Retro Gamer 168

[flatapex]

a lot of us work on computers for our jobs and should be getting eyesight tests

Why? I understand the need for eye tests once in a while for everyone (since it can pick up issues like glaucoma early), but working with computers is irrelevant. There is no evidence to support the common myth that VDUs are damaging to eyesight.

If you work with computers for a large amount of your work then your employer has a requirement to assist that they wouldn't in other roles. In any other job its solely down to yourself to sort

[Mayhem]

I don't think it's the vision focus aspect of your eyesight that might be the problem here, more the colour aspect, and being able to see certain colours against other colours as clearly as other people. Not necessarily like being colour blind, but a comparison acuity.

[paranoid marvin]

Picked up a copy in WH Smith and no blurry text, so obviously a problem with 'early' (ie subscribers) batch.

Even so, white text on a starry-white background is going to be a struggle, and reading text against a bright orange background isn't a great experience. But hopefully we will see improvements in this area.

[Boulder]

Probably would have been a nice issue, but if approximately one third of the pages are unreadable unless you have a bright light and tilt your head or magazine to be able to read the mess, it's not worth trying. There were some places where the left page was a mess and the right page perfectly readable, like it used to be some time ago. This is the first really messy issue that I got and I've been subscribing for over three years now.

I know the creators of the magazine don't have anything to do with the printing issues but they can affect the background. Stop using white text on a black background, or other difficult combinations. Simple as that. Black text on a white background never has any issues even if the font size is small.

[Crusty Starfish]

Love the mag! Enjoyed since issue 1

[Ryan GH]

Didn't take too long to reach me this time, I think its been a 3 week wait?
Can't say I had any trouble reading any of the text of any article in the megazine.

[Nikolai]

I'm just going to weigh in with regards to the readability of the magazine.

It's very hard to gauge how serious this issue actually is because no one apart from a few members on the forum complain about it to us. No complaints filter down to us from social media or other parts of the company, so all we can do is continue making a quality magazine.

We check the magazine at both paper level and onscreen and myself and Drew always make changes when we feel they are necessary and we won't pass anything we can't read. I wear glasses and have poor vision without them, but I've never found anything in the magazine unreadable. We've also looked at the last few issues of PC Gamer and their layout is pretty much identical to ours. They have a lot more black on white text admittedly, but we don't want that style in Retro Gamer as I don't feel it's a good fit for the magazine.

We always note these complaints when they crop up, and we'll continue to take them into consideration while we're making the magazine. As we always do. Sam is going to look at making a few tweaks so that issues like the Rogue Squadron article are less likely to happen.

I mostly have no problems with readabiulity(other than the occasional hard to read, but able to read situations). I read exclusively on iPad. However, you recently had a horrible article in the mag readability wise, that I had to stop reading. I don't have the iPad here now, but it was black background, white letters and the page was littered with tightly spread out white stars. The text was some places unreadable, and else hard to read.

[Ryan GH]

I think I must had been the only person who could read it just fine.

[deadpan666]

I don't think it's the vision focus aspect of your eyesight that might be the problem here, more the colour aspect, and being able to see certain colours against other colours as clearly as other people. Not necessarily like being colour blind, but a comparison acuity.

Nah, it's not just that...there's definitely blurry/smudgy text going on! I'll see if I can scan one of the offending pages in when I get back from PLAY Expo in Glasgow on Sunday....