Like an inferno cutting through forest bristles, the news that Hearst Corporation had acquired the popular site 1UP.com set the gaming community ablaze two weeks ago.’ No one could believe it ‘mdash; or, more aptly put, no one wanted to.’ If the feat had been a simple baton pass from one owner to the next, there probably wouldn’t have been anything to worry about, but the repercussions have been far-reaching.
The Jan. 6 transaction revealed that not only had 1Up and its various sister sites fallen under Hearst and its UGO.com brand, but that Ziff Davis Media had effectively shut down Electronic Gaming Monthly ‘mdash; arguably the most popular, respected, and longest-running gaming publication in the nation ‘mdash; abruptly firing the vast majority of its editorial staff a month before its 20th anniversary.
I suppose all good things must come to an end; however, I didn’t think I, or anyone else, could’ve anticipated just how much the end actually seethes.
‘ Truthfully, the acquisition shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise, especially since Ziff Davis had filed for Chapter 11 last summer. I’m sure we were all shocked. But surprised?’ Not likely.
Ever since key staff members started disappearing, subtle hints of the company’s mismanagement were obvious.’ Well-known personalities like Luke Smith, Bryan Intahar and Kathleen Sanders may have gone on to bigger and better things, but when influential figures like Mark MacDonald and then EGM Editor in Chief Dan Hsu became freelance writers, it stopped making any sense.
Having lost a majority of the site’s leading names, many questions have been raised regarding 1Up’s future.’ What’ll happen to all the talented editors, writers and producers who were let go?’ What’ll be made of popular podcasts ‘The 1Up Show’ and ‘1Up Yours’?’ And what’ll become of the community that 1Up helped foster for an entire decade?’ But of all the questions to ask, I think the most important has yet to be approached: Why is it that we care?’ Companies fold. People get fired.’ So what makes the departure of EGM and its staff so painful?
At a time when most gaming publications acted as vehicles for commercial hype, purporting the popularity of a given console (read: Nintendo Power), EGM’s coverage was admittedly a big fucking deal.’ Upon its inception, the publication made a point of staying unbiased and covering almost any significant game for every available system, anywhere in the world.’
The impartiality of gaming journalism may be a standard today, but it’s only because EGM blazed frontiers. And while the most obvious benefits of the magazine’s objectivity were the honest previews and reviews of both upcoming and existing games, EGM’s greatest success spawned from its ability to take its readers seriously. As both video games and gamers became more sophisticated over the years, so did the magazine.’
Remaining true to its impartiality, EGM began addressing the perception of gaming within the general public with topics ranging from video violence and narrative structures to video games as fine art. And once EGM combined with 1Up’s online publication, its writers themselves became household names ‘mdash; well, maybe not in every neighborhood.
Due in large part to the brilliant success of the site’s numerous
podcasts, 1Up did what EGM never could: destroy the unconscious barrier between writers and readers.’ Podcasts gave the staff real human qualities, experts could finally relate. In conjunction with editor blogs and message boards, 1Up built an expansive community for gamers from the toil of the older gamer generations. EGM’s editorial staff became our voice, expressing our opinions and asking our questions to those in and outside of the industry. They became as much a part of us as we became of them.
It’s with great sadness that we say farewell to a legendary publication and the imagined community we once called home. Though there’ll never be a magazine that could possibly fill the void that EGM has left (and 1Up.com will inevitably continue to exist), we all know it’ll never be quite the same.
But even still, EGM’s story does have a silicon lining. The talented individuals who made the 1Up podcasts such a resounding success have recently gone on to make podcasts of their own ‘mdash; one of which, Rebel FM, currently sits pretty in the No. 2 slot on iTunes. So while it’s a sad time for gamers everywhere, at least we can know that the ghost of a great will continue to make its well-deserved presence known.