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Promotional Consideration: Advertising with Power, revisited
If you recall, back in November, we put up a short piece on the increasing number of ads in Nintendo Power after the magazine was handed over to Future US, the same publisher behind the official Xbox and PlayStation magazines. Chris Slate, Nintendo Power's new editor in chief, explained the ad-bloated issues: "Love or hate the ads, their number should go down significantly over the next couple of issues as we move away from the busy holiday selling season. We saw a huge upswing in ad pages last month because more games than ever are being released right now for the red-hot Wii and DS. However, new titles will slow down midway through December, and the ads will follow suit."So, now that we've put a few months in between us and December, has the magazine kept its promise, scaling back the number of ads in favor of delivering more news, reviews, and previews? Jump past the post break for the breakdown.
Promotional Consideration: Moons, Zombies, Dodgeballs, and Tactics
Aside from its preview page tease and Time Hollow's localization, there wasn't much in the way of exclusive DS news in this month's Nintendo Power, at least compared to what we've seen in recent issues.Paging through the magazine, however, we spotted at least two advertisements that we wanted to share with you. As we were tearing them out to throw into our scanner, we thought, "Why not post all of the other DS ads (and the cover)?" Join us past the break for the scanned pages!
British magazine giving away free Wii Wheel
Here's something: despite our initial skepticism, we actually really like the Wii Wheel -- in fact, it's all we use now for Mario Kart Wii. The only downside? At $10 per wheel (or £7 in the UK), buying enough for four-player matches can get kind of pricey.So the way we see it, you have two choices: Go with one of our totally awesome (and totally free) homemade Wii Wheels (the option we'd recommend) or: Pick up the latest issue of NGamer, which comes with the above "free" wheel packed in. It's not technically free, obviously, because you'll have to pony up the £4.99 for the magazine, which optimistically suggests that the free gift is worth £7, meaning somebody in NGamer's accounting department may well be clearing their desk later this month. Incidentally, while NGamer is a UK publication, some of my U.S-based colleagues think they may have spotted copies in Barnes & Noble, so keep your eyes peeled and you too might save hundreds of cents.Update: Corrected U.S. price.%Gallery-20778%%Gallery-19823%[Via Go Nintendo]
Beckett releases an in-depth WoW guide
Beckett Media is a company normally known for their collectible magazines -- they cover things like baseball cards, Yu-Gi-Oh, toys, and all of that other junk most people don't bother with (ok, ok, I kid, collectors, but I don't get the point of buying toys you don't take out of the box). Apparently, a little while back, Beckett started to get into another field where most of what you do is collecting: massively multiplayer online games, and they started a magazine called Beckett Massive Online Gamer. And now, they've started publishing a series of biannual guides for various online games, starting with our very own World of Warcraft.We haven't seen the guide, but their sales page promises "tips for conquering dungeons, guides for leveling to 70," and "perfecting WoW endgame classes," all for only $9.99. To tell the truth, it sounds pretty lame (not to mention that you can get exactly the same stuff right here for the low, low price of free), but at least there's another print competitor to the official Brady Guides -- if you absolutely need your WoW news in print form, you've got at least two choices now.Anyone seen one of these yet? Next time you're at the collectibles store, see if they've got one sitting on the magazine shelf and let us know what it looks like.
Print gaming journalism may be on its way out, says 1UP's Cox
We can still fondly recall those afternoons during our formative years when, while returning from school, we would notice a rolled-up, plastic sheathed bundle of gaming journalism joy poking out of our mailbox. We're sure it's an occasion that most of you can warm-heartedly remember as well, whether your poison was Nintendo Power or Electronic Gaming Monthly. Unfortunately, in a recent interview with the mighty Ombudsman, 1UP's Simon Cox spoke about the closing of Games For Windows magazine, and how EGM (as well as print gaming journalism as a whole) may have an expiration date.Cox explained that "dollars and eyes," particularly the beady, sunken eyes of PC gamers, are continually moving away from print media and towards internet publications, stripping the ink-and-papers of their subscribers, advertisers and, eventually, life. Cox remarked that while EGM still has a great deal of spunk, and is supported by a body of loyal readers, it too will eventually be crushed by the incipient, grim claw of new media. The fact that you're reading this right now may support his claim -- have your gaming news consuming habits changed over the past few years?
