When I was a little boy gamer I would spend a bit of my allowance on Electronic Gaming Monthly a great little gaming magazine. Unfortunately, young gamers will never understand what the industry was like twenty years ago. In a time before the Internet, the only place to get gaming news for a young kid was a glossy magazine. Today, EGM closes its doors and we’re losing a historic piece of gaming history.
Granted, there were other glossy magazines prized by young boys too, but we were old enough to purchase Electronic Gaming Monthly, now known as EGM by the hip and cool. Although EGM was founded in 1989, many adults between the age of 29 and 35 probably spent their youth flipping through the pages reading the reviews and editorials.
The days of the magazine are drawing to an end for many industries, with video game websites covering everything from truly hardcore to highly niche, we all demand our information as soon as possible. If a company like Ziff Davis is selling its properties, we want to know the minute it is announced, when 1UP is purchased by UGO we want to know the minute the ink dries. Why? Because we can.
January 2009 marks the last issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly. After Hearst Corporation (owner of UGO) purchased 1UP from Ziff Davis it was announced that EGM would be seeing its last issue. Sure, there was a chance this would occur without the acquisition as well but the sadness wouldn’t be any different. We’re sure the staff will find a great home writing for another publication or in the online world, but it is sad just the same.
Along with the sad news of EGM closing, we’ve heard a number of folks at 1UP have also been effected by Hearst Corporations purchase of 1UP which has many people out of a job during tough economic times. There has been rumor the 1UP podcasts being ditched as well, but we have heard nothing official yet (please comment with official stories if you hear).
Of course, 1UP is “officially” rejoicing at the news but we know this is part of the “smoke and mirrors” that is an acquisition. A few, now former, 1UP folks have been using twitter and game forums to voice their own “opinions” of the purchase.
This is a rough economic time for many people, printed magazines, online publications and others. The only shining light is knowing many of these individuals will find new places to call home or start brand new online publications to compete against their old company. Talent will not go restricted, they will no doubt group together to form new aged publications to show off why the big boys are flailing in the dark.
We wish them all well in their efforts to find success.
This weeks gaming podcast we’re doing a review of Rock Band 2 and it’s drum kit. We are also digging into some juicy news on:
Halloween is a scary time of year, no less when you’re posting a $310 million net loss. EA CEO John Riccitiello sees “weakness” at retail in October and we’re betting this isn’t the end of the road of sorrow for game publishers around the globe.
Hi guys!
Thanks for this episode! I really loved, that you talked so much about older games, so I could listen more carefully because I nearly knew all the games!
But some things to mention:
Open world Elden ring: I am completely on your side Jonah: I don’t have that much time to grind 10 hours to get to next point. I want games where I knew that they will end after 10 levels or when you solved 50 puzzles or something like that. Open world games don’t have that goal for me. I totally understand that people having fun with that, but not me 🙂
Street fighter 3: I was involved in the street fighter video game scene so I knew what you tried to analyze. In my opinion on 3rd strike came up when SF4 was released. Many old players didn’t like it and tried to show their disrespect by hyping 3rd strike again.
Hard mode / easy mode / achievements:
I think it’s hard for developers to find the best way between „not to easy but hard enough to not get bored“. Sometimes I like to change the difficulty but sometimes I feel like I don’t wanna have the choice because I want to play the game how it was intended by the developers.
Achievements: sometimes I try to get them, sometimes I don’t care. It depends on the game. It’s nice because you don’t need them, they don’t change the game itself but if you really want to can play the game a different way. So I think it’s a nice thing and it’s a nice addition.
Thanks again and please stay healthy and enjoy life!
Greetings,
Ralf