous No.9691704]

>>9688539
I want to get the DS collection because cheaper but I'd sure like to get the individual GBA games for the sake of playing them on my gameboy player.
How bad is the recent collection?

[Anonymous No.9691730]

>>9691597
Maybe to make them stand out more on shelves?

[Anonymous No.9691862]

>>9689386
The Japanese pokemon game boy boxes were unironically better.

[Anonymous No.9691959]

>>9688539
Americans ruin everything.
Digimon dub, pineapples on pizza, Iraq, Libya, GBA boxes.
They almost ruined Pokemon to make them look like this (pic)
https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/pokemon-american-charizard-pikachu-changes/