Since we talked about this awhile back, I kept wanting to mention that Wal-Mart has quite a lot of titles on the shelves, particularly in educational software, in the new box format. When I was there two days ago to pick up Grandia II and Bangai-O for Dreamcast, I noticed a few game titles in the new box too.

I think the retailers are going to drive it home. It's incredible how many more of those educational titles are packed into half the space of the entire PC games wall. It's almost a sign of the vanity of PC gamesmakers. Like they need that box because they're so far above the rest of the software world or something...or maybe the small box resistance is a sign of the inferiority complex they now have in the face of the massive console blitz?

Either way, these new boxes are nice. They're just the right size, can hold thick manuals, and will fit MUCH better on a rack near the PC without needing to be discarded based on size alone. If you get to Wally World for some diapers, toys or some toilet paper, look in on the PC section and check the box out.

--Dave

I wonder if this will make it easier for smaller developers to get shelf space.

Yeah I like the new double DVD case format too. Much easier on my computer room shelf space.

They've been like this in the UK for about a year now, the first time I noticed the DVD style smaller packaging was when I bought a copy of Championship Manager last September. Good riddance to those damn huge boxes I say, they only used to get thrown away anyway.

"I wonder if this will make it easier for smaller developers to get shelf space."

You would think so, but the stores probably won't want to give up their extortionist shelf space fees...

This reminds me of the CD longbox flap about a decade ago... they were seen as a total waste and rightly discontinued. Really I suppose you could go all the way with PC games and just have the jewel box shrink-wrapped -- a la console games. Why not? However, DVD-style packaging might be a nice compromise.

I confess, though, that part of me loves those hefty boxes with lots of stuff rattling around in them. Nothing could beat the mid-'80s Ultimas -- cloth map, metal ankh, three or four manuals, and a nice big glossy box to hold it all. It screamed "classy production values."

Gordon, it's still a box. It's just at the size of a double depth DVD case. There's still plenty of room in them for some extras, albeit folded up a little more. It's a nice compromise between the jewelcase (too little manual for some PC games) and the huge boxes we have today at EB, etc.

What it should do, is allow us to maintain similar stocking levels for PC games in stores like EB and Best Buy while they start to have multiple racks for console games. If publishers don't get onto this box fast enough, I think they're risking their game getting spined or binned in favor of more console game racks. We're going to see Xbox, PS2, Gamecube and Gameboy Advance with the majority of the rack space. PC games will be next followed by Playstation, N64 and a tiny corner for what's left of Dreamcast. No matter how you slice it, PC games are going to have their space cut down at most retailers. The small box would allow for the same amount of titles in a smaller space which is just what Wal-Mart is demanding.

Anyway, the box is plenty big enough for goodies. It could almost hold the manual for something like BG2 in spiral bound form. It'd be darn close.

--Dave

Personally, I prefer the smaller boxes - less waste. The marketing folks hate them, though, since more product on shelf means more competition, and the smaller box means smaller screenshots. Believe it or not, the majority of purchase decisions are still made in store based on the box.

For right now, I know that we are planning to make two different boxes - one for Walmart and one for everyone else. No mandate has been passed down by other retailers as of yet.

I'm for it, as long as the manuals don't come as just pdf files. I was at Walmart yesterday and noticed they had a bunch of games in just jewel cases. You could buy the first Age of Empire or Civ II or Fallout 1&2 (together in a double pack) for $9.96. Not a bad way to do bargin bin material.

Brad Grenz

Brad, manuals are heading towards PDF format even with full price full size box games anyway.

I'm kind of surprised that paper manuals are persisting. Software makers are pretty much forcing all of us IT people to print humongous manuals with any software we buy.

When I compare IT with the game marketplace, it seems kind of backwards. My company pays a premium for that latest database, application, whatever...yet I don't even get a fucking book in paper form to learn how to use it. Then on the other hand, I buy this $30 game and I get a 60 or more page book (often not all that well-written, but at least informs me how the software works) with it. It's so backwards.

The jewelcase games around are a good idea to an extent. I don't like that they publish those "special editions" in jewelcase format that only contain like one-third of the full game. They're very deceptive.

--Dave

I think it's that way due to the game market being much less influenced by economic pressure. Paper manuals are awfully expensive for the use they get, yet everyone ends up paying a buck or two for them.

'I don't like that they publish those "special editions" in jewelcase format that only contain like one-third of the full game.'

Those are amazingly scummy. It's almost like a "so, you're new to video games, eh?" tax.