Games for Windows Magazine goes online-only
The list of defunct video game magazines has grown quite a bit over the last few years: Tips & Tricks; Computer Games; the Official PlayStation Magazine (the old one, not the new one). Well, we can add another name to the list today, as Ziff Davis just announced that Games for Windows: The Official Magazine will no longer exist in its print form.In announcing the move, effective as of the April/May issue, Ziff Davis Vice President Simon Cox assured readers that the decision had "nothing to do with the Chapter 11 stuff," and everything to do with the computer gaming audience's massive migration to online news sources. The magazine's editorial staff will be transferred to computer game coverage on 1UP.com, Cox said, though the magazine's art team will be moving on. Current subscribers will be able to transfer their subscriptions to Electronic Gaming Monthly or request a refund PC Mag, according to 1UP's Dan Hsu [updated with correction from Hsu himself @ 3:09].The decision marks the end of the run for a magazine that started in 1981 as Computer Gaming World and leaves Electronic Gaming Monthly as Ziff Davis' only print video game magazine and Future's PC Gamer as America's only computer game-focused print mag. Will this latest streamlining help attract interest in the long-offered sale of the Ziff Davis Game Group? Given the widespread contraction of the magazine market, we can't say it would hurt.
Ask Joystiq: On bankruptcy, guitar compatibility and Euro-rock (band)
Welcome to the inaugural edition of Ask Joystiq, the column where you ask the questions and we track down the answers like the lowly, underpaid servants we are. This week's topics include the magazine industry, PlayStation 3 guitar compatibility and Rock Band's absence in Europe.If you have a question you want answered, drop us a line at ask AAT joystiq DAWT com. Let's get down to it:Q: Regarding Ziff-Davis' filing for Chapter 11: Did online kill the magazine star?-Jonah FalconWhile most people associate the word "bankruptcy" with "going out of business," Chapter 11 status is often used by relatively healthy companies to restructure old debts. 1UP Vice President for Content Simon Cox explained as much in a recent blog post: "Ziff has been saddled with an enormous amount of debt for many years. An amount so large that even though we're a profitable company (and growing all the time), the repayments were killing us ... So last year we brought the bondholders of that debt to the table and proposed that they turn that debt into equity in Ziff Davis. They all said yes."
DS Daily: Do you still read gaming magazines?
Thanks to the internet and, hey, sites like this one, gaming magazines have been read the last rites on numerous occasions in recent years.This saddens us, and not just because we're nostalgic old fools. Magazines still prove useful to us on an almost daily basis. For one, we write about their contents quite a lot. And for this blogger, they make excellent bathroom reading (taking a DS on bathroom breaks is out of the question. It's unhygienic, and the DS has never mixed well with water). There's a healthy, dog-eared pile of old Edges and other assorted publications in the bathroom of Casa de Greenhough.What did you used to read? What do you read now? And do you think gaming magazines have a bright future, or are the print dinosaurs heading for extinction?As a cheeky aside, we'd like to use today's DS Daily to remind you good folks about DS Fanboy's new twitter presence. If you're a fellow twitterer, join us at twitter.com/dsfanboy and read all about our lives as we laugh and cry our way through each blogging day. You'll discover who hates who, who's sleeping with who, and who has plans to overthrow Alisha and David as blog leads.** Rather boringly, the answer to all of these is "nobody."
Girl Gamer magazine thinks it's still the 1950s
Attention female readers of DS Fanboy! You know how you're ALWAYS thinking about nothing else but pink things, cooking, and raising cute ickle babies? Well, Nintendo is, like, TOTALLY on your wavelength! The company has just teamed up with publisher Future to launch gaming magazine Girl Gamer in the UK, and it won't cost you a penny, meaning you can save for those divine shoes that you just have to have or you'll die.The 32-page magazine is being given away with the latest copies of Bliss and Mizz, two of the UK's most popular girl's titles, and is yet further evidence that Nintendo is completely in touch with female gamers. Just look at the cover: pink things? Check! Cooking? Check! Babies? Check![Via press release]
Promotional Consideration: Quote-based strategy II
Promotional Consideration is a weekly feature about the Nintendo DS advertisements you usually flip past, change the channel on, or just tune out.Since we bemoaned Advance Wars: Days of Ruin's lacking marketing push last week, Nintendo has kept us holed up in our bomb shelter, walls trembling and lights flickering as wave after wave of advertisements, massive shells blasted from Leo Burnett's distant dreadnoughts, pound the smoking city above.Here's every salvo we've been hit with in just the past week: an official web site launch (with new media) media-heavy previews and several interviews with Nintendo's localization team two promotional emails sent out to Nintendo's online newsletter subscribers a launch event held earlier today at the Nintendo World Store (New York City) television commercials on both network and cable channels a two-page ad running in at least three video game magazines -- GamePro, Game Informer, and Electronic Gaming Monthly We stand, crumbs of concrete falling from our hair, corrected. As we promised in our last installment, we're taking a look at that two-page magazine ad for Days of Ruin, a print piece which features flattering quotes from three online video game sites.
