[music]
Welcome to the art gallery. Here, we'll be looking at video game cover art.
There's a saying: "Don't judge a book by its cover", which is true.
Sometimes the cover does not accurately represent the work that is inside.
However, the cover is a work of art in itself.
And it's the first thing you'd see. It was especially important in the old days, because we didn't have the internet to tell us what the game is like.
The cover had to tell us everything. So it's about time we give game cover art the attention it's due.
Usually, we sit down and play the actual games to review them in depth.
And that's all fine; we will do that. You will see a new Nerd episode in time for Christmas.
But since it's the season of giving, I'll be giving you a little something extra.
Every day, until Christmas, we'll be observing some of the most exquisitely bad...
...works of art from game history.
["We Wish You a Merry Christmas" plays]
Pro Wrestling. For the Sega Master System.
Absolutely stunning.
This work is all about irony, in the sense that it uses the term "pro" for professional, yet goes for an amateurish style.
The background grid paper is reminiscent of the graph paper used in school for Math and Geometry.
Students always doodle on that paper, right?
And I don't mean they doodle on it. I mean, mean they... they... shit on it...
I mean, they scribble on it, okay?
Anyway, it looks like something a bored student would draw during class when they're supposed to be doing their work.
The most striking thing about the cover is the wrestler, who has no head, yet is doing a chokehold on a head.
Is it is own head? Or somebody else's?
Whatever the case, it's a very non-traditional wrestling move.
Once again, it's ironic that the cover is so traditional, with the same font and background as other Sega Master System games.
They all have a uniform look, but this wrestler, who stands outside the corner of the game box;
his method goes literally off the grid.
Let's assume he is wrestling his own head.
It's body vs. head. It depicts the internal struggle of brains against brawns.
The wrestler, who develops his muscle over mind, shows that muscle is winning the battle.
And after all, the term "professional wrestling" implies the staged form of wrestling.
To entertain, at the audience's suspension of disbelief.
Can we suspend our disbelief?
Or, does this cover make no fucking sense?
["We Wish You a Merry Christmas" plays again]
[dramatic music]
[Board James] This is the end of my game... but the beginning of your nightmares.
[dramatic music continues]
We're just playing a game of Hangman.
[Bootsy] I was hoping we were gonna play Candy Land.
