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A Work of Box Art #4: Alone in the Dark

Resident Evil is generally credited with bringing survival horror into the limelight, but it was Infogrames' Alone in the Dark that pretty much invented the genre as we know it.  There had been horror games before, but the 3D graphics and environments, puzzles, fight-or-flight gameplay, and scarce resources laid the groundwork for Capcom to improve upon.  Make no mistake, the AITD games are deeply flawed.  They're almost impossible to control, and nigh inscrutable for a lot of modern gamers.  Even I find them difficult to play, and I played them when they were groundbreaking new releases. 

One thing that has aged much, much better than the games themselves is their stunning packaging.  The original Alone in the Dark trilogy is home to three of the best goddamn pieces of artwork ever commissioned for a video game. 

Just look at that gorgeous thing, and tell me it wouldn't grab your attention on a store shelf if you were a kid in the 90s.  A lone figure stands hesitantly outside of Derceto Mansion, its door ominously cracked as cosmic horrors swirl above.  Interestingly, the protagonist appears to be Emily Hartwood, the niece of the mansion's owner, and not series protagonist Edward Carnby. 

I won't belabor the Lovecraft influences noted on the box, or how poorly the game has aged.  You can read all about it in my review from a few years ago, if you're so inclined.  Instead, we'll move onto the next game in the series.

Different, but equally beautiful, the cover for Alone in the Dark 2 showcases the game's ghostly pirate theme.  Most fans agree the sequels are inferior to the original because of the drastic change in setting.  Personally, I had no problem with them other than the still-clunky gameplay and absurd difficulty.  I attempted to replay AITD2 after I finished my playthrough of the original for my review, but I couldn't get through it.  Despite the graphical upgrade, and one of the best intros ever, I couldn't suffer through it.

Similarly, I've hardly ever played Alone in the Dark 3.  There used to be a store near my house that would rent PC CD-ROM games, and those two days I had it in my possession were mostly spent trying to figure out how to copy the data from the CD (remember, at this time, CD-Rs were not a thing).  As you can tell from the box art, this game has a wild west theme, and that is about the extent of my knowledge.  But how about that box, huh?  I love how the sequel artwork retains elements from the original game, such as the raised lantern, a ghostly visage, and a pathway to the unknown, be it a doorway, a staircase, or in this case, a mine shaft. 

After a seven year hiatus, Alone in the Dark returned.  Ironically, the game that beget Resident Evil borrows liberally from its younger sibling.  The New Nightmare is a reboot that ignores the original canon and takes place in a modern setting.  Similar to Resident Evil 2, there are two protagonists whose paths occasionally intersect, and players will experience different parts of the story depending on who they choose to play as at the start.  It's actually a pretty good game that holds onto many of the Lovecraftian influences from the original while updating the gameplay mechanics. 

But this isn't a review of the game; it's a review of the box art, and well... I don't hate it, but it's nowhere near the masterpieces the original three games bore.  Its status as a reboot is clear to series veterans, featuring Carnby - now wielding a gun instead of a lantern - approaching an obviously evil dwelling.  The mansion looms large in silhouette, with shafts of yellow light punctuating everything.  It's actually quite clever because the game features some really excellent lighting, which has actually become a mechanic this time around.  It lacks the fine details of the original paintings, but it's still very evocative and gives a good sense of what the game is like.

The franchise went dark for another seven years before resurfacing with another soft reboot, simply titled Alone in the Dark.  This new game is both a reboot and a sequel - a requel - to the original trilogy, told in episodic format (similar to the spectacular Alan Wake, which is often reminiscent of AITD itself).  Like the originals, it's flawed, but the PlayStation 3 re-release, subtitled Inferno, fixed many of the issues from the original Xbox 360 version and is generally worth a look given its cheap price on the secondhand market.

The box art, however...

For a game called "Alone in the Dark," there sure is a lot of light.  Carnby stands front and center as a bog standard brooding protagonist, complete with five o'clock shadow and leather jacket.  This highlights pretty much everything I hate about modern game artwork.  It tells you nothing about the game, other than what the protagonist looks like.  Looking at it, one might thing it's some sort of fire-fighting game.  There's no real indication of anything supernatural, and it doesn't stand out among the hordes of other pre-rendered faces on a shelf these days.  The original 360 release was even worse, if you can believe it, as it is zoomed out further, revealing the gun in Carnby's hand.  Yes, another Guy With Gun game cover. 

