caponeart

Random : no9 '100 worst Videogame Box Art Covers'
My run down of what I find to be the most laughable, ugliest and most disturbing box art covers of all time. All of these are commercial games.

At 100 it's Safe Cracker 'The ultimate puzzle adventure game', not quite sure where the adventure is in opening a safe. Maybe they are dotted around the world. Check out the amazing motion blur noise photoshop effect for the metal background! Oh and the keyhole in the 'A'.




















At 99 it's Arcade Pool. Join in and play with some guy in his bedroom with his invisible pool playing buddy.




















At 98 it's Championship Pony. If you're going to stick a big horse head in the middle at least make it sort of correct. Seems a bit harsh insulting this illustration compared to what is coming up later...














At 97 it's the Xbox360 version of the Streetfighter 4 box. That's not Ryu! This is like one of those badly illustrated covers of the late 80's (only much much better).




















At 96 it's Crabby Adventure, inspired naming skills going on here. By the way this is the first of many entries from Pheonix games, the absolute masters of bad box art covers. This cover is one of their most beautifully pieces of design work so far.




















At 95 we have Ghost Recon jungle STORM! JUNGLE STORM! GO GO GO!! Apart from the 15 minute tea break in between battles that has been beautifully captured here with some kind of weirdly colour schemed cover.




















At 94 we have the brilliantly named Gem'x starring a beautiful bunny girl in dire need of toilet relief. Those eyes! You'll later discover the eyes are a big factor in what makes a true disturbing box cover.




















At 93 we have more eyes in Lady Cruncher. R U HUNGRY?




















At 92 we have the splendid Super Bust a move cover. "I have a great idea for a design to our puzzle game. Baby, shades, baby has writing on head and red thing coming out of mouth..."




















At 91 Diva Dancers. Scary face.














At 90 the fondly remembered Chuckie Egg. Not for it's cover however.




















At 89 Bust a move's followup sets out to make a worse cover than the last and succeeds.




















At 88 ULTIMATE Duck Hunting. Broken up on occasion with boss fights featuring over sized gigantic dog heads. Oh and aim lower mate, the duck's down THERE on the bottom right!!




















At 87, the Power Ranger's grandparents in FinalZone 2?















At 86 Deal or no Deal. If it glows it means it's special.














At 85 Yellow haired Ken in front of orange background in Streetfighter EX2 PLUS. What's up with the arm and face? Thankfully the title hides all your other deformed limbs.















At 84 What's going on here then?















At 83 It's Battle Arena Toshinden. CHOP! Nice arms sir.















At 82 It's Dur Daragh! (what?) I can't wait to play it and check out that rock.




















At 81 Phoenix Games with Hansel and Gretel. Banana hair!




















At 80 It's Body Blows (Galactic!) Yeah, fighting game. Let's stick some of the characters on the box and leave it at that. Oh and let's stick on an absurd surreal thing on the bottom right.




















At 79 Ico! The European cover remains one of the most celebrated covers of all time. The American cpver has him clench a stick in his hand with a scowl that suggests 'Back off bitch! or I beat yo ass'. Talk about missing the point of the game.




















At 78 Bionic Granny shown with her two spooky children. It should be the granny running away from THEM!




















At 77 Party Babyz. Who thought babies were a good thing to put on a cover?




















At 76 Crescent Century hits us hard with this photoshop trickery.




















At 75 Spiderman Web of Shadows indulges in some tattoos and shows them off with pride.




















At 74 Galdregon's Domain! Featuring girl floating from a cup and a bare naked chest prat. The best bit however is the sticker on the right that tells us that the game is of a 'Utter Brill Quality'. Half naked males is quite a trend in early box art as you'll soon discover.




















At 73 Ninja Rabbits! (more like ninja rabbit) a game about ninja rabbits that comes with free 'ninja combat'.















At 72 no.














At 71 Deeeeep Feeeear check out the spoooooky hand (and the red 'thing' in the middle)




















At 70 take the eyes! Vigilante's box art made people feel warm inside for buying it.















