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It’s the 90s. Saturday has arrived and you are done with school for the week. You just rented or bought a video game and are diving right in. If the game is anything apart from the standard action game, you’re going to need help.
At this point, you have some options. First, you can try to look it up on a website like ign.com. If that works, problem solved. If your internet is slow, it’s only your next option. You could try to wing it and see how far you can get or your last option is a strategy guide. This came in two forms. It was either a dedicated guide to your game with pictures or you’d find a game magazine that had an inside guide about the game.
Game magazines were an interesting thing. They were either specialized by platform or they covered all things gaming and gaming culture related. Some examples of the general ones were GamePro, Electronic Gaming Monthly and Game Informer.
The more specialized magazines were platform specific. The big ones were Nintendo Power, Xbox Magazine and PlayStation magazine. PC also has PC Gamer.
I will be covering the multiplatform magazines in this feature and discuss their fall.
Game Magazines: a Slice of the Culture
The main magazines I grew up reading were Nintendo Power, Electronic Gaming Magazine, Xbox Magazine, and whatever handheld magazine I could find. All of them are entertaining to read, and they all offered unique perspectives on gaming culture.
Nintendo Power was the earliest exposure to gaming magazines. I subscribed to it in its early days, and I have collected about 100 or so issues. During my childhood, I only looked at the pictures. This was only a fraction of what Nintendo Power covered. They had everything that included news, reviews and previews of the latest and greatest in the Nintendo field. The primary platforms they covered were Game Boy and Nintendo. Then, that evolved into the Game Boy Color and Super Nintendo. The rest were the other predecessors being factored into updated pieces about previewing games and the new system’s capabilities.
Nintendo Power did a great job of taking advantage of the page space to have a balance of highly detailed sections of notes or facts about something, but it also had beautiful screenshots or concept art from many games.
The other things it also did well were have removable folded posters and even trading cards from big SNES games like Super Mario World. These elements are what set it a part from other game magazines. They would lead the way for other publishers to help expand the print industry with video games.
Nintendo Power established themselves as a worldwide brand everyone got into. It advertised some of their biggest games ever, but included the inside perspective needed to create a balance between fans and creators. They would carry this printing legacy for many years until they inevitably closed. It was a hard loss for the fans because this would not be the last magazine to close.
The Other Ones: All the General Gaming Magazines
While magazines like Nintendo Power were great for platform specialization, the multiplatform magazines picked up in traction. They did all the same things as the niche magazines, but they remained as objective as possible with their coverage of games. These magazines resonated with me better because I could objectively examine what each side offered. PC gaming blew up from the 90s onward, but it was nice to see what consoles offered and the ideas they brought to the table.
Game Informer, Game Pro and Electronic Gaming Monthly were the main magazines I remember subscribing to. I liked electronic gaming monthly over the other ones the best because it did a great job making recommendations or the cover story would lead into an upcoming game release and go into specifics about the game.
Another reason why I liked EGM the best is its creative covers. They would do an excellent job making a landscape style art cover for both the front and back page or they would create a unique theme based on the main game features they wrote about.
Whether it was the hidden issue my dad used to hide under my pillow in my room or buying a magazine at the store, game magazines ignited my interest in reading them again. I enjoyed reading about how gaming slowly evolved with new systems and games released. We lived in one of the best eras ever that pushed us into a renaissance of fresh ideas and innovation in video games.
The Fall: What Happened to Magazines?
Fast forward to the 2010s and magazines like EGM shuttered in 2014. Their parent company that owned them pulled the plug and the employees were let go. They had a minimal online site to accompany it, but it never built the momentum it once had. This was the end of an era. They had to adapt fast or get swept behind in the era that had social media take over along with more video media. Unfortunately It was too late. Other venues like Twitch and YouTube made news and events instantaneous in recordings and could get out content out faster than print.
The way things were going print media wasn’t as effective anymore. Even with the rise of online websites and social media, gaming magazines and publications Like web sites struggled to find a foothold in this modem era.
Although social media and videos conquered this era of print media instead, I still preferred physical copies of printed media. There was something magical about picking up a physical copy of a gaming magazine and carving a chunk of time reading about a hobby I cared about. What made me sad the most is print media still had the heart of video game coverage versus social media giving that instant gratification will expect it. Print media like these magazines at least made us want to look forward to something each week for each month will they cover tiny slices of the industry of video games and I love it.
We may never return to that time where print media Is dominant, but we can appreciate that it laid the ground work to give us the social media explosion and different to who grow the culture of video games overall. I hope that one day we can look back on those days of video game magazines and remember the people who typed away and were at their desk putting everything together to enjoy this wonderful hobby. I owe my early explorations of video games to gaming magazines and the people that put their heart into showing what the culture is all about.
Charle Subketkaew is a passionate gamer, storyteller, and daydreamer. When he's not immersed in a fresh new video game, he also enjoys creating art, graphic design, spending time with friends, watching movies or anime, listening to a podcast or custom playlist, writing, collecting, working out, and scouting out his next weekend adventure.
He runs a design page and website, Fortis Ideas. This is an evolution of his design and media career over the span of a decade. He works with different creators in different disciplines on a multitude of projects to push himself to create new ideas.
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