Since the physical release is a code in a box, what does the box itself look like? Is it the standard case with the cover art, is it a slipcase, is there an insert?
Asking as someone who is going to buy it and put it on a shelf regardless of what is inside it, which I am aware is ridiculous.
The cover art itself is the two protagonists and the car rather than the nine panel grid the series has used since III, which is a genuine break from their own house style.
A standard case with nothing in it is somehow worse than a slipcase would have been. At least a slipcase admits what it is.
The grid being gone is a bigger deal than the disc thing honestly. That grid was on every box for twenty five years.
Standard case with the cover art on it as far as anyone has shown. Nobody has published a photo of the insert, which is presumably a card with a code on it.
buying a box with a code in it and putting it on a shelf is not ridiculous, i am doing the same thing