At 69 come and party with Cheggers, you know you want to.




















At 68 it's the return of Phoenix Games's box art covers. Crazy Golf, This cover was done by their best artist, at least this one will not give children nightmares.




















At 67 it's the slightly creepy Ballyhoo cover"




















At 66 it's Spaaace Roooogue (by Paul Neurath). Every boy wanted this game so they could feel just as cool as that dude on the cover.




















At 65 we have Suspended. Now I feel bad since this was actually a creative cover at the time. It was a sculpture with depth as a cover but it's all wasted effort if it makes children cry themselves to sleep every night.




















At 64 Virtual Kasparov! Yes! We have the Kasparov license! Let's stick him on the cover! Headbutting a huge horse head!















At 63 Valis 3. What on earth is that?




















At 62 Phalanx. The hyper speed shoot out in space. It's a game about space so why not have some old dude with a beard playing a banjo. His face, his face screams 'This is FUUUN!!'.















At 61 Legendary axe 2. TWO. TWICE. TWO AXES. Clever stuff here.














At 60 it's time for some Magic Meanies. 'Waah, I am a wizard. I have a giant apple on my shoulder. Just because I can. The other stuff? Oranges?"




















At 59 it's time for Dalmatians 4 (4?!) Another entry from Pheonix games. Now they are starting their journey into the world of hideous cover art.



















At 58 it's Final Fight 2. Featuring guys that are so awesome they just have to flex their muscles while doing drop kicks.















At 57 the Sega Master System box art revolution kicks in with Secret Command. You just know from those 3 little waves emitting from the gun that this game is going to be INTENSE. Shame the artist couldn't at least add an emotional roar to the soldier, or just a mouth in general.




















At 56 It's Crazy caveman. Stop hitting that big stone with the title in it otherwise it will break and we won't know what the game is called!




















At 55 It's Dark Century. Boom! It has a tank or something on a shiny chessboard (The mirror ball in the background proves this)




















At 54 CHOP!! (again) Buy Guardian Angel and you'll be able to chop bad guys too.




















At 53 What says 'This game is action packed!' more than a guy punching through a brick wall with his fist? How about TWO fists as shown on the cover of Brawl Brothers.















At 52 KAPOW! David Duchovny is on the loose in StreetSmart.




















At 51 brown and unexciting silhouettes. Can't wait to get this one home.















At 50 Bad Company cover. What the hell is that on his head?

















At 49 ROBODEMONS! Glowing sex toys, glass jars attached to knees, little weird midget things. Welcome to the lower 50 of worse game covers of all time.




























At 48 Cheap Skate, in more ways than one.




























At 47 Space Harrier. "OOOwww my chin!". Oh and remember, 'Twice the mega power!'.




























At 46 Be just like these two kool kidz from the city (check the blue building in the background for proof of this) in RIVAL TURF!




















At 45 This really was the cover the sequel to Xenon.




























At 44 the pure emotion captured by this guy's face in the cover for Wire Head is what makes it.




























At 43 Wonderboy in Monster Land has possibly the most freakiest face in game box art history.




























At 42 Steam Express! Suprised there wasn't steam emitting from this piece of crap from yes you guessed it, Phoenix Games.




























At 41 Phoenix Games again with Cinderella's Fairy Tale. Don't know what's going on here, nice placement of the big logo thing in the bottom right. They should just make them a bit bigger and then Phoenix Games would not need to do so much work.




























At 40 Shock and awe for the solider on the cover of Socom.




























At 39 Incredible illustration skills on the cover of Burger Time. Check out the scary egg.




























At 38 Pheonix Games have created two Snow White games. This cover is the not so scary one.




























At 37 River City Ransom. What on earth is he doing?




























At 36 it is of course Hammerin' Harry. Featuring none other than that freak out of the Goonies.




























At 35 yes. Ninja Scooter Simulator. Check out the spikes on the bike and the skulls! This is hardcore stuff.




























