1up’s list of worst game covers ever

Sometimes you really can’t tell anything by a cover, except that maybe the artist was inhaling some strange substance that day. 1up has compiled a list of fifteen of their least favorite video game covers. Highlights from the list include:

Phalanx “The Hyper-Speed Shoot-Out in Space” (SNES) – The cover features a good ol’ boy with a banjo. Sure screams space shooter to me, if it were produced by the cast of “He Haw,” that is.

Megaman (SNES) - I seem to recall a discussion of this cover revealing that the artist didn’t know anything about the game except the name. It’s a bit Tron meets Rollerball in Florida in the ’70s.

Stormlord (Amiga) – It screams Dungeons & Dungeon hardcover manuals from the same era with a bearded warrior with a sword and glowing fist of fury. Not so much bad as just very, very dated.

Metro Cross (PC) – It screams metrosexual before the term was ever spoken. A skater wearing helmet, protective pads and very, very tight blue spandex body suit with red highlights. *shudder*

Irritating Stick (PS1) - The name says it all. Blinding colors, red-and-yellow-and-blue. Your eyes will try to leave your head.

Ghost House: The Sega Card (Sega Master System) – One of the most generic game covers I’ve ever seen with a hand and the came card on a blank grid. Yawn.

Most of the others are really not so bad, just pretty era typical. If you look back to some early Atari games you’ll see some really, really simple covers that were about as complex as the game itself.

Of course there will be a day when there really won’t be any physical game covers thanks to digital downloads, so we gotta love ‘em even when they’re ugly.

Read [1UP] via [HardOCP]