As a series, Alone in the Dark has always fascinated me.  The games are all far from perfect, but I have a lot of affection for them - at least the ones I've played.  One thing I think we can all agree on is that the box art is pretty phenomenal...except that last one.  The last release in the series was in 2015, again a seven year gap, and was an ill-conceived multiplayer shooter.  Because when you think "ALONE in the Dark," you immediately think multiplayer!  It was critically panned, and worse, it took the place of a canceled 2013 remake of the original game.  Given the seven year cycle between the last three attempts, let's hope THQ Nordic does the series justice in 2022.

A Work of Box Art #3: DOOM

Few games are as iconic and influential as id Software's classic first-person shooter, DOOM.  Or Doom.  Or DooM.  However you stylize it, Doom has stood the test of time as one of the greatest examples of first-person monster-blasting action. 

With the recent reboot/sequel/re-quel, confusingly also titled DOOM, shattering expectations, I felt it was worth taking a look back at some of the series' equally iconic box art.

Released in 1993, DooM...or Doom...or DOOM...or possibly even dOOm's eye-catching cover art is undoubtedly one of my favorite pieces of video game artwork ever.  A lone space marine blasts away are hordes or demons, threatening to overwhelm him with their sheer numbers.  In the background, a second marine - possibly a nod to the game's multiplayer component - desperately runs toward his compatriot, arm outstretched.  In the lower left corner, a single demon faces the consumer, as if to say, "You're next!"

It's a fantastic, horrific piece of art that perfectly captures the spirit of the game.  A single marine with a small arsenal of weapons fighting for his life against overwhelming odds.  That's Doom in a nutshell, and the game's title makes no bones about your likely fate. 

Speaking of, the giant, angular block letters embellished with machinery are a clear nod to the game's levels, especially early on while you're still in the UAC installation.  Computer panels and machinery are everywhere, and even enemies later become a mix of biological nightmares and cybernetics. 

Due to its massive popularity, Doom was ported to nearly every video game system at the time.  Many of them retained the original cover art, sometimes cropped for space, but the Custom PlayStation Edition was an exception.

Here we have a sort of Bruce Willis look-alike blasting a hole through an imp with the fan favorite shotgun, as a Baron of Hell closes in on the side, and a Lost Soul flies up behind him.  It's not bad, but the depiction of the game's hero couldn't be further off from the in-game model.  Sure, Doomguy's face in the status bar is displayed, but everyone knows that the space marines wear bright green armor and a cool helmet.  They most certainly do not wear a tattered vest, a white t-shirt, and cargo pants.  It is worth noting, however, that the player character's representation features the zigzag haircut that would be featured on the sequel's box art.

DOOM II...or DooM II... or... you know what, forget it... The sequel eschews the original's massive battle shot for a one-on-one showdown between the space marine, sans helmet, and the Cyberdemon, one of the game's massive boss monsters.  The marine's armor is in tatters and skulls line the floor of what is presumably Hell itself.

Again, it's a wonderful and grotesque painting.  It's somewhat ironic that it focuses on a one-on-one encounter, however, since Doom II's battles were much larger than the original game's.  I guess they wanted to showcase the extremely large nature of some of the new enemies, and it works.  The Cyberdemon certainly cuts an imposing figure with his huge rocket launcher arm dwarfing the marine's tiny chaingun.

Surprisingly, many people don't realize that Doom 64 is not a port of any existing Doom game, but an entirely new title exclusive to the Nintendo 64.  In the years since its release, it has been heralded as a better third entry than the actual Doom 3 because it retains more of the frantic action and relies less on atmospheric jump scares.  Its box art, however, is...well, boring.

Kudos to Nintendo for allowing a vaguely Satanic image on a game cover, but there's little else of note for Doom 64's box art.  The logo alone takes up 50% of the real estate, so I guess Midway were banking on people simply recognizing the logo and buying the game regardless of what else was on the cover.  Not that a box should ever be the determining factor in a purchase, but given the strong presentation of the other Doom covers, this one falls flat.  I suppose the machinery in the red sidebar is a nice touch.

