Nintendo Gamer is dead, Kazuo is one year closer to death - The Bear and Badger

Mod74

In some ways I agree with Simon Pegg and do pine for a slower time and the excitement of discovery in a monthly magazine. But that's possibly romanticising it and ultimately that's just not the world we live in any more. At least it's not the world we live in. Plenty of my friends only find out about games when either I tell them about them or they see them on TV.

retroking1981

Moot_Geeza wrote:

Was Arcade the Neil West one? I used to buy it but didn't really rate it.

At one point in late 1993 I bought pretty much every games magazine on the shelves just to gawp at the same screen grabs of Sonic 3 and read slightly different previews filled with very little information. So off the top of my head, in one month I probably bought: The Official Sega Magazine, Mean Machines Sega, Megatech, Megadrive Advanced Gaming, Mega, Mega Action, CVG, Diehard Gamefan, Gamesmaster, and I dare say a couple more. Obsessive.

That's about Â£20 worth of mags in a single month. You could have got yourself a decent second hand megadrive game for that back then.

Mod74

When I was about 16/17 we had to get three buses to the one store that traded in second hand SNES games. A days worth of effort and there was always the chance that what you got was a pile of rubbish. I must have some super rosey tinted specs because I remember it being great.

Shame that with Steam and Amazon and XBLA I'll never have that experience/thrill again. Which is a good job really as I'm far too lazy.

Blue Swirl

Oh damn. I nearly picked up last month's issue, but a quick flick through in the shop revealed it wasn't quite adult enough for grown up readers, nor quite child friendly enough for the young 'uns. Plus I can't see the teenage CoD crowd warming to it much, nor the middle-aged Brain Training lot caring enough to drop cash on a mag each month. Must have been a tough sell for Future Publishing.

Sad times indeed.

I'll grab the final issue, should be interesting to see all the front covers. I wonder how many I'll recognise. Man, it's been years since I heard the name Super Play.

loxdog

I have over hundred copies of N64/NGC/N-Gamer magazines in my room back at my parent's house. Got every month since early 1998, and only stoppedÂ subscribingÂ earlier in the year as my Nintendo love faded. Realised I don't have a 3DS, don't want a WiiU and I barely play on the Wii or the DS so I felt I'd been holding on for far too long.Â

Brilliant mag, even in some of the early N-Gamer issues, and the N64/NGC issues were my gospel on buying games at that time. However, I think it tried to aim a bit "younger" over time and Matthew Castle is a terrible journalist (sorry Matthew).

Now, what to do with all those old copies...

Mod74

I remember ringing Super-Play in about 1992 to order a copy of a back issue. They took my debit card details.

They never took the money and never sent the mag. Rot set in early.

hylian_elf

Dante speaks sense in his last post.

I'm like him.

I_R

bogard wrote:

So, is EDGE next?

regmcfly wrote:

Last month I moved my subscription for Edge over to Nintendo Gamer, and obviously now Nintendo Gamer has gone tits up.

Omens are bad.

regmcfly

bwhaah.

regmcfly

TBH from Kaz and I's conversation with Edgeman, I don't think it'll go down, it's still seen as the flagship.

Mod74

mk64 wrote:

Could a gaming mag switch to a smaller weekly segment like front?

I know you meant printed mag but I was listening to Giantbomb earlier and it struck me that if you didn't slavishly follow news then a weekly podcast (probably one a bit tighter than GB) would probably give you all the info you need.

One of my mates doesn't check game news every day but he watches the Invisible Walls video podcast and that gives him all the info/opinion he needs. With moving pictures to boot.

regmcfly

The Giantbomb podcast is a 3 hour baggy joy.

retroking1981

This has made me realise how few video game magazines there are these days.

To my knowledge Future has:
Multiformat: Edge, Gamesmaster
PS: PlayStation Official Magazine, PSM3
XB: Official Xbox 360 Magazine, Xbox World
N: Official Nintendo Magazine, (Nintendo Gamer RIP)
PC: PC Gamer

Image has:
Multiformat: Gamestm
PS: Play
XB: X360
N: None
PC: None
Misc: Retro Gamer

and emap have given up completely.

