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An Exploration of Classic Game Magazines 2: OPM US again

If you saw my first thread on exploring some of the older gaming magazines from the 2000's then this is going to be the same deal, albeit with some changes. For one, I'm not going to talk about the magazine itself so much (Since that was already covered in the last thread) rather, I am going to be more commenting on the actual contents of the magazine.

Again, I apologize for any horizontal images that may crop up.

SRahlc1.jpg

The cover for the February 2005 issue. As I said before in the last thread, OPM US of this era was really good with minimalist covers that conveyed what was being advertised without many blurbs to clutter everything up. Right off the jump, you know that the PSP is the main focus, and that the main story for the issue is EA's willing development of games on the system.


Contents page. Again, very minimalist, lots of black and yellow present.


What is present on the famous demo DVD. This time, it's demos for Katamari Damacy, and the GOTM for the issue, Mercenaries.


Article about the lack of enforcement on selling violent video games to youth, especially in the wake of the runaway success GTA San Andreas had in the holiday shopping season of 2004.


A preview for Batman Begins. Alas, we would not get a truly great Batman game until years later...I think we all know the story on that one, no?


Probably the best part about the entire issue is this interview with David Duchovny and Marilyn Manson literally shooting the shit about video games and their roles in Midway's FPS around this time, Area 51. Really fun interview, both of them just try to keep it in character...


...and break out of keyfabe to talk about violence in video games.


Ad for Enthusia. I quite like this game at the time, and it does some interesting things that differentiated itself from Gran Turismo.


Article about the launch of the PSP in Japan. Talks about some of the trials and tribulations in getting one, and some of the games released for the system in Japan, including Lumines, Hot Shots Golf, and Ridge Racers.


By that same margin, this looks at the PSP's footprint in Europe, while outlining the same games in waiting for the region, which adds onto it Wipeout as well.


The big draw for the issue, EA's commitment to the PSP via the EA Sports brand, and alongside a profile of the team that made the only truly original game from this time period of EA on the PSP: Need for Speed Underground Rivals.


Page that outlines what is reviewed this month. As mentioned before, and shown here, Mercenaries is the GOTM for this issue.


The actual review for Mercenaries.


Movie reviews written by John Scalzi.


Basically OPM US's GOTY awards. I wanted to talk about this because it has something very important....


...that is, Burnout 3 winning GOTY for 2004. Now, I have hang ups on Burnout 3 (Which I should probably talk about at some point in a RTTP thread) but essentially, it comes down to the time frame: remember that in 2004, two landmark games were released: GTA San Andreas and MGS3 (which isn't nominated, but it should have been, and for this comparison I'm going to add it) and for what amounts to a plucky little arcade racing game winning GOTY between those two is like David fighting two Goliaths, and winning. That's pretty amazing, in my eyes.


A sort of exit interview with Guerrilla Games over the fizzling out of their first true AAA title, the original Killzone. And yet in 2017, they have released a potential GOTY title in Horizon: Zero Dawn. What a turnaround.


A neat little article on some of the changes that box art for games that have crossed either to Japan, to Europe, or the US.


And finally, the last page of the issue, the Rewind which goes back to what was present in an issue that happens in that month. This time, the focus is on the WWE Smackdown! games that were coming onto the PS1.

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With that, it finishes yet another look of the gaming magazines of my youth. Do you have any memories or comments about this thread, GAF?
 
Honestly I thought that this iteration of the opm was terrible, too little text. As a consequence reviews were very superficial.
 
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