1989-2009 - EGM is Dead - RIP

gigadrive32 · Post by **gigadrive32** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 1:22 am

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_i ... tory=21759

Breaking: Ziff Davis Sells 1UP To UGO/Hearst, Closes EGM Following repeated rumors to the effect, Gamasutra has learned that Ziff Davis has sold its 1UP division to Hearst's UGO Entertainment, and is shutting long-running print magazine EGM in the process.

According to a statement received by Gamasutra, Ziff Davis Media has now officially announced the sale of the 1UP Digital Network to Hearst's UGO Entertainment division.

The sale includes 1UP.com, Mycheats.com, Gametab.com, and
GameVideos.com, and specific financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

In association with this, Ziff Davis Media's EGM Magazine, a consumer game print mainstay since 1989, will be discontinued. The January 2009 issue will be the final printed issue.

Sad news, I got into gaming mainly because of EGM's preview of the 16-bit consoles, this issue in fact:

Never thought the day would come that my favorite magazine would die. Obviously print media became much less relevant a decade ago with the popularity of the internet/world wide web, and now another decade has gone by making print media completely obsolete. Still, it sucks.

brokenhalo · Post by **brokenhalo** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 1:31 am

just saw the news over at 1up. this is terrible. i've read egm for about 15 years, been a subscriber for 8. ugo can go f**k themselves. everyone from egm and gamevideos has been laid off already. it would be nice to see them form their own site together.

RIP EGM

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 1:36 am

Is there a webpage out there with thumbnails of covers for every issue?

Anyway, RIP.

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 1:45 am

umm.. why would they buy something just to close it down? does the buyer already own a bunch of competing gamesmagazines or what?

gigadrive32 · Post by **gigadrive32** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 1:58 am

Turrican wrote:Is there a webpage out there with thumbnails of covers for every issue?

Anyway, RIP.

http://www.magweasel.com/wiki/Electronic_Gaming_Monthly

They have the covers of most issues. Other magazines also.

Battlesmurf · Post by **Battlesmurf** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:00 am

haha. I have shitty timing. I buy EGM's from time to time. Amazon had a promotional offer for magazine subscriptions so I bought one. Isn't supposed to go into effect until March.

Boo.

Skykid · Post by **Skykid** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:17 am

Weren't they going downhill anyway?

They had some real blunders in terms of reviews in the past too iirc.

neist · Post by **neist** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:30 am

I dunno about you guys, but I'm going to go drink a bit in their honor.

Crappy times for all. See you in the drunk thread sooner or later.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:32 am

EGM wasn't that good anymore anyway. I stopped reading it years ago. Yeah.. there's Lamepro... but who cares about them now?

neist · Post by **neist** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:37 am

Yea, but the guys who got canned were good guys.

This just sucks.

Udderdude · Post by **Udderdude** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:47 am

This sucks, Broken Pixels was my favorite make-fun-of-shitty-videogames show on the interwebs, and now it's gone forevar

power UP · Post by **power UP** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 3:30 am

I stopped caring about 1up.com and related stuff after the final GFW podcast

brokenhalo · Post by **brokenhalo** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 3:40 am

sure, egm isn't as relevant as it used to be, and a lot of the faces have changed recently, but it was still the best videogame magazine out there in my opinion.

i was just leafing through the last (final) issue, and the teaser for next months issue is "hell freezes over". pretty accurate, i guess.

Zebra Airforce · Post by **Zebra Airforce** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 3:57 am

Thank god

Ganelon · Post by **Ganelon** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 5:14 am

Man, that's sad. I still had a free subscription up until the end... Then again, magazines have died all around in the past decade and with CGW on the PC side dying, it was only a matter of time before one of the big 2 on the console side died. EGM was amazing back in the early 90s when it was impossible to get import info from anywhere in the US except Usenet and import stores, much less with pictures. They covered all the random games that GamePro sometimes didn't

quoth09 · Post by **quoth09** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 5:22 am

Game Fan was the only magazine I really ever enjoyed.

EGM has gotten worse and worse over the years, and it's not surprising given the way everything is going that they are going the same direction.

Everything is going net based...wouldn't be surprised if in 25 years, there are no magazines at all.

Sonic R · Post by **Sonic R** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 5:52 am

quoth09 wrote: Everything is going net based...wouldn't be surprised if in 25 years, there are no magazines at all.

