The Space Between Era's

Right now the shift to digital media's is very apparent. Movie's are being shot with digital camera's. Your fav TV shows can now be seen anywhere on the internets. Even comic's can be found online with the most recent example being the digital version of the Watchmen on itunes. And as we all know the shift of hard copy video games to digital distribution.

One shift that is occurring right now is video game journalism. As a kid and throughout my life EGM has always been my main source of information of the gaming world. I'm sure I'm not alone when their issue with FF7 on the cover will be a day we won't soon forget. Each month I would pick up their thick, funny, informative issue with a lot of anticipation.

Even when I started checking my news on the sites like this I still enjoyed my monthly issue of extra insight and always got a good laugh from their captions on screenshots, Seanbaby's articles, the Hsu and Chan comic, and the ingeniously written reader response section. However things have changed and not for the better.

The first sign of EGM's downfall was the redesign of the the magazine. Don't get me wrong the redesign was needed but it always gave me a suspicious feeling. Then Ziff Davis, the publishing company in charge of EGM, declared bankruptcy which nearly confirmed my suspicions. That event I believe started a avalanche of events, first being the resignation of the backbone of EGM Dan Shoe. But it was the most recent issue that I have decided to cancel my subscription of this once great magazine. Not only was the issue extremely light on content that really said anything but there are only seven reviews with only one reviewer attached four of those reviews. Ontop of that the Hsu and Chan comic just issued its last comic, even though the comic hasn't been funny for quite some time it was still a reminder that EGM is still EGM. Not to mention two page interview with Itagaki that had no relevance on anything.

Now what does that mean "still EGM?" By all accounts EGM is the only magazine out there that can even be taken seriously. GameInformer to me is a sell out mag that will take bribes for high reviews. And any magazine that has a major company in its title is a biased report to begin with. I'm not going to believe anything Nintendo Power or Playstation magazine or OXM have to say. EGM has always been the staple of what game journalism should be. You may disagree with them but you can't say they pull their punches. EGM has always been unbiased in my opinion and ask the hard questions to people who think their just doing a fluff piece.

I'm just sad that I'm seeing a magazine that always held up a standard for everyone else being slowly and quietly whittled away to nothing. I know most of that team are a part of the 1up network and that's all good and fine, but the symbol that was EGM is disappearing and when its gone it will be the passing of an era in video gaming.