He Said There's A Storm Coming

We'd heard a few reports that Games For Windows magazine wasn't doing so well since its... puzzling 2006 rebrand to a Microsoft-sponsored title. Who knows whether or not ditching the Computer Gaming World name it'd carried since 1981 truly did harm sales, but the whispers that publisher Ziff Davis was worried about bankruptcy were a surer sign that unhappy change might be coming.

Still, the news that one of the eldest gaming mags is dead is a shocker. Well, dead-ish.

While my few encounters with it (mostly whilst idling at US airports) hadn't placed it terribly high up on my list of required reading, it's nonetheless sad to see the old dear's life support unplugged. And, if you're a guy who makes most of his meagre income penning words for print mags, it's more than a little scary too. I pray it's not a sign o'the times. At least not until we've got our hands on some of that lovely internet money.

The writing staff and most of the content are moving online and into the soon-to-be-embiggened PC channel of 1Up.com, the Ziff Davis webb-networky-thingy. The mag's art team weren't so lucky, sadly.

"In some ways, this change will both liberate and, uh, empower (sorry, I was trying to avoid that word) us to drill down into certain key aspects of PC gaming in the 21st century--modding, patches, MMO updates--that were always challenging for us in print," says Editor Jeff Green in his extensive obituary for the mag/roadmap for the future. Great. More competition. We can take 'em, right? Right?

Farewell then, CGW. 27 years. Man!

(Thanks to the various folks who mentioned this to us).