ISSUE LINK: https://archive.org/details/official-u.-s.-play-station-magazine-volume-1-issue-02-november-1997

For the first time, we were ON CAMERA as we dug in to The Official U.S. PlayStation Magazine's hard pan of The Lost World, a beautiful and ambitious mess from Dreamworks that barely connects to the blockbuster Jurassic Park movie sequel it's an adaptation of. Check out the video on our YouTube channel! https://youtu.be/DRaYBvpndkk 

Are negative reviews like this one, as Ratatouille's Anton Ego said, "fun to write and to read?" As a Hugo Award-winning critic himself, Aidan has a lot to say. 

We're working on a lot of the technical aspects of this, from getting zoomed-in shots of the content to getting Ty better framed in the video, but we'd love to hear your feedback! Join our Discord server and let us know: https://discord.com/invite/5VBpWGSuz6

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Sources include the Video Game History Foundation, the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections. The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: https://archive.org/details/gamepro-issue-108-september-1997/GamePro%20-%20Issue%20108%20%28September%201997%29/mode/2up


Grab your whip, your holy water, and your PlayStation 1, because we're reviewing GamePro's review of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night!

We also get on one of Aidan's biggest hobby horses--2D graphics vs. 3D graphics, and whether the latter inherently beat the former--and ride. We had a ton of fun talking through the different biases that we (and different magazines, editors, and writers!) had when discussing the power of novel technology versus, and in the pursuit of, creative ideals.

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Sources include the Video Game History Foundation, the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: https://archive.org/details/NEXT_Generation_31/mode/1up

Great jumpin' ray guns, or some similar 1950sesque exclamation!

Captain Blasto, everyone's favorite James Bond-meets-Inspector-Clouseau-meets-Flash-Gordon, except make it a parody, and also it's Looney Tunes, superhero got a big, splashy cover and a huge preview spread in this issue--and why wouldn't it? A bold, new, original-IP action platformer from Sony's top U.S. studio, led by legendary programmer Dylan Cuthbert. 

Except, well, it didn't turn out great--and the seeds of why it didn't were right there in the preview. How did they handle it? And how did WE handle how they handled it?? Listen to find out!!

We also go long on journalists' role in the PR hype cycle, then and now, as well as dig in to NG's big interview with Sid Meier, and super-ambitious feature declaring the six essential elements of great game design.

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Computer Entertainer images and information are sourced from the Video Game History Foundation, under the Creative Commons license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en

Other sources include the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: Computer Entertainer, Volume 5, Number 3 | Video Game History Foundation Library – Digital Archive

VHGF HOME: Home | Video Game History Foundation

BONUS UNLOCKED!! This week, for our six-month anniversary, we're making one of our favorite bonus episodes available for everyone--one featuring a pair of guests we've been dreaming about landing since before we launched the show: Frank Cifaldi and Phil Salvador of the Video Game History Foundation They're two of the highest authorities on the planet on retro games, games media, and the culture around it all.

The VGHF recently acquired the copyright to the 1980s game mag Computer Entertainer, and their contemporary review of Super Mario Bros. for the NES might be the only such surviving American professional written critique of one of the pillars of console gaming history.

Unusually for one of our bonus episodes, we--as well as Frank and Phil--review it!

As always, we thank all of you so much for supporting the show. If you dig it, please tell people! We'd love nothing more than to get more cool people in the ULTRA Lounge of our Discord server--and have the support we need to keep doing this show we love.

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Computer Entertainer images and information are sourced from the Video Game History Foundation, under the Creative Commons license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en

Other sources include the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

DESIGN ROOM DOT SITE: https://www.designroom.site/

Matt Leone, formerly of Polygon, EGM, and elsewhere, has launched a new subscription-based site that gets right to the heart of everything Ty and Aidan love about games media: oral histories of classic, beloved and/or interesting old games.

Not only do we get deep into how and why Matt launched the site, we also look back on some of the vital work Matt did at some of the mainstream games media outlets we've covered--and it inspired and guided Aidan's own work in games-history storytelling.

Matt was super generous with his time on the eve of the launch, and we had a great conversation.

