Import magazines

[Dire 51]

Gaijin's print ads thread got me to thinking about this. I've always been interested in Japanese gaming mags, as more often than not you see games you've never seen before (and may likely never see). A friend of mine back in high school had a couple of Mega Drive mags that I tried to get him to sell or give to me, but he wouldn't part with them.

So, what do you all think of import mags? Does anyone know what some of the big ones are? Currently I have two issues of Marukatsu Famicom (circa 1988) and one issue of Sega Power (circa 1991) - so it's not Japanese, but that's the first and only British mag I've ever seen. I just wish mine was in better shape.

[GaijinPunch]

Famitsu is about the biggest thing under the sun here. There's the "general" Famitsu, and then one for pretty much every system made. It's unreal.

Then you've got dengeki and the other mags. There's just too many freaking magazines to keep up with.

[Dire 51]

Famitsu I've heard of, but I've never heard of dengeki. Ever heard of a mag called BEEP! Megadrive?

[jaydubnb]

I always heard good things about "Edge" magazine. I was pondering a subscription, but it does cost a pretty penny in US dollars and i dont know if its worth THAT much (i think it was like 50 bucks for a year).

[GaijinPunch]

BEEP Megadrive is an old magazine. There was also FLash Sega Saturn which came w/ demo discs. Or maybe Flash was just the discs... can't quite recall. Those were dedicated to that system only.

Famitsu XXX is mainly dedicated to XXX but will cover some other stuff for a few pages from time to time. At least a couple of adverts in the back or something.

Generally, Famitsu is the most popular, although sometimes the free stuff gets lame. Dricas (Dreamcast) Magzine was good. Came with a demo CD w/ about 7 demos on it each quarter.

I've not bought a game mag in months... they generally just tend to take up space after you flip through them once. :(

[Saturn Sensei]

Edge magazine should be read by all. An awesome read every month. It is high-class in every way. Similar to the older issues of Next Generation, with the thicker stock cover. Definitely worth the price of a subscription. Plus, it comes out 13 times per year(lots of British mags have 13 issues every year. Why? I don't know).

I also subscribe to Games TM by Paragon Publishing. While not quite as good as Edge, they do have a 30-ish page Retro magazine in each issue.