GOG Brings Back 'Big Box' PC Games, One Printable Template At a Time

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Those who remember PC gaming in the days before Steam may have fond memories of the "big box" packaging that made those games stand out as shelf eye candy and sought-after in-home collectibles. Today, PC gaming platform GOG is hoping to reignite some of the nostalgia for those days by adding downloadable 3D models and printable, foldable high-res packaging scans for a handful of PC games on the platform.

Thus far, the "Printable Big Box" collection on GOG is limited to just five games: Armikrog, Descent, Hitman: Codename 47, Myst, and Star Trek: 25th Anniversary. Players browsing those games on the GOG store will now see "3D Boxes" listed among the included "Goodies" before purchase. Owners of those games on GOG can download a ZIP file containing a version of the box art as an animated 3D object file (in an easy-to-open GLB format) and a "flat printable template" in PDF, SVG, and Adobe Illustrator formats. Those downloads allow for what GOG calls "a proper papercraft project for anyone who misses shelves full of PC game boxes."

The physically focused expansion of the existing GOG Preservation Program comes through a partnership with Benjamin Wimmer's Big Box Collection website, which has grown since 2015 to include over 1,000 3D scans from his private collection of physical PC games. In an interview with GOG, Wimmer said that while he appreciates the artistry of a good old-fashioned big box, he also appreciates their evolution into the "interactive cards" on modern digital storefronts that "provid[e] us art, screenshots, gameplay videos and whatnot and that not shown as a box, [it] is just good UX." "Physical media doesn't survive the way software can -- boxes get lost, crushed, thrown out," GOG writes in today's announcement. "Scanning them, and letting you print your own, is preservation in a different shape: the same mission that keeps these games running on modern PCs, applied to the objects they used to come in."

We need more physical waste!

[logjon]

One of the upsides to digital distribution has been reduced packaging and waste. So much for that.

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[snowshovelboy]

lol, yes, people are printing these boxes to recreate the nostalgia of throwing the box away.

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[93 Escort Wagon]

You should be recycling the box, you insensitive clod!

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[sabbede]

I kept them. My closet was full of game boxes, until my mom went through and threw them out.

Re:We need more physical waste!

[Fly Swatter]

All that savings undone when you buy one cheap usb flash drive encased in a hard plastic clam shell in the store to backup the game's download files. Don't forget the scissors you buy to open that flash drive package also came in a plastic clam shell. But those scissors broke when you tried to cut the plastic. So you drove back out in your gas guzzler to buy a nice sharp knife that also comes in an even thicker bigger plastic clam shell. Oh and those broken scissors? not recyclable so it and those plastic handles to cushion the grip for your soft hands are now in the trash.

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[Anonymous Coward]

He lives in a tree and owns nothing.

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[Fly Swatter]

No, the point is I am surrounded by plastic. I kept (hoarded?) all those game boxes from back in the day. They are still more useful to me than the anti-theft clam shell plastic wrapping that encases everything you buy today.

To stay on topic, GOG should just have a printable PDF you can print at an office supply store onto a cardboard blank - then you have a real box you can fold up - and it isn't just more plastic waste.

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[TwistedGreen]

Isn't that exactly what they have done?

...a "flat printable template" in PDF, SVG, and Adobe Illustrator formats.

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[Fly Swatter]

Yes, but seeing all the 3D stuff mentioned made me think 3D printer for some reason. Oh well, bad day to be me.

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[CrankyFool]

I hope tomorrow is a much better day to be you! You deserve a great day!

Iâ(TM)d rather

[ThurstonMoore]

Iâ(TM)d rather see them bring back the big manuals. Microprose games came with great supplemental info.

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[sabbede]

And copy protect gimmicks!

Origin had great stuff in their boxes. I remember that fondly. What game comes with a cloth map nowadays? Or the ship blueprints that came with Wing Commander.

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[rsilvergun]

A lot of those old games are basically unplayable without the manual. I could not imagine playing a microprose game without the physical manual to flip through. I guess you could use a tablet but those games are so complex you really need to be able to quickly flip through pages.

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[WolfgangVL]

Learning to play the game WAS the game!

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[tlhIngan]

IÃ(TM)d rather see them bring back the big manuals. Microprose games came with great supplemental info.

