The Art of the Game Logo 19
Making game logos is an art form, and Hamagami/Carroll is behind many of the most recognizable ones on the shelf today. Gamasutra takes a look at what it takes to craft iconic imagery, talking to company co-founder Justin Carroll. From the article: "Typically, we're brought in fairly early in the process, as soon as they start building marketing plans, somewhere about halfway through, we're brought in and we start working on the packaging. Depending on the company we're working with, we're also working on the in-store display, we're working on sell sheets, materials for E3, and different parts of the brand identity."
Running out of logos? (Score:1, Interesting)
You can't make me believe that they would get paid the same for branding and packaging on a new title versus putting a "2" and a sub-title on a pre-existing logo.
Does anybody care? (Score:2, Insightful)
Graphic design in itself is useful for helping to differentiate products from one another, good box art will make the eyes drift to your game rather then a slew of similar games sitting on the shelf, but are we fixated on which game has a better logo?
I mean, if I bought Quake 4 because it had that highly noticable logo, wouldn't I still be dissapointed in the lack of innovation and originality in that franchise? Same goes for the Doom
Re:Does anybody care? (Score:3, Insightful)
I think a logo tends to be a smallish part of a brand, but a useful hook for it, and if it gets big enough you can start to have fun with it.
Re, your $20 jeans...the fact is how we dress, including brands, is the short story we tell ourselves to the outside world. Whether you like it or not you a
80% of the market cares* (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem with your "logic" is that it isn't. It's your rationale for not buying logoed products, but it isn't actually logic.
The important question is, "Is a logoed product the same as an un-logoed product?"
The answer is, "Only if the unlogoed product is identical to a logoed product".
So the true logic involved is to actually determine that the products are identical. You spent how much gas, how much time, and how many pairs of jeans to compare the Tommy Hillfiger jeans to the
Re:80% of the market cares* (Score:2)
The more appropriate question as to the value of a 'logo' would be to ask questions like "Would you be more likely to buy an iPod that was imprinted with the old Apple logo (multicolors) or the new Apple logo (one color)?" Or "How would you feel about a Ford with a red oval logo as opposed to a Ford with a blue oval logo?"
Re:80% of the market cares* (Score:3, Insightful)
I also think the OP used the word logo interchangeably with brand because people don't tend to buy logos, though if they do like a company they may buy other products with that logo (Apple t-shirts, XBox mugs, whatever).
Re:Does anybody care? (Score:2)
(Another I noticed recently is the whale tail logo for the New Bedford Whaling Museum [whalingmuseum.org]. Simple, but a part of me wishes I was the one that thought of it first!)
Will they sell me on one thing
Re:Does anybody care? (Score:2)
And the primary demographic that the game companies are trying to market their products to is...?
Not necessarily true (Score:2)
And some th
Re:Does anybody care? (Score:1)
No Kidding Logo Work is Hardwork (Score:3, Interesting)
Not to mention that logos have so many unwritten rules to follow: have to look good big and small, have to print in B&W well, have to be easily recognized, cannot offend a foreign culture, etc...
To tell you the truth, I'm considering just using a damn circle. :-p
Re:No Kidding Logo Work is Hardwork (Score:3, Funny)
Circles offend me you insensitive clod.
Re:No Kidding Logo Work is Hardwork (Score:2)
Nothing special. (Score:5, Interesting)
A poorly designed logo, on the other hand, stands out like a sore thumb. At best, it is completely inappropriate for its application, at worst, it looks like an atrocity. There are countless examples of awful logos from the dot-com era, when everyone and their grandmother had those stupid swoops in their logos.
That said I don't really consider game titles logos. If you really want to stretch the concept of what is a logo, they qualify, but I don't see them as logos any more than the title of a comic book is a logo. Certainly there are logotypes that contain no graphical element, like Sony or Microsoft, to point out some of the more obvious examples. However, I see these simple as titles, done in an ornate style that reflects the theme of the game.
This company did a good job of recapturing the theme of the previous games from these respective developers. Although, it's something that any sensible design company would have done. I don't think game packaging is particularly creative. Everything I've seen follows the same basic template while trying to be as flash as possible. However, in the sea of crap I see on the shelves nothing stands out. I have a hard time finding anything because all the game art melds together in one giant blur of color. It's even worse with console games considering that they're forced to stuff additional elements on the front of their packages. It also doesn't help that retailers don't bother to keep anything neat and organized.
I think packaging for applications tend to be a lot more creative than game packaging, if you discount the illustrations which don't necessarily qualify as an integral part of the design since the designers are just using art provided by the client. In most commercial applications, however, the designers are responsible for producing the artwork and photography.
On another note, I notice that guy is working 14 hour days. But thats the design world for you; designers are some of the most over-worked, under-appreciated people you'll ever meet in the corporate world. There's no reason why designers are given such ridiculous deadlines, but with desktop publishing you've got your average idiot thinking they understand design. I've dealt with people that think it takes 15 minutes to lay out a complicated design because they know how to paste text into word and insert a photograph. And then they go and second guess everything I design even though they wouldn't know good design if it punched them in the face. The worst is when someone in sales tries to sound like a designer. Even worse is when you've got a boss who's 20 years out of date trying to cram his design style down your throat.
If only people were this demanding with auto mechanics, construction workers and politicians the world would be a much better place. I got carried away with my rant there...
Favorite game logo, Quarantine. (Score:2)
You play a taxi driver in the quarantined city, splitting your time between carrying fare-paying passengers, running over pedestrians, launching missiles, and carving up other vehicles with the giant sawblade on your front bumper.
The logo was a styl
Speaking of bad logos (Score:1)