My Life in Fanzines

In an effort to associate myself with every reputable gaming blog possible, a recent GameSetWatch article inspired me to chronicle my foray into fanzines over fifteen years ago. GSW's "Game Mag Weaseling" column from January 27 makes mention of Rocket editor Casey Loe, one of "the usual gang of Play and GameFan standbys". Not being a reader of either magazine, I never knew my Prodigy pal and fellow amateur publisher Casey had become a successful journalist. We and many other hard-working kids collaborated on Next Generation, one of the classic fanzines of the pre-Internets era. Having written strategy guides for Final Fantasy VII, Devil May Cry and the Zelda and Resident Evil series, Casey transformed a pubescent hobby into a dream career.

Some of my favorite teenage memories involve long hours messaging over review ideas, talking with publishing executives, playing pre-release carts and getting exposure for illustrating one of my hobbies. My experience with Next Generation made me feel like I was closer to gaming than anyone I knew in school. My interests since then have changed and expanded but I still passionately treasure the phenomenon of the video game and regret with a tinge of jealousy that Casey is much more ensconced within the industry than I.

Some months back, I unearthed my old box of fanzines from my parents' attic and brought them back to New York to run through the scanner. These are some of my favorite front- and back-cover pieces from Next Generation. There were other titles I also contributed to such as Random Access, Power Play and Bitz, but NG was my bread and butter. Here are one teenager's overly-masculinized renditions of some of the finest games of the 16-bit (and now, Virtual Console) era:

click thumbs to embiggen

Super Smash TV (NG#8)

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (NG#9)

Super Castlevania IV (NG#7)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in Time (NG#10)

Contra III: The Alien Wars (NG#8)

Mega Man X (NG#14)

Mortal Kombat (NG#12)

I'll post more old 'zine stuff in the future if there's any interest in ancient fandom history. If you were on Prodigy (or The Sierra Network) during the early '90's and you were involved with or read Next Generation, drop me a line!

That includes you, Manticore.

- Shadowfax

UPDATE: GameSetWatch picked this up Tuesday. Thanks Simon!