/vr/ - Retro Games

After I got my playstation I subscribed to PSM because lidstickers.

Which magazine used to sell DragonBall Z action figures in the back of each issue? I cant remember.

EGM was easily one of the best.

EGM was the best. It was the largest and covered all consoles. Early Nintendo Powers are also awesome because they would map out the NES levels and were essential for some games like Milon's Secret Castle, Castlevania II, and Link's Adventure.

The straightforward serious standard.

NES era NP was best, SNES/Genny era EGM was best (GamePlayers was pretty damn good too)

>>2467260
Next Generation, because it was the only video game magazine not staffed entirely with autistic manchildren.

For whatever reason, my library in Seattle used to carry the UK magazine C+VG. The writing was so much better than any American publication at the time, and they had info on computers and arcade games too. Plus imports and just more interesting coverage all around. Been downloading some old issues from archive.or lately, really nostalgic stuff.

I always liked GamePro and PC Games growing up

Published weekly.
Still thicker and more content dense than EGM (who took much of their layout and graphics from them.)
Pictures of waifus.

Gamefan was the best

>>2467430
NG was total 3D snobs. They had a strange distaste for 2D games. Funny that those 3D games they fawned over back then aged shittily in comparison.

>>2467528
I can't stand GameFan, primarily because of Dave Halverson. He later went to work on Play where his shit opinions were amplified.

>>2467260
Nintendo Power pre-SNES. They retooled their format slightly after the 16-bit gen got underway and it was never the same after that.

>>2467321
VERY early on this was actually relatively entertaining. There was a spin-off called Code Vault or something like that dedicated to cheat codes that was really useful in the pre-GameFAQs days.

PSM
cover art, extras & articles were tops

sega saturn bang

/thread

>>2467774
Fuck yes. Brutally honest, covered plenty of imports, often genuinely funny.

GameFan
I still have this exact copy somewhere
slightly worn though

Either UGP or PCXL.

Great writers, great coverage.

>>2467528
the pictures where great, but the articles and reviews were horribly written trash.

>>2467918
>pictures where great
>horribly written

>>2467573
I thought Nintendo Power held up pretty well until the N64-era, although it jumped the shark earlier for me when they canceled the Super Metroid manga by Benimaru Itoh during mid-run.

>>2467562
I find it amusing Nick Rox and Shidoshi both turned out to be sexual deviants. Then again, Shidoshi always seemed rather queer from my few interactions with him on TNL.

>>2467948
Super play was the greatest mag I ever bought.
amazing reviews the best guides ever and really funny and it introduced me to anime and jrpgs

If we look at Japan, Gamest was a very respected magazine for arcade games. Pretty much all the writers were actual hardcore arcade gamers. Aside from the main magazine they also published lots of guides for specific games, and even comic anthologies and such.

This holds a special place,

>>2467268
So many boners were popped to PSM, sooooooooo many...

>>2468226
PSM had the best art, many furious kid boners.

>>2467870

PCXL hit that perfect ratio of info to retarded shenanigans, especially once they knew they were being cancelled and stopped giving a fuck.

>>2468248
>>2468226
Them swimsuit specials.

Sinclair User

can't find a cover

>>2468248
drool Adam Hughes

>>2467528
I need to find my issue with the bullshit apology from the following month.

Gamefan
Gamest

I loved Nick Rox's anti western gaming views, especially his hatred for "Eurotrash" games. Nigga could also design godtier layouts ( FF7 spread).
GMR also gets a nood, really great mag and Gamegeezer was like a slightly less militant version of Nick Rox.

>>2467260
depends how you define "best"

- best combo of writing + entertainment: pre-1996 EGM
- best actual journalism: pre-2000 Next Generation
- best entertainment: pre-1999-ish GameFan (before ECM took over)

>>2470543
>gamest

lol be quiet, you weren't reading Gamest back n the day.

>>2467501
you also never read famitsu back in the day. pls stop lol

>>2467562
Halverson is a loon to be sure, but the magazine was always entertaining.

>>2467738
the best thing about PSM was the covers and stickers. the writing & content were not good.

>>2467948
it's interesting to hear that shidoshi is "queer" given how obsessed he was with waifus

is nick rox gay or something? why is he a "deviant"?

>>2467260

I used to have a couple years worth of these from the mid 90s. my mom threw them out.

anyone else mom be a total cunt with your old stuff?

>>2471204
My dad threw out a huge stack of EGMs that I left in the house. Initially I was mad but it wasn't long before I realized it's not like they were actually important

>>2467268
>>2467738
I miss demo discs

>>2471217
I gave em to my mom for her art class years ago and I imagine they're in a bunch of shitty collages in a landfill now.

>>2467845

>>2471204
my gave all my Lego stuff (like 2 big containers) to our tennants children without asking me. They were 2 asian kids. They moved out like 2 months later. I wasnt using them anymore but they held a lot of sentimental value as a lot of them were my brothers.

