Mongoose Cover Art

[Mongoose_Will]

Whats your Favorite Cover? and why?

of the more recent cover arts what would you change? if you could.

Do you like/dislike the art or the layout and fonts?

constructive feedback appreciated

 

[Greg Smith]

My favourite cover art is Conan, Across Thunder River. I don't play Conan, but it is a great picture.

I like the B5 2nd edition covers, the dynamic blue, with the smallish picture in the centre.

I find the art a bit dark for Lankhmar and Lone Wolf.

 

[Tolwyn]

My favourite cover is from the B5 adventure cold equations.

PSI Corps and Black Ops in all its glory. It would be great if the whole picture would be available as desktop backround

 

[Deleriad]

Of the stuff I've seen, I like the B5 first edition Psi Corps as it's quite clever. I think the Spinward Marches design is good too. Conan 2nd edition has quite a nice movie poster vibe about it. I like the hellhounds companion cover because it sets out to be over the top and succeeds. Most of the paranoia work is fun too.

I don't actually *like* the RQ rulebooks with the runes on but I actually think they're quite distinctive and well done. The new Empires one is by far the best while RQ Deluxe is rather dumb.

As an RQ player, the main thing I would like is to see some unifying design language. I'm personally a fan of minimalist elegance. That generally means finding one or two fonts and sticking to them, a simple but consistent colour palette and so on. I suspect that RQ could do with a mini logo that is derived from the main logo and simply states "RQ."

Hope that's useful.

 

[BlackCat]

LW 7: Castle Death! It's different than the fight scenes we see on all the other covers we saw so far. And sticking to LW, for book 6, I would had put more space at the top of the illustration so that the title don't mask the face of the Dakomyd.

 

[lastbesthope]

C'Tech main book.

LBH

 

[Samvail1]

I'm loving the look of the new Quintessential line, although I think the Fighter image needs a frame as per the Wizard image. And I would leave off the company logos on the front, very distracting.

Overall, I like most of the Mongoose covers with a full colour image of the subject and line-logo heading.

For me, it's definitely the interior layout that let's the books down. Whole line spacing between paragraphs makes them look like early reader books. Justification of 'short' lines is criminal as is justification of headers. Breaking column width with pictures is another Mongoose habit which is OK as long as it doesn't force runaround text to be 3 words or less. Some of the header styles used are equally nasty and hard to read. Widows and orphans are liberally scattered and the table style is very average. Spacing needs to be used better, especially around a/ws and headers.

Page borders are usually fine as long as they are not too intrusive, nice when they incorporate the page number and chapter head.

I could go on, but those are my main Mongoose Bugbears. Hope that helps, Will.

Cheers

Sam
(Celebrating 25 years of employment as a Graphic Designer and Layout artist)

 

[lastbesthope]

C'Tech main book.

LBH

Not technically a Mongoose book I realise

So a Mongoose cover:

A:2089 Main Book
Warmachines of 2089
High Frontier, all good covers.

As for interior, colour definitely adds value as far as I'm concerned.

LBH

 

[MongooseMatt]

As for interior, colour definitely adds value as far as I'm concerned.

LBH

Your wish is our command - we'll be covering this in the forthcoming State of the Mongoose, but there will be a lot more colour (and big hardbacks!) in 2009.

 

[Mr Evil]

as a wargamer im not a fan of harback ... infact i refuse to buy hardback books for wargaming now.

 

[lastbesthope]

As for interior, colour definitely adds value as far as I'm concerned.

LBH

Your wish is our command - we'll be covering this in the forthcoming State of the Mongoose, but there will be a lot more colour (and big hardbacks!) in 2009.

Excellent, I would almost always rather pay more for a colour hardback than a B&W softback.

LBH

 

[shotgun-toting chipmunk]

How about color paperback? I can't stand hardbacks because a) they generally cost more, b) they take up more space, and c) they're heavier to lug around. I do think color is great in many cases. I think Modern Combat could have benefited from color, while Apocalypse Z works better in black and white because it better portrays the feel of the universe.

 

[Mr Evil]

How about color paperback? I can't stand hardbacks because a) they generally cost more, b) they take up more space, and c) they're heavier to lug around. .

totaly agree, colour softbcks please from a wargamers point of view any way...

RPG stuff is fine in hard back after all they need to spend money on somthing as they dont have all the pretty toys wargamers have to contend with lol.

 

[Jame Rowe]

As for interior, colour definitely adds value as far as I'm concerned.

LBH

Your wish is our command - we'll be covering this in the forthcoming State of the Mongoose, but there will be a lot more colour (and big hardbacks!) in 2009.

Excellent, I would almost always rather pay more for a colour hardback than a B&W softback.

LBH

[Snarky Comment Redacted]

I am of the camp of "pay less, even if it means B&W art, because I have a severely limited budget."

 

[Adybard]

I'm loving the look of the new Quintessential line, although I think the Fighter image needs a frame as per the Wizard image.

I'm glad you like the new Quintessential line design, as we worked hard to find a new style while maintaining the old overall approach. The Fighter cover you've seen so far is not the definitive version. I bet you'll like that one when you'll see it done (and yes, the image will be framed).

 

[Narchy]

I love the Conan stuff, looks great!

Though I reckon the 2nd edition Babylon 5 RPG/ACTA books could have done with a bit more work.

 

[Strom]

I would have to say I love the Conan RPG art by Chris Quilliams as the best RPG art at Mongoose. The CthulhuTech cover and the Dark Passions supp are a close second. 8)

 

[Mongoose_Will]

I must admit i have quite a strong visual taste myself so i find it hard to find artwork i personnally like but in terms of the cover art from the mongoose archive...

well the cover for the new elric book "cults of the young kingdoms" is very strong, not having any idea about the elric books the image it self has a great style and colour pallette, i'm looking forward to playing with the layout

 

[Shadow Queen]

Hardback deffo and full colour as B&G not very nice softback just too easy to become dogeared like my Dark Passions and Vade Mecum just have to keep them under heavy books to keep them flat.

 

[lastbesthope]

Hardback deffo and full colour as B&G not very nice softback just too easy to become dogeared like my Dark Passions and Vade Mecum just have to keep them under heavy books to keep them flat.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Vade Mecuum isn't out yet?

LBH