COLUMN: 'Game Mag Weaseling': Selling Out to My Digital Overlords
April 3, 2011 12:00 AM |
['Game Mag Weaseling' is a weekly column by Kevin Gifford which documents the history of video game magazines, from their birth in the early '80s to the current day.]

Apologies if this seems a bit sudden, but I'm looking to offload nearly all of my 8000-volume magazine collection.
Wait! I can explain! Don't get the wrong idea!
My basic stance -0 that print magazines can and do produce deeper, better researched, more entertaining reading about games than online sites (though not as much as I'd like them to) -- hasn't changed a bit. I still subscribe to every US mag and a couple UK mags, and I plan to keep that up until the last print title shuffles off this mortal coil. There's too much good stuff that I'd miss otherwise.
However, I'd definitely like to get rid of a lot of the older magazines in my collection. The reason: now that I've got an iPad, I'm at the point where storing them digitally is far more convenient for my needs.
By now, I have a fairly large collection of old video game and computer magazines in digital format on my computer. They've come from assorted sources over the years -- some official releases from the old publishers, some from sites like Retromags and zzap64.co.uk, and many from some random place or another that's long slipped my memory.
For many years, this repository has rested on my hard drive, growing to a fairly vast size but only rarely getting much actual use. The reason? Reading digitized print media on a computer just isn't fun, for the same reasons reading longform articles on game websites isn't fun -- you're sitting uncomfortably at a desk or in some similarly awkward position in front of a laptop, reading text off of a screen that seems intent on causing you eyestrain until the end of your years.
The iPad I got a few months back, along with the PDF/CBZ reading software you can get for it (CloudReaders is free and good enough for my needs), changed all of that. Loading mags onto the thing is a breeze, and a great big chunk of my collection is right there, in my little tablet, ready to pick up and read at a moment's notice -- just like a print magazine, in other words, except with a distinct portability advantage. (I know I'm far behind the curve on realizing this, but cut me a break. I've spent about five years advocating print media on this weblog, after all.)
With all the old mags I could want on my iPad (not to mention a possible move coming up in my future), I'm suddenly finding myself a lot less attached to a pretty hefty part of my physical collection. But what about the part of my collection that hasn't been digitized yet?
That's a sticking point, definitely, and so I'll make this offer to whoever's interested: If there's a magazine printed before 2000 that hasn't been digitized yet, you're welcome to them for free if you're willing to scan the issues in. It doesn't have to be right away, of course -- automated scanning devices ain't cheap, after all -- but I'd be more than willing to help out with any project to get old game or computer mags in digital form as much as I humanly can.
Give me an email if any of this sounds interesting to you -- or, for that matter, you're a museum or library or some other nonprofit who'd like to receive a donation of mags. You can write to me via the mail form on Magweasel, and I'll send off a list right away. Let's see if this goes anywhere, eh? I'd reckon mags like Byte, Creative Computing, Game Players, Softalk, Next Generation, and the old GameFan could all use some help along these lines.
(PS. Hey, EGM, didn't you tease an iPad version of the digital magazine a while ago? As shown above? What happened to that?)
[Kevin Gifford owns over 8000 video-game and computer magazines. Despite this, he is capable of sustaining a conversation with a woman for at least three minutes per go. He runs Magweasel, a really cool weblog about games and Japan and "the industry" and things, and in his spare time he does writing and translation for lots of publishers and game companies.]
Categories: Column: Game Mag Weaseling
12 Comments
Please send the list to me, jason at textfiles dot com. I suspect the Strong Museum of Play could easily store this collection, and I could see about getting rare issues digitized. Please don't piece this collection out.
Jason Scott | April 3, 2011 10:38 AM
HI Kevin,
Fist of all, I have thorughly enjoyed reading your column over the years and appreciate that you speak to those like me who truly enjoy what print media has to offer and what we have enjoyed from it over the many years. Like you, I too have amassed quite the collection, both physical and digital. The difference is that, through many moves, I have had no choice but to get rid of a majority of all but a few of the magazines: I have gotten the digital bug also and have recently purchased a Fujitsu SnapScan S1500, which can easily scan a magazine (pdf or jpeg to turn into a cbz), start to finish, in just a few minutes if you don't mind tearing it apart first. I bought it with the intention of scanning lots of magazines in a relatively short period of time in mind. I am targeting the following magazines to complete a digital collection: Electronic Games (V1 and V2), Video Games and Computer Entertainment, EGM, Gamepro, Next Generation (or Edge) and Gamefan. I have scoured the internet and likely have the same digital issues as you, but would gladly pay for the shipping and handling costs to be able to scan the issues that neither of us have, so you would have no out of pocket costs. I would be a perfect person to work with on this if you were willing. Please let me know if you would like to discuss further. Thanks.
