Welcome to 5 years ago. This is old news man.
But things do seem to be getting worse as of late. Freaking MGS4 came with a b&w manual, but GRID came with a color manual.

Some publishers are just becoming cheap ass beyond words, while others with far more niche titles offer up all the goods.
As a fan of great game packaging it's hard to ignore how awesome some of the PS3 first party games are, with there great instruction manuals, and interior color pictures on the inside of the case. Love that.