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Dave Halverson Re-launches GameFan Magazine
- Thread starter CO_Andy
- Start date
Seeing this thread bumped made me go see if there was any news about GameFan #5 being out. I know at this point a lot of people just assume I love trolling the new GF, but the cover for issue five is terrible. That image would make me never, ever want to touch LittleBig Planet 2.
lunarworks
Member
Hmm. I was wondering if it was still around, because I've never actually seen it on a shelf anywhere.
I AM JOHN!
Banned
I saw the Enslaved issue on the shelf at Barnes and Noble a couple days ago. I didn't even care enough to flip through it.
aparisi2274
Member
lunarworks said:
It's still out! The LBP2 issue is on shelfs now. You may need to look toward the back row of the video game mags because of the unusual size of the magazine.
I got Issue 5 the other day, though I have yet to really read through it all. It was nice to see a big article on Retro City Rampage. Love the smaller-dev coverage.
I still like the overall layouts of the magazine (colorful and dynamic), and the mix of old + new always fits my taste (Wow, we're talking about Dirty Pair in a modern magazine? Amazing! XD)
With the Moviefan side dropped, it feels like a nice heafty mag. I remember issue 1 feeling flimsier.
I can still see where it feels a bit sloppy (Why a Dead Nation review in the beginning of the mag? You throught Fist of the North star had only 4 playable characters (more unlock!)), but overall, it reminds me of what I like about Gamer's Republic, Gamefan, GameGO!, etc, more than most out there.
I still like the overall layouts of the magazine (colorful and dynamic), and the mix of old + new always fits my taste (Wow, we're talking about Dirty Pair in a modern magazine? Amazing! XD)
With the Moviefan side dropped, it feels like a nice heafty mag. I remember issue 1 feeling flimsier.
I can still see where it feels a bit sloppy (Why a Dead Nation review in the beginning of the mag? You throught Fist of the North star had only 4 playable characters (more unlock!)), but overall, it reminds me of what I like about Gamer's Republic, Gamefan, GameGO!, etc, more than most out there.
lunarworks said:
Me neither. I used to be able to buy Play at Safeway here, but there aren't any B&N or Borders type stores in my hippie ass county, it's all mom & pop used bookstores that don't even sell mags lol.
shidoshi said:
Yeah, it's pretty fucking weird man. I like how on the website the Blade Kitten chick is sort of like a mascot with her little "Hey gamers wanna try before you buy?" spiel next to the preview the last few months. I completely forget that game exists until I see that again, but I guess in Dave's pantheon she's up there with Blinx now...
Son.Ralph.Funk
Member
Oh god, not Dave Halverson. This is the guy that would give any pretty good game that he liked at least a 97/100.
bigdaddygamebot
Member
Son.Ralph.Funk said:
There are reasons to be disparaging about this fellow but his enthusiasm for games is not one of them.
Here are the reviews for issue #5:
Dead Nation- 7.5
Kirby's Epic Yarn- 9.5
Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 2- 8.0
Epic Mickey- 9.5- Game of the Month
Need for Speed Hot Pursuit- 9.5
Majin & the Forsaken Kingdom- 7.5
Megamind- 5.5
Tron- 8.5
Splatterhouse- 9
Sengoku Basara- 7.5
Fable III- 8.5
Fist of the North Star- 7
Donkey Kong Country Returns- 9
God of War: Ghost of Sparta- 8.5
Fallout New Vegas- 9.5
Top Games of 2010:
1 Red Dead Redemption
2 Mass Effect 2
3 Bayonetta
4 Darksiders
5 Super Mario Galaxy 2
6 Castlevania Lords of Shadow
7 Epic Mickey
8 God of War III
9 Halo Reach
10 Enslaved
11 Final Fantasy XIII
12 Metroid: Other M
13 Monster Hunter Tri
14 Fable III
15 Assassin's Creed Brotherhood
16 Donkey Kong Country Returns
17 Heavy Rain
18 Shantae: Risky's Revenge
19 No More Heroes 2
20 DeathSpank
21 Limbo
22 Retro City Rampage
23 Sin & Punishment: Star Successor
24 Cave Story
25 Fragile Dreams Farewell Ruins of the Moon
BTW, they use their own original screenshots and should share the capture techniques with others. Even Wii games look vibrant, crisp, and sharp. Not like the blurry, jaggy mess they often do in official screens.
Dead Nation- 7.5
Kirby's Epic Yarn- 9.5
Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 2- 8.0
Epic Mickey- 9.5- Game of the Month
Need for Speed Hot Pursuit- 9.5
Majin & the Forsaken Kingdom- 7.5
Megamind- 5.5
Tron- 8.5
Splatterhouse- 9
Sengoku Basara- 7.5
Fable III- 8.5
Fist of the North Star- 7
Donkey Kong Country Returns- 9
God of War: Ghost of Sparta- 8.5
Fallout New Vegas- 9.5
Top Games of 2010:
1 Red Dead Redemption
2 Mass Effect 2
3 Bayonetta
4 Darksiders
5 Super Mario Galaxy 2
6 Castlevania Lords of Shadow
7 Epic Mickey
8 God of War III
9 Halo Reach
10 Enslaved
11 Final Fantasy XIII
12 Metroid: Other M
13 Monster Hunter Tri
14 Fable III
15 Assassin's Creed Brotherhood
16 Donkey Kong Country Returns
17 Heavy Rain
18 Shantae: Risky's Revenge
19 No More Heroes 2
20 DeathSpank
21 Limbo
22 Retro City Rampage
23 Sin & Punishment: Star Successor
24 Cave Story
25 Fragile Dreams Farewell Ruins of the Moon
BTW, they use their own original screenshots and should share the capture techniques with others. Even Wii games look vibrant, crisp, and sharp. Not like the blurry, jaggy mess they often do in official screens.
