Nintendo Gamer magazine to close

[MoFo2]

Apologies if a topic on this already exists, couldn't find it.

On Thursday 1 October 1992, the first issue of Super Play arrived in shops throughout Britain. Published by Future Publishing, Super Play claimed to be the first British magazine that not only focused mainly on Nintendo games but also unashamedly covered grey imports, anime and other subjects not usually covered in magazines at the time.

In the twenty years that followed Super Play developed a huge cult following, evolving over the years with the release of each new Nintendo system. As the Nintendo 64 approached it became N64 Magazine, later becoming NGC when the GameCube arrived. Then, with the launch of the Wii it became N-Gamer, which later was revamped and transformed into Nintendo Gamer, which was to become its final form.

Next week issue 80 of Nintendo Gamer will arrive in the shops. It will be the final issue of the magazine, ending a history of more than 20 years of independent Nintendo magazine coverage from Future Publishing. The final issue is a special tribute issue, containing a feature focusing on every cover and iteration of the magazine from that first issue of Super Play all the way up to 2012.

It will also feature a special cover illustrated by Wil Overton, the long-time illustrator who created all the amazing cover art in Super Play and N64 Magazine and returns to end the magazine the same way it began ? with a fantastic, eye-catching image.

Subscribers should get a letter tomorrow, ahead of the final issue. It?ll explain what will happen to their subscriptions. Their magazine should follow, with an exclusive subscriber-only cover, again illustrated by Wil Overton. For non-subscribers, the issue is on sale next week, 6 September.

Although as of next week the Nintendo Gamer magazine is dead, the website will continue to live on. Nintendo-Gamer.net will continue to provide you with Nintendo news, reviews and features with that same sense of humour and unmatched passion for Nintendo games that made the magazine so popular over the past two decades. Like this one showing you how to paint a Spanish fresco in New Art Academy in less than 15 minutes.

As the Online Editor of Nintendo Gamer it is a great privilege to be able to keep the name going and I hope that the site can continue to further develop your love for Nintendo in the same way that first issue of Super Play did for me back when I was nine years old.

?After careful consideration we?ve taken the decision to close Nintendo Gamer magazine,? said Nintendo Gamer publisher Lee Nutter. ?However, with Future?s ongoing strategy to drive digital growth across its international, digitally-focussed brand business, the website, Nintendo-Gamer.net will continue as excitement builds ahead of Nintendo?s Wii U launch.?

The magazine is gone, but there will always be a place for Nintendo Gamer ? it?s just in a different medium now. Over the next few months we?ll be sharing the best features and issues from the Nintendo Gamer vaults, dating all the way back through the magazine?s 20-year history. Please do follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook to ensure you don?t miss out on any of these articles.

On behalf of everyone who?s ever written a word, designed a page, checked some text, written a caption or reviewed a game for Nintendo Gamer, thank you so much for reading the magazine. Please do buy the final issue when it?s released on 6 September, and we hope you?ll continue to stick around the website as it continues to evolve.

Onwards and upwards.

Chris Scullion
Online Editor
Nintendo-Gamer.net

Note: If you have any comments, thoughts or memories of Nintendo Gamer, N-Gamer, NGC, N64 Magazine or Super Play, please email them to chris.scullion@futurenet.com with the subject heading ?Nintendo Gamer memories?. We?ll be posting the best of your tributes on the site over the weekend.

Source.

[parkinho]

Sad news, been reading this since '92 when it was Super Play. The superb humour always made it a pleasure to read, even during the periods when there were very few games to write about. Glad that Wil Overton is back to provide the cover for the final hurrah.

[teddymeow]

Gutted. Though I stopped buying it a long time ago (when the GC died) I have fond memories of getting issues before family holidays and reading the hell out of them for a fortnight.

Will buy the last issue though.

[nakamura]

Well, a real shame for all involved here. I had no idea that Super Play morphed into N64 magazine and through to now. I pretty much stopped buying mags in the late 90's but had I known I would have kept buying them.

Super Play was and still is a fantastic magazine. I recently purchased around 30 issues and aim to get more in the near future, not cheap!
I never knew about Nintendo Gamer until a forum member mentioned the rebrand that happened last year. Picked it up and it was a fantastic read, the best read on the shelf, bar Retro Gamer.

Huge shame it is going, would loved to have seen it evolve further as it really felt balanced to read and it reminded me of some of the magic of the days gone by.

Good luck to all the staff involved.

[Grapple Convoy]

Got the last issue in the post a few days ago. I'm going to miss this particularly publication a lot, as it was actually proper good. But I felt utterly depressed when it dawned on me that for me this it is for print magazines. Basically ever, most likely. Magazines cultivated and strengthened my interest in games at a young impressionable age, and made games into something I do and think about every day rather than a casual interest. For better or worse, games magazines made me who I am today; as soon as I was old enough to read properly, I was reading my dad's Crash or YS or whatever, or at least attempting to. I can remember the games magazines I bought the day I started secondary school, or the issue of NGC I bought on my final day of university, for example. Almost certainly still own both of them too, LOL. Life's going to feel basically wrong not having least one magazine to look forward to popping through the letterbox each month.

[MoFo2]

Remembered I used to sporadically buy Super Play, N64 and NGC from newsagents here in Norway, which was (and is) currently 3 times the price of the magazine in UK, so the first years of the 90s I spent my hard-earned allowance on Total! as it was more "colorful" or "easier" to read, I don't know. I think my excuse is that I was 10 and had just started learning English at school haha. I remember Total! cost about ?3 back then, while Nintendo Gamer now in a Norwegian newsagent is more like ?13.

However, is it possible to get hold of these magazines digitally these days, either legal or not? I found all 47 issues of Super Play and put it on my iPad (joy!), but Total!, N64 and NGC seems harder to find. I found retromags.com, but most, if not all, of their links seem broken :/

[parkinho]

I do have a couple of issues of N64 Magazine electronically, though I cannot remember where I acquired them from nor whether the entire collection was available. Will do some digging around this weekend if no one else can locate them.

Incidentally I still have a couple of print copies of N64 - wish I'd kept all the issues I bough back in the day but c'est la vie - and in particular the Ocarina of Time review issue. Never will I be as excited for a game as that one, and most of the hype was down to N64 Magazine's coverage. Think I have every issue of N Gamer but my sub ran out as they rebranded earlier in the year, sadly I forgot to renew my subscription

[MoFo2]

The memories... wish Future would sell scans of old EDGE, Total!, N64, NGC ... "I would buy them at a high price"!

Currently up to issue 29 of Super Play, so much enthusiasm in those pages: Import guides, anime, calling the VB for the bad hardware it is, obscure Japanese games etc etc

[noobish hat]

Perhaps RetroMags had their files with MegaUpload? I know a lot of other sites lost their archives when it got taken down.

As far as I'm aware, there is no complete collection of scans for N64 Magazine. I'd like to do it myself, but it is really too much work. Not only do you have to actually disect your precious magazines, but the page sizes are annoying and won't fit into a regular scanner, so you have to scan each individual page twice and then edit them together. Doing even one issue would take many many hours.

[Grapple Convoy]

noobish hat, it does seem like RetroMags' entire archive is gone, unfortunately.

[noobish hat]

Well it should only be a temporary setback for them. It's not like they'll have to scan everything again!

[Sketcz]

Only just discovered this sad fact! Am I too late to buy the last issue? I live in France, so can't exactly pop down the shops. I started a topic in the WTB forum, but if anyone has seen a copy and pick it up for me, I can paypal the cost and postage. I actually have a holding address in the UK, so you wouldn't need to post abroad.

Anyone seen a spare copy anywhere?