Bad game box art re-drawn by me less badly

I've been writing about the old game box art, the kind of that isn't done anymore. The works I've chosen have been something I consider good, but now I've decided to begin a new series of bad game box art with a twist. The twist being, that I'm going to re-draw the art into something a bit better. Hopefully.

The first victim for this series is an old text adventure title Adventure Quest (1982). I've never played the game itself, but by all counts, it seems to be a standard text game, where you give a verb and a noun in order to either progress or the game telling you, that it does not understand what you are saying. In my experience with these old text adventures, the latter is usually the case.

The game itself has no graphics, so Level 9 had to trust the picture on the left to sell the game. While I don't want to claim the image wholly incompetent, it does strike me a bit doodle-like, despite it having been inked and coloured. You could also describe the style as nativistic, or better yet, drawn by an actual kid. If it was drawn by a kid, good job, if not, then the artist didn't quite nail it.

I don't know if the game is any good, but that piece of cover doesn't make me feel like going to lengths to find out.

Here's my own take of the box art. It is drawn on paper and inked with document pens, the colours are done in Clip Studio Paint Pro.

I didn't want to alter the setting too much, so it still has the same dude standing somewhere in the mountains, in front of a castle. His pose is a bit different and I added some new details on his suit but kept his weapons the same.

Is it better than the original? That, I guess, depends on whom you ask. I do find it a tad more intriguing, but there wasn't really much going on in the original image in the first place, so it isn't that much more thrilling piece of work.

I can't say if the image represents what the game is like. Maybe that is what the main character does most of the time, poses with his club held high in front of buildings. Or perhaps it is more thrilling than that. I don't really care in a way or another, but this was the end result of this first little experiment. 

Comments

MatchedContent