Brawl scores 40/40 in Famitsu, flawless victory
We don't normally highlight a single review, preferring to study the opinions of multiple publications at a time, but this Super Smash Bros. Brawl perfect score from Famitsu gives us a chance to break out of our routine; as you can see from the post title, it has also provided us an opportunity to bring back Mortal Kombat phrases. "Get over here!" Remember that one? It's from Scorpion.Super Smash Bros. Brawl joins the ranks of The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, Soul Calibur, Vagrant Story, Zelda: Wind Waker, Nintendogs, and Final Fantasy XII, all being titles that received a 40/40 score from Japanese video game magazine Famitsu, or four 10/10s from a panel of four reviewers. The critics applauded Brawl for its enjoyable adventure mode, brilliant Final Smash moves, and outstanding (!) presentation. While Famitsu's scores shouldn't always be taken seriously, as the reputation of its reviews ranks far below that of an esteemed magazine like Edge, Famitsu hardly ever hands out 40/40s, awarding perfect scores to only seven titles in the past ten years. Perhaps this Super Smash Bros. Brawl game turned out alright after all.
Subscribing with power (and $3.23)
The common argument against subscribing video game magazines is that you can get all of your news on the internet for free, but Nintendo Power has done a good job separating itself from its online competition with exclusive previews, attractive posters, and interviews with interesting figures. And with this latest bargain, you can get a hella cheap subscription for 12 months. BestDealMagazines.com, a site which we assume trades in the best deals for magazines, is offering a year's worth of Nintendo Power issues and a free gift for only $3.99. Type in the "YEAREND19" coupon code during checkout, and you'll save 19%, dropping your final total to $3.23. See what we mean? Hella cheap.See also: Promotional Consideration: Advertising with Power[Via CAG]
A year of Promotional Consideration
Promotional Consideration is a weekly feature about the Nintendo DS advertisements you usually flip past, change the channel on, or just tune out.The titling of this post is a bit of a misnomer, as we didn't start this column until early July, so it's more of a "half-year of" piece. No, you jerks, the humor in us beginning our Promotional Consideration retrospective on a disappointing note isn't lost on us.Still, with 26 articles now behind us, one every week since this feature's inception, we've written enough of these to develop a few that are actually worth reading. We've picked out our five favorite Promotional Consideration posts of 2007, carefully hiding them after the post break, that magical realm where anything seems possible.
The VC Advantage: A TurboPlay Holiday
The internet has made it easy to find cheats for games, but we miss the tips pages from game magazines, when the discovery of a new code could inspire you to go back to an old game. These codes aren't exactly new, but oldness is the essence of the Virtual Console! We're bringing back the classic codes every week on The VC Advantage.The stated purpose of this column (see above) is to explore the nostalgia of video game magazines via their cheat columns. We've imitated those columns in style, but we've never done the most obvious thing when it comes to magazine nostalgia: link actual old magazines. When we happened upon this archive of TurboPlay magazine, we knew we had to share it. TurboPlay, published by Larry Flynt Publications (who also published the cheat-focused Tips & Tricks), was the longest-lasting TG16-specific magazine in the U.S., and featured a who's-who of game writers, including Andy Eddy, Chris Bieniek, and even Working Designs' Victor Ireland. (As a young pre-blogger, I had a subscription to TurboPlay, and also devoured all four issues of TurboForce and the three TurboEdge newsletters from NEC. You probably could have guessed that.)We encourage you to browse the entire TurboPlay archives, as well as the other two magazines' brief collections, to see what the world was like when NEC was still involved with the TurboGrafx-16 (all of that stuff has since been handed off to their partner Hudson) and was goofily optimistic about the future of their ultimately doomed, yet still beloved, console. We've provided the entirety of TurboPlay issue 7's "Turbo Tips" columns for you after the break, so you can get a taste of retro-cheatery.
