RPG Cover Art - Preferences?

[MaxBantleman]

What do you like to see on the cover of an rpg?

Something representative of the game through characters, monsters, background, or a much more generic atmospheric piece?

Are there great examples out there of what you like, and bad ones?

Tell me!

[Evilgaz]

It has to be good! Seriously, get some good art. Otherwise do the Traveller thing where’s its stylish black books with a nice branded font I guess. (More recent) Lot5R would be a better example I guess, fairly plain cover, but its got a big samurai sword on.

I’ve not got a preference on the subject of the art for the cover per se, but it should pertain to the game in some way. I felt a bit cheated by A|State for example, a lot of the promo art was quite dystopian future Bladerunner type stuff and the cover feeds into this. The text inside however (and subsequent first release) as much more Victorian London with a twist.

Good ones:

Iron Kingdoms (new one particularly) – the company is run by artists and everything is sexy gorgeous
GODLIKE – evocative montage shot
Earthdawn - supplements and later edition – the 1st Ed core book has a random face on it from the Mist Swamps. It was okay in the 90’s but these days, we need something a bit more direct
[In fact I’ve still got a soft spot for] Shadowrun, the ICE MERP games, and lots of other colourful photo-realistic art from the 90’s
In Nomine - hardback Infernal and Angelic covers
Hot War - gives you a better idea of what’s going on than Cold City
Dead of Night - 2nd ed, good internals too


Not So Good Ones:
REIGN - only stylised background images, the cover tells you nothing about the contents
Amber - I guess only people who read the novels bought this
Savage Worlds - as much as I love the game, the various covers are not really clear on what’s going on – in fact any “generic” system tends to have a dodgy cover – the supplements are much better though
Pendragon (5th?) – über boar and incorrect perspective – seriously with the reams of Arthurian legend, this is what you pick?


The Jury is Out:
A Song of Ice and Fire - big battle scene with heraldry on display etc., but some of the perspective is off, so its best not to look too closely
Countdown - for Delta Green, its got Nazis on the front, and I’m not sure that’s a great idea, plus the Swastika is the wrong way round so its not even accurate if you do think it’s a good idea
3:16 Carnage etc. – Great cover, but the internal art is amateur hour, so you feel a bit cheated


I guess most of the time, the core products don’t have much in the way of art, and I don’t mind. But the ones that do, when its good, have a more cherished place on myself (spine facing out bizarrely).

The crunch point for me is “does it look good?”. As that’s subjective largely, it’d be hard for people to cater for, but there are some examples of things that are plain bad, in anyone’s book (or on the cover of it).

[oreso]

Personal prefs
I think stylised full body shots are a little over-used, with full page poses of sexy heroes bedecked with cool gear. It's something I associate with pulp (including sword and sorcery, etc) and fluffy escapism (I can pretend to be a guy as cool as that! Awesome!111) , and I mean, that's fine if the game is pulp, but if it's any other genre then I'd say no.

Gimme a nice atmospheric landscape if the game is about the setting. If a game is Dungeons and Dragons, I wanna see a big ol' dragon sat on a pile of treasure in a big ol' cavern with some figures running towards it silhouetted against the dragonfire that's just about to TPK them. And any creepy horror game with a nice clear picture of a monster on the front is probably a bit fail: unimaginable horrors should stay unimaginable! (other genres of horror should be fine; we all know what werewolves look like)

Examples of Awesome win!
I do love 3:16's cover and the blurb that Hutton gives: "You're in this spaceship right here. You're crashing down to this planet right here. And then you're going to kill everyone there". I'd actually prefer it to be in Hutton's 'amateur-hour' style; because those stark, juvenile and messed up lines are entirely appropriate to the tone of the game. But I can't argue that the CG is prettier

Monsterhearts is great to. Young female vampire looking up to the camera rebelliously as she's chomping on some naked dude. Sexy, teenage and violent. Perfect.

I guess I'm not so fussed if it looks good, I want it to look right for the game.

