AVGN Bad Game Cover Art 5 - Shingen The Ruler (NES)
("We Wish You a Merry Christmas" plays and ornaments numbered 1-25 are seen on a Christmas tree. A raspberry sound is heard and the cover to Shingen the Ruler appears on the 5 ornament, along with shit.)
The Nerd: (The Nerd stares at the box art with his arms crossed.) Shingen the Ruler on NES. Here we have a decently rendered male face...
The Nerd: Which seems to disappear into an image of an army riding on horses. It's as if a cloud of less detailed more generic art floated in front of him.
The Nerd: Why would this be so important that it needs to intrude on the focal character?
The Nerd: It's as if the background took a bite out of the side of his face.
The Nerd: I believe it symbolizes the conformity to a larger society of socio-economic repression.
The Nerd: It should be noted that sometimes the art on the box is different than the art on the game cartridge. On the cartridge, he's obscured even more by the goddamn instructions!
The Nerd: Why is this on the cartridge??
The Nerd: It seems like somebody really hated that artwork and wanted to do everything they could to cover it up.
The Nerd: Or maybe they'd never seen a video game before. The instructions come with the game! You know, on paper! In a little booklet! You don't need it on the cartridge! Of course, it's not the full detailed instructions, but they sure fit as much as they could!
The Nerd: Just for a quick reference in case you're playing the game and you either lost the instructions...
The Nerd: Or you find it easier to look at the cartridge while you're playing... the cartridge.
The Nerd: And this would only work in a top loader. If you had the original NES model, you wouldn't even see the fucking cartridge! Maybe it's meant to be read like some kind of art-house poetry. "Yield. Money. Disaster. Product." Yeah, this product was a disaster that you should yield before spending money. Shingen seems to be peeking out from the cluttered mess of periodic table-like frames of clinical information as if to say "Hey, it's me! Me! Look at me! Look at me!"
The Nerd: This is horseshit. I can't even pretend! Does this make you want to play the game? Was it so complicated they had to put the rules on the cover?
The Nerd: Is it because the game is called Shingen the Ruler? They thought it must have the rules?
The Nerd: I'm surprised they didn't put an image of a measuring ruler on it. Well we're gonna need to find the longest tape measure in existence because I didn't know they stacked shit this high!