The issue of sexism in the gaming industry has been raised yet again following the news that Naughty Dog, the studio behind upcoming PS3 game The Last of Us, was told by Sony to remove a female character from the front cover. Naughty Dog refused, and Ellie, the young woman who is key to the story-line of the game, will remain on the cover. The news comes just days after images of the front cover of Bioshock: Infinite were released, which depict a generic-looking man holding a gun, with female lead Elizabeth only present on the back of the box. The studio behind the game has tried to appease fans by making the cover reversible and holding a vote to decide the second cover. Both Sony and Bioshocks creator Ken Levine stated these decisions were because they believe their games would sell less if there was a female on the front cover. But is that really true? Would gamers shun a game just because there was a girl on the front? Do gamers even care about box art anyway? I say no. In the days before the Internet, where gamers didnt know much about a lot of new releases, the front covers had to be bold and interesting to draw people in, to make gamers think Wow, that looks pretty cool! The illustrated covers of games like Contra and Revenge of Shinobi had to look appealing to make up for the basic graphics of the actual games. But now, when almost everything about a game is known weeks before its release, with trailers, previews and gameplay videos available for people to judge it on before they buy, the actual front cover of the game is the last thing people are thinking, or caring, about. The covers of the last few Call of Duty games have just been random soldiers holding rifles, but almost every game in the series has made over $1bn each. The cover of Batman: Arkham City was rather bland (and its Game of the Year cover an ugly mess of critic scores and additional content offers) but it was one of the best games of 2011. When the game is in your console you arent even looking at the cover anyway. But the question here is does the cover matter when theres a girl on it? Well, obviously it must, because I cant think of many games with a female on the cover that sold well. Except that is for a little series called Tomb Raider: Lara Croft has been on the cover of every single Tomb Raider game ever made and is one of the biggest and most recognisable icons in gaming alongside Mario and Sonic. Did people care that she, a woman, was on the front of the box? No, because the game was about her. She was the character you controlled, and hers was the story you journeyed through. If she wasnt on the cover it wouldnt make any sense, and you would be hard-pressed to recognise that it was a Tomb Raider game - it would be like having a Spider-Man game without our friendly neighbourhood Spidey on the front. Nowadays, all the cover has to do is tell you what the game is: Assassins Creed has assassins on the cover, the Lego games have Lego people on the front, and a game about a specific character should have that character on the front, regardless of their gender. Bioshock: Infinite is one of the most anticipated games of the past few years. Its countless delays have only raised the hype and expectation surrounding the game. Do you really think that all these fans who have been waiting so long to buy this game will suddenly be turned off it just because theres a girl on the cover?