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Its fair to say theres nothing you really like, but coming on and calling it mediocre is, in my opinion, pretty rude to all who worked on the issue - theres no need to take it that far, especially when there are obviously a lot of people who love this issue based on the comments.

I loved the 'Master System' article and the cover automatically bought a nostalgic smile to my face

The peripherals part bought back some memories for me, I can remember receiving the arcade stick and being confused by the left handedness of it, it made me question whether right handed people were in the minority
I found the styx article interesting as I never knew it was a Matt Smith game, I can definitely remember owning the game as the box art really stood out to me but I can't remember the gameplay at all sadly

The only comment I really will make is that I'm surprised Megaman X did not break into the capcom list but to be honest I can't knock any of the games that are listed

just read the Breakout piece.. know all about the story but always love reading about it again, and Steve Jobs' abuse of Wozniak, just amazing. Lovely ol' pal. And read Stuart's leaving... if thats the case thank you so much sir for all your wonderful work, sucks you're leaving but of course all the very best for the future. I wish i could be your replacement but unfortunately all it would amount to would be swear words for games i didnt like and lots of "awesomes", "brilliant, this one", and "10/10 no sweat" for games I did like, resulting in unquestionably dreadfully boring fare.

antsbull wrote:Its fair to say theres nothing you really like, but coming on and calling it mediocre is, in my opinion, pretty rude to all who worked on the issue - theres no need to take it that far, especially when there are obviously a lot of people who love this issue based on the comments.

Do you actually know what mediocre means?

Hi,
Greetings from Norway.
I've been reading RetroGamer for a couple years now, and just wanted to thank you for yet another good issue. I'm well into it now, reading a few pages each day.

As a 27 year old, many of the games covered in your magazines are well outside my experience, but I love to read and learn more about old games and game devs. I especially love the articles about companies and devs of old! In fact, reading about Jeff Minter's Minotaur project in one of your mags made me check it out and get GoatUp2 (which I admittedly suck at, as I do with all games ever created. I've not even managed to complete one single Mario game ever, even though I LOVE Mario...).

My first game console was a NES btw, everybody and his dog had a NES and/or Gameboy in Norway when I was a kid. I had both. So I am a bit surprised you say the NES was not successful in Europe. Must be a Scandinavian thing... I still have the Gameboy, and ONE game(the rest got away during a move to a new city back in the late 90s...), but unfortunately not my old NES. The NES died on me back in the mid 90s, and my dad threw it away without asking me. And he threw away all the games. Including DuckTales, which I've been told is quite valuable these days...

Big thank you for getting the magazine on iPad btw, I'm subscribing there. Without it, I couldn't have afforded to read this magazine. ~18 GBP for six issues on iPad vs ~15 GBP for ONE issue in the news stand, due to import prices. Ouch! Together with the subscription, I'm buying old back issues on my iPad, and have soon got down to a complete ownership of all issues down to the late 60s. Only compaint I have is that reading the mag on iPad is troublesome sometimes, as I need to zoom in and loose the complete overview of the pages. Checking on images suffers, as I miss them due to zooming in on the text.

As for this issue, so many good articles. Coin snatchers, Naughty Dog, SMS... Loved it!

Btw, I'd love it if you one day took a look on the Scandinavian gaming devs. Funcom with The Longest Journey is perhaps a bit too new yet, but it must surely come close now? Sweden has a long tradition of making games too, but the highday of theirs is in the early 2000s, so it's on the edge, I know. As a Paradox fan(of Europa Universalis, Hearts of Iron, Crusader Kings fame, and later as a indie publisher fame), I'd love to get a peek at their early days, like Airfix Dogfighter and the first Europa Universalis game(1998 and 1999/2000, respectively IIRC). As you are covering the late 90s now, I guess it's possible now/soon.

Thanks again for making this mag!

Welcome to the forum Nikolai! Would love to cover some of the Scandinavian stories - especially Stavros Fasoulas, the Finnish coder.

Gabe wrote:

antsbull wrote:Its fair to say theres nothing you really like, but coming on and calling it mediocre is, in my opinion, pretty rude to all who worked on the issue - theres no need to take it that far, especially when there are obviously a lot of people who love this issue based on the comments.

Do you actually know what mediocre means?

I can only assume he doesn't . He obviously also doesn't understand the concept of "feedback". How he works out that I don't like anything from one post is also baffling.

I actually thought my post was polite and respectful despite my criticisms and Darran replied in a polite and respectful way , I believe that is called a discussion . Obviously based on his logic I can only conclude that because other people really love this issue I am compelled to love it too and am not entitled to have an opinion that differs .