Magazine comes with EQ2 in-game item
EverQuest II's new Rise of Kunark expansion is the cover story of the November/December issue of Beckett Massive Online Gamer Magazine. That's fun in and of itself, but it's particularly worth mentioning because anyone who buys the magazine will get a code with which to claim an in-game item.The item is "a portrait of Venril Sathir, the infamous Iksar warlord" which can be displayed in players' houses. SOE has done several free-in-game-item promotions before, but something this small and insignificant is likely only to draw the hardcore EQ2 fans who would have bought the magazine because of the article anyway. But an extra bonus can't hurt, can it?
Promotional Consideration: Advertising with Power
Promotional Consideration is a weekly feature about the Nintendo DS advertisements you usually flip past, change the channel on, or just tune out.As of October of this year, Nintendo of America relinquished its hold of Nintendo Power and handed over publishing duties to Future US, the same media corporation behind the official Xbox and PlayStation magazines. Two issues into the transition, Nintendo Power's writing staff and format haven't changed much, but the number of ads certainly has!
Promotional Consideration: Having word ability continues to pay
Promotional Consideration is a weekly feature about the Nintendo DS advertisements you usually flip past, change the channel on, or just tune out. In last week's edition of Promotional Consideration, we snickered over Ubisoft's scandalous My Word Coach ad, reveling in the juvenility of its baseball/sex metaphor. Imagine our surprise and mirth when we stumbled upon another printed piece promoting the vocabulary trainer, this time targeted at women! While not even half as bawdy as its brother, nor as clever, this advertisement still has some qualities worth examining.
Escapist does MMOs and WoW for a week
Escapist Magazine (who have really been hitting it on all cylinders lately-- hard to believe they're the same folks who did the subtle PDF/graphic hybrid a year or so ago) have released an issue called "Raid" this week, looking at MMOs in general, and WoW in particular.Of interest: their features is an article called "World of Germcraft," about the Corrupted Blood plague that spread through Azeroth, and how scientists used it to study real outbreak patterns (we've also covered this here before). "The Angel in the Guild" is an interesting article about a young woman who finds herself dealing with her guildies' real life problems, and "The Good Ending" is Sean Sands' story of leaving Azeroth with a bang.All excellent reads-- I've always liked the Escapist's professional and insightful tone (if a little haughty-- it's like the Granta of online videogame media), and reading about World of Warcraft there is just icing on the cake.[ via incgamers ]
PlayStation: The Official Magazine hits newstands in November
Last November, Sony announced the discontinuation of the Official PlayStation Magazine, but it appears it's getting a new lease on life as Sony and Future US announced their agreement on a new magazine – PlayStation: The Official Magazine. The magazine, which will initially have a circulation of about 300,000 copies, will arrive in November."We're very excited to be working with a group that is nearly as passionate about our brand as we are ourselves and we look forward to working with Future on many innovative ideas they have to create a best in class enthusiast publication," said Peter Dille, senior vice president of marketing at SCEA.Ziff Davis, the former publisher of OPM, continues to battle financial issues, so it's understandable Sony's preference to find a more reliable company in Future, which has continued to publish OPM in Europe. Additionally, when Sony made the announcement last year, it said focus would shift to delivering content via PlayStation.com and the PlayStation Store, so we wonder what spurred this change of heart. [via NeoGAF]
Future publishing taking over Nintendo Power
While searching for a way to get out of journalism and make some real cash, Gamasutra discovered a listing on the Nintendo corporate job board for someone to be the Licensing Manager for Nintendo Power. The job would entail being in close contact with new publisher Future Publishing.Future publishing already handles the official Nintendo, PlayStation and Xbox magazines in the UK, and handles the Official Xbox Magazine in North America. This is obviously all part of Nintendo's corporate restructuring which saw the retirement of George Harrison. Future has no comment to make at this time, but expect an announcement real soon. This stays in line with reports from May that Nintendo Power employees were told to look for new work by September.
