RIP Official Nintendo Magazine

I used to know somebody that used the Textbroker website & earned £800 in a year. Might be worth checking out if you're any good at writing and need a cash boost.

Rudderless' post made me think a little about how the gaming community views games writing.

Around the time I joined here, you would have quite a sizeable number of members wanting to write about games for a living, and there were a few budding journos around. Could you say that now? Do you think that is what people aspire to?

In a way, I think people here wanted to work on a gaming mag largely because of the atmosphere publications like N64 Magazine created - it honestly did seem like a great place to work and almost like getting paid to play your hobby and have a laugh.

Is this the same now? When we read content on websites? I don't get that same feeling.

Of course, it helps that we are all a bit older and most of us are past the early teenage years of dreaming about a future career in the industry.

But still, I wonder if some of this might not die if print media disappears. You just don't get that same communal feeling on a website, nor is as much of an event as a mag hitting the shelves. Content updating every hour of every day is great, but it also lacks a certain something that a monthly mag through your door provides. I still read my old N64 magazines, but online content is often disposable and a one-time read.

I don't really agree with the thought that half the reason media/writing is dying is due to writers feeling their readership resents them. I think it is unfair to put that on readers. Maybe it is the fault of that rotten 5% of publications and writers that had their nose in the trough and ruined the industry's reputations, rather than its readers? Honest, hard-working writers like Chris would do better, I feel, to resent those people than the readers for turning their back on gaming media.

[iup=3584314]Corazon de Leon[/iup] wrote:

[iup=3584305]Buffalo[/iup] wrote:

Fade wrote:I remember when me and HuntingJake stayed up real late and bumped all of the oldest thread to the front page

Haha what a right pair of lads you are!

When I joined GR I was 13 years old, Fade(I turned 25 at the end of September). Most of the people here grew up, or at least have grown older, while on the forum. Which is immensely disturbing, when I think about it.

It's a shame to see ONM go even if I wasn't a fan - the death of dedicated Nintendo magazines in the UK is more upsetting. If it wasn't for a dedicated Nintendo magazine I'd never have made it to GR, and some people I count as close friends I would never have met or corresponded with. So I'm a bit sad to read this.

Wow now that's making me feel old, i remember joining the original gamesradar forum and just worked out that was 10 years ago now, back then i was 22. I originally was a forum lurker and then got more involved , i never really went in to off topic though until this forum had to be started up due to the gamesradar UK forum closing and now here i am a grumpy twisted old man because of GRcade

[iup=3586417]Parksey[/iup] wrote:I don't really agree with the thought that half the reason media/writing is dying is due to writers feeling their readership resents them. I think it is unfair to put that on readers. Maybe it is the fault of that rotten 5% of publications and writers that had their nose in the trough and ruined the industry's reputations, rather than its readers? Honest, hard-working writers like Chris would do better, I feel, to resent those people than the readers for turning their back on gaming media.

Sorry, I think you misunderstood me. I wasn't saying that's why traditional games writing is dying, just that the abuse you get in comments threads and on forums is part of the job. Coupled with everything else - the low pay, the long hours - it's an element of why I wouldn't recommend it as a career, not why sites are struggling.

And I'm certainly not putting it on all readers - there's a silent majority who read reviews and features and just don't comment. And there are those who do and aren't nasty about it.

But I'm not wrong in saying that's part of the reason people leave to do other things because I've spoken to several writers who've specifically cited it as a reason. And it's been there since day one - I'm not just talking about GamerGate, and it's not just a corruption/collusion/ethics thing. It's people disagreeing with the score you've given a game without having played it. It's people accusing you of not having played the game or not having played it for a specified number of hours first, of being on drugs when you wrote the review, of being paid off by Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. Of being the worst writer around, of not being worthy of writing for certain publications, of being a jaded hack, of hating games.

I certainly don't resent the people who read my work, or that of other writers. I don't resent people for not buying magazines, or spending more time watching YouTubers play games than reading reviews. That's just the reality of how the internet has changed things, and long ago I accepted that traditional games coverage was going to become more of a niche, specialist thing. I was merely referring to an element of the job that's sometimes slightly demoralising. You need a very thick skin at times.

rudderless wrote:...You need a very thick skin at times.

'The internet' has enabled everyone to be able to share their views easily and cheaply. Any opinion can instantly be derided or abused. In some ways it makes communication harder as some people take advantage of the impersonal and hidden nature of the process. A tough skin and a dash of humour can help, but I can understand how a consistent barrage of inanity could damage the spirit over time. I guess it's important not to let the gripers get you down, but in doing so it gradually eats away at any real passion for the subject.

