History
The idea for the name GameFan came from the Japanese Sega magazine called Megafan. Although it began as an advertising supplement to sell imported video games, primarily from Japan, the small text reviews and descriptions drew attention for a lack of refinement and a sense of passion. Editor profiles featured caricatures drawn by Terry Wolfinger. The anonymized approach allowed certain editors like Dave Halverson to write multiple reviews of the same game under different pseudonyms.
GameFan was well-known for its extensive coverage of important games and its expansive coverage of emerging interest in anime. Another major feature that separated it from other gaming magazines was the high-quality paper used to print it. GameFan's game screenshots were more colorful and accurate to in-game graphics.
By 2000, the magazine had a monthly print circulation of more than 100,000.3
Controversy
In the September 1995 issue of GameFan, an article was printed that contained several derogatory comments about Japanese people (calling them "little Jap bastards") as well as a self-degrading racial comment ("Us poor white trash from So CA"). The text took the place of one of the paragraphs of one of the sports game reviews. The article discussed a Namco combat flight simulator, Ace Combat, rather than College Football '96 (which was the topic of the article) and was poorly written.4
GameFan's official explanation was that a rogue employee had sabotaged the magazine in order to alienate its Japanese audience and fan base. However, later reports indicated that it was actually filler text that someone had neglected to remove, and the entire incident was an internal joke that accidentally got printed.5 An apology (dated August 24, 1995) was published in DieHard GameFan's October 1995 issue in both English and Japanese.6
The Adventures of Monitaur
The magazine included a comic strip, The Adventures of Monitaur, an anime-derived series. Although the title character Monitaur was only drawn for the strip, the rest of the magazine's staff personae appeared as characters. Monitaur's main storylines were his struggles against The Blowmeister, who represented the leadership of rival magazines such as Electronic Gaming Monthly. In 1994, GameFan and two new startups, known as Dark Moon Productions and Dark Moon Comics, entered into an agreement to launch a Monitor comic book series, and at that time discussions were underway to make a full-length animated movie to be produced by Dark Moon Productions Inc and DMP Multi-media, a sister company founded by Andrew Spencer and Gary Tucker.
Golden Megawards
The winners of GameFan's annual Golden Megawards were chosen by editors.
2010 relaunch
After the bankruptcy of Fusion Publishing and the closure of Play, Dave Halverson began work on a relaunch of GameFan. The magazine returned to newsstands in April 2010, headed by Halverson and a few key staffers from Play, with Rob Duenas serving as the new art director. It was available in both print and digital formats, the latter of which was sold directly through GameFan's online shop.
The first two issues of the relaunched GameFan featured a section titled MovieFan, which covered movies, anime, and comics. The first two-thirds of the magazine was devoted to GameFan, and then readers would have to turn the magazine upside down in order to read the MovieFan magazine. As of issue 3, the MovieFan portion of the magazine was discontinued, but later issues still featured anime and comic reviews similar to Play. In its second and final issue, MovieFan conducted one of the last known interviews with the late filmmaker Satoshi Kon.14
The first five issues of the magazine were released on a consistent bi-monthly schedule. However, problems occurred with the magazine's development due to issues with advertising revenue, causing the sixth issue to be released in August 2011, eight months after issue 5, and with an entirely new editing team, headed by newcomer James Bacon. Issue 7 was assembled by only three people – editor-in-chief Dave Halverson, art director and graphic designer Rob Duenas, and managing editor James Bacon – and was released in December 2011. Soon thereafter Duenas resigned. The reason for his departure was due to an overwhelming workload; Duenas stated that he worked "20 hours a day for two weeks straight and [he was] still short cover art".15 Despite the stressful working conditions, Duenas harbored no ill will towards Halverson or the magazine, stating that he would have still been willing to contribute with cover illustrations or provide assistance with layouts. Soon after Duenas' departure, Bacon left for reasons unstated.
A press release was issued on April 18, 2012, highlighting the supposed future of Paper Planet brands: GameFan and Girls of Gaming. The company planned on increasing its online presence through app development for mobile devices as well as a new online channel. None of these plans would come to fruition except the creation of a channel. Former editor Wesley Ruscher was named the magazine's new editor-in-chief but resigned shortly after the release of issue 8, stating that it "lacked the necessities to keep food in [his] belly and a roof over [his] head."
References
- 1Lindquist, Tim (June 28, 2004). "Onionbat Publishing Message Boards". Archived from the original on August 27, 2017. Retrieved May 10, 2012.
- 2"Gamefan / Moviefan Magazine". YouTube. Archived from the original on December 21, 2021. Retrieved August 17, 2015.
- 3Gaudiosi, Jonn. "Express.com drops Gamefan Network". Video Business. Archived from the original on December 14, 2000. Retrieved January 23, 2026.
- 4Cavalier, Cal. College Football USA '96. DieHard GameFan. Volume 3. Issue 9. No.33. Pg.115. September 1995.
- 5"20 Biggest Gaming Controversies". Gamepro. May 5, 2009. Archived from the original on May 9, 2009. Retrieved July 26, 2012.
As of June 2013, GameFan's web presence had been in a mostly inactive state for about a year. Issue 9 was finally made available in February 2013 after missing the holiday 2012 release. This issue was only worked on by two people, Dave Halverson and Greg Orlando. Issues 8 and 9 were only available in a digital format. GameFan later went on a two-year hiatus, returning in 2015 with a redesigned magazine and website. In February 2015, GameFan simultaneously released issue 10 digitally and on newsstands. The digital version was freely released on Magzter with the use of a promotional code. The magazine went through a complete overhaul, simplifying its layouts and design, most likely in order to have the magazines completed on schedule. The size of the print magazine is significantly smaller compared to previous issues. In addition, the GameFan mascot, Monitaur, and logo were redesigned.
On May 6, 2015, GameFan announced a partnership with Destructoid to help promote the GameFan brand with collaborations and free subscription offers. The initial plan was to bring back the dual-cover format from the first two issues, but instead of a MovieFan portion, it would be exclusive content created by Destructoid for the magazine.17 According to GameFan's official Facebook page, the deal with Destructoid would have allowed for the magazine to be released on a monthly schedule.18 However, the deal with Destructoid resulted in only one issue of the GameFan/Destructoid magazine ever being released. As of January 2019, there have been no new updates regarding GameFan's overall status.