At 34 Great Soccer. Imagine if today you got 'Fantastic FPS' or 'Brilliant RPG'. Oh and they couldn't even be bothered to do the rest of the character.




























At 33 yet more breath taking character work from Phoenix Games in Legend of Camelot. Is that an egg in his crown or part of his head?




























At 32 Neverworld. What?




























At 31 Crackdown. Where to start? Laughable demon goat guy? Both expressions on the guys or that random out of place monkey in the bottom right?




























At 30 Phoenix Games created a wonderful cover for Hot Shot, a game about a gun.





















At 29 Phoenix Games with Snow White. Possibly the most disturbing cover for a kids game yet. Featuring the same castle from their Cindarella cover.




























At 28, Killer Kong! Starring a gorilla that has metalic human breasts appears to have just done a rude.




























At 27 Cave Fighter, you take on the role of Mr Pointy Knee as you take on some naughty ducks. Look at the unparamount expression of pure terror and fear in his little face.




























At 26, Abraham Strong, Space Mercenary. Not too sure what is going on here. A giant Mercenary standing in a warzone in which a dishwasher has gone out of control?




























At 24 Sorcerer Lord, oh my god one of his horns has turned into a dragon and is about to gobble a lady who has also come out of his hat!




























At 23 ElfMania. I totally dig the guy in the bottom left.




























At 22 Gepetto left his drugs out in the kitchen again. Check out the Pinocchio title, it has a wood filter on it. This is because Pinocchio is made out of wood too! Phoenix Games don't just make beautiful covers but are clever with them too.




























At 21 we have One on One. I'm not going to say anything about this one.




























At 20 another Kong game. This one manages the seemingly impossible task of being worse than the last one.




























At 19 it's Suspect. Again, I really dig the bottom left character.





















At 18, we have my most hated Phoenix Games cover. Street Warrior, not only does it have awful artwork but it's painfully generic. The dog IS amazing though, I'll give it that.




























At 17 Command and Destroy. Can't believe this is box cover artwork for a recent game. Love the copy and pasting (flipping and scaling too!) of the alien.




















At 16, Countdown to DOOM! (by Peter Killworth). They couldn't even be bothered to colour it in.





















At 15 European 2 the 'Exciting Strategy Game'. What's with the hand growing out of the elbow?





















At 14 The Kristal. Again, it's all about the expressions. Wonderful stuff.




























At 13 Not sure what this is called to be honest. Some splendid posing for the cover though. Bless the guy being headlocked, he seems to be rather enjoying it.




















At 12 Freddy Mercury and Tom Selleck's lovechild goe's awol in Joe Blade 2.




























At 11 Knights of the Sky. Want to be their friend? Play this game!
























At 10 Street Sports Baseball. Featuring some deranged guy trying to whack a fly.





















At 9 the popular Ghosts n goblins had




























At 8 you can't expect to much from a game named Blood and Guts but this is shocking. So many unexplainable things going on but of course the best bit is the guy standing on a cats tail for no reason whatsoever.




























At 7 Black Belt is the worst Sega Master System box cover of them all. At least with the Great Soccer they bothered to draw a full leg and had someone over the age of 6 do it.




























At 6 What the hell is this? If you're going to mirror something at least try and not make it so obvious.




























At 5 so wrong.




























At 4 Metro Cross has possibly the most uncool image in the history of box art.




























At 3 possibly the most famous bad box art covers and from Capcom of all people. Mega Man not only has horrendous illustration but they have tried to humanize the character to make him look more cool. Liking the crazy gun perspective though.











































At 2 we have Karnaaj. I can't believe this made it to the shelves. No idea why the R is highlighted or why the guy has blue hair and eyebrows. This isn't that old either!
































At 1 Puzzle Maniacs. I don't quite know why I find this to be the worst cover in video game history. I'd just love to have seen the meetings that took place in coming up with this cover and how it was proposed.