Gamers. and .

Little quirk with the final issue... the spine picture replicates the previous issue, so instead of seeing the final piece of the Wii U we have an unfinished version.

[Ad7]That's art reflecting real life AMIRITE?!?[/Ad7] :-).

It's meant to be symbolic of the fact that Nintendo WILL NEVER END.

(Or the total absence of an art team meant an accidental design fuck-up, one of the two.)

Haven't those that write about stuff always received abuse of some sort? It's just that in the letters and email days we would never have seen any of it.

[iup=3586551]jawafour[/iup] wrote:Little quirk with the final issue... the spine picture replicates the previous issue, so instead of seeing the final piece of the Wii U we have an unfinished version.

[Ad7]That's art reflecting real life AMIRITE?!?[/Ad7] .

strawberry float off Jawa.

[iup=3586417]Parksey[/iup] wrote:Rudderless' post made me think a little about how the gaming community views games writing.

Around the time I joined here, you would have quite a sizeable number of members wanting to write about games for a living, and there were a few budding journos around. Could you say that now? Do you think that is what people aspire to?

In a way, I think people here wanted to work on a gaming mag largely because of the atmosphere publications like N64 Magazine created - it honestly did seem like a great place to work and almost like getting paid to play your hobby and have a laugh.

Is this the same now? When we read content on websites? I don't get that same feeling.

Of course, it helps that we are all a bit older and most of us are past the early teenage years of dreaming about a future career in the industry.

But still, I wonder if some of this might not die if print media disappears. You just don't get that same communal feeling on a website, nor is as much of an event as a mag hitting the shelves. Content updating every hour of every day is great, but it also lacks a certain something that a monthly mag through your door provides. I still read my old N64 magazines, but online content is often disposable and a one-time read.

I don't really agree with the thought that half the reason media/writing is dying is due to writers feeling their readership resents them. I think it is unfair to put that on readers. Maybe it is the fault of that rotten 5% of publications and writers that had their nose in the trough and ruined the industry's reputations, rather than its readers? Honest, hard-working writers like Chris would do better, I feel, to resent those people than the readers for turning their back on gaming media.

Games magazines are an 80's & 90's thing. With the internet what it is, there's no actual reason for them to exist.

I switched to the iPad versions of Edge & GamesTM and they have the right idea on how to deliver content to the users, but even then I believe they have a strawberry floating cheek to charge for it. The idea of charging for this sort of stuff is a nonsense in this day and age. There's just so much competition out there and a very high level of quality free content. It's only a matter of time until Edge & GamesTM go tits up unless they start getting funding through advertising as people are not prepared to pay for this any more. Just look at the numbers dropping year after year. It's unsustainable.

Magazines/publishers are trying to cling on to a 20th Century business model that has no place in current times.

You want it for free, Steve, you get IGN. And I don't think anybody wants that to be the future of games "journalism".

[iup=3586417]Parksey[/iup] wrote:Rudderless' post made me think a little about how the gaming community views games writing.

Around the time I joined here, you would have quite a sizeable number of members wanting to write about games for a living, and there were a few budding journos around. Could you say that now? Do you think that is what people aspire to?

In a way, I think people here wanted to work on a gaming mag largely because of the atmosphere publications like N64 Magazine created - it honestly did seem like a great place to work and almost like getting paid to play your hobby and have a laugh.

Is this the same now? When we read content on websites? I don't get that same feeling.

Of course, it helps that we are all a bit older and most of us are past the early teenage years of dreaming about a future career in the industry.

But still, I wonder if some of this might not die if print media disappears. You just don't get that same communal feeling on a website, nor is as much of an event as a mag hitting the shelves. Content updating every hour of every day is great, but it also lacks a certain something that a monthly mag through your door provides. I still read my old N64 magazines, but online content is often disposable and a one-time read.

I don't really agree with the thought that half the reason media/writing is dying is due to writers feeling their readership resents them. I think it is unfair to put that on readers. Maybe it is the fault of that rotten 5% of publications and writers that had their nose in the trough and ruined the industry's reputations, rather than its readers? Honest, hard-working writers like Chris would do better, I feel, to resent those people than the readers for turning their back on gaming media.

Money is an important issue, and if the viability of making money from games writing dries up, then the talent will most likely go elsewhere.

A lot of personal bloggers have been able to monetise their websites and make money that way. But I'm not sure if that is something that a blogger can do if they are writing about GAMES. I for one see very little evidence of any success stories coming from the gaming sector as one of the things that big name bloggers have been talking about is the ability to be geographically mobile whilst making money passively.