Son.Ralph.Funk
Member
djtiesto said:
It's a breath of fresh air to give any half decent game at least a 95/100?
How are you supposed to differentiate between good, really good, and great games if they all score within the 95-100 range?
Son.Ralph.Funk
Member
bigdaddygamebot said:
I'm not being disparaging about him. I'm criticizing the way he scores his reviews. If you are only going to use the 90%+ range, there is no point in even scoring games out of 100. I still have a couple old episodes of Gamefan from the 1990s.
Freshmaker
I am Korean.
Son.Ralph.Funk said:
Well...
Compared to "5 is average." With all games usually rated between 6 and 9....
Not much difference.
Son.Ralph.Funk said:
I don't listen to review scores to begin with... but I was saying the "breath of fresh air" was having someone with actual enthusiasm and appreciation for games writing about them, as opposed to many other magazines (EGM being very guilty of this) where the reviewers act all jaded and ironic (like "hipsters"), maybe making some not-so-subtle jabs at gamers for being nerds, etc.
I AM JOHN!
Banned
Yeah, I'll take being jaded and realistic and resolute in the correct assumption that most things are mediocre, making the higher score you give that much more meaningful over blindly cheerleading anything that involves a cartoony art style or platforming catgirls or Sega any day of the week, thanks.djtiesto said:
bigdaddygamebot
Member
Son.Ralph.Funk said:
If you're relying on any one or even a handful of reviewers to guide you in your purchases...well...you have a whole other set of problems to worry about than how Halverson reviews games.
djtiesto said:
I agree with this side. It's more interesting to see "Gamers" reviewing games, rather than people who act like they're almost embarassed to like what they do.
For example, all the reviews I saw or FOTNS: Ken's Rage barely ever seem to ever attempt to understand WHY someone would enjoy the game. But Daves review of it touched on much of what I liked about it; how each character feels unique, and has a depth of gameplay that transcends initial impressions. Of the 5+ "professional" reviews I've seen, he was the only person who seemed to not have pre-concieved "Warriors games SUCK!" notions.
Wehrwolf" said:
Respect is good!
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I have to mention, I've read a Majority of the Retro City Rampage article now... what a nice read. Feel like the issue was worth that alone.
It'd be great to see a couple of the XBLIG people get featured like this...
And I still like the mags colorful layout. It's so nice seeing huge pieces of character art on pages like this. Sure, I have the internet and such now-a-days, but I'll always enjoy seeing such in print.
To me, original screenshots combined with the crazy colorful layouts is what sets the new GameFan apart from everyone else. I know it's easier to just run official PR shots, but that has led to every magazine showcasing the exact same set of images for every game. Using their own captured screenshots allows the layouts to have much more variety and impact.radcliff said:
The review scores are still garbage (par for the course with Halverson), but the presentation makes it worth it to me. There's definitely nostalgia at play here, but I love how the new GameFan reminds me of 90's print media with a modern sheen. Every game gets its own unique layout, and you can definitely sense the love for gaming in every page. Much like when I occasionally read the GameFan of the 90's, I can explicitly remember how certain game articles look because they are so uniquely designed. That's a good thing, and it's using print media in a way that web coverage would never bother to match.
But don't get me wrong. If GameFan wants to become a really good publication, it needs better organization and for Halverson to possibly change his review scoring methods. As it stands now, it's simply a refreshing throwback with great production values (the size and paper quality, layouts, screenshots, use of color... etc.). GamePro and the new EGM are still the best publications when it comes to modern design and insightful feature articles.
Sorry about the bump, but I think retro gamers might be interested to hear that the first 2 issues of the original 1992 GameFan magazine are now available for purchase in digital form on the GameFan store. 
GameFan Vol.1 Issue1 - october 1992
GameFan Vol.1 Issue2 - december 1992
Each issue costs only $2 and comes as a DRM free PDF file I believe, and should be useable on just about any device that has a PDF compatible application.
Issue 3 shouldn't be too far of as there are only a handful of pages that need to go through the restoration process before they can be turned over to Dave.
GameFan Vol.1 Issue1 - october 1992
GameFan Vol.1 Issue2 - december 1992
Each issue costs only $2 and comes as a DRM free PDF file I believe, and should be useable on just about any device that has a PDF compatible application.
Issue 3 shouldn't be too far of as there are only a handful of pages that need to go through the restoration process before they can be turned over to Dave.
Correctomundo
Member
Oh hell yes.