This also started a downward trend for Doom games.  As publishers became content with slapping a render onto the box rather than commissioning meticulously detailed paintings, Doom 3 was something of a marriage of the two.

It's a Hell Knight and a logo.  It still looks hand-painted, but it definitely lacks the punch of the first two PC games.  The colors are comparatively drab and other than the creature's face, there isn't much detail.  Notice the whole torso is covered with inky blackness, which I suppose is evocative of the game's graphical style, but it also seems like a cheap cop out to avoid having the draw more details.  Even the logo itself has lost some of its detail.  While there are still cybernetic flourishes, it's no longer two distinct segments.

But nothing - and I mean nothing - compares to the atrocity that is the DOOM reboot's box art.

Look at that hideous thing.  It looks like Halo and Call of Duty had some kind of mutant baby.  It couldn't possibly be any more generic.  A boring render of the space marine, an even more toned down version of the classic logo, and boring colors in the background.  DOOM's newest entry is everything wrong with modern game covers, but it's also a good example of why you shouldn't judge a game by them.

The excellent game inside the awful case deserves better, and it seems someone at Bethesda knew that because the standard version features a reversible cover that is so superior in every way it actually stands up with the classic games.

As you can see, it's very evocative of the original game, with a large number of beasties closing in on a lone space marine.  The logo still lacks the old details, but the painting itself is marvelous.  This comes with the standard version of the game, so unless you just have some weird obsessive-compulsive thing about all your games having the blue PS4 or green Xbox One stripe on the spine showing, there's no reason not to display this on your shelf.

What I particularly love about this cover is that it features most of the game's standard enemies.  Cacodemons fly towards the player, imps rush on the ground (including one looking back at you, like the first game's art), revenants leap into the fray, a mancubus can be seen towards the back, near the spine there's the iconic pinky demon, and beyond that on the back there's a Baron of Hell in the foreground and a lost soul screaming in.  It once again captures the feel of your impending death at the hands of all these creatures, and serves as an excellent updated version of the original game - much like the game itself is to its forefather. 

It's also worth mentioning that the limited collector's edition of DOOM contains yet another cover, in the form of a steelbook case showcasing the Revenant enemy.  It's still just a render, but the monster is still a step up from the generic marine cover that the standard edition comes with.

From an artistic perspective, Doom's covers haven't always matched the games - which have usually had stellar graphics, regardless of what you think of the gameplay - but the first two games in particular have remarkable artwork that has stood the test of time just as well as the games themselves. 

 

A Work of Box Art #2: Classic Mario

As far as video games go, there is no more recognizable face of the industry than Nintendo's little Italian plumber.  He is as synonymous with gaming as Mickey Mouse is Disney, even if both of them have suffered a decline in cultural relevance through the years. 

Originally appearing as Jumpman in Nintendo's arcade classic Donkey Kong, Mario would go on to appear in dozens of games through the next three decades.  He and his brother Luigi took center stage in the Mario Bros. franchise, both Super and otherwise, but Mario has also refereed boxing matches (Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!), tennis matches (Nintendo Tennis), briefly worked as a member of a construction crew (Wrecking Crew), played numerous sports (Mario Hoops, Mario Tennis, Mario Golf), become a professional racer (Mario Kart, which is in its eighth iteration), and has even been referenced in games from both his creators and third parties.

Mario is a gaming superstar.  He's an every-man who has taken center stage in some of the greatest video games of all-time.  My introduction to him came, ironically, from our family's Atari 2600 and its port of the original Mario Bros.

Like many Atari games, there were several variations of this box art, but this is the one we had.  If there's one thing that can be said for 2600 games, it's that their packaging almost always featured some fantastic artwork.  Mario Bros. is no exception.  Here we see the titular brothers, Mario and Luigi, who wouldn't feature prominently on another box in North America for decades, fighting off a Sidestepper (the crab) and a Fighter Fly.  It's bright, colorful, and cartoonish.  It perfectly encapsulates what the game itself is like.  It's also worth noting Mario's pose - fist in the air - which would go on to become a staple of future artwork.

While the port itself, like most 2600 games, was a far cry from the arcade version's graphics and sound, it played well enough and I loved it. 

