Internet Killed The Magazine Star

 

Once upon a time, internet connections were so slow and relatively uncommon that only PC owners played games online, and the games magazine ruled supreme. With little to no competition, magazines had a stranglehold on the business of keeping consumers updated. That is not to say that publishers and journalists were drunk with complacency. People have fond memories of many now defunct games magazines including but not limited to Zzap, CVG (original version), TOTAL!, Mean Machines, and Game Zone. The one constant among these well loved publications is a strong sense of humour, with some titles such as Game Zone unafraid to go off on a tangent and spend hundreds of words at a time ignoring video games completely, delivering excellent humour for excellent humour’s sake. These publications would often be read from cover to cover regardless of how much or how little interest the reader had in each individual game and topic therein.

Think of the last games magazine you bought. Did you read it cover to cover? Three quarters of it? Half of everything that was written, perhaps?

 

First of all, let me assure you that I am not seeing the games mags of yore through rose tinted spectacles. The biggest problem with the magazines of the nineties, for example, was the Nintendo vs Sega fanboy rivalry that the Nintendo and Sega magazines positively encouraged. Sega magazines would gleefully print crudely drawn pictures sent in by readers of Sonic decapitating Mario, and Nintendo magazines would print letters issue after issue from insecure fans saying just why Sega machines were inferior. Both Nintendo and Sega magazines would feature childish jibes at the rival company written by the staff themselves. Nonetheless, when the writing was good, it was good enough to temporarily ignore this childishness. There are also some great writers with a sharp wit that are working in games magazines today, make no mistake about that. Unfortunately, not nearly enough.

This lack of top quality writers can be traced back to one simple fact: magazine sales are down. Imagine Publishing shut down the Nintendo magazine N Revolution altogether at the end of 2008, and the sales figures for those still going are a mixed bunch. Some titles actually enjoyed increases in circulation, most notably Uncooked Media’s 360 Gamer, which saw a 29.8% increase from the previous year to 18,073 (an issue I shall return to shortly). Smaller percentage increases were seen by the official Sony and Nintendo magazines, and unofficial titles N Gamer and PSW. All other titles saw a drop in sales. Perhaps surprisingly, the biggest loser was multiformat magazine GamesMaster, which saw its sales plummet 20.3% from 51,389 in the second quarter of 2007, to 40,940 in the second quarter of 2008.

The situation is even worse than it at first appears, as sales have been slipping year on year for some time. PC Zone saw a readership of over 30,000 in early 2006; that number was down to little more than 19,000 in the year ending December 2008. Edge, 33,600 in 2006; 28,898 in 2008. GamesMaster sold 53,300 in 2006, eventually slipping as far as we have already seen. Information on the number of ‘hits’ that the big games sites receive is difficult to come by, and more difficult still to sift through until only useful data is left. It is worth noting however that in the same year of 2006, Eurogamer.net reported 1.2 million unique hits – that is, 1.2 million different people or IP addresses – in the month of May alone.

Journalists do not see their reviews, articles etc. in print without the work first being examined and given the green light by an editor. It is part of the editor’s job to see that the publication speaks with one voice; that one part of the magazine does not clash in tone and opinion with another to the extent that it seems conflicted and broken. If the magazine has adopted a macho night-in-the-pub attitude, all who write for it must be sure not to write with a conflicting style. There may well be journalists out there who, given free reign to write in their own styles, would dazzle with their talent. The only way to confirm or deny this would be to ask a variety of journalists. And of course, they would not want to say anything negative on the record, regardless of their true feelings.

This American jock style of writing (most prevalent in PS3 and Xbox 360 magazines) has several problems. It immediately excludes potential female readers, of course (further exasperated by the pages and pages of adverts for pornographic services such magazines usually carry). In addition, publishers really do not seem to realise that not every ‘red blooded male’ who likes ladies appreciates such a crude writing style. Rather than having to endure as much tit, boom (as in ’stuff blowing up is cool, duuuude’) and beer humour as can be possibly crammed into one magazine, perhaps some readers would prefer good journalism. It does nothing whatsoever to dispel the myth that only lonely teenage boys play video games, either. Such an immaturely presented publication is just as childish as a Nintendo magazine that gives away stickers, sweets, and posters every month.

 

Which leads me on to ‘free’ gifts. It is fair to say that most people who used to buy games magazines every month kept each issue, for a certain period of time at least. Why? Mainly so they could refer back to them at a later date for cheats, guides and reviews for games that they did not have or consider purchasing at the time. Now of course, all this and so much more is available 24 hours a day, immediately, for free via the internet. This in a nutshell is why magazine sales have been falling so worryingly in recent years. Why pay for something you can get for free? So magazines offer physical, tangible rewards that websites cannot. Hence so many of today’s magazines bursting from the shelves in plastic bags that contain all or some of the following: Sweets, decals, cheat books, stickers, posters, a DVD full of trailers, a demo disc, promotional leaflets, a money off voucher, postcards, scratchcards, or an envelope that may or may not contain some sort of prize. Oh, and there’s a magazine in there somewhere too.

 None of these are ‘free’ gifts, of course. The average price of a magazine nowadays seems to be £4.99. You’ll pay a pound more for a magazine with a demo disc, or on average a pound less for a magazine with fewer or no ‘gifts’. The obvious problem with this idea is that the most relevant material mentioned above such as demos, trailers and guides can be viewed or downloaded from internet sites or PSN/Xbox live – again for free. What you are left with then is a fairly thin magazine, full of mostly advertising, that comes with a handful of rubbish you’re not going to use. The price then looks less attractive still. This is why 360 Gamer has seen such a proportionately large increase in readership. At £2.89 it’s cheaper than its rivals – less than half the price of the official magazine – and concentrates on the writing more than most similar publications. Nonetheless, 18,000 is a higher readership than only two other games magazines (360 and N Gamer). The troubled path of PC magazine sales can largely be explained by the sharp decline in PC game sales, which is another issue entirely. However, the elitist attitude that these magazines often display in their writing does nothing to endear them to new readers, either.

So what is the future of shop shelf video game magazines? An interview Future Publishing’s publishing director James Binns gave to gamesindustry.biz earlier this year seems to contain some clues. While answering in the negative when directly asked if print is ‘dead’, reading between the lines appears to reveal a different opinion. He makes a point of saying “I’m not defending print, I’m defending specialist media.” earlier in the interview. Is this Binns subtly telling us that he is not foolishly dedicated to preserving a doomed medium? The article ends with Binns saying: “Our biggest story this year is the launch of a digital edition of Official PlayStation Magazine on PSN. That will be an all-singing, all-dancing hi-def production, and that’s where we’re putting all our efforts. (italicising GhostStorm’s)” Make of that what you will.

Future Publishing is the market leader in video game magazines in the UK. The thing about leaders is, others follow them….

 

 Luke Kemp

 

gamesindustry.biz: Official titles suffer as games magazine sales continue to decline

gamesindustry.biz: Circulations slide for majority of Future games magazines

gamesindustry.biz: Alphabet Aerobics

mediatel.co.uk:          ABC Consumer Magazine Round-up