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Edge Magazine Available in the US!


dogbert

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The premier UK games magazine Edge is now available to buy at Barnes & Noble in the US! This is a long time coming - Edge has always been unavailable at US retail due to a deal made to avoid conflict with a US gay magazine with the same name, but for some reason, this situation has changed & B&N are now stocking it in amongst their other import game mags like GamesTM.

 

What is Edge? It's the sibling of late great NextGeneration, concentrating on discussing games with an adult & informed point of view. It's recently gone through a revamp with a change of editorial staff & design, though that won't affect new readers. It covers games from all around the world, not just what's new to the UK market, and regularly features interviews & articles on developers as well as the industry in general rather than just reviewing/previewing games.

 

It's well worth dropping 8 dollars on an issue to get a feel for it. The issue currently on B&N shelves features articles on George A Romero's upcoming game, "scare tactics" in games, an indepth look back at Skies of Arcadia, a "making of" of LCP, as well as the usual columns from the likes of Gary Penn & Stephen Poole, reviews, previews, news, tech musings etc.

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Does it still have that awesome, plastic coated cover, that Next Gen had or, did Edge drop it when Next Gen went to the standard, shiny cover?

 

This is good news though. Weird too. I was sitting here cleaning out my Xbox mags. I'm throwing them in the trash except for the 1st issue. It made me think that maybe I should throw out my entire Next Gen collection, except for the first issue.

 

Naw, not Next Gen. They're keepers.

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I couldn't remember if this was the magazine that profiled a friend's videogame colleciton or not. Worth picking up, huh? Will do.

 

That would be GamesTM, but yes, Edge is worth picking up.

 

And their covers aren't quite like the old NextGen, but still more stylish & tactile than EGM or GamePro ;)

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With the weak dollar, that's only a little more than the ?4 we pay in the UK, so you're not even being ripped off. The article on fear in games in that issue is pretty good, but what you'll really be wanting is the in-depth interview with the WarioWare team you get next month (the one with the absolutely gorgeous WipEout purE cover and article).

 

The current month has probably the most balanced GT4 review I've seen anywhere, as well, which is nice.

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the one with the absolutely gorgeous WipEout purE cover and article

 

Is that issue on sale here yet? The prospect brings back fond memories of the time Edge had it's first Wipeout cover almost ten years ago. I'll have to pick it up, though it will surely be the last thing to put me over the edge (no pun intended) and leave me lusting for a PSP.

 

Daniel

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It's good news but I sure wish they had a reasonable subscription program in the US.

 

Hopefully if they're shipping it over in bulk for retail, they'll handle subs the same way. However that'll mean a delay in getting the issue.

 

The weak dollar really doesn't help of course.

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Is that issue on sale here yet?

 

Sorry, Dan, I didn't realise you didn't know. It's been out for weeks, and I'd expect you've got a hunt on your hand to find one now. The following month has yet to hit my postbox, though, so it's still current.

 

You shouldn't have problems spotting it if the shop does have a copy, though; the Pantone Magenta leaps off the shelf before burning your eyes out.

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Hopefully if they're shipping it over in bulk for retail

God, why would any company do this?! Fine, produce it there, but print it and ship it domestically where you're distributing it.

 

Btw, what makes this at all associate with Next Gen? I loved the magazine and the web site... I believe it eventually became Dailyradar and then was absorbed by IGN, right? I just recall the NextGen people referring to IGN as their sister site all the time before they went under. Anyway, in what way are they associated with NextGen? Writers? Designers?

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God, why would any company do this?! Fine, produce it there, but print it and ship it domestically where you're distributing it.

 

The problem is that sub copies are shipped over to the US by airmail individually to the sub address. For retail distribution, they ship over a box of copies by the cheapest possible method, usually ship, which gets which means the UK magazines that B&N sell usually are 4-5 weeks behind UK retail. For the amount of copies sold in the US, I can't imagine it makes sense to print the magazine here - it's 100% niche. Hell, Edge & GamesTM are niche even in the UK.

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Anyway, in what way are they associated with NextGen? Writers? Designers?

 

NextGeneration shared content with Edge - the US mag would reprint articles written for Edge & vice versa (though usually it was much more often the US would print UK sourced articles). The original owner of Future, the publisher of Edge, owned the US publisher of NextGen, Imagine, I believe.

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Right. Imagine. Imagine Gaming Network (IGN). I wonder if any of the writer's from NextGen are at IGN, PCgamer, or any of the other Imagine magazines. On a related note: Since Nintendo is partnering with Gamespy for matchmaking on their online network, and since IGN owns Gamespy, and since IGN is up for sale (heard this, sorry, no source), is it possible that Nintendo is going to buy IGN?

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 3 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

These are apparently scores from the latest issue of Edge (unconfirmed):

 

Killer 7: 8

Battlefield 2 (PC): 9

Guild Wars : 7

Fire Emblem : 7

Ateleir Iris : Eternal Mana : 7

Advent Rising : 6

Conker L & R : 8

MOH - Euro Assault : 3 (ha ha)

Batman Begins : 6

Bomberman DS : 7

Trace Memory : 7

Intelligent License : 5

Black Hawk Down : 4

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I'll happily confirm them for you, if you want - mine arrived yesterday. Generally they look like reasonable scores, though the Bomberman one is causing a lot of debate of the "it's just Bomberman yet again" vs. "But it's fecking Bomberman! Wirelessly!" variety.

 

The main reason I'd suggest getting this month's, other than the fact that they seem to be taking their PS3 fanboy blinkers off and discuss the merits disclosed so far in better detail than Anand did, is that there's a rather nice and in-depth interview with Ron Gilbert.

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