History Main / ArtworkAndGameGraphicsSegregation

* Despite Marth receiving a redesign in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemMysteryOfTheEmblem'', his battle sprite in Book 2 still depicts Marth's appearance from ''VideoGame/FireEmblemShadowDragonAndTheBladeOfLight'', pantless and all. While his portrait in Book 1 resembles his original appearance, his portrait in Book 2 closely resembles his redesign, so it is likely a case of graphical oversight.

** ''VideoGame/KirbysDreamLand3'': Ado is an unusual case. In her official artwork, she' depicted with a stout body, mittenlike hands, and BlackBeadEyes, which matches her sprite. However, the close-ups of her depicted in the game's credits show her with more realistically designed hands and eyes with visible sclerae. ''Kirby: Art & Style Collection'' features [[https://cdn.wikirby.com/8/8f/Ado_Adeleine_2.png a page]] discussing Ado's design, revealing that her more detailed appearance in the game's credits is indeed her intended appearance and that her sprite's appearance, which the official art used as reference material, is a simplified rendition made due to graphical limitations.

* ''VideoGame/KirbysAdventure'':
** Official artwork depicts Kirby's appearance remaining unchanged whenever he obtains a Copy Ability, save for Ice and Freeze, which turn his skin pale blue. While his Ice and Freeze colorations carry over to his in-game sprites, other copy abilities recolor his skin peach and make him slightly fatter (best shown by the arm facing away from the camera no longer being visible) for accessibility purposes.
** [[spoiler:Nightmare's Power Orb form]] is black with yellow stars in official artwork, but the in-game sprites use a pink and blue gradient with white stars. Depictions in later games and the VideoGameRemake ''Nightmare in Dream Land'' would follow the in-game graphics' example.

* ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight'': Richter Belmont's sprites in-game depict him with short hair, similar to his previous appearance in Dracula X. However, his artwork (and even his in-game portrait) show him to have at least shoulder-length hair and be wearing a completely different outfit with a BadassLongcoat, reflecting the TimeSkip that occurs after the prologue. The UpdatedRerelease for UsefulNotes/SegaSaturn redrew his sprites in the main scenario to better reflect his artwork.

* ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight'': Richter Belmont's sprites in-game depict him with short hair, similar to his previous appearance in Dracula X. However, his artwork (and even his in-game portrait) show it to be at least shoulder-length.

** Sometimes the Album art that you get has the main character wearing an outfit that doesn’t fit the requirements for the stage that they represent.

* ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda'' series:

*** Despite the game's artwork firmly establishing the Master Sword's iconic appearance even today, in-game it appears to have an indistinct brown hilt that becomes white after the sword is tempered later on. This is especially egregious since the sword otherwise appears relatively accurate until Link actually obtains it.
*** Aghanim's robes are portrayed as green in-game but are depicted as red in all other media.
** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', promotional artwork depicts Link with a sash across his chest for his scabbard. However, his in-game model just has his scabbard [[SticksToTheBack inexplicably stick to his back, with no strap]]. The sash was added in ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask Majora’s Mask]]'' and later back into ''Ocarina'' via the 3D remake.

* ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'': The NES and SNES games feature numerous deviations between the official art and how characters appear in-game:

** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', the promotional artwork depicts Link as having a shoulder strap for his scabbard. However, his in-game model just has his scabbard [[SticksToTheBack inexplicably stick to his back, with no strap]].

** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', the promotional artwork depicts Link as having a shoulder strap for his scabbard. However, his in-game model just has his scabbard [[SticksToTheBack inexpicably stick to his back, with no strap]].

** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', the promotional artwork depicts Link as having a strap for his scabbard. However, his in-game model just has his scabbard [[SticksToTheBack inexpicably stick to his back, with no strap]].

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaALinkToThePast'':
** Famously, the color of Link's hair in this game. He appears dirty blonde in official artwork, but pink in-game. There have been theories for why this is, ranging from graphical limitations to consistency with his pink bunny form later on, but all of this has been disproven.
** Despite the game's artwork firmly establishing the Master Sword's iconic appearance even today, in-game it appears to have an indistinct brown hilt that becomes white after the sword is tempered later on. This is especially egregious since the sword otherwise appears relatively accurate until Link actually obtains it.
** Aghanim's robes are portrayed as green in-game but are depicted as red in all other media.