I enjoyed reading this magazine for its sense of humor. I'd read articles about games I wasn't interested in just for the humor. They often had great, huge posters, too.

>>2471550

This is the only possible answer.

Also PC Accelerator magazine, which was done by the same people

>tfw The Cleansing didn't happen

>>2470641
>>>2467948
>it's interesting to hear that shidoshi is "queer" given how obsessed he was with waifus
He still is. He's just a tranny now.
>is nick rox gay or something? why is he a "deviant"?
He's a self-confessed furfag.

>>2467319
Strange thing, I found this issue sitting in a doctor's office waiting room sometime around 1996. Dunno why I didn't take it home. Well, germs, but yeah.

>>2467738
>>2467268

How many fucking covers WASN'T Lara Croft on.

I mean sure I fapped to many of them but gaming started to feel really stale in the late 90's due to this cunt.

>>2471550
Such a cool ass magazine. I hate to use a /v/ trope but it was totally "comfy" prior to the pretentious Ultra Gameplayers our-logo-is-subtitled-in-Japanese-now bullshit.

I actually mailed Bill Donohue for a copy of his band's demo tape about Bomberman and it's got some pretty cool tracks on it. Been meaning to convert it to MP3.

>>2471763
>He's just a tranny now.

I feel like I should be surprised, yet I am not.

>>2471430
LEGOs are INSANELY expensive.

>>2470641
I actually haven't read Famitsu *since* back in the day. Last thing I read regularly was either Game Lab, or Arcadia for a year or so after Gamest called it quits.

>>2471834
The fact that all his forum avatars on TNL gave it away. He goes by Mollipen now.

http://hg101.proboards.com/thread/8579/history-videogame-magazines-croatia

Dad bought me a bunch of Hacker and PCPlay as a kid. I didn't have a pc strong enough for most of the games but I drooled over the reviews. Really great memories with these zines, I still have them in drawers and stubbornly refuse to get rid of them.

Here is a young Nick Rox in the 80's before his "blue shadows" days at Gamefan (with his mother noted for being a rockstar groupie of the 70's).

>>2471821
>>2467738
>>2467268

I love how much they loved Dino Crisis

>>2468054
>>2468063
Shit, I remember getting OPSM issues as gifts fucking forever ago. I even got the one that had all those Net Yaroze games on the demo disc. Total Soccer and Psychon were fucking great.
>tfw they were all thrown out and the issues will probably never be archived

>>2472584
I have loads of discs including the Yarzoe special.

Not saying it's the best but I highly enjoyed having a subscription to the DC magazine back when the Dreamcast was relevant. Gave them all to my nephews 10yrs ago-ish in pristine condition. I shutter to think what they look like now.

>>2471763
>>>/v/

Sega visions was free, that just makes it Bretty good

>>2472691
It's true though. They even call themselves that.
https://twitter.com/mollipen
https://twitter.com/nickroxnrx

>>2473104
and yet I'm expected to care?

>>2473107

no one cares what you care about

>>2473326
I do

Wish I still had all my old issues...

>>2467260
PCXL was one of the only good ones that ever was.

It would be nice to find a bunch of full scans of Gamefan issues. Someone needs to scan the whole thing and torrent it or something.

>>2467865

GAMEFAN WAS THE FUCKING GREATEST

most of /v/ will never know how fucking awesome gamefan was

>>2476479
The often psychedelic layouts were the stuff of legend: you would almost think that you too got a hit of the acid Halverson took when he wrote the Cybermorph article.

>this thread
>no mention of based Tips & Tricks
/vr/ i'm dissapoint

>>2476554
T&T and egm2/expert gamer were by far the best. Previews and reviews are gine, but in a pre-internet age the info those two had was invaluable for playing and beating games.

>>2476554
I had a ton of those magazines but sold them all a few years ago for like two bucks to fucking Half Price Books.

>>2468248
>>2467870
>>2472170
>>2476607
> the shit storm if these were released in 2015

someone please remind me why we can't make
media catered to a male demographic anymore?

Report and ignore.

>>2467321
This. EGM was okay, but GamePro was it.

>>2467865
This shitty grocery store rag.

>>2476554
I thought I did, but I guess that was in the last magazine thread. Tips & Tricks wasn't the sexiest looking magazine, but I did enjoy going through it.
EGM is the one you want to date. T&T is the one you want to marry.

there can be only one

1982

Before your time.

>>2476710

Hoooly shit.

Thanks /vr/ that shit brought me way back.

Fuck I've wasted my life.

I regret nothing.

>>2476984
>electronic wargames
This should have stuck.

>>2476934
T&T had some really awesome features in it, like interviews, and articles about little-known games. I really enjoyed those.

>>2477213
They had great content except for the tips & tricks portion, which was half the magazine and just the same stuff reprinted every month.

>>2477185
Wargames were a thing before video and computer games, basically tabletop versions of famous theatres of war like Normandy. Like and much more complicated game of Risk and not unlike D&D.