With many development studios downsizing, the resultant effect from layoffs etc has been a greater number of developers going it alone and choosing to go indie. This has been made all the more possible with digital distribution coming to the fore, and with self-publishing becoming altogether more easier in recent years - especially with Sony and MS also getting on the action.

What I'd like to know is, and given that Future have also announced its intentions of laying off staff, whether there will be a similar situation occurring in future where teams of writers band together to form their own indie publishing houses. I know that RPS are one of the very few that have become reasonably successful, but even for their big-name journalists, it was pretty scary on occasion. Can a lone blogger become financially successful? And does the online publishing model even allow such an improbable success story to even be possible?

[iup=3587632]Somebody Else's Problem[/iup] wrote:You want it for free, Steve, you get IGN. And I don't think anybody wants that to be the future of games "journalism".

My point is that the old fashioned monthly magazine business model is outdated. All gaming magazines will close at some point because people don't want to buy them any more, not in any serious business sustaining numbers anyway. And as I said above, as good as Edge on the iPad is (very, very good), they need to find a way of giving it away for free and funding via advertising as the numbers will ensure that will close at some point, unless Future are happy to run Edge at making next to no money or even running at a loss!

You can't charge for stuff that people can easily get for free from 1000's of other sources. It's a complete and utter nonsense. It's not the golden age of the late 80's and 90's where people only got their gaming news, previews and reviews from mags.

To prove I am right, we can look at the graveyard of all the dead magazines that have snuffed it over the last 5-10 years because their publishers thought it was still 1992.

I don't understand why magazines don't do exclusive website content if you buy the magazine. or something along those lines. Would that be so hard?

You know, kind of like Giant Bomb do.

I think I flicked through this last week, a lot more personality than I expected, a lot more than when I first browsed the editions when the Wii arrived. The previous Official Nintendo magazine when the N64 was out was what I bought alongside N64 magazine. This is a dry boring post that is slowly slipping away.

I always see Retro Gamer on the shelves and see so much to read about, but every time I leave disappointed, the articles always scraping the surface of whatever making of they're covering, and i don't think Edge's go into satisfying detail either really. If you're going to track down some guy who made a game before I was even born, interspersing the odd sentences from the person in between blocks of text feels wasteful. Miyamoto is going to die before someone picks his brains, i hope journalists can sleep well knowing that. Capitalism has really taken over when someone who understands the essence of needless play spends his whole life being a salesman focussing only on the popularity of his products/making more money. I don't follow every interview he's done, but the N64/NGC one where he talks about capturing fun like a child would catch bubbles and how young designers would pitch ideas to him that are essentially their favourite genres mixed together says so much about modern videogames.

When games become overwhelmingly interesting I expect specialized magazines to be produced, a quarterly publication like football specific The Blizzard that just gives writers the freedom to write football articles they're passionate about.

I actually interviewed the editor of Retro Gamer. We talked about why the magazine's articles aren't in depth... You can listen to it at: http://prankster101.com/podcast/prankst ... episode-5/

Edit:

And without trying to show off... I did my own magazine once. It was a free magazine when free magazines were en vogue. I only did one issue, but based on my first (ever) attempt, I got pre-orders of 25k from over 40 different game shops, as well as getting distribution from the same distributor that deals with Metro, ShortList, Stylist, TNT etc... I also managed to get a crack team of writers in place. But alas, it all comes down to money unfortunately. And the market changed. Yeah, it would have been great.

http://issuu.com/prankster101/docs/re-play_november

Now if I were to try to publish a magazine in today's market, I'd make it a paid-for magazine using cheap paper stock and sell it for about £1-1.50. Have it come out every 2-3 months or so, and generally just orient it towards opinion pieces, feature articles, makings of, and retro reviews. In other words, just tweak some of the workings of Re-Play (my free magazine attempt), and make it a cross between Edge/Games TM and Retro Gamer. With a community (user generated) aspect too. But that's unlikely to happen. I just don't think the market can support what will ultimately be seen as a vanity project. As people have said, there are no need for magazines...

It's not the content that is the problem, but the manner in which it is presented (and digested) that has become so.

I was just thinking to myself the other day wether a gaming magazine could work in a format like The Blizzard. Forget news, previews and reviews, make it something that's just as relevant to read a couple of years after it's released as it is the day of publication.

Picked up the new issue in WHSmiths today. Will leaf through it when I have time...

Bought the last issue on the way home for the holidays. Quick flick through and its looking good. Did some counting in the top 100 Nintendo games and I've played 79, own 93. Not a true fan.