ISSUE LINK: https://www.retromags.com/magazines/usa/game-players-1993/game-players-issue-83/Here come the RPGs...sort of. Aidan and Ty revisit Game Players yet again, as the drumbeat for more RPGs gets louder across 1996 and 1997. The splashy cover art of Beyond the Beyond's Finn helped rook a young Ty into buying one of the most disappointing and frustrating games he's ever played.But the review is actually for the seminal Resident Evil, with the GP crew doing its level best to review a genre-shattering, brilliantly innovative game with a couple of truly nasty flaws. -----Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!
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Game Informer 47 - Carnage Heart [S1E14]
ISSUE LINK: https://archive.org/details/game-informer-issue-47-march-1997ANDY MCNAMARA ON MY PERFECT CONSOLE: https://shows.acast.com/my-perfect-console/episodes/andy-macnamara-former-editor-in-chief-game-informerMATT MILLER ANNOUNCING GI'S RETURN: https://gameinformer.com/letter-from-the-editor/2025/03/25/game-informer-is-backWe've been grinding XP and saving up MP for this one: Our first issue of Game Informer--though in 1997, the mag is years from its dominant Aughties peak, and decades from its shocking 2024 closure and its thrilling 2025 revival.Ty comes clean about his lack of history with the magazine, Aidan discusses having written for it; they both talk about how the PS1 library was chock full of brilliant, groundbreaking, unconventional, and nevertheless first-party (or AA/AAA-level funded) experiments of the kind that are so hard to get greenlit these days.And then...Carnage Heart.It was Ty's bizarre obsession, Aidan had never heard of it, and it was (and is) one of the most unusual, tough-to-talk-about games of all time.How did the GI staff handle it? Listen to find out!-----Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!
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PC Gamer Vol. 4, Issue 3 - Diablo [S1E13]
ISSUE LINK: Video Game History Foundation Library | Collection: PC GAMER (US)More info on "Free Speech and Magic Money," Jillan E. Foley, PhD's forthcoming book from Harvard University Press: Book – Jillian E. FoleyWe enter the dangerously Adult world of PC gaming: Mail-order explicit games, game-deletion utilities to keep people from finding out you play explicit games, politicians fear-mongering about games being a "dirty, dangerous" gateway to Hell--and a very thorough and excellent review of Diablo!You know, a game about going to actual Hell!For one of our most-requested mags, PC Gamer, Aidan and Ty get personal about their history with PC gaming, the thrill of the illicit, and late-stage AOL's idealized business model.-----Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!
ISSUE LINK: Tips & Tricks - Volume IV Issue 1 GAME LOSERS T&T ARTICLE: A Comprehensive Oral History Of Tips & Tricks – The #1 Video-Game Tips Magazine | Game LosersWe're the Tomb Raiders! Aidan and Ty teased Tomb Raider takes last episode, and here they finally are--and so is our look at a very popular game magazine that didn't (quite) have reviews at all, Tips & Tricks.Our hosts explain the appeal this magazine had (or didn't) to them at the time, flip out about the masthead featuring a very diverse staff working under Larry Flynt, and flip through the unique combination of in-depth strategy reference material with little-to-no traditional editorial.And then: we review their walkthrough (?) of Tomb Raider, and talk about how the game itself might have impacted it.-----Sources include the Internet Archive, the Video Game History Foundation, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!
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ULTRA Review Crew TEASER: Video Game History Foundation - Super Mario Bros. 1 [S1B5]
ISSUE LINK: Computer Entertainer, Volume 5, Number 3 | Video Game History Foundation Library – Digital ArchiveVHGF HOME: Home | Video Game History FoundationA pair of guests we've been dreaming about landing since before we launched the show, Frank Cifaldi and Phil Salvador of the Video Game History Foundation are two of the highest authorities on the planet on retro games, games media, and the culture around it all.The VGHF recently acquired the copyright to the 1980s game mag Computer Entertainer, and their contemporary review of Super Mario Bros. for the NES might be the only such surviving American professional written critique of one of the pillars of console gaming history.Unusually for one of our bonus episodes, we--as well as Frank and Phil--review it!As always, we thank all of you so much for supporting the show. If you dig it, please tell people! We'd love nothing more than to get more cool people in the ULTRA Lounge of our Discord server--and have the support we need to keep doing this show we love.-----Computer Entertainer images and information are sourced from the Video Game History Foundation, under the Creative Commons license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.enOther sources include the Internet Archive, Retromags.com, our original research, and our personal magazine collections.The FunFactor theme, and all other original songs, are composed and performed by Millennium Falck. Check out his work at millenniumfalck.com!
Ty Schalter (VICE, FiveThirtyEight) and Aidan Moher (WIRED, Vulture) review what rocked and what sucked about the classic video game magazines that inspired them to become professional journalists, authors, and critics—and what they can tell us about today's digital media and games.New episodes drop every other Tuesday!
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