How about some LamePro.

>>2477552

>>2477554

EGM by a long shot. I actually have dozens of EGMS from 1994 up through the 00s. Every few years, I go back and re-read them chronologically, for nostalgia's sack, while replaying games mentioned in the issues along the way.

That said, while mid-90s EGM is nostalgic, the best era for editorial content was the the 90s up to early 2003. The largest issues, the greatest amount of info per issue, Hsu and Chan, getting to know the Review Crew better than before, magazine design that still looks respectable today, etc.

Mid-2003 redesign was the beginning of the decline and when I cut off my chronological re-read every time.

>>2476694
landwhales

>>2476706
gamepro was shit, literally

Sega Pro and CVG

>>2477880
this.

protip: I still bought it anyways though.

>>2472691
>>2473107
Triggered!

>>2477880
The Video Games relaunch of VG&CE was the only gaming publication worse than GamePro. What kind of generic name was "Video Games" anyway for a rag?

>>2471732
>PS2's Zelda killer
>Dark Cloud

how wrong they were

>>2476694
That Play cover was controversial even back in 2009.

>>2476970
Love N64 Magazine even though I wasn't a Nintendofag.

>>2477930
Dark Cloud is better than most Zeldas though.

>>2476473
Halverson apparently scared off at least one site from providing Gamefan scans (threatened legal action), but so what? This is the Internet, after all: Rom sites regularly defy Nintendo et al. so a fucking ancient mag should be nothing for someone with some balls to upload.

>>2480879
Halverson doesn't own the rights to GameFan and hasn't for over 15 years, so he can fuck right off.

>>2477927
that's just good SEO

>>2477916
>he paid for gamepro
Dude, I got gamepro for FREE for several, several years. They constantly gave out "complimentary" subscriptions to gamepro, because they wanted to boost their subscription number to increase advertiser revenue. And even as a free magazine, I still thought it was shit.

I used to get a ton of print magazines for free, by looking up "complimentary subscription", the best score was a DECADE long subscription to EGM. Which unfortunately was changed to that piece of shit Maxim after Ziff-Davis cancelled EGM. Which I still get monthly copies of, and promptly throw away. These days the number of freebies has dwindled, or turned to related career field only free subscriptions primarily aimed at doctor's offices.

>>2467260
From UK and mainly into PS1 in the 1990s/early 2000s. There was no 'best' as such, I just bought whatever looked good each month. These were some I remember that didn't suck. Sadly all my old mags got thrown out before retro games became cool otherwise I would have scanned them. Overall my favourite was PLAY.

PLAYSTATION WORLD magazine made a late debut but was packed with info and really good value for money from what I remember. Glossy and had style. The first issue also came with a free memory card (although it didn't fit into the playstation very well).

OFFICIAL UK PLAYSTATION MAGAZINE was printed on good quality paper, didn't seem biased, but kinda expensive considering they were a bit stingy with number of playable demos. I bought this one every few months when there were demos and yaroze games I liked. Pretty good all round.

TOTAL CONTROL was an awesome mag but didn't last beyond a dozen or so issues. I had a copy of all the issues that were published.

EDGE magazine was pretty good quality. I bought some of that but didn't really like their style. When I was a kid reading them it felt like they were a bit pretentious - more style over susbtance.

PLAY. This is the magazine I bought most often. Seemed the best to me as it was unbiased and had right amount of humour and different content. I heard it changed after 5th gen and became worse though.

CVG. Good all round, although a bit short from what I remember. Didn't buy many of this for some reason. I think it was because the newsagents didn't stock it rather than because it was bad. I remember being annoyed by the fact that they wouldn't tell you everything about the game when reviewing it. They would give little bits of info over many issues but when they came to review they were more or less just saying whether it was bad or good. Good way to make money lol.

>>2480912
Yeah, retromags apparently backed down after he huffed and puffed about it but there is nothing stopping someone like archive.org from hosting the whole Gamefan run (other than a shitload of scanning, but Internet Archive has serious scanning capability and would just need someone with the complete run).

I wonder about the rights to Gamefan myself: the relaunched Gamefan does have Halverson at the helm, but who actually owns the name? The convoluted history of the mag has shown some shady "money people" behind the scenes over the years and Dave's claims are, as you said, dubious.

The whole history of Gamefan is fascinating stuff. The import game shop Diehard, that Gamefan grew out of, looked like an amazing place (PC Engine and Mega Drive in neon? YES.) They even had a chain of these shops...cool stuff.

The complete story of Diehard Gamefan is the stuff of legend: http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/gamefan/GameFAN.htm

>>2481845
Holy shit, that article is hilarious.

>I'm not sure if this was before or after the authorities came looking for Andrew for obtaining a fake ID under the name "Guile" from Street Fighter 2, and had used it to get a passport and went to Japan on it, but I'm pretty sure it was before spiking the company coffee pot with lsd.

>>2467260
>better than Mortal Kombat 2

I don't know...