Real Photos on Cover Art

No Need to Draw

Games featuring real photos on their cover-art are of a special sort. Throughout time, they have often appeared in relation to sports and movie tie-in games, and have only rarely appeared on other games' covers. However, with the great boom in casual games lately, a lot of new instances are appearing on the shelves.

The games can be split into four categories:

1. Sports Games These games are often mimicking real-world events and therefore include a lot of real persons. People who are interested in these games are often interested in the associated sport as well, and most likely know some of the players' names. Therefore it is reasonable that the game covers often feature pictures of high-profile sports-players to draw in more buyers. If the cover features a person they know or like, they're more likely to buy the game.

2. Movie Tie-Ins These games are often released at the same time as their corresponding movie hits the cinemas, and therefore often features a cover that resembles the movie's poster-art. The matching cover and poster art makes the products seem to fit together as one unit, which often leads to regrettable purchases by people who really liked the movie and thought the game would be of the same standard. However, this is rarely the case since most movie tie-in games are rushed to completion to hit the movie's release date, so they can cash-in all the extra money from people who liked the movie.

3. Shovelware These games are often targeted at children, or to be more specific; their parents who don't know jack about games. The cover might not resemble the game's content at all, but there is a cute kitten on the box. The parents are likely to think: "Hey, that's a cute kitten! My daughter would love that game!" and end up buying the game. Sad but true. These kind of games are highly disregarded and often referred to as "shovel-ware" by the gaming community, because their main focus lies on getting units sold rather than creating a great game experience for the user.

4. Other This category is for games that can't be placed in one of the three others. Most of these games are from previous generations back when they thought photos and FMVs were the future of gaming graphics. So, naturally, you had to have a crisp, realistic photo on your cover art to make your game seem more professional.