I don't mind the PDF's. It means more people print them up at home therefore they need to own a printer and buy more ink/toner.

Since I work for a printer company that's a GOOD THING ! J

Shows my age maybe. But I loathe .pdf manuals. I deal with them a lot, having to review and preview Gold discs and all. So I'm used to them, but I'd hate to see paper manuals done away with. I'd kick and I'd scream. I also don't believe doing away with them would result in lower prices for the consumer.

Pity manuals aren't what they used to be. In the old days (by cracky!) they were often an amusing read. That hasn't been true for a long time.

-Andrew

I never print them. I just have to save my game, exit, open up acrobat, look for the information I need, close acrobat, restart game, load save, realize I forgot the thing I just looked up, rinse and repeat.

The first game I ever bought with just a digital manual was Privateer. It said on the box it had an "online" manual, which being much less experience then, meant on the internet. This was before I had a net connection so I just had to make due without any guidance from the manual. You know how ling it took me to figure out how to fly to a different star system?

Brad Grenz

Yeah, I'm with you Brad. I don't have the cash to spend on a printer that will print up a sixty page manual -- which isn't long enough for a lot of the games I play -- in any decent amount of time. And I shouldn't have to. If I'm gonna pay forty-five bucks for a game, I'd better get a good two-inch, fifteen pound manual, dang it!!

It's a little different with the games on the ten-dollar rack at Wal-Mart. But there is NO excuse for a New Release to NOT have a good manual.

NO EXCUSE!!

I like to read the manual (for a game that needs one) off-line, in bed usually, or while I'm snacking in front of the TV. Civ III's 250+ page manual, which I have only on PDF at the moment, is a case in point. I would really like to read it at my leisure, but I haven't gotten up the energy to print it out on my little inkjet at home. I'm assuming the boxed version will have a real manual.

I hate pdf manuals. C'mon, a sim like Sub Command should have a spiral bound manual akin to the ones that came with Jane's Longbow 2. Having to print 250 pages on my inkjet printer is ridiculuous.

"There's still plenty of room in them for some extras, albeit folded up a little more."

Also, I would worry about that more if games actually CAME with extras. Sure, I have plenty of fond memories of those excellent Infocom packages, or the cool stuff that might come with an rpg, but these days most boxes that I open (and I open a LOT) come packed with only a jewel case. With that in mind, I'd be perfectly happy with the DVD case format.

Sure, sims like Longbow and Sub Command need a large, bound manual. Diablo, though? Warcraft? The new Doom?

Everyone assumes the point of going pdf-only is for everyone at home to print out their own. I thought it was to never print the manual out.

Also, if they switch to the DVD format, there's nothing stopping them from shrinkwrapping a nice manual (for games that need one) to the package. Not self-contained, but I wouldn't mind putting manuals on a bookshelf next to the DVD they belong to.

-Andrew

Yeah, that wouldn't bother me, as long as they didn't start charging extra for the manuals. That would really tick me off.

Personally, I'll miss boxes. Don't rightly know, why, yet there has always been something I liked about them. Perhaps it is, as has been said, nostalgia for the days when the box would be a treasure trove of material beyond the game media. Most of today's boxes, though, are larger than 1980s boxes. After all, originally EA's stuff came in album-like sleeves. It was those huge multi-disk epics before the CD age that drove box sizes bigger. I'd like to see a halfway point, something like the size of SSI's "small size" boxes of the 1980s and early '90s (such as the Gold Box games). These are much smaller than the average PC box today--which is too big, yet more substantial than DVD packaging.

Oh, back in the days when games came with
interesting manuals!

I recall sitting at my desk in the software
department I worked in, feet up on the desk,
reading the "Secret Weapons Of The
Luftwaffe"...nice manual. And I didn't even play
that type of game.

Then I remember the boss coming in, getting
all upset and forcing me to dust the Amiga
section just to look busy.

Ah, those were the days.

i got Max Payne on the DVD box and it looks kewl !

^_^ finally im gonna keep the fox instead of making more trash... i thik its a good thing

"Not self-contained, but I wouldn't mind putting manuals on a bookshelf next to the DVD they belong to."

That's not really even necessary. They already make all sorts of special "extra thick" DVD cases for special collector edition DVDs; games that come with thick manuals could just use those.

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Quote:

Yeah, that wouldn't bother me, as long as they didn't start charging extra for the manuals.

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I'll compromise - you can put a .pdf manual on the CD if your game includes a decent tutorial. Otherwise, spend the bucks and kill some trees.