Many GOG downloads include a PDF manual. These big box templates are just templates to produce your own box as well, so it's basically the same thing

The first 'big box' game - Sabre Wulf

[mccalli]

I remember the very first big box game in the UK. It was Sabre Wulf [wikipedia.org], from Ultimate Play The Game [wikipedia.org]. At the time, games were around £5.99 to £7.99 - Sabre Wulf was the first £9.99 game in the UK and they part justified it by having a bigger box.

Since everything at that point came on cassette, this was annoying as hell because you couldn't fit it into your cassette holders that you definitely, definitely had as an 8 bit gamer in the UK. No stranger to later price gouging, Ultimate became Rare and was bought by Nintendo. I still think Nintendo is lord of the overpricing, at least these days (in ye olden times there was the NeoGeo charging £300 for a game back in the early 1980s. I think PC Engine charged a fortune too. But absolutely nobody had these in the UK).

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[_merlin]

Nintendo didn't buy Rare. Microsoft bought Rare in 2002 to turn them into an Xbox exclusive developer, like they did with Bungie.

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[mccalli]

Did some reading off the back of your comment and yep - I now remember the fuss when that happened. Had totally forgotten it, Slashdot even did an article at the time. I'd so associated them with Nintendo that I got it mixed up.

Actually...

[Black Parrot]

I'm more interested in the game than in the packaging.

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[Dusanyu]

The nostalgia is not so much about the box themselves (although collectors love displaying them) but more so about the physical media, Pring manuals Add for upcoming games and the other doo-dads that came in the box. Some games had these funny little wheel things for copy protection but the Game makers made them fun to play with in there own right like "Dial-a-pirate" Interactive Dial-a-pirate found here https://ia801405.us.archive.or... [archive.org]

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[TwistedGreen]

Yes, of course, but this just a nice extra. GOG has always had a "goodies" section with some fun bonus items, like wallpapers and even ringtones... nice to see them improving this with some more detailed box art. It's rarely important for playing the game, but sometimes it provides vital context to playing the game. A lot of those old games came with inserts, magazines or full-on books containing introductory text, backstory, jokes and hints that were vital to get started in the game. The box and manuals we

It really bothers me

[rsilvergun]

That when we have that big brouhaha about losing physical PlayStation discs absolutely nobody talked about gog.com they just outrage farmed for clicks and patreon donations.

I hate how the Internet is just full of people trying to make me angry to monetize my anger. Which is ironic that it makes me angry that they're doing that...

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[jenningsthecat]

I hate how the Internet is just full of people trying to make me angry to monetize my anger. Which is ironic that it makes me angry that they're doing that...

"Good. I can feel your anger. I am defenseless. Take your weapon! Strike me down with all your hatred, and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!"

Sorry, I couldn't resist the comparison. But there's something there that I need to take away for myself, and you might want to consider it as well. Our anger at these things hurts us and helps the cause of our oppressors. Personally, I'd like to find a more constructive response. I know, it isn't easy.

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[taustin]

A Bot doesn't feel anger, its only follows its programmed instructions.

So I'm aware that I'm being manipulated

[rsilvergun]

And I can take steps to prevent that from happening to me but that doesn't stop it from being done to tens of millions of people who are out there doing crazy stupid things cuz they're in a constant state of mild anger because that makes them useful to the algorithm.

It's not myself individually that I'm worried about. It's what the effect of this massive outrage machine has on other people and their actions and what their actions do to me. I can't sit here and pretend that the stuff other people do does

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[jenningsthecat]

Fair points all - thanks for responding.

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[taustin]

Their entire business model is based on nostalgia. If that's not your thing, they really aren't of any interest to you.

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[rsilvergun]

Gog sells plenty of new games. I just bought the most recent star ocean games from them. They don't usually get the bleeding edge stuff because companies don't like to have to bother releasing patches over there so they wait until the game is completely settled down before putting it out unless they are an Indie.

Or unless it's something from CD project red itself.

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[taustin]

Being an AI bot, it would, of course, be more inclined to hack the web site and steal it.

Only it's a very broken, stupid AI bot from the 80s, and posting to /. taxes its CPU so much there's a real risk of fire from overheating.

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[taustin]

Gog sells plenty of new games.

They do now. That's not what they were based on, though.

Collectible but not vintage

[OrangeTide]

Having a physical box printed up seems like a fun little collectible. I already have a small collection of retail box Linux games, including Myth II: Soulblighter. I would love to get my hands on a copy of Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri Planetary Pack for Linux.

Star Trek 25th Anniversary

[ByTor-2112]

Talking about that game, which I played at a friend's house when it was released, right after the 60th anniversary, is a great way to make me feel old AF.