Please discuss your views here.

Shadowrun 4th ed logo

It's unimpressive, non-distinctive, and amateurish. They would have been far better off going with one inspired by the original logo, or just sticking with the S and letting it speak for itself.

It's modern, chromed, sleek, implies all the aspects of neotribal technology and is centrist. I liked it.

no better or worse than any of the others...

It's an impressive evolution of the SR3 logo, made to look sleeker, more technological and in step with modern imagery and ideas. The retention of the tribal 'S' as a backdrop instead of part of the word itself reinforces the iconic nature of the logo, and gives it a greater weight. The game is as much associated with that symbol as with the name 'shadowrun' itself, and the symbol establishes a mythological component to the very mention of the game's name (for those who aren't already neck deep in the mythology, that is).

Nicely construced, good colours that evoke the emotional style that the game takes as its standard, and a futuristic look that tells the casual viewer a good deal of what the game world is about without ever cracking a book. Well done, overall.

should have stuck with the original logo, but this isn't bad.

Sucks. The worst so far, IMO.

I actually prefer it over all the past logos, personally.

It is fine, a nice enough change. Nothing was broken.

The only thing I don't like is that the relocation of the "S" made the title somewhat downward centered, leaving lots of empty space next to the upper half of the "S".

Better than SR3.

Still nothing compared to the old skull logo. (IMHO)

It looks nice and .... streamlined.

To play on the phrasing of another poster, it's an unimpressive evolution of the SR3 logo with a vain attempt to look sleeker and more technological, dropping substance for style and not even managing to get the style down (the stylized S becoming nothing more than a funky pointless shape in the background is particularly offensive). The balance is completely off leaving an unfilled void. I actually like the style they've done most of the word itself in, but when you add everything else it's definitely too little too late.

To put it another way, the SR3 logo draws attention to the word "Shadowrun". This logo draws attention to a shape in the middle of a word. The word is still "Shadowrun", but is now optional reading.

~J, desperate for something, anything that he'll actually like so that he won't look quite so much like a poo-flinging monkey.

I give it about 1+1/2 thumbs up.

I like this, of course I didn't like the skull so I may be in the minority.

The skull logo was the best, not bad me thinks, but lets face it it could have been a whole lot worse.

I think so too blakkie, but it was totally cool that way. They´ve kept it for SR Duels, so it must have been a viable option. The new logo is way better than the SR3 one in any case.

I don't know why you keep referring to it as a "cow skull," especially considering the horns. It was clearly a symbol of the occult within the game. The scroll hinted at a medieval flavor, but the circuitry within it hinted at the cybernetic nature of it all. It looks aged and 80'sish, but it wouldn't have been very hard to update it to a more modern look just by playing with the coloration and selecting a new font for the text itself. They could have even incorporated the 3rd Edition's "tribal S" itself into it.

The point is (regarding both the 3rd Edition and this new one) that the new logo does nothing to impart what the game is about. It's just a bland and unimpressive word with a curious symbol behind it, and it certainly isn't very memorable at all. Doubly so when coupled with the atrocious cover art.

If anything, it's going to turn more new players away from it than towards it. There may be a surge of sales at the very beginning from people who've heard about it and are interested in seeing it, but it's not going to be due to the cover or even the content of the game. (Though I'm sure those responsible for such things will believe as much. They certainly did with 3rd Edition, thinking the cartoony feel of the artwork was part of the reason it had an increase in sales, as has been mentioned a few times in the distant past here.)

In the Earthdawn Dragons pdf on page 37 Mountainshadow clearly states that some dragons have horns like a ram's. Let us let that issue rest from now on because we know the skull is a dragon's.

That is no Logo. It is a title. The only thing that qualifies as a logo is the snake tribal, which they insisted on putting behind the font.

Other than that, it looks ok, but I don't think you'll see this often. It somehow does not get the idea aross, that it IS a logo, but well, it can be me after all.

regards
Daniel

It isn't so much bad as it is uninspired.

Meh.

I repeat:

In the Earthdawn Dragons pdf on page 37 Mountainshadow clearly states that some dragons have horns like a ram's. Let us let that issue rest from now on, because we know the skull is a dragon's.

Just ED AFAIK

For what it's worth, the official answer from FASA in the 2nd ed days was "We don't know what it is". They just thought it looked cool.

ED dragons may have tossed in the line about rams horns to "retcon" the skull officially as a dragons skull, or it may have been coincidence. Considering that by the time ED Dragons was even written (Which was I think about 2 years before LRG published it?), the Skull logo was already gone and replaced with the new SR3 logo. And of course the fact that ED as a whole was published 3 years after SR1 came out...

<shrug> Now play nice kids...

Bull

I like it although it doesn't make me do flips. But I don't really like the cover anyways. I might just get the limited edition, just so that the cover is different ( it is just a foil cover w/ no cover right?)

We´ll see. But seeing that logo will bring back SNES memories for a lot of people who has long forgotten the title of the game. Would be foolish not to catch their fancy when it would be so easy to do so.

It's ok, nothing special though.

I really don't like the font used for 'fouth edition' though, most of it's fine but the F irritates me, it really doesn't need the downstroke that makes it look very close to a P.

It's a rams skull...take a look at this link...almost looks identical.

Rams Skull

Compare to

Beg to differ, just look at the placement of the eye sockets. Whatever the Shadowrun logo skull is, it's predatory, got those forward facing, stereoscopic vision eye-set needed to track and target moving prey to pounce upon it. While the goat skull has the wide-set eyes to cover the maximum peripheral vision range to watch for predators about to pounce on it.

It's two different critters or else a really nasty carnivorous meta-varient goat.

Personally, I think of the original logo when I think of Shadowrun. The logo was on Never Deal With a Dragon, the book that got me hooked on the game.

In any case, I don't really like this cover. It doesn't have the same dark, edgy feel I associate with the game. It almost seems like they are trying to move SR in the direction of being more heroic, maybe towards D20 Modern in style. That's not a direction I find particularly pleasing. The logo merely adds to that feel.

I'm only going to say this once. It's a Hellcow skull. Hellcow.

Not a dragon. The empty nasal socket at the bottom of the skull should immediately tell you that it's a creature with a soft nose. It's obviously a hellcow.

No, you're both wrong. It's a heavencow.

I loved the skull, regardless of what animal it came from (I'm leaning towards heavily stylised goat myself) because it lends strong horror overtones to the setting, and that's the style which I'm trying to emphasise in my own game.