The point is, saying "the issue is mediocre BECAUSE there is nothing that interests me" does not really help anyone. It's certainly not helpful to the writers who created the content or the editors and designers who put it together. It's the same with "list articles are lazy/just fill space" - you are not criticising the actual content, just the way the information is presented to the reader.

merman wrote:The point is, saying "the issue is mediocre BECAUSE there is nothing that interests me" does not really help anyone. It's certainly not helpful to the writers who created the content or the editors and designers who put it together. It's the same with "list articles are lazy/just fill space" - you are not criticising the actual content, just the way the information is presented to the reader.

I'm not here to help anyone, I was merely stating my opinion of this months issue as asked . (clue - feedback)

Bloody hell if you all get this wound up because I think an issue is mediocre , lets hope they never release one that's rubbish .

I listed what I liked and disliked in the magazine and gave reasons . What more do you want ?

And yes list articles are lazy and I'm fed up with them . Whats wrong with that ??

Ohhh sorry people , everything abut your magazine is wonderful , please carry on .... Surely that sort of attitude is less helpful ?

You just don't understand what "being mediocre" means. Something is not mediocre, bad, good or whatever just because it doesn't or does cover a topic you're interested in. A feature is mediocre if, e.g. it does merely scratch the surface of the covered topic, doesn't dig deep enough or features too many factual mistakes. THOSE are criteria you can judge a feature by. You can't judge it on a scale of how much the topic interests you.

You can say either say "there's nothing in this issue for me" or "the writing in this issue is pretty mediocre", but saying "the issue is mediocre because there is nothing in it for me" is pointless and actually just wrong.

rockdjuk wrote:

merman wrote:The point is, saying "the issue is mediocre BECAUSE there is nothing that interests me" does not really help anyone. It's certainly not helpful to the writers who created the content or the editors and designers who put it together. It's the same with "list articles are lazy/just fill space" - you are not criticising the actual content, just the way the information is presented to the reader.

I'm not here to help anyone, I was merely stating my opinion of this months issue as asked . (clue - feedback)

Bloody hell if you all get this wound up because I think an issue is mediocre , lets hope they never release one that's rubbish .

I listed what I liked and disliked in the magazine and gave reasons . What more do you want ?

And yes list articles are lazy and I'm fed up with them . Whats wrong with that ??

Ohhh sorry people , everything abut your magazine is wonderful , please carry on .... Surely that sort of attitude is less helpful ?

you are spot on.

we have seen it before it the feedback thread, there are a few people who get very upset if the feedback isn't 100% digital rimming. As a paying customer you are entitled to post your comments, you gave your views and had a response from Darren, that is how the feedback thread works.

Think people are taking what the OP wrote the wrong way, we had a similar issue a while back when people took offence. I'm sure most of the articles are written very well, he meant 'mediocre' as in theres nothing much that interests him, not mediocre crappy articles.

Last month i didnt enjoy the BBC article as i thought that was way too techie, i'm sure it was well written but something i really have no interest in whatsoever.

If next month featured 40 pages on the best games of the Oric and a 14 page article about programming the Jupiter Ace it would be a bad/mediocre issue for me.

Thank you Halcyon and psj . At last someone gets what I'm trying to say .

psj3809 wrote:Think people are taking what the OP wrote the wrong way, we had a similar issue a while back when people took offence. I'm sure most of the articles are written very well, he meant 'mediocre' as in theres nothing much that interests him, not mediocre crappy articles.

That is the exact problem. People are using a word the wrong way and then complain that other people don't get how they meant it. Mediocre is an adjective judging the quality. The quality of the mag is completely(!) unrelated to whether or not it happens to cover topics dear to one specific reader. If you think the issue offers nothing for you, fair enough, but then just say so instead of judging its quality purely based on your preferences.

hydr0x wrote:

psj3809 wrote:Think people are taking what the OP wrote the wrong way, we had a similar issue a while back when people took offence. I'm sure most of the articles are written very well, he meant 'mediocre' as in theres nothing much that interests him, not mediocre crappy articles.

That is the exact problem. People are using a word the wrong way and then complain that other people don't get how they meant it. Mediocre is an adjective judging the quality. The quality of the mag is completely(!) unrelated to whether or not it happens to cover topics dear to one specific reader. If you think the issue offers nothing for you, fair enough, but then just say so instead of judging its quality purely based on your preferences.

While I agree with what you say about using the wrong word, if he said in his opinion it was mediocre then that is his opinion.

As for judging quality based on preferences, well lets be honest thats what most people do for everything.

Personally I have enjoyed every single issue so far, and think every magazine has been fantastic. but thats just my opinion, it does not really mean every issue has actually been fantastic, and strangely enough I doubt people would pick me up for doing that in the same way they have done to the other guy.