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Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: https://www.retromags.com/magazines/usa/game-players-1993/game-players-issue-83/

Here come the RPGs...sort of. Aidan and Ty revisit Game Players yet again, as the drumbeat for more RPGs gets louder across 1996 and 1997. The splashy cover art of Beyond the Beyond's Finn helped rook a young Ty into buying one of the most disappointing and frustrating games he's ever played.

But the review is actually for the seminal Resident Evil, with the GP crew doing its level best to review a genre-shattering, brilliantly innovative game with a couple of truly nasty flaws. 

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Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: https://archive.org/details/game-informer-issue-47-march-1997

ANDY MCNAMARA ON MY PERFECT CONSOLE: https://shows.acast.com/my-perfect-console/episodes/andy-macnamara-former-editor-in-chief-game-informer

MATT MILLER ANNOUNCING GI'S RETURN: https://gameinformer.com/letter-from-the-editor/2025/03/25/game-informer-is-back

We've been grinding XP and saving up MP for this one: Our first issue of Game Informer--
though in 1997, the mag is years from its dominant Aughties peak, and decades from its shocking 2024 closure and its thrilling 2025 revival.

Ty comes clean about his lack of history with the magazine, Aidan discusses having written for it; they both talk about how the PS1 library was chock full of brilliant, groundbreaking, unconventional, and nevertheless first-party (or AA/AAA-level funded) experiments of the kind that are so hard to get greenlit these days.

And then...Carnage Heart.

It was Ty's bizarre obsession, Aidan had never heard of it, and it was (and is) one of the most unusual, tough-to-talk-about games of all time.

How did the GI staff handle it? Listen to find out!
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Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com,  our original research, and our personal magazine collections.
The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: Video Game History Foundation Library | Collection: PC GAMER (US)

More info on "Free Speech and Magic Money," Jillan E. Foley, PhD's forthcoming book from Harvard University Press: Book – Jillian E. Foley

We enter the dangerously Adult world of PC gaming: Mail-order explicit games, game-deletion utilities to keep people from finding out you play explicit games, politicians fear-mongering about games being a "dirty, dangerous" gateway to Hell--and a very thorough and excellent review of Diablo!

You know, a game about going to actual Hell!

For one of our most-requested mags, PC Gamer, Aidan and Ty get personal about their history with PC gaming, the thrill of the illicit, and late-stage AOL's idealized business model.

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Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com,  our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: Tips & Tricks - Volume IV Issue 1 

GAME LOSERS T&T ARTICLE: A Comprehensive Oral History Of Tips & Tricks – The #1 Video-Game Tips Magazine | Game Losers

We're the Tomb Raiders! Aidan and Ty teased Tomb Raider takes last episode, and here they finally are--and so is our look at a very popular game magazine that didn't (quite) have reviews at all, Tips & Tricks.

Our hosts explain the appeal this magazine had (or didn't) to them at the time, flip out about the masthead featuring a very diverse staff working under Larry Flynt, and flip through the unique combination of in-depth strategy reference material with little-to-no traditional editorial.

And then: we review their walkthrough (?) of Tomb Raider, and talk about how the game itself might have impacted it.

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Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com,  our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!

ISSUE LINK: Computer Entertainer, Volume 5, Number 3 | Video Game History Foundation Library – Digital Archive

VHGF HOME: Home | Video Game History Foundation

A pair of guests we've been dreaming about landing since before we launched the show, Frank Cifaldi and Phil Salvador of the Video Game History Foundation are two of the highest authorities on the planet on retro games, games media, and the culture around it all.

The VGHF recently acquired the copyright to the 1980s game mag Computer Entertainer, and their contemporary review of Super Mario Bros. for the NES might be the only such surviving American professional written critique of one of the pillars of console gaming history.

Unusually for one of our bonus episodes, we--as well as Frank and Phil--review it!

As always, we thank all of you so much for supporting the show. If you dig it, please tell people! We'd love nothing more than to get more cool people in the ULTRA Lounge of our Discord server--and have the support we need to keep doing this show we love.

-----
Computer Entertainer images and information are sourced from the Video Game History Foundation, under the Creative Commons license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.en

Other sources include the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.

The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!