GFW:TOM vs. V:TOM

[DTG]

So we all know how Games for Windows: The Official Magazine ended.

Today at South Station, Boston, I had an hour to kill so I picked up Vista: The Official Magazine. I don't know why...I know how all of those "secrets of windows" magazines suck.(fwiw, I picked up a PC Gamer too).


I notice that V:TOM is published by Future, the same company that does PC Gamer.

I also notice that V: TOM looks like an entire magazine of what used to be the "Advertorial" section of GFW:TOM. That was the section I used to laugh at. The same font, the same Gap-attired, good-looking folks posed around computers with huge smiles like they've been overcome with the awesomeness of Vista. The articles about how Vista is the answer to every problem mankind has, including a top-10 misunderstood nasty things about Vista. It has a small game section, including a helpful description about how you have to watch your health bar in games because if it gets too low you die.

I don't mind a magazine like this being out there...there is a market for everything. I just wonder if the contrary attitude maintained by GFW:TOM led to its closing. I assume that Future went through a simliar Microsoft selection process like CGW did, and unlike CGW, they decided to tow the line. Boy, did they ever.

I found it very funny, and refreshing , to read Jeff Green's columns to Bill Gates about how the whole Games for Windows brand...well...sucked. But it also worried me that he was begging for the plug to get pulled, which it was. And now V:TOM has a "game section" that says how great the GFW Brand is doing. I guess it's OK if it helps keep PC Gamer going as an independent magazine.

[Jeff Green]

Well, just know that the decision to pull the plug was one made by Ziff Davis, not Microsoft. Microsoft was so uninvolved with the magazine it was ridiculous. Yes, it was great to not have them breathing down our necks, but, on the other hand, they never did fuck-all to help us either, despite all sorts of glorious promises in the beginning. After awhile, my taunting was almost more like: "Let's see if they notice us NOW!" The irony is that the most they ever got involved was after we told them it was shutting down. Then suddenly they became concerned about how the mag closing was going to affect the image of the "Games for Windows" brand itself. Good times!

[hong]

GFW Tom vs V Tom: who would win?

[Coca Cola Zero]

They still have magazines?

[Spect]

Somehow I read this thread title as some sort of 'virtual Tom versus regular Tom' substitute for a Tom vs Bruce type column.

[Charlatan]

And I thought you were comparing the tone of articles written by Tom for GFW and Variety!

[SpoofyChop]

Somehow I read this thread title as some sort of 'virtual Tom versus regular Tom' substitute for a Tom vs Bruce type column.

Yeah I was really disappointed too.

[Foxstab]

Yeah I was really disappointed too.

Thirded.



The way I see the entire thing is like those people who make cash companies and then shop-PR around to yell how awesome it is, then cash in on all the stocks and flee the country.

Sure, they can produce tons of junk, live very nicely off the advertisers whom butts they suck, but eventually people realize the deception, that they're puddling junk, and will abandon them, the entire thing will be blown in their face and they'll die with a horrible tag of shame and lies attached to each and every one of the staff who'll be unlikely received by the public again.

And even if not, my grandfather has imbued high values of moral in me, so I for one, no matter the cost, am not going to play along with BS, sure only telling the truth has gotten me screwed up on "opportunities", but I'm no sellout and I can keep my identity and soul.

[stusser]

Then suddenly they became concerned about how the mag closing was going to affect the image of the "Games for Windows" brand itself. Good times!

MS could have sustained CGW (I refuse to call it GFW) for years from petty cash. I can't imagine they were that concerned.

[Jeff Green]

MS could have sustained CGW (I refuse to call it GFW) for years from petty cash. I can't imagine they were that concerned.

They were concerned enough that Ziff had to delay the announcement while MS figured out a strategy to spin it. I didn't just make something up here. :). Thus the whole malarky about "moving the magazine online." That was done strictly as a PR gesture towards MS.