In older video games, this was most often due to graphical limitations which didn't allow for the characters to appear in full color and at much lower resolution than on modern displays, thus requiring the sprite artists to get creative with what they had (if not due to needing the characters to stand out from the background.) It can also occur, though, due to communication breakdowns between artists and game developers, leading to characters being depicted with things and in ways that simply don't appear within the game itself (ie: Someone depicted with long hair in all artwork, when its chopped short in the sprite, or always carrying a rifle in their profile photo, when they are clearly established wielding dual pistols.)

* ''VideoGame/DiscoElysium'': In Kim Kitsuragi's character portrait, he wears his jacket zipped up. His in-game model however wears the jacket un-zipped.

* ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'': The NES and SNES games feature numerous deviations between the official art and how characters appear in game:

* ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends'' is a game whose art direction and graphical quality [[ArtEvolution have evolved]] non-stop through more than a decade, with a cast of over 150 unique playable champions to sell the series. This unfortunately results in the game's assets and promotional material showcasing a huge dissonance in quality and tone, especially the older a character is. Take Malphite for example, a giant rock elemental who in lore is sleek, sharp and built like a mountain. His game model meanwhile, which was created in 2009, is a bumpy, low-fidelity Warcraft-type creature with much goofier proportions and features.

** Aghanim's robes are portrayed as green in-game, but are depicted as red in all other media.

*** Spinarak is canonically pale green with yellow legs and dark turquoise accents, but it's initial sprites were dark blue and purple. This would be corrected in ''Crystal''.
*** Sneasel's official art depicts it with a dark blue body and red feathers, but it's ''Gold/Silver'' sprites appear brown bodied with pale cyan feathers. This would likewise get corrected in ''Crystal''.
*** Bellosom is an interesting case. The artwork gives it dark blue skin like the rest of it's evolutionary family, with red flowers on it's head and a green/yellow grass skirt. It's ''Gold/Silver'' sprites instead show it with lime green skin and pink flowers and skirt (due to palette limitations of the time the flowers and skirt had to share the same color). While it's flowers and later it's skirt would be changed to match the artwork, it has kept the green skin ever since with the ''artwork'' changing to reflect it.

*** Banette is shown in official art to have pink eyes, a yellow tuft on its tail and a golden zipper mouth, while the in-game sprite makes them all orange. The sprite also lacks the distinct triangle shape of the upper half of its eyes and the horns on its head also look smaller.

* ''VideoGame/SporeCreatures'': Numerous creatures on the cover do appear in-game, but use different color schemes and slightly different parts. This is most obvious with the Meepers; on the cover the creature is green with light green spots on its wings, but in-game the creature is bright red with solid yellow spots along its back and wings.

*** Princess Peach is depicted with blonde hair and a pink dress in official art, but is a redhead with a white dress in-game. This would go on to affect her depictions in ''WesternAnimation/TheSuperMarioBrosSuperShow'' and ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfSuperMarioBros3'' thanks to the production staff having only a limited amount of reference material to go off of. [[VideoGame/SuperMario3DWorld Twenty-eight years later]], Peach's white with red trim dress would be acknowledged by making it her Fire Form.

*** Official artwork frequently depicts Bowser wearing a large blue cape, which is absent from his in-game sprites. This especially stands out as the game released in 1988, by which point Nintendo had gotten enough of a hang on the NES's graphical capabilities to make the idea feasible.
** ''VideoGame/SuperMarioWorld'': Bowser's official artwork depicts him with his standard orange skin color, but due to a developer oversight, his skin is the same shade of green as his shell. Graphic designer Shigefumi Hino openly regretted this mistake, stating that he especially felt bad about it due to Bowser being a central character to the game. Consequently, the ''Super Mario World'' mode in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioMaker'' and ''VideoGame/SuperMarioMaker2'' features new Bowser sprites based on his modern design.

