Update: While we reached out to the community/marketing teams, we didn't receive any response or confirmation from Remedy or 505Games about the new cover artwork. However, both companies have now begun using the promotional image widely. In addition to the new appearance of it on social media channels, more and more stores have switched to the new artwork including Microsoft. [23/3/2019 at 15:39 GMT]
Initially surfacing on International Women's Day (8th March), Control looks to have had a change in box art, as new photos of the cover design were posted online. Details of this change were brought to our attention by gematsucom (a Japanese video game news site based in the US), and later retweeted by PayneReactor.
While many stores have started posting up the new box art, we've marked this as a rumour as neither Remedy or 505Games has yet to comment on the early reveal.
Control from @remedygames has an updated box art— Gematsu (@gematsucom) March 8, 2019
Old (the PEGI-rated one) vs. new (the two ESRB ones) pic.twitter.com/8r8nuOzaLx
While the older version of the box art, initially released for E3 2018 in time for the game's reveal, looks to be based on Jesse's in-game model. The newer version of the box art seems to have used the previous work as a reference, creating a gorgeous brand new look, similar to the style that promotional artwork for Alan Wake's American Nightmare had.
Gematsucom has commented that while the previous design looks to be from the PEGI (European) version, the later edition is taken from the ESRB (American). We expect that all versions will have the same artwork by launch but the early reveal was by an American-based company.
