I rarely write a blog on a impulse and get it out within the same hour but I feel this sad news deserves some attention

As you've seen on the front page, UGO has bought out 1UP.com and EGM, and in the process laid off half the 1UP staff and has ended one of the last great gaming magazines EGM

I have never once had a subscription to EGM (I've only subscribed to Tips 'N Tricks, PSM, and PTOM) but I used to read it monthly via the public library. Back before I gave a damn about bias and who was paying who off I realised on my own that my beloved Tips 'N Tricks was dieing, GameInformer was full of ads, and pretty much every console-specific mag sucked except PSM

But right there in the fray was EGM, I loved that mag, it had good writers who were actually funny. They cared about community and as such discussed things gaming-related. Long before I even dreamed of a 360 I was learning the cream of the crop of Forge and dreamed of how glorious it would be to play Pac-Man in Halo. I think I still have that issue that mentioned the best forges stored away somewhere

Now most comments I have seen thus far about the demise of EGM and the podcast are:

"Aww... the podcast is over"

and

"Print is dead anyway, what's happening to the site?"

From my perspective, someone that only visited 1UP.com once ever and never got the first page to load on the PS3 browser, I never got into the community. I did get into the mag, one thing that makes this news hit me harder than most is I had actually just last week started getting money together to get a EGM subscription going. It feels bad to JUST miss out on something epic like this. I felt the same way about Halo 2's online. I had a disc and I had a Xbox but never got Live...


I very rarely get worked up over stuff like this in the Gaming world. I didn't worry when PSM died because I knew everyone went over to PTOM (and left their only semblance of un-biased reviews behind) I did get worked up the night GTA IV won Game of the Year on the Spike VGAs (actually I was watching it with a friend with a cam in a PS3 chat and when they announced it we cursed the TV and he turned it off) but got over it the next day

This is the death of a gaming icon, the only Gaming award I ever cared about was the Tobias Bruckner award, I saw my first screens of Halo 3 in EGM, If she was still in print I would've read my first pre-view of Halo 3: ODST in EGM

I learned of how the PSN and LIVE worked before having them myself. EGM taught me who Uwe Boll was and why to avoid his movies at all costs.

Say all you want about digital media but I never threw away a copy of EGM or Tips 'N Tricks, I delete week-old bookmarks every day without a second thought

Internet media is... expendable to me, I grew up reading all the time and as such I respect the written word and hoard books. Typing speech is on the same level as writing it, i'm not naive to think any modern writers use anything short of a word-processor theses days.

Web sites and news articles come and go, they can be written and deleted in the blink of an eye. A physical copy of something holds more weight to me, hence why I would pre-fer a mag over Kotaku or somewhere else for vauge rumors pertaining to games. News on the gaming industry is usually correct on the internet, on games themselves not so much.

We have lost a friend, but we will not forget them

Electronic Gaming Monthly was a blast, its been a good ride

Feel free to play appropriate cheesy music and argue with me about OXM and GameInformer being end-all be-all sources of awesomeness in the comment section.

Just do SOMETHING for EGM to mark its passing, perhaps blog about your first issue ever. Discuss their best ever April Fools joke (Lego Halo and the Sega Saturn sale are tied in my opinion)

Very Bummed Ninja Out