8 AMAZING Box-Arts That Made You Buy BAD Games
2. Left Alive
Developer Ilinx definitely knew what they were doing when they hired legendary Metal Gear Solid artist Yoji Shinkawa to design the characters and promotional art for their 2019 sci-fi action game Left Alive.
Shinkawa's extremely distinctive and popular art style is all over the game's marketing materials and especially its box art, immediately reminding players of Metal Gear Solid and likely leading them to expect an experience of a similar caliber.
But hoo boy, Left Alive just isn't that, like, at all.
This utterly tossed-off entry into the Front Mission franchise was widely panned by critics and players alike for its godawful, wildly unforgiving stealth mechanics, poor controls and camera, trash AI, and woeful checkpointing system.
Though the aesthetics, driven by Shinkawa's design work, were unquestionably the game's highlight, Left Alive remains one of the most crushing disappointments of the last decade - and we're not just talking about video games.
Ultimately bringing in Shinkawa to superficially prettify things was a mere act of putting lipstick on a pig and calling it a day.