30 replies to this topic

[chrisbid]

these days, game companies are locked into a generic design parameter for their game boxes. Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony have all adopted the top 1/2 inch of space for their system logo, as well as nearly 1/3 of the spine and back. Microsoft even insists that companies use 1980's hair metal green on their dvd cases.

while a collection may look nice and uniform in these cases, i would have to say that i think i prefer the classic days (when there were no license restraints on third parties) and the days of the NES and Genesis, where a third party only had to include the "official seal" of Nintendo or Sega. I guess the first system that was 100 percent consistant was the game boy, with the GB logo taking up an inch on the side of the cover. This design has stayed the same for 14 years now, but oddly, its needed the least, as those square boxes have never had a true rival to mistake a game boy box for. Sega later in the genesis's lifespan did start using a red side bar, but companies like EA didn't use them, while they were forced to use those very restrictive boxes for the SNES, where the left and bottom border was taken up by Nintendo standards. I like unique box art and i dont mind games sticking out in my collection, though i will be the first to admit, that rarely do the games stand out gameplay wise

any thoughts? disagree?

[liveinabin]

While I like the idea of all box art being different from an aesthetic point of view, I can see how it'd confuse all the mothers buying games for their kids.
Little Johnny asks for a game for his Xbox, mum only has to head towards all the green and she's halfway there

[liquid_sky]

i like it, when im in a pawn shop i can tell where the xbox games are and head toward them, but if i want a dvd i have to sit and read the spines and some turn out to be ps2 games. Its all about industrywide standards to make things easier on the consumer.

[Artlover]

Personaly, I like the standardized boxes.

Lets not forget even Atari was doing this as far back as 1983. Atarisoft boxes are generaly standardized, and color coded to system. So were the later Silver boxes for 2600/5200/7800 games.

[Raijin Z]

I'm all for standardized framing... It's a lot easier to tell the PS2 games from the GCN games in a hurry, even by the spines. Pawnn shops only do a halfassed job of separating games by system. Dreamcast and PSX stuff gets mixed together more than Saturn and Sega CD.

[Flojomojo]

I like the standardization, myself. The Japanese Dreamcast releases were all white with an orange tab across the top, very distinctive. I hate buying the "platinum" XBOX games and "Greatest Hits" PS2 games because they don't line up well with the original releases. And don't get me started on the day Sega of America decided to start putting its CDs in black cases just like the Sony Playstation. It's as if they were hoping someone would pick up their game for the wrong console or something.

Activision's colorful cases were great, and Atari always had a uniform look, even if they changed it as time went on. Parker Brothers' silvery boxes were very distinctive as well.

[chrisbid]

Flojomojo said:

Activision's colorful cases were great, and Atari always had a uniform look, even if they changed it as time went on.  Parker Brothers' silvery boxes were very distinctive as well.

thats what im talking about, Activision, Imagic, Parker Bros, EA, and other companies had cool designs that made their packages unique. I cant see why a company would want to hide what system a game is for, and as for uniformity, its already ruined by greatest hits games and demo disks

[Ze_ro]

I very much like the standardized cases... I wish every system had such standardization, as it would very much ease storage of the games (M Network games are the bane of anyone trying to stack 2600 games... and "regular" sized Genesis games fit perfectly into a tape case, while EA games (as well as the odd Sonic & Knuckles and Virtua Racing) do not). Being able to use a DVD rack for movies and games is great.

Plus, I'm really glad to see that PC games are using a standard box size now too. I have a bunch of old PC games in the basement, and stacking those boxes is really annoying

I'd actually like to see more difference in appearance of the three DVD cases used for systems though... The X-Box ones are green, which is good... but I would have liked to see either Nintendo or Sony choose a different color as well. Having to explain to my mom how to tell the difference between a PS2 game and a Gamecube game so that she can buy my Christmas present feels odd somehow (And who knows if she got it right?).

--Zero

[Raijin Z]

Old PS2 games came in midnight blue cases.

[Nintendo Penguin]

I dunno... don't matter to me either way I guess. I like all the old boxes, but my nice neat row of 91 GameCube games looks really bith'n... partly because of the uniformity!

[Famicoman]

Mixed Opinions

[Jasoco]

Flojomojo said:

And don't get me started on the day Sega of America decided to start putting its CDs in black cases just like the Sony Playstation.  It's as if they were hoping someone would pick up their game for the wrong console or something.

Didn't Sega do it first? They'd been doing the big oversized plastic cases for years before the PSX was released.

I actually have one of the PSX big box jewel cased games. Rayman. My DOOM is in the cardboard variety. I just wanna know why they decided to make the boxes so big in the first place. Especially when there's so much empty space inside. They could have cut down the size so much from the beginning. Instead of getting the point later and switching over. This just leaves mixed case games. Some big, some small. It's hard to shelf them when they're different heights.

[JB]

Jasoco said:

Flojomojo said:

And don't get me started on the day Sega of America decided to start putting its CDs in black cases just like the Sony Playstation.  It's as if they were hoping someone would pick up their game for the wrong console or something.

Didn't Sega do it first? They'd been doing the big oversized plastic cases for years before the PSX was released.

I actually have one of the PSX big box jewel cased games. Rayman. My DOOM is in the cardboard variety. I just wanna know why they decided to make the boxes so big in the first place. Especially when there's so much empty space inside. They could have cut down the size so much from the beginning. Instead of getting the point later and switching over. This just leaves mixed case games. Some big, some small. It's hard to shelf them when they're different heights.