I could be wrong but didn't Future consolidate a third xbox mag into the official one recently? I wouldn't be to suprised if they also close Xbox World and PSM3 and just have the 3 official Mags for single formats. Either that or Image jumping in and releasing a independent Nintendo mag in time for WiiU.

regmcfly

ONM needs to smarten the fuck up for the WiiU launch. The podcast can be great fun, but I think that's mostly due to Chris Scullion's presence - he's kind of anarchic and brilliant, but a Nintendo Gamer dude.

Moot_Geeza

retroking1981 wrote:

Was Arcade the Neil West one? I used to buy it but didn't really rate it. At one point in late 1993 I bought pretty much every games magazine on the shelves just to gawp at the same screen grabs of Sonic 3 and read slightly different previews filled with very little information. So off the top of my head, in one month I probably bought: The Official Sega Magazine, Mean Machines Sega, Megatech, Megadrive Advanced Gaming, Mega, Mega Action, CVG, Diehard Gamefan, Gamesmaster, and I dare say a couple more. Obsessive.

That's about Â£20 worth of mags in a single month. You could have got yourself a decent second hand megadrive game for that back then.

True.Â It didn't help that Sonic 3 was probably the first minor letdown I experienced with a flagship title. The full extent of its charms were revealed when Sonic & Knuckles was released, but as a standalone title it was a bit weak.

adored

I used to love N64 magazine, had almost every issue, only got rid a few years ago after a move.

Those trays they used to give away for storing your cartridges were a godsend as well, stupid Nintendo cardboard packaging.

Kazuo

I was gutted to read this yesterday. Been a subscriber for about 14 years, and reading it growing up was a big part of what made me want to get into journalism. I wrote some sad words about it on my blog last night.Â If you're into that sort of thing.

Matt_82

retroking1981 wrote:

Good shout on Arcade, that was a great mag! Another multi format one I loved was Ultimate Future Games. The mag probably wasn't that great looking back but I think it was just the excitement of the era. PS, Saturn, 3DO, Jaguar, CD32, CD-i and ULTRA64, lol. So many consoles back then.

Wow that is a blast from the past. Â Would never have remembered that had you not mentioned it. Â I actually had a CD32 as well.

afgavinstan

When is the last issue available?

regmcfly

Just read. Great post. AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Edit - at Kaz

Gav it says 7 September inside the last issue

Kazuo

regmcfly wrote:

Just read. Great post. AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY Edit - at Kaz

Thank you. I now consider this my proxy birthday thread.

EvilRedEye

Kazuo wrote:

regmcfly wrote:

Just read. Great post. AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY Edit - at Kaz

Thank you. I now consider this my proxy birthday thread.

Thread title amended appropriately.

Kazuo

Hahaha, I'm touched. Maybe Future will kill me next.

Ian

Nice blogpost there Kazuo. Didn't realise you were with OPM, you should have come and said hello.

Kazuo

Swung by the Edge digs a couple of times and chatted with Nathan, but nobody else was around. You guys have a very nice TV. I think you might have leaned over me to give someone a hat at some point, but I may have been dreaming.

Ian

The amusing panda hat? Yes, that was me.

beano

When is a panda hat not amusing?

Birthday *fistbump* Kaz, again.

regmcfly

Do they only have one tv at Edge? Coz, fucksake.

mistercrayon

Its a Sony bravia!

Gamermike

N64 Magazine was brilliant, and Kazuo's blogpost brought back some long forgotten distant memories. I had no idea N Gamer was a successor to the N64 and Superplay magazines, unfortunately in NGC days I lost interest for a while and then started reading Edge.

What sticks in my mind were the writers, everything was so entertaining to read and genuinely funny. I also remember the magazine was nearly always late out, making the already agonising wait between issues feel even longer.

As an aside - just a few weeks after he left Rare, I randomly wrote an email to Will Overton as his awesome artwork was an inspiration to me as a youngster and the good ole N64 mag. Out of the blue, I got a reply from him a month or so afterwards thanking me for bringing him back some fond memories, offering me some friendly advice and gave feedback on some of my work. Struck me as a genuinely nice chap.

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