EGM: Game Over?

Technically the magazine’s owner Ziff Davis hasn’t shut down or anything like that. But they did file for bankruptcy last week and have started throwing around corporate terms like restructuring. We’ve all heard a similar terms before — downsizing, transitioning, and reorganization. The reality to that plan is that some people are going to be out of work.

The company cites poor subscriptions and ad revenue as the central reason for them being in this hole which raises the question — is their core publication, Electronic Gaming Monthly relevant anymore? Is this trouble with Ziff Davis a reflection of our digital, electronic age where people just don’t read magazines any more? The company publishes other mags like PC Weekly and Games for Windows but with less people signing up for subscriptions what does that mean for these publications as a whole. There are certainly enough gaming zines out there. All you need to do is go down to your local Borders to see them. You have to wonder though — who is reading them?

Granted I’ve always enjoyed going to the mailbox and getting my copy of EGM which a great compendium of news, features and reviews all in one nice glossy magazine I can read at my leisure. That being said, sites like this one and others like IGN, GameSpot and Ziff Davis’s own 1UP provide me with all that information daily anytime I want. Not only can I read news and reviews, I can see videos, demos, screenshots, blog posts, user comments and so on and so on. Add to that is G4TV, an entire channel dedicated to gaming along with a slew of podcasts on iTunes with the and anything an everything gaming related. With all that at my fingertips, why wait every month for a magazine?

When the magazine itself, has a website that has everything the printed version has, it becomes hard to justify the expense of printing a publication which produces news and features people will already know or have seen. The immediacy that the Internet and cable TV provides all but eliminates a monthly magazine like EGM’s power as a resource for gaming news.

It’s a hard fact to argue and even harder to compete with. While no actual announcements have been made it’s clear that something is in the wind since the masthead of EGM has new titles for its lead staff members. It will be a sad loss to the community if the magazine becomes a victim of this restructuring. The bigger question — how many of the current generation of gamers will really miss it?