Indeed it is.Aokage said:
Couldn't talk about any of this before today as the people at GF had to get everything ready for the magazines to be put on sale and such.
It's not just a quick and dirty scan job either.
Every page gets scanned several times so that there are basically no parts of the page missing. This also fixes the problem of having the part right next to the spine become blurry.
Everything gets put back together digitally and then we go through the time-consuming process of restoring the pages to their former glory.
With magazines that are 20 years old, you can imaging that this can take quite a bit of time to do.
After all that said and done, the pages get color corrected and are sent off to GF for final approval as well as distribution.
For an example of how serious we take the restoration part, have a look at this example, or this one.
Just keep in mind that these 2 images are GIFs, so certain graphical problems that pop up in the finished image, like the blue pixels on Stimpy's tongue isn't actually there in the original JPG files.
Those GIFs were made to illustrate the before and after effect and what exactly happens before the issues are ready for distribution.
ShinobiFist
Banned
If they do all of them, I might consider getting rid of my MAGS then.
sixteen-bit
Member
I only have one physical copy of GameFan. February '97. Had some nice previews of Street Fighter III New Generation and Tekken 3 in there. That's about all I remember of it though.
That certainly is the plan.ShinobiFist said:
But please do keep in mind that doing a single issue from start to finish can take up to 30 hours or more, depending on the condition of the pages and the overall wear and tear that the magazine has undergone throughout the years.
Also, besides doing this work on classic video game magazines, everyone of us at Out of Print Archive has a regular 40+ hour day job as well, which sometimes interferes with our scanning and editing duties.
So please be a bit patient with us, but you can feel assured knowing that we're already hard at work on the next couple of issues.
meppi said:Sorry about the bump, but I think retro gamers might be interested to hear that the first 2 issues of the original 1992 GameFan magazine are now available for purchase in digital form on the GameFan store.
GameFan Vol.1 Issue1 - october 1992
GameFan Vol.1 Issue2 - december 1992
Each issue costs only $2 and comes as a DRM free PDF file I believe, and should be useable on just about any device that has a PDF compatible application.
Issue 3 shouldn't be too far of as there are only a handful of pages that need to go through the restoration process before they can be turned over to Dave.
This is fantastic news! My mom threw out most of my Gamefan mags way back when, and I missed out on a lot of their goodness, but the old Gamefan is by far my favorite mag ever. Now if only EGM can do that with their backissues.
Have you bought those issues, meppi? The quality of the scans didn't seem that great, based on the sample images. Does the actual PDF file look a lot cleaner?
I didn't buy those issues, I actually created them.djtiesto said:
Well the digital versions anyway.
Carl from OoPA scans the issues in and then sends them to me.
I do the restoration parts and when everything is finished, all the pages are sent over to Dave and Rob at GameFan, and they handle it from there.
The original images are 2400 pixels wide.
Not sure how they are resized when they create the PDF files though, if at all.
As for the amount of work that's been done on them. It all depends on what exactly the pages need.
Just take a look at these covers for instance: example 1 and example 2.
The type of editing also depends on the kind of paper used and the way they were printed as well as how the design was put together back in the day.
Those kinds of things can be like day and night between different publications.
The little preview images I put up before of issue 1 and 2 have been resized to the extreme so that they don't take up a whole page on here.
Boards of Canada
Member
Do you guys not have the original Quark files? Or PageMaker?
east of eastside
Banned
In whatever issue it was, GameFan had in its rumor section a statement that Cruisn' USA was on par with Daytona USA.
Great stuff.
Great stuff.
TheBanditKing
Member
Is this still in print? My local B&N doesn't carry it (or many game mags anymore).
There's a preview on the site www.gamefanmag.com
or just follow this link to get straight to it: http://c15110576.r76.cf2.rackcdn.com/index.html
or just follow this link to get straight to it: http://c15110576.r76.cf2.rackcdn.com/index.html
Type_Raver
Member
Sweet! Definitely getting first print.
As most have touched on, print media, unless they get exclusives, are always a step behind to the internet medium.
But thetes always something satisfying in holding a mag, gawking at pics and smelling the pages.
Edit: just realised the original post was from 2010!
As most have touched on, print media, unless they get exclusives, are always a step behind to the internet medium.
But thetes always something satisfying in holding a mag, gawking at pics and smelling the pages.
Edit: just realised the original post was from 2010!
I'll get it, if I see it. So many bookstores closing...
Easily a decent mag, from the issues I've gotten, and it's much more "90s" in style, with all the gaudy colors, art-filled pages, expensive looking paper and print, etc. I'm one of those that has little love for the overly-steril, white page, small screenshot look, and Gamefan, as always, is the furthest from that possible.
Love all the fresh artwork they have for covers and such, too. And the spotlights they give to independent /smaller games. I think the organization improved a bit since the early issues, but that was never a massively big deal to me in the first place.
mr stroke
Member
You're that guy... Dave has mentioned that story. Well all he said was he sold it someone
Here's a nice large pic of the Skullgirls cover.
http://gamefanmag.com/ed-zone/gamefan-magazine-issue-08-now-availale
http://gamefanmag.com/ed-zone/gamefan-magazine-issue-08-now-availale