COLUMN: 'Game Mag Weaseling': Mag Roundup 9/13/08

Bad news, game mag fans! If CNN and Fox News are to be believed, by the time you read this, I am going to be dead, my bloated, bleached body floating listlessly in brackish mire, surrounded by waterlogged issues of Game Players' Strategy Guide to Nintendo Games. I'm writing this on Thursday, and I've already put all my affairs in order -- my ferrets are going to the rescue, my dog to science, and my game mag collection's headed to the recycling center. Gotta save the environment, you know?

So while you're mourning my untimely death, why don't you click on and read all about the game mags released to US newsstands in the past two weeks? There's a bloody ton this time around from all corners of the world, and if you need something to read at the shelter in Austin, you're totally spoiled for choice. See you in the next life, everyone!

(Note: None of this is actually going to happen to me, since I'm not that close to the coast -- where I'm at, the worst I have to worry about is power failures -- but I was reminded of that CBS classic Category 7: The End of the World the other day and thought I'd channel it a little bit.)

Edge October 2008

Cover: Heavy Rain

This issue is 196 pages long! 196 pages! Enormous! It's like we're back in 1998 or something! Much of this sudden bloat is the result of the mag's annual "Get Into Games" section, the UK equivalent of Game Developer's Game Career Guide with much of the same sort of job profiles, school listings, and so forth that you'll find in GD's special. There's also a long piece on the game development scene in Yorkshire, a lovely burg to the north which -- no offense meant to Yorkshire residents -- sounds kind of boring. (Sumo and Team 17 are based there.)

The cover feature is pretty basic, largely a description of a demo put on by the director of a completely contrived scene that won't even appear in the final game, and the Nintendo piece (given a coverline up front), while making some use of an anonymous source allegedly close to Nintendo, is simply a more intelligent version of something you could read on NeoGAF any given evening. The neater bits are an article about the design (or, sometimes, lack thereof) in game manuals, looks back at Pikmin and NARC, and interviews with Will Wright, Peter Moore, and a few other smart-sounding lads.

That's all. Mind still slightly blown by the size of the book, however.

Retro Gamer Issue 54

Cover: OutRun

I'm too cheap to subscribe to Retro Gamer ($11.99 an issue is a bit easier to swallow than 80 pounds for a 12-month sub), so I get the issues a month late. For this Britmag, though, it hardly matters given the subject matter. The cover piece is a must-read about one of my favorite driving games of all time in terms of atmosphere, filled with neat tidbits of information -- it, along with similar making-of pieces devoted to Q*Bert and Sensible Software's Cannon Fodder, are completely radical.

Electronic Gaming Monthly October 2008 (Podcast)

Cover: Mirror's Edge

The Milkman-ization of EGM is well underway, judging by this eye-catching cover -- busy, but artistic and nice-looking on the table. The feature inside is all business, with a clear design that's obviously inspired by the game and enough cool hyperbole to rival even Shane's treatment of LittleBigPlanet's edit functions (done up in a neat spread timeline sorta thing) just a bit previous. The other main highlight: Jeremy's turn at interviewing Yuji Horii, who's suddenly showing up a lot in American mags. It's got an eye for history and is generally extremely well executed.

Hsu and Chan's replacement on the back page is "Game Over," a name that should ring a bell with moldy EGM fans. It looks like the page doesn't have any regular theme, though -- this month, it's a piece on the top ten badass undead characters from video games. I'm hoping it gets more of a stronger voice in future issues -- if it's meant to be a humor section, well, Seanbaby still has a spread just a few pages previous, so...

Total PC Gaming Issue 10

Cover: Call of Duty: World at War

I'm not sure if I'll be getting this mag every month on the stands. I might alternate between this and PC Zone, assuming my regular outlet for PC Zone doesn't give up the mag (it's been a bit spotty lately). I want something to compare with the US edition of PC Gamer, after all.

The CoD-piece (har) is pretty straightforward, as is much of the rest of the mag. In fact, unlike other books in this update, it's tough to point to any single piece or article and say "This is it; this is why I bought this mag" (though the multi-spread Bullfrog retrospective is quite nice). I think I like TPCG for its design more than anything else -- massively large screenshots, every preview or review designed as a complete textual/visual package (you can tell that the writer works closely with the art guy to make sure every page looks as pretty as possible), and a package that's among the most complete in all of print-mag-dom. That, and the large page size. I can't deny that it makes me feel like I'm getting more, although there's really not much here that ain't in PC Gamer (albeit in small form with fewer words).