Several years after the Video Game Crash of 1983, Nintendo took a real gamble on releasing the NES.  Many retailers scoffed at the idea of carrying another video game console after further attempts from Atari failed to gain traction.  They saw gaming as a fad, but Nintendo was determined to prove otherwise.  History proved them right.

Early on, one of the NES' selling points was its faithful reproductions of classic arcade games.  While only two of its North American launch titles were actual arcade ports (10 Yard Fight and Kung-Fu, both from Irem), 17 of its 18 launch games were arcade-style quick-fix games.  The one exception: Super Mario Bros.

The NES showed it was capable of producing far more realistic depictions of sports games with the black box Soccer, Tennis, and Baseball games, but Super Mario Bros. was revolutionary.  Large stages with smooth scrolling, fluid animation, spot-on control, colorful graphics complete with different backgrounds, and of course the iconic music were all things the Atari 2600 simply couldn't do.  It was one of the first games I can ever recall playing that had a story, meager as it was. 

The box art is just as memorable to me.  I so vividly remember being enamored with it on Christmas morning 1986 when my brother got his NES Deluxe Set.  Looking at it today, it's actually kind of funny.  Upon closer inspection, Mario is seconds away from death as he's jumping headfirst into a wall, with lava nipping at his heels.  In a pitiful last ditch attempt to save himself, he threw a fireball at the blocks, but anyone who's played the game knows fireballs can't break bricks. 

Still, once again the box art provides a solid depiction of what the game is like.  You know there's going to be jumping, and the streaks give the impression of speed.  You know it's probably going to be challenging from the fact that Mario is about to fall into the lava and die a horrible, painful death.  You also get a hint of the famous fire flower power-up from the red and white outfit and the utterly ineffective fireball hitting the wall.

It's easy to look back on the classic black box games and say, "So what?  It's just a screenshot!"  And that's true.  There are some minor artistic flourishes, such as the streaks to suggest momentum, but by and large they're just screenshots.  Context, however, is important.  For example, here is a side-by-side comparison of the Atari 2600 version of Mario Bros. and how it looks on the NES port:

As you can clearly see, the NES version is far more accurate to the arcade version, with considerably more detail in the characters and the stage itself.  Gameplay elements were still missing, but at a glance it was a much more faithful reproduction of the arcade experience at home.  You wouldn't dare put a screenshot of the Atari 2600 version front and center on a box, but by putting a picture of the gameplay on the NES box, it gave consumers an idea of just how big a leap forward the NES was over the 2600.

Once again, some minor artistic liberties were taken with the image.  In fact, if you look closer, you'll see that this is the exact same image of Mario used on the Super Mario Bros. box art, just recolored.  Oddly enough, the coloring doesn't match his in-game red and blue outfit.  You may also have noticed that Mario appears with his fist raised in his signature jumping pose in all three boxes shown thus far.

Personally, I love the simple look of the NES black boxes.  Sure, they kind of pale in comparison to some of the beautiful hand drawn and painted artwork of many 2600 games, or even later NES titles, but there's a beauty in their understated design.  The colors of the graphics pop against the black backgrounds, and it sets the expectation for the game itself.

By the time the much-anticipated sequel, Super Mario Bros. 2, came out, Nintendo had long since abandoned the black boxes.  That doesn't mean there aren't similarities, however.

This is undoubtedly one of my favorite video game packages ever.  The pseudo-3D lettering and gorgeous coloring are eye-catching.  Though it's an artistic rendering, notice Mario is still in his famed jumping pose, complete with momentum streaks behind him - just like the previous games in the franchise.  This time, however, he's holding a turnip - an important clue to the weird nature of SMB2. 

As we would later discover, the reason for this game's unique setting and gameplay is that it wasn't originally a Mario game at all, but a licensed game centered around a popular Japanese television network's mascots.  To me, Super Mario Bros. 2 remains one of the best games in the franchise because of how different and unique it is, only surpassed by its successor.

