Dear Future Gamer

The reasons for those big boxes aren't obvious unless you know the full story. You'll kick yourself when you see why.

I once wrote an Atari ST game in early 1994. It was released on two 3.5" floppy disks which lived in a very large, airy box capable of housing a family of four and their dog. Why? Because boxes this size are more common, therefore more of them are made. Since more of them are made, they cost less than their smaller counterparts simply because of economies of scale. This actually makes sense when you realise that the box-makers don't just use their machinery to make boxes for computer games. They make boxes for anyone who needs to sell stuff in boxes, from video cassettes to socks. So we get little CDs in big boxes because big boxes are cheaper than little boxes. After all, if 'smaller' always meant 'cheaper', everyone would play Quake on a laptop.

This is one of the reasons why console games tend to have standard packaging: Sony and Nintendo order their packaging by the kiloton, so they get their boxes dirt cheap. Also, Nintendo aren't interested in releasing tons of games per week, so shelf-space is much less of an issue than packaging costs. Since retailers and distributors usually end up with about 50% of the customer's money, packaging costs are important - the cheaper the box, the more the publisher and developer can make.

For PC games, a bigger box also means more chance of being noticed. The casual buyer is as important, if not more so, than the hardcore gamer, since there are far more of the former. So, if a box is more likely to catch the casual gamer's eye, it makes sense to use it.

There's also the small matter of needing to print tons of text on the box as that's the only way you'll be able to work out what the game's all about, or what 3D cards it will work with. Music CDs don't need much more than a track list.

No conspiracies. No cartels. No aliens. No dead US presidents. Just plain, boring old economics and marketing.

Sean Timarco Baggaley

FG: It's a good point, Sean, and a fine one to end all of this box talk. Enough people, enough!