Wed Apr 14 2021 at 18:35:55
When the Nintendo Entertainment System first shipped in North America, Nintendo wanted everything about the system and its marketing to reassure video game-shy toy stores that this was something different than the torrent of Atari 2600shovelware that crashed the video game market a few years earlier. One major component of this was a standardized packaging design for all games released by Nintendo themselves for the first year and a half of retail availability. Since this packaging used a black background for the game box, this set of games has become known as the Black Box games and is now a common collecting target.
Packaging for the Asciiware Sphere 360 PlayStation controller (photo courtesy of Hock Wah Yeo)
When Hock Wah Yeo was hired by the game publisher Velocity, the head of the company gave him an unusual order: “Scare me.”
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Let’s say you go to the store and buy a video game. What does it look like? Chances are, it comes in a plastic box, roughly the size of a DVD case, and there’s a logo on the top that tells you what platform it’s for Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo. It’s easy to understand, and it’s easy to fit on shelves. Retailers like it. The platform owners like it. This is the way it’s been for decades simple, predictable, and safe.