Super Mario Bros. 3 is, was, and ever shall be the single greatest 2D platformer of all-time, as far as I'm concerned.  I know many people prefer Super Mario World, and I can appreciate their argument, but to me World failed to capture the magic of SMB3.  Perhaps I was just getting a little older and more jaded.  By the time the SNES and World came out, I had already been converted to a Sega Head and World didn't offer much of a reason to switch.  It's still a damn fine game, don't get me wrong, but Super Mario Bros. 3 was a testament to the power of the NES and features some of the greatest level designs in gaming history, in addition to features that would go on to become staples in the Mario franchise to this day.

Once again Nintendo opted for a simple cartoon depiction of the hero, this time set against a bright yellow background.  Once again, Mario is in mid-air, but this time he's clearly flying with both arms outstretched and sports raccoon ears and a tail.  Ignoring that raccoons can't fly, it's another excellent example of cluing the gamer in on what to expect.  The raccoon leaf is easily the best-remembered power-up from Mario's third and final outing on the NES, thanks not only to its effectiveness in-game, but it's appearance on the game's box art. 

Mario's games on the NES may not have the flashiest boxes, but they're almost as iconic as the mascot himself.  The artwork lacks some of the flash of the Atari 2600 version, and it's definitely ironic that the other brother never makes an appearance, but they sum up what the games are about in simple images with bold colors sure to draw the attention of children.  I own only a handful of NES games in their original cardboard boxes, but there's a reason Super Mario Bros. 2 & 3 are on that shortlist.

A Work of Box Art #1: Deadly Towers

For lack of a better term, eye-catching packaging is a lost art these days.  So many games are content to put a boring render of a game's protagonist on the cover.  I suppose it still requires an artist to create the 3D model, but so many games fail to evoke a sense of excitement, terror, or wonder.  With the ubiquity of the internet, consumers can see screenshots and videos of games in action on their smartphones.

If you were a gamer in the 1980s, you probably remember walking into your local toy store or video rental place and scanning the covers of all the games available.  Oftentimes, we'd make our decisions about a particular game based on its box art - for better or for worse.  That's how I ended up renting Deadly Towers, whose box looked like this:
Not bad, right?  There's a ripped warrior standing in front of the titular towers, and presumably a dragon lurking behind him judging by the tail and what appears to be a scaly leg.  "Yeah, this game looks cool," 10-year-old me probably said.  This is what Deadly Towers actually looks like:

Hot garbage, right? 

In fairness, no game from that era could match the box art, unless we're talking about the famous NES black boxes that featured little more than a screenshot on the front cover.  But come on...!  Where is the musclebound barbarian warrior from the cover?  Why am I wearing teal blue full-plate armor and fighting purple balls and worms?  Talk about misleading!

Deadly Towers is widely considered one of the worst games of all time.  I remember it being so terrible that I returned it to the video store well before it was due - an anecdote I've told several times, but one which underscores just how impenetrably obtuse and awful it is.  The game itself doesn't even come close the fulfilling the promise of adventure its cover art hints at.  Instead of fighting dragons, you wander around a maze of nearly identical rooms, fighting mostly geometrically-shaped enemies, and dying frequently.  The guy on the cover doesn't look like he'd go down without a fight, but in the game you can be killed by a purple bouncy ball. 

Easily the best thing about the game is its packaging.  It has a nice hand-painted look, akin to many of the fantasy novels I would grow to love in my teens, and a nice use of color.  Even the title font looks cool.  The only thing that spoils it is the giant bluish-purple block taking up 40% of the cover.  It would have been much cooler to see the dragon.

The Japanese Famicom version is considerably worse:
Known as Masho (literally, "Evil Bell"), the hero on the Japanese cover is definitely more representative of the in-game sprite, right down to his stupid "derp" face.  Look at his stupid face.  The color scheme of his armor is still way off, and I don't know why they drew grassy hills or mountains, considering you never see any of those things in the game.  Perhaps it was an attempt to trick players into thinking it would be a game similar to The Legend of Zelda, with a vast word to explore.  I'd also like to draw your attention to our hero's left hand holding his scabbard.  As you can see, he has some kind of horrible deformity that gives him stubby, claw-like fingers, except for his grotesquely large thumb.  I suppose it could be handy in a fight, but I'm sure he was teased a lot.

Deadly Towers is a prime example of why you should never judge a book, or a game, by its cover.  Even the worst covers can hide a great game, but even the best artwork ever commissioned can't hide a turd like this.