-----
Own efforts
For Witch I did a stylised silhouette of the landscape from London to Lindisfarne, dotted with nice tall oppressive crosses, to represent the journey itself. It's a silhouette because the game's about making black-and-white choices. I cracked the sky with a crumpled paper texture in sepia tones made to look like lightning; medieval manuscripts and the wrath of god. Finally I added the moon as a symbol of witchcraft.

For What You Wish For I went with plain black-and-white for home-printing use (any PDF without a plain B&W home-print option is teh fail) and because the game's about potential and the unknown future. The title is a big floating ideal all dazzling with glory (but mundane glory, made from scribbles), and it's being strived for by the little person. But they're still rooted to their shadow, who is despairing like a n00b; representing that indecision and anxiety.

Cheers!

[Pete]

I like covers that are either representative of a slice of play you'd expect to have in the attendant game, or that evince a mood relevant to the game.

First (and Second) Edition Shadowrun is a good example of the first: you've got decking, magic, and cyber-shizzle all knocking around on the cover. The art direction flowing through all the covers of the various playsets for Fiasco is an example of the second.

Fo'Shang! Covers

• Spirit of the Century! (Dude, there's a gorilla flying a bi-plane!)
• Sea Dracula! (Does a giraffe job of telling you what the game's about.)
• Action Castle! (Lovely homage, useful artifact too.)

Bwuh-Meh Covers

• SmallVille. (A licence, sure, but Tom Welling's mug is uninspiring.)
• Marvel Heroic Roleplaying: Basic Game (Wow, such an über bland non-effort; moar Kirby/Simonson plox!)
• Dogs in the Vineyard. (Nice enough but rather static, meh; a cover in the same crappy scratchy style as the interior art would've suited better, or just the plain tree of life symbol.)

Cheers
Pete

[MaxBantleman]

Thanks for the replies: I'm checking out some of the ones mentioned with the comments in mind.

The quality of the art has always been primary for me: it has to look good whatever it is.

Thanks again, useful stuff.

[Neil Gow]

I cannot believe that this topic has come up and no one has mentioned ICONS yet!?

[dpmcalister]

I cannot believe that this topic has come up and no one has mentioned ICONS yet!?

You mean this masterpiece?

[Kaiserjez]

I'm a massive fan of the artwork in ICONS.

[Tsenn]

If I remember, I'll go through my books tonight, but for now:

It has to be good. If it's not high quality, it shouldn't be on the cover of the final product.

It has to be evocative of the setting. Give me strong visual cues that will make me say "this looks cool" and pick it up off the shelf.

It should (ideally) tell a story. Help me to understand what it is that players will be up to in this particular book. At the very least, suggest the theme or ask a question.

[Mick Red]

Only thing i will add is no art is better than shitty art!! If you can afford decent cover art take the traveller route with name stamped on black background

[Tsenn]

Was just thinking about that. Vampire, with the green cover and the rose on it, that is one I like but it doesn't exactly hit my criteria for being "good". Shiny, distinctive, there's subtext (the rose is beautiful and a wonder to the senses but has thorns and by the way it's dead) but it doesn't tell me anything about the game. Unless the subtext is meant to be the message, that Vampire is a game of subtlety. Hmm.

[MaxBantleman]

I've got a good fix on what's what with the cover now, sounds stupid, but something I don't usually think about as I'm a bit of an art wh0re - if it's shiny, cool and in my face I like it...

Portraying something of the background and feel is a good one to start with, which counds easy, a picture being worth a thousand worms and all that, but you need to choose subjects carefully.

I've got an idea for the cover, so hopefully working towards that now.

Point well taken that no art is better than dodgy art.
Bob Shaw, chap who is doing cover (Hi Bob!) has a great style and feel for the game and its characters, so no worries on that score.

I went through a lot of my shelf bound games and checked the covers, some are truly awful and some are epic!
Once you start looking at covers with a 'I wonder what they were thinking?' head on, it's interesting to see some of the choices made by publishers...