*shrugs*
To distinguish them from music CDs?
They DID assume the consumer was a moron.

[liveinabin]

While I do like the standardisation of modern games packaging, I'm not a fan of DVD cases for games. DVD cases are just so ubiquitous, it doesn't feel like you're getting anything special when you buy a game (remember, I'm from Europe, where PS1, Saturn and DC games all came in custom packaging - never cd cases).

I also don't like the way that my UK and import Gamecube titles have different spine layouts, though I guess Nintendo weren't hoping to cater for the tastes of the importer

[christianscott27]

well at least it makes for easy replacement of lost or damaged cases. i'm saving all the AOL DVD cases i get, occasionaly i purge my CD collection to find new jewel cases for games...try finding a cheap way to replace cracked saturn cases, and they shatter quite often. its also a boon for shelving your collection, nothing perfectly fits atari and NES boxes but modern systems are no problem.

[Raijin Z]

The problem with AOL and Earthlink cases is the gigantic sticker they put on the outside. They're a triple bitch to pull off without leaving a mess on the case.

[Flojomojo]

Jasoco said:

Flojomojo said:

And don't get me started on the day Sega of America decided to start putting its CDs in black cases just like the Sony Playstation.  It's as if they were hoping someone would pick up their game for the wrong console or something.

Didn't Sega do it first? They'd been doing the big oversized plastic cases for years before the PSX was released.

Let me clarify: I rue the day that Sega of America started putting the US DREAMCAST games in black CD cases, just like the PSX. The US DC never really had the nice uniform look of the Japanese versions. I can picture some pointy head at HQ pontificating that "orange doesn't sell" right now.

The tall, thick "crack me now" Sega CD-style jewel cases were an abomination, no doubt. I liked the paper and paper/cardstock boxes used by 3DO and the early PSX games, but getting "Aquanaut's Holiday" in the very first standard size CD case was a cool day.

[Happy_Dude]

My favorite collection, Dreamcast, is 100% uniform. Appart from slight variations in the blue and a few Jap games I love it .
Although I'm over 20 games and my 2 storage towers are full (now I have nowhere to put any future games )
I like weird packaging. It's a pain in the ass but I still like it

So to cap off I like uniform packaging.


p.s: If anyone can get some PAL DC storage towers (the EB kind or Sega if they made any) P.M me.

[Ze_ro]

Flojomojo said:

Let me clarify: I rue the day that Sega of America started putting the US DREAMCAST games in black CD cases, just like the PSX.

I still don't fully understand why some Dreamcast games have the white spine to them, and some have the black spine... I would have preferred they had chosen a theme and stuck with it. (And the orange-spined "Sega All-Stars" are the worst looking of the bunch)

--Zero

[Jasoco]

Ze_ro said:

Flojomojo said:

Let me clarify: I rue the day that Sega of America started putting the US DREAMCAST games in black CD cases, just like the PSX.

I still don't fully understand why some Dreamcast games have the white spine to them, and some have the black spine... I would have preferred they had chosen a theme and stuck with it. (And the orange-spined "Sega All-Stars" are the worst looking of the bunch)

--Zero

Yeah. I have all three types. It's a mess. I'd like either one or the other.

And Flojo, what do you mean? When did Sega put US DC games in the big cases? The only ones I've seen, and I've seen very early releases, are in standard Jewel cases. In fact, the only DC disc I have is the damn GameShark Lite that has a stupid huge oversized non-standard case that I've never seen before and is the bane of my collection. How can I cleanly neatly put my DC games on my shelf if I have to make the shelf higher to accomodate the Shark?

[Raijin Z]

Put the shark in a different case. Savvy?

[Ze_ro]

Jasoco said:

the damn GameShark Lite that has a stupid huge oversized non-standard case that I've never seen before and is the bane of my collection. How can I cleanly neatly put my DC games on my shelf if I have to make the shelf higher to accomodate the Shark?

I think you're overreacting... I like when things fit together neatly and efficiently, but if something is a little off, it's hardly a problem. If you're only collecting video games to impress people with the displays, then I think you're into this for the wrong reasons.

I have to admit though, that this is more annoying than your 32X Doom complaints... at least the Doom box will still fit with the others, even if it looks odd.

--Zero

[Jasoco]

Ze_ro said:

Jasoco said:

the damn GameShark Lite that has a stupid huge oversized non-standard case that I've never seen before and is the bane of my collection. How can I cleanly neatly put my DC games on my shelf if I have to make the shelf higher to accomodate the Shark?

I think you're overreacting... I like when things fit together neatly and efficiently, but if something is a little off, it's hardly a problem. If you're only collecting video games to impress people with the displays, then I think you're into this for the wrong reasons.

I have to admit though, that this is more annoying than your 32X Doom complaints... at least the Doom box will still fit with the others, even if it looks odd.

--Zero

[Note to self: Overreact and complain about petty things more often.]

[Shannon]

Bigger boxes equals less retail space for the competition.

I for one like the uniformity in size although wish for better variety in the box art.

[Jasoco]

I kinda would have liked to see the US GameCube games come in the small cases like the Japanese versions. I kinda like them. I mean, really, was there any REASON to make them DVD sized? They're NOT DVD's! And it'd be less space wasted for me.

Thoush, I guess bigger cases makes their somewhat small library look bigger than it would.