Why album covers are square but game covers aren’t?
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Album covers are formatted square to fit on Vinyl 33 record sleeves, and later CD covers that were the same shape. CD jewel cases were made with square art so that existing Vinyl art could be shrunk down to fit.
Video games have traditionally used rectangular boxes going back to the Atari days but most games today still have covers formatted for DVD jewel cases that were rectangular.
DVD jewel cases are rectangular for the same reason CD jewel cases are square. The previous format (VHS tapes) were rectangular.
Before the CD most music album covers were square to fit nicely around a vinyl record so all the artwork were square. Granted the artwork made for compact cassettes were rectangular but with a very high aspect ratio. So the music CD album covers were usually made square around the CD so they could reuse the artwork from the vinyl records.
Similarly a lot of game artwork were made for square boxes around the cartridges. But there were a major difference between music and games. Music formats were all standardized. All CD players could play all CDs. But for games there were a huge difference in the consoles, so this had to be clearly marked on the box. And people wanted the consoles with the most games so the console manufacturers wanted games shelves full of their logo on all the games. So they demanded that games all had a big logo on them with the console both on the front and on the spine. And they all had to be the same format so they could be neatly stacked on shelves. To fit square artwork on a box with a huge banner over it they went for a rectangular box. This also made it fit more neatly into book shelves. So while music shops had to build new shelves for CDs the computer shops just bought standard bookshelves, or more likely used the ones from the bookshop that just went bust in the mall where they opened.
Album covers descended from vinyl record albums. The covers didn’t need to fit any kind of form factor other than big enough to hold and protect the record. So, the cases were square. CD cases are *mostly* square with a bit more space for the hinge.
Game covers descended from VHS covers, by way of DVD cases. Covers for cartridges had to fit the form of the cartridge to some degree – if cases were used. VHS, though, was the technology you would have around your television and furniture was developed to hold a library of VHS tapes. The first CD-based games were kept in cases like [music CDs](https://www.google.com/search?q=ps1+game+case&sca_upv=1&hl=en&authuser=0&sxsrf=ACQVn09d4cncxK6zY8mAkzwOf9XQb1in4g:1713381020841&iflsig=ANes7DEAAAAAZiAsrObVNJAEeT11vaoL7rs4iDJfUuA5&udm=2), but the next generation were kept in DVD cases: rectangular cases that fit the space of a VHS tape. It fits the furniture better and looks more like a library of books. That history has been preserved through the generations.
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