I wouldn’t usually post about videogame boxart here, but this Hard Rain cover (right) for the North American market got my goat, and made me want to rant . About what, exactly? Simple: about how North America all too often gets sucky art on its games compared to Europe and Japan.
Yeah, okay, I know its “only” boxart for some game, but that’s not the point. This kind of thing says a lot about how game publishers regard the North American audience. In short, they (wrongly) regard the NA market as dumb . They don’t trust you with anything too subtle, in case you missed the point and thought Hard Rain was an origami simulator.
So while Europe gets a mysterious, interesting, and imaginative cover for the game, the North American game has to show people on the front to MAKE IT EXTRA OBVIOUS THAT THERE ARE PEOPLE IN HARD RAIN . See what I mean? Just a bit patronising, I thought.
Anyway, it’s certainly nothing new. A bunch of other games with dumbed-down boxart for the North American market:
And last but not least, there is the famous boxart for Ico . Europe and Japan got a cover that looked like a piece of art, North America got a cheesy-as-hell CGI still:
Uuuuuuuuugh. Thankfully, the game itself will look awesome wherever it’s released – see the latest trailer here .
[Via Kotaku ]