Indeed… everything is heading in this direction. The two major news papers here (The Detroit News and The Detroit Free Press) have cut delivery from daily to just three days a week now… they will offer the a pdf of the traditional style newspaper format of which one can print if they choose…

As for EGM,

I have this issue packed in a box at my parents home, I'm going to go dig it out soon enough…
It was in this issue that as a child, I learned of the upcoming Super Nintendo, as well as the other 16-Bit gaming consoles. Also reviewed in this issue were Sword of Sodan (great graphics, horrible game play) and Time Soldiers for the Sega Master System (they gave it a "near hit" rating but I LOVE this game to this day…)

EGM was a good enough magizine in the 1990s and I enjoyed to read them and looked forward to each issue to get the latest in video game news! Back in my day, they did not have internets. EGM was the best magizine on the newsstands. LamePro has always been lame, Nintendo Power, well that was Nintendo exclusive…

These days, I have internets, and physical magazines are a novelty more or less… I had a free subscription to EGM back in 2005, but it wasn't like the days of old.

It is sad to hear that Electronic Gaming Monthly will be no more…

Elixir · Post by **Elixir** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 5:59 am

RIP Akuma in Resident Evil 2.

tommyb · Post by **tommyb** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 6:19 am

Sonic R wrote:
Indeed… everything is heading in this direction. The two major news papers here (The Detroit News and The Detroit Free Press) have cut delivery from daily to just three days a week now… they will offer the a pdf of the traditional style newspaper format of which one can print if they choose…

Wow, I didn't know that. I don't get either of those papers, I get whatever Monroe's paper is, but still, that's crazy.

The Coop · Post by **The Coop** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 8:09 am

Well this sucks monkey balls.

GamePro has always been a bad magazine (2 for graphics, 2 for sound, 2 for gameplay, 5 for fun factor... WTF?!), GameFan, NextGen, and GMR got canned, I've never been a fan of Game Informer, which just left me with EGM, which I've been reading for quite a few years. Sure, EGM as a brand has had its ups and downs, but I enjoyed reading it, and looked forward to the articles and extra bits. Hell, it's been a staple of my sitting on the crapper routine for ages

R.I.P. EGM, and to everyone who worked on it over the years, thanks for the years of entertaining reading.

So is the issue that's supposed to come out next week the final one, or is the one that came out last month the final one? "January 2009" could go either way.

hermosaguy · Post by **hermosaguy** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:31 am

I'm going to miss that mag...not for the recent stuff but for the memories.

D · Post by D » Wed Jan 07, 2009 10:30 am

EGM, I remember those really big issues in 92, 93? half of the pages adverts, but still they put some work in.

CStarFlare · Post by **CStarFlare** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 4:15 pm

The Coop wrote:I've never been a fan of Game Informer,

GI was decent for reading if you're bored and want to read about video games, but they're not a magazine I ever took seriously.

Hardcore Gamer was really cool before they went quarterly and dropped all their reviews and stuff. Now they're just pretty cool.

EDIT: And on topic, I've never really been a fan of EGM. Can't really explain why.

EDIT 2: oh christ

Jon · Post by **Jon** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 5:16 pm

hermosaguy wrote:I'm going to miss that mag...not for the recent stuff but for the memories.

Ditto. It seemed to go downhill right around the time of the 32-bit era but its still the only gaming magazine I have subscribed to and read on a regular basis.

My subscription isn't up till June.

Battlesmurf · Post by **Battlesmurf** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 7:05 pm

lol- I *just* (within the last few weeks) paid for mine- I have yet to receive a single issue. I asked amazon customer support and they said "the subscription is still active- contact the company with your questions". So I paid $20 for a year (a good price for any subscription) to a magazine whose last issue is in January.

Blargh.

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 7:23 pm

Battlesmurf wrote:lol- I *just* (within the last few weeks) paid for mine- I have yet to receive a single issue. I asked amazon customer support and they said "the subscription is still active- contact the company with your questions". So I paid $20 for a year (a good price for any subscription) to a magazine whose last issue is in January.

Blargh.

With as many ways to score a free subscription to EGM, why pay for it? I'm lollerskating here!

Actually that might have been part of their problem....

SFKhoa · Post by **SFKhoa** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 8:35 pm

When I was a kid, I used to love reading EGM for no apparent reason, then I slowly started hating the magazine, also for no apparent reason.

So honestly, I don't know how to react to the fact that they're closing down.

Phil12 · Post by **Phil12** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 8:50 pm

awww dude. This and Tips And Tricks used to be my life. This is a sad sad day.

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:09 pm

The only magazine I had an emotional connection with was the german Club Nintendo magazine. It fell into a time when gaming used to be more fascinating to me. When things like these die, it feels like a part of your youth dies with it. I still remember watching the Donkey Kong Country promo VHS and being super hyped about it...

Pixel_Outlaw · Post by **Pixel_Outlaw** » Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:14 pm

Magazines ruled back in the early 90's but now they just showcase big business games and neglect their former classy commentary.