Do you like the new cover?

[Rurik]

What do y'all think?

[golden wheel dancer]

is it a game set in a world where spaceships attack gun wielding aztecs? The differentiation between the genres isnt clear enough.

That wouldnt matter so much if the picture did it for me BUT......

......I was hoping the BRP cover would make me go "WOW!" but it didnt it made me go "hmmm"....the monographs looked better.

[Simlasa]

Yeah... I mean, it's well done... not to harangue the artist... but if I was the art director I'd have to give it thumbs down...

I'm kind of thinking it needs to be less of a cohesive scene and more of a collection of images... either of evocative but disparate elements/objects or several smaller scenes representing different genres (of which the current cover image might be one).

[Joseph Paul]

I'm with Simlassa on this one,

JP

[Enpeze]

I dont like the new cover very much. Its bland and uninspiring. I mean do the Chaosium guys have such a bad taste?

The 4th ed. Gurps books shows how good a cover of a generic rpg could be done. I am graphics designer and layouter in normal life and my customers would throw something after me if I delivered them such a picture. Alone the guy with the bow....big ouch.

There are many young talented painters and designers out there. Why not using one of them?

And I agree, the font for Basic Roleplaying is plain ugly and old fashioned. It looks like a typical font from the 80ties. Do the people behind Chaosium still live in the former century?

If Chaosium is not able to put up a better cover, they should IMO use no graphics at all at the front page. Cover just in Black with big silver metallic BRP or similar.

[Lord Twig]

While I kinda like the cover, I think it is obvious that the Chaosium guys are better at putting together rules than they are at marketing. Really I prefer it that way to the other way around.

I don't understand how you can hate a font, but I guess I don't do that type of thing for a living.

[Trifletraxor]

Originally Posted by Lord Twig

I think it is obvious that the Chaosium guys are better at putting together rules than they are at marketing.

That's pretty obvious. It's also the reason why Chaosium isn't bigger than they are. Now, is there a contradiction between making a quality product and marketing it well too?

This is the single most important picture for the entire product line! It should be stunning! Instead it's "Oh well, Chaosium was never known for it's artwork..."

If they just draw stickfigures for the rest of the supplements, this cover should have been great, not meeh...

Sverre.

[Enpeze]

Originally Posted by Lord Twig

While I kinda like the cover, I think it is obvious that the Chaosium guys are better at putting together rules than they are at marketing. Really I prefer it that way to the other way around.

I don't understand how you can hate a font, but I guess I don't do that type of thing for a living.

Well I dont hate it, but I think its ugly and totally out of fashion. Its not even stylish retro, its just retro. If you have to work with fonts the whole day as I do, you get a different perspective about them.

[Enpeze]

Originally Posted by Trifletraxor

That's pretty obvious. It's also the reason why Chaosium isn't bigger than they are. Now, is there a contradiction between making a quality product and marketing it well too?

This is the single most important picture for the entire product line! It should be stunning! Instead it's "Oh well, Chaosium was never known for it's artwork..."

/totally agreed.
They should seek assistance from their collegues at Pegasus Press. These german Call of Cthulhu publishers are able to produce wonderful artwork and layouts for some years now.

here are some of their covers:
http://www.pegasus.de/cthulhu.html

[Simlasa]

Lots of designer have font's they love/hate... the woman who trained me HATED Helvetica... just wanted it banned forever.

I'm guessing that the art is bought and paid for and their ain't a lot of cash sitting around to come up with another one...
I agree that I'd just as soon them leave the cover blank except for lettering... compared to this attempt. White with an INTERESTING font... not that cheese-whiz thing they're using in the example.

True it's the rules inside that are the only thing that really matters to ME in the long run... but I'd really like to see the game take off and grow a wider community of fans. This cover ain't gonna help with that.