Play September 2008

Cover: Tomb Raider: Underworld

Haven't had enough Lara after buying Girls of Gaming Vol. 5.5? (You did buy Girls of Gaming Vol. 5.5, right? Don't think you're too good for it, you perv!) Well, good for you, 'cos you've got ten more pages of her in this issue, though it's mostly comprised of environment shots and an extremely lengthy interview with directors Toby Gard and Eric Lindstrom. A classic Play feature, in other words, and it works -- it always works, really, if the game they're covering is worthy of the space they give it.

GamePro October 2008

Cover: Call of Duty: World at War

It's never much appreciated by readers, I don't think, but GamePro experiments at least a little bit with each issue. You can see it in their opening piece on Mirror's Edge, which is almost entirely a single screenshot blown up over a spread with maybe 120 words of text on top of it. I like the idea, as I did with the CoD feature which is classic GamePro -- lots of box-outs and lists and things. I just wish it were longer.

This issue mentions an upcoming book called The 25 Most Influential Games of All Time, apparently a hardcover coffee-table kind of thing similar to a hefty special Edge put out a year or two ago. Apparently you'll be able to order it off GamePro.com this fall, but I couldn't find any information on the website about it yet. Definitely looking forward to it, though, judging by the sample pages printed in this issue.

The Amazing Cavalcade of Fall Specials

   

Even with the twin spectres of creeping inflation and windy death from the Gulf, Future still can't stop bankrupting me with their specials. This latest batch is pretty high quality, though. Ultimate Guide to Xbox 360 Achievements is mostly original content (most prominent: a roundtable interview with assorted devs about how much they enjoy, or don't enjoy, coming up with achievements).

It reprints the failed "10K in 1 Day" piece from last month's OXM, but supplements it with an original article by Dan Amrich that extends the deadline to 30 hours and shows you how to succeed at reaching five figures -- and he didn't even use Avatar: The Last Airbender, either! Remarkably fun stuff to read, and one of the most buyable Future game specials in a while.

PlayStation Network/D, meanwhile, is a broader overview of PSN today and tomorrow. The reprint quotient is a little higher than OXM's special this season, but the original stuff -- including a critique of some of the most infamous SingStar webcam users on the net -- is super-cute.

   

The Ultimate Guide to Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is not actually a "guide" (ie. strategy) at all -- it's really an artbook and making-of special, and it's pretty nice for what it is. I don't think much of the potential audience will realize this, though, 'cos the cover suggests that it's something akin to an issue of Beckett Massive Online Gamer. Something like this would really be better served by the boutique coffee-table treatment, I think.

Also, CHEATS! Volume 16 came out. I don't know why I buy these. I think I just like the visual stimulus I get from looking up at the bookshelf and seeing CHEATS! CHEATS! CHEATS! CHEATS! CHEATS! all in a row. Does anyone have the first eight or nine volumes of this, by the way, so I can "boast" a complete set?

   

CVG Presents Issue Three departs from the making-of keepsakes that the first two were and provides us with a much more traditional fall-preview special. I will say, though, that it's a fall-preview special with impeccable visual design -- whoever the art guy is definitely earned his salary. Every single page makes perfect use of the art assets at hand, and it's really a beauty to behold. "GamePro on steroids" is what I want to call it. I fear it'll get overlooked in the marketplace, but it shouldn't.

Finally, Game Developer September 2008 isn't a special, but I put it here anyway because it's special to me. (Awwww.) Partly that's thanks to Brandon Sheffield's editorial, where he breaks out the old debate about game "journalism," how it's pretty useless, and what can be done to improve it. Partly it's the N+ postmortem, an accessible and engaging look at one of my favorite games of the past few months.

Mainly, though, it's the mind-blowing piece by Masaya Matsuura outlining his take on music games -- it starts out normal enough, but soon delves into crazy metaphysical reflections on aural stimulation that goes over my head just as quickly as the earlier article on Nintendo DS ragdoll physics implementations. Whew.

[Kevin Gifford bred ferrets and ran Magweasel, a site for collectors and fans of old video-game and computer magazines. In his spare time he did writing and translation for lots and lots of publishers and game companies. GameSetWatch will miss him terribly.]