Nintendo Power magazine being shuttered
Yet another gaming magazine icon is biting the dust. According to a new report, Future Publishing is discontinuing Nintendo Power.
Update: The magazine's closure has been confirmed by senior editor Chris Hoffman, who promises to make the last issues "memorable."
Yet another gaming magazine icon is biting the dust. According to a new report, Future Publishing is discontinuing Nintendo Power.
The magazine is one of the longest-running gaming magazines, having started in 1988. Nintendo originally produced and distributed the magazine until 2007, when it outsourced the magazine to Future Publishing (who also produce "official" magazines for Xbox and PlayStation).
A source speaking to Ars Technica says that Nintendo was "uninterested" in renewing their contract with Future, or partaking in digital initiatives that were "necessary for the long-term health of the brand." The source says that Nintendo is not interested in taking control over the magazine again.
Current staff are already moving to other Future properties, including GamesRadar and MacLife. According to the report, it's unclear how many more issues of the magazine are still planned and how current subscribers will be compensated.
Last year saw the death of GamePro, another long-running gaming magazine.
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replyAndrew Yoon posted a new article, Report: Nintendo Power magazine being shuttered.
Yet another gaming magazine icon is biting the dust. According to a new report, Future Publishing is discontinuing Nintendo Power.-
Sad, but not surprising I guess. This is Nintendo Power's legacy for me:
http://chattypics.com/files/IMG_0258_k0gjf149g3.jpg
Three years of magazines right there (including the back, which I don't have a picture of I guess)-
Awesome.
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Awesom, I used to love doing collages in High School, had a bunch of Wizard mags that I pilfered, cut and pasted all over everything. Still have some of the better ones laminated in the attic. Need to go back and check those out :)
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Riker's head over Marle's shoulder makes the whole thing IMHO.
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My love/hate of 'official' mags go all the way back to Atari Age. Yeah, they had the inside scoop, but didn't seem to do anything more than the non-official mags. Kinda sad to see this go even though I never subscribed.
I'm curious what these closed magazines are doing to game publishers in terms of their marketing budgets. I suspect a closed magazine doesn't mean an increase to website. I'd be surprised if is any segment left that doesn't visit one or more gaming sites. So, when that ad dollar spend with NP frees up, what does the publisher do with it? Dump it back to game sites? A little bit bigger display @ E3?
When the last of the tech/gaming mags closes it'll be a sad, sad day for me. -
Time to re-watch this
AVGN: Nintendo Power
http://cinemassacre.com/2007/09/04/avgn-nintendo-power/
Good times. -
I used to love NP as a kid. Getting the subscriber bonuses were great, especially the strategy guides. And I loved how the magazine splines always made an image.
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Used to buy a lot of them off the shelf. My first subscription issue was the reveal for Super Mario RPG and I was hooked. I remember Nintendo Power made me want to go into writing.
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:( RIP childhood
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I'd be upset since I had this as a kid but I uh am sort of part of the problem......PC game thanks you Nintendo
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Anyone still have one of the renewal pins they'd give you?
http://www.flickriver.com/photos/garyfixler/sets/1722353/
The pin was better (more wings, gold, etc.) depending on how many years you renewed. I swear I had one of these things but it's long gone now.
I subscribed in the first year back in the day after reading the first issue to death at my friend's house. Back in 2002 I re-subscribed for a year to get the Legend of Zelda Collector's Edition disc, with the hi-rez Majora's Mask port to the GameCube. Magazine was more or less the same propoganda rag as always (why yes this Nintendo-published-and-developed game gets five whatsits out of five, why do you ask?)
Good times. -
Damn it... I remember coming home every day running to the mailbox hoping the new issue of Nintendo Power had arrived! :(
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It was a large part of my life for ~8 years growing up. All through the NES and SNES years..
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It's just one more piece of nostalgia dying.
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awwwww fuck
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im stupid for other reasons
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They did until 2007. Honestly I'm not sure how much of this "don't want to renew the agreement" thing is Nintendo being dumb and how much is Nintendo being smart. Nintendo Power is a great nostalgia thing but print magazines from a publisher of digital games doesn't make as much sense in 2012.
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Does it? Much of traditional media has struggled to find better (or any) profits in digital content and the money in online advertising on the whole is down quite a bit lately.
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Speaking of classic Nintendo stuff, did any of you guys call the 1-900 tip line for Nintendo?
I loved that thing as a kid. My parents allowed my brother and I a certain allotment of minutes each month to use on it, so we'd figure out what stuff we wanted to ask. -
Every day after school I'd rush into my room and was always delighted when a new, wrinkle-free issue of Nintendo Power was placed on my bed. No homework was done on those nights.
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Wow. It's just one of those things that I assumed would always be there.
I still have issues 1-50+ stashed somewhere. -
Future Networks is such a ridiculous monopoly - that company owns basically every print magazine out there. Same thing happened with all the guitar magazines I used to read - all were bought by Future and eventually all of them except Guitar World (the worst one out of them imo) were closed down.
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no, actually, they don't anymore.
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I remember getting this as a subscriber bonus once. It was awesome!
http://chattypics.com/files/20120821151843_og5jimoqua.jpg -
I miss their Zelda comics :(
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My mom got me the complete Zelda: ALTTP comic in graphic novel form for my birthday one year.
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Oh man I had that too!
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This makes me sad - I was in the magazine way back in the day as a kid. I got randomly picked from the contest card you send in every month. So i got my picture and 5 favorite games towards the back of the issue. I trashed most of my old collection years ago but I still kept that issue that I'm in (Was the one with Vader on the cover).
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What ever happened to Howard Phillips? Nintendo Power was never quite the same after he left.
I wouldn't mind seeing a short Shack article about him.-
Runs his own consulting company, haven't heard anything in the industry about him for years though. For like ten years I thought he was just a pseudonym for Howard Lincoln.
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I would pay good money for Android versions of back issues!
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i literally wallpapered my room with cutouts from Nintendo Power, and newspaper comics (mostly far side and calvin and hobbes)
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Aww man. :(