Joseph Russo | April 3, 2011 2:47 PM
HI Kevin,
Fist of all, I have thorughly enjoyed reading your column over the years and appreciate that you speak to those like me who truly enjoy what print media has to offer and what we have enjoyed from it over the many years. Like you, I too have amassed quite the collection, both physical and digital. The difference is that, through many moves, I have had no choice but to get rid of a majority of all but a few of the magazines: I have gotten the digital bug also and have recently purchased a Fujitsu SnapScan S1500, which can easily scan a magazine (pdf or jpeg to turn into a cbz), start to finish, in just a few minutes if you don't mind tearing it apart first. I bought it with the intention of scanning lots of magazines in a relatively short period of time in mind. I am targeting the following magazines to complete a digital collection: Electronic Games (V1 and V2), Video Games and Computer Entertainment, EGM, Gamepro, Next Generation (or Edge) and Gamefan. I have scoured the internet and likely have the same digital issues as you, but would gladly pay for the shipping and handling costs to be able to scan the issues that neither of us have, so you would have no out of pocket costs. I would be a perfect person to work with on this if you were willing. Please let me know if you would like to discuss further. Thanks.
Joseph Russo | April 3, 2011 2:48 PM
Kevin,
As Jason mentioned above, we would definitely be interested in preserving the magazines at The Strong museum's International Center for the History of Electronic Games, and I would love to talk further with you about these and how we might work with you to preserve these.
Best,
Jon-Paul Dyson
Jon-Paul Dyson | April 3, 2011 8:18 PM
If you had the original Pocket Gamer magazines from the early 2000's (generally covered Gameboy Color and Neo Geo Pocket Color) I would love to scan those for digital archiving. As a personal favor, just so that I can relive a very nostalgic moment of my life, if you had the issue of Pocket Gamer that covered Pokemon Gold and Silver Japanese versions, I would be really happy!
Good luck with your project, its an excellent idea.
-Danioka
Daniel Ocasio | April 4, 2011 8:42 AM
I have tons of old 1989 - 2001 Nintendo Power maganizes that i can try and scan over the next couple of months. they're alll neatly stacked though i am missing a couple years in between and a couple that are missing here and there that i lost over time. i have most of all the "Metroid" "Super Mario" and "Legend of Zelda: LttP" comic issues.
David | April 4, 2011 9:04 AM
Eh, Nintendo Power complete PDF collection files are available all over the net, save your scanner.
Matthew Szewczyk | April 4, 2011 1:44 PM
Hey Kevin,
I'm actually a recent graduate from a library studies program in Los Angeles interested in digital libraries and gaming culture. I found this post via Kotaku so I'm not sure where you are located but I would be interested in helping if I at all possible. Although a museum like the one posted above would most likely be the best bet. Let me know if I can help
best,
D
Derek Quezada | April 4, 2011 10:29 PM
Hey Kevin,
I'm actually a recent graduate from a library studies program in Los Angeles interested in digital libraries and gaming culture. I found this post via Kotaku so I'm not sure where you are located but I would be interested in helping if I at all possible. Although a museum like the one posted above would most likely be the best bet. Let me know if I can help
best,
D
Derek Quezada | April 4, 2011 10:53 PM
Hey Kevin,
I'm not sure if you remember me, but we traded some mags a few years ago.
I would love to buy some of the magazines that I am missing in my collection.
I WILL NOT tear them apart for scanning. I think it's important to keep physical copies of these magazines.
That being said I am able to scan them without degrading the condition of the mag. Also, in most cases, flat bed scanning will result in better quality scans than the rolling, bulk scanning method. I've tried both.
I've also contributed several magazines from the 80's to Retromags.
I have a few thousand gaming magazines and most are mint/well cared for, polypropylene bagged, acid free cardboard in a temp controlled dark room.
So just know your mags would be in a very safe place and well cared for for future generations of gamers to gawk at. :)
-Matt
Matt Henzel | April 5, 2011 7:01 PM
Wow, what a collection! I'm sure one of the commenters above will be able to help.
By the way - I have one question for the 'worldly' GSW commenters...
Here in Australia, I grew up reading the British mag 'Zzap 64'.
What mag or mags would be the USA equivalent? ie popular 80s Magazines that reviewed Commodore 64 games, rather than concentrating on the programming side of things? (Just want to do a bit of research.)
Gabe McGrath | April 5, 2011 8:16 PM
Hi Kevin,
As a huge classic videogaming mag fan myself, I've been following your column for some time with interest. You're articles are always a fascinating and informative read. I lost hundreds of magazines during a move in 1999, which I greatly regret now, and apprreciate any preservation of these classic mags either physically or digitally. It's a shame you have to get rid off your impressive collection there, but it's good that you are requesting that they go to somone who will preserve them further.
Finally, I feel I have to jog your memory regarding official releases. Out-of-Print Archive (www.outofprintarchive.com/) is, as far as I'm aware, the only videogaming magazine preservation project that actively seeks permission to release official digital scans of magazines. Not only do we scan the magazines, but we edit them (straighten pages, remove blemishes, enhance colouring, etc.) to a degree that you would think they were straight from the publishers' original digital copy. You may recall we shot you a message of our first official release, Mega Drive Advanced Gaming issue 2, which you had kindly posted about here. That was the first of our official releases of Maverick Magazines. We have also had the official nod from Roger Kean (co-founder of Newsfield Publications - i.e. Zzap!64, Crash, etc.) and several silent OKs from other publishers ;) Oh, and we have been steering clear from the likes of GameFan and I'd advise anyone else to do the same.
Thanks for the memories and long may it continue.
Neil
Neil Reive | April 6, 2011 1:58 AM