Videogames & computer entertainment magazine (VG&CE)

Memory is a funny thing. I swear to God there is an episode of Beavis and Butt-Head where the pair cracks jokes over the videoclip to Jeremy by Pearl Jam. You know, the song about a bullied teen that brings a gun to school and shoots himself in front of his classmates. While I’m convinced this happened, I’ve never been able to find that actual episode.

Similarly, I’m convinced that there’s an editorial in Videogames and Computer Entertainment (VG&CE) magazine where they criticise Dr Mario for peddling drugs to kids. I’ve not been able to find this feature. And God knows I’ve looked. Unable to locate it online via the usual channels, I even had my folks go through the old boxes of videogame magazines I left in a cupboard at home.

The best I could come up with was the January 1991 issue with John Madden on the cover, where editor Andy Eddy makes reference to his “tirade” against Dr Mario, and how Nintendo sent him a copy of the game — with the cartridge missing — in response.

Which is all just a really long and laboured way to say that at one point in history, the magazine took issue with the plumber’s career change, and jumped on the short lived moral panic around Dr Mario dispensing pills.

It’s this critical, adult-contemporary approach to the videogame industry that helped distinguish VG&CE from the numerous other magazines on the market (especially those from the UK).

Let’s take a step back here, folks

Released for the NES in 1990, Dr Mario has the plumber downing tools to moonlight as a doctor. Taking place inside a stylised medicine jar, Mario has to match pills of the same colour in order to destroy the viruses.

The game is ‘okay’. Nothing special. Following the success of Tetris, companies were flooding the market with variations on a puzzle theme, and Dr Mario was Nintendo’s attempt to crow-bar their mascot into a new role. Which is where our story picks up…

As I recall it, VG&CE’s editor, Andy Eddy, did a a whole editorial bit on how Mario dispensing medicine promoted drug use amongst kids. Because reasons…

At the time I thought that was a stretch. And looking back it highlights the difference between the UK and US gaming media. Or the difference between the enthusiast (UK) press vs more traditional (US) media.

In the UK, games magazines were mostly staffed and written by guys who loved videogames and had no formal writing qualifications.

As Mean Machines founder and editor Julian ‘Jaz’ Rignall explained in his article for USGamer, “The magazine where I got my first gig, a Commodore magazine called ZZAP! 64, featured a team that was exclusively gamers — which resulted in a magazine filled with slang terms and contemporary phraseology that resonated with gamers.”

In the U.S., the writing staff tended to be older, more formally trained, and more likely to approach games from a traditional journalistic standpoint. So when parents started expressing concerns about Mario peddling drugs they felt more compelled to investigate his new career choice.

Also, they were a bunch of nerds.

Dorks. They look like dorks…

A quick look at the press shots of US editors back in the day reveals heavy ‘dad vibes’. Moustaches, receding hairlines and glasses were all par for the course. Basically, they all looked like middle-age data analysts. Which is probably where Kotaku’s Jason Schreier got his whole vibe from. But that’s another article…

Their counterparts in the UK were probably ten years younger, and if they were nerds they hid it behind elaborate haircuts, leather jackets, and juvenile humour. They didn’t think of themselves as ‘journalist’ and didn’t carry the puritanical streak that still defines large parts of the US media.

Which brings us back to that Dr Mario editorial and VG&CE magazine. The magazine always played it pretty straight, and favoured an investigative approach to the industry.

Which is to say the multi-format magazine was pitched at an older audience, and featured contributing writers like the legendary Arnie Katz and Bill Kunkel. Guys who built careers on a more insightful approach to games than the hyperbolic approach of the UK media or the kid friendly Nintendo Power and its ilk.

And to revisit Julian Rignall’s article for a moment, that more straight laced approach wasn’t just ‘cos they were a bunch of dads. As he explains, “In the US, however, there was far more nervousness about upsetting publishers, because pulled ads put a magazine’s bottom line in jeopardy. This resulted in a tempering of language — or simply not covering a game if its coverage would be controversial… This made some European mags feel more ‘honest’, simply because there was a perception that writers could say whatever they wanted.”

The first issue of VG&CE I remember picking up was January 1991, the one with that John Madden cover. But what really struck me at the time was the Final Fantasy walk-through. Some 30 odd years later, I can still recall the multi-page spread and how it captivated me as a kid.

The other thing that sticks out after all these years is the clip-art style graphics used throughout. While the European titles favoured large screen shots and bold magazines spreads, VG&CE, much like its editorial policy, had a much more regimented look and feel.

Things fall apart

What’s interesting about all this straight-laced reporting is how it evolved over the course of the magazine’s life. By 1993 the magazine was rebranded as VideoGames — The Ultimate Gaming Magazine, in order to compete with the all conquering EGM. Out went the family friendly vibes and in-depth features, replaced with a more ‘radical 90s’ persona.

If a picture tells a thousand words, the change in tone is pretty clear across these two editorials — one from July 1989, the other from February 1994.

According to former staff writer, Chris Bieniek, the change in direction came about due to collapsing circulation numbers, and focus groups that described the magazine as old and dull. As he recounts in an interview with AtariHQ.

“Andy Eddy was the Executive Editor at that time. He had his picture on the editorial page, and this kid pointed at it and said, ‘I don’t wanna hear what Grandpa has to say about this game!’ And Andy was on the other side of the mirror going, ‘Oh my God…’ It was a pretty traumatic day.”

VideoGames — The Ultimate Gaming Magazine kept going until 1996 when it was bought out by Ziff-Davis and folded. By that point the publishing industry was consolidating around a handful of flagship magazines, and there simply wasn’t need for a dozen magazines all covering the same systems.

Which left VG&CE as a footnote in publishing history. A magazine that tried to bridge the uneasy gap between videogames and computers, but found itself on the wrong side of history. Buried under an avalanche of bold, bright, kid friendly publications that didn’t care if Dr Mario was dispensing pills, as long as the end result gave them a buzz.

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