* ''VideoGame/TalesOfPhantasia'': In the original SNES version the party's sprites differ greatly from their official artworks. Specifically, Cress has a blue cape instead of red, Chester has his EyesAlwaysShut and wears a cape, Mint has an ushanka and blue robes instead of nurse-like dress, Arche wears a dress instead of poofy pink pants, and Claus looks like an university graduate instead of his vaguely-shamanistic look. This is a result of the game being nearly finished when Creator/KosukeFujishima was hired to do character design. As a result, the party was left stuck with their "beta" costumes, which reused several unrelated sprites in order to fit the game into the SNES cartrige, and couldn't be changed easily. Meanwhile, the BigBad had more memory space dedicated to him, and so Fujishima' design was implemented for him alone. When the PS remake came along, one of its selling points was that characters' sprites now matched the offical art.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyV'': Faris looks very different in-game compared to her concept art. In the official art, she has white hair and dons a black BadassLongcoat over a flowing white blouse with matching thigh-high boots. In-game, meanwhile, she has pink hair and wears a blue coat over a light blue dress, brown boots, and a green scarf.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI'': Terra's official artwork has her with blonde hair, but her sprite has green hair. However, this is fairly typical of the pixel-based ''Final Fantasy'' games, as they tend to have their in-game art deviate a lot from their Creator/YoshitakaAmano made concept art. In particular Faris from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyV'' has a very different in-game sprite compared to her concept art.

** ''VideoGame/MarioBros'': In the UsefulNotes/Atari2600 port, the official art work depicts Mario in a white cap & overalls with a red shirt and Luigi in a beige cap & overalls with a brown shirt. In-game, Mario wears blue with a brown shirt, while Luigi wears green with a brown shirt.

In older video games, this was most often due to graphical limitations which didn't allow for the characters to appear in full color, thus requiring the sprite artists to get creative with what they had (if not due to needing the characters to stand out from the background.) It can also occur, though, due to communication breakdowns between artists and game developers, leading to characters being depicted with things and in ways that simply don't appear within the game itself (ie: Someone depicted with long hair in all artwork, when its chopped short in the sprite, or always carrying a rifle in their profile photo, when they are clearly established wielding dual pistols.)

* This was very common in the [[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue first generation]] of Franchise/{{Pokemon}}, with various Pokémon bearing very little resemblance to their official artwork (Gastly for example is just a diffused cloud of gas with a face rather than having a defined head). It wouldn't be until ''Yellow Version'' that the sprites would start to line up with the artwork, and even in later games there would be the occasional case of a Pokémon's in-game color pallet not lining up with the art.

* ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'': Due to the series debuting in 1985, at a time when video game graphics were a lot more restrictive, there are multiple aspects of characters' official designs that were omitted or altered in their in-game sprites and models:

*** In official artwork, Mario wears a red cap & overalls with a blue shirt, while Luigi wears white, with a green shirt. Contrary to popular belief, Luigi's colors matched his sprite at that point in time, but in-game, Mario wore a brown shirt. Luigi would not appear in-game with a green hat/overalls and a blue shirt until the game was remade on VideoGame/SuperMarioAllStars.

*** Bowser is depicted in much of the game's Japanese artwork with blue skin and a yellow mohawk, but is green-skinned and bald in-game. Later artwork would update Bowser's appearance to match his sprite, while his initial blue-skinned look would be carried over to his brother, who appears as an enemy in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBrosTheLostLevels''.

** ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'':
*** Banette is shown in official art to have pink eyes, a yellow tuft on its tail and a golden zipper mouth, while the in-game sprite makes them all orange. The sprite also lacks the distinct triangle shape of the upper half of its eyes and the horns on its head also look smaller.
*** Dusclops has five-fingered hands in its official artwork, but the in-game sprites have four-fingered hands instead.
*** Salamence is shown to be the same shade of blue as its base form Bagon in official art, but the in-game sprites make him purple instead.

** ''VideoGame/SuperMario64'': Bowser's in-game model features much more exaggerated proportions than his official artwork, featuring a bigger and wider head and stubbier limbs. This version of his design would become standard in most other 3D N64 appearances.

[[quoteright:840:[[VideoGame/SporeCreatures https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/artistingame_sc.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:840:Why doesn't mine look like that?]]

*** Princess Peach is depicted with blonde hair and a pink dress in official art, but is a redhead with a white dress in-game. This would go on to affect her depictions in ''WesternAnimation/TheSuperMarioBrosSuperShow'' and ''WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfSuperMarioBros3'' thanks to the production staff having only a limited amount of reference material to go off of.

[[quoteright:240:[[VideoGame/SporeCreatures https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/artistingame_sc.jpg]]]]