"Wargames Illustrated " Topic

I started reading Wargames Illustrated when it first came out many years ago but stopped buying it when Duncan sold it. The magazine started to become filled with numerous ads, poor gaming pictures and uninteresting articles with many being non historical in nature. It was a blessing when Battleront took over. More pages of interesting articles and Dave Taylor images of wargame action.
I'm sorry I resubscribed now for another year. The new/old owner has gone back to the old ways again of ads galore,poor pictures and articles. The current issue has almost half of the article space filled with Mad Max type gaming.

I decided last month not to get this issue, because I thought last month was just too much history and not enough wargame and too many issues have looked like that lately, but when I popped into Smith's today and had a browse, I thought there was enough in there for me to pick it up.

It is themed on Post Apocalypse. I'm quite ignorant of Post Apocalypse gaming, but there are some PA things of interest for me there, even if only to admire the modelling skills.

I'm not keen on the idea of magazines using themes for each issue (even though I generally really like WSS that does the same thing) – it can be the main reason why I just to leave a mag on the shelf.

'Blucher in 6mm' looks a nice article that is good wargamer stuff and the idea of doing labels for the napoleonic scenario is new to me.

I see we have another theme next month.

This must be about the only positive view of BF's ownership that I have ever read.
Just a couple of points from my PoV.
Perhaps there was less advertising under BF because (a) BF were subsidising it by having so much FoW related content; or (b) advertisers were put off by the massive advertising BF got in that content. Let's be realistic, advertising is what pays for the magazines.

Historical gaming isn't the be all and end all of wargaming. I used to moan about the lack of fantasy reviews in MW but Henry and John Treadaway have both said that they can only review what they get. Fantasy manufacturers seem reluctant to engage with the process.

I think it took a nose dive when it bacame a BF rag. Good if you like that sort of thing, fairly uselsss if you don't.

Normsmith, I'm with you. I don't care for theme based content. I do have a passing interest in PA gaming, so I will probabaly pick this one up.

Nope, I had zero issue with it under BF leadership – rather liked it as well.

I will probably skip the Mad Max issue as well (I say that now….)

Not a FOW player, but from flipping thru the mag when it's a BF publication I have to admit that its production value and gloss factor were way up compared to before. So I have no issues with it being FOW's 'White Dwarf.'

The new/old owner has gone back to the old ways…

Is it not BF owned anymore then? I thought BF did a good job with it and certainly didn't turn it into their own version of White Dwarf.

I think the proliferation of gaming blogs, along with news sites like TMP has pretty much made all the gaming mags redundant. Why read an article by, for example, Big Red Bat about his Romans when you can go onto his blog and see 100 x as much material?

Whenever I browse WI or MW in Smiths all I can think is, I could buy this and spend an hour or two reading it at home, or I could spend that time painting figures for my own games.

I also thought BF did a good job. Since the recent turnover, the issues arrive during the first week of the month they are for rather than a week before. Still have not received the June issue yet.

Did I miss it or has there been no coverage/recap of Cold Wars?

DM

If it requires a turret, I typically have no interest, but I thought BF did a nice job with the magazine, noting that no magazine devoted to a hobby will ever come anywhere close to pleasing everybody. The production quality was high, and although every theme wasn't my cup of tea, I still found them interesting. However, if it starts reaching out to sci if and fantasy, I'll probably drop my subscription. If that gaming genre appealed to me, I would subscribe to White Dwarf.

BF content was gorgeous so I can't complain.

I probably would prefer a Horse & Musket themed WI. Think Lead Adventure Forums Monthly for what I'm getting at.

Those "numerous ads" are what keeps the magazine in print.
This point of view is why no one can make any money in this hobby. Everyone wants something different and wants it cheap, and in campaign and summer dress, with different heads, in both metal and plastic.
God bless the manufactures in the hobby.

I have no objection against adding more (and more!) non-historical material to WI. And less (and less!) BF advert-articles.

I have a nasty suspicion that if BF had continued to push WI in the direction it was heading, it wouldn't have been long before it became White Dwarf WW2. I hope that the majority of WI's readers embrace the fact that wargaming is many periods, settings, and scales, to many gamers.

I have liked it a LOT more since BF took it over, and have never thought it a "rag" for the Flames of War stuff. There has always been around 2/3 of most issues that cover other games and genres. Those that complain about it being another White Dwarf style advertising publication have probably never looked at it much, if at all.

Oh, and I like the ads. I have found any number of new companies simply because of their ads in WI.

This is the sort of perspective that drags down our hobby. WI is a the most technically savvy, well produced, and sophisticated historical magazine we have and a huge innovator. Ads pay for all of this and you can't please everyone every issue when it comes to content. Just because you find something "uninteresting" doesn't mean evryone else does. Also, if you don't like it, don't buy it, or how about writing a letter to the editors with some constructive thoughts? What value is there in a "this magazine sucks" post here? Are you hoping that there will be a revolt that will force change, or would you prefer that the magazine go down in flames because you don't like it?

I picked up a copy yesterday; first WI I've purchased in years. It looks pretty good to me. Like nazrat said, the ads have pointed me to figures that I never knew existed.

Any body who says WI is like White Dwarf has not looked at both magazines lately. WI covers different genres and different manufactures every issue. If you can find anything in White Dwarf by anybody but GW it is a misprint. I know BF puts allot of adds in there for their stuff but they do not always even include articles about their product if it is not relevant to that issue.

rhacelt wrote:

I know BF puts allot of adds in there for their stuff but they do not always even include articles about their product if it is not relevant to that issue.

To me it was more a case of tailoring the content of an edition to suit what they were advertising.

Extrabio1947 wrote:

However, if it starts reaching out to sci if and fantasy, I'll probably drop my subscription. If that gaming genre appealed to me, I would subscribe to White Dwarf.

Your opinion is just as valid as mine regarding WI but please don't imagine that WD caters to any broad range of Sci Fi or Fantasy players, it doesn't even cater to people who play the older GW games. Time to go for a game of Necromunda now.

Those "numerous ads" are what keeps the magazine in print.

Exactly!

If you don't like the content of a war game magazine let me say this.

WRITE SOMETHING!

I've been writing for war game magazines for 30 years. Wrote for the courier and Historical Gamer. The problem all publishers of war gamers face is two fold.

CASH- They need money to cover the publication costs. That means advertising because the subscription fees don't nearly cover even the postage. Want an idea? Try subscribing to a scholarly Journal Very Very few adds but they cost up to $250 USD a year.

CONTENT

Can't tell you the number of times the editors of Historical Gamer or the Courier called me and asked me to gin up a half dozen articles for their files, when they were getting low.

So if you don't like what a magazine is publishing, write something. I'm sure they'll use it. Don't expect the rest of the world to take a persona interest in your own entertainment. You have no entitlement to entertainment.

Finally, if something isn't exactly what you're interested in, you should still buy the magazine. You never know when you'll find something new to be interested in, and there's always the very real chance you'll be able to steal an idea or a process from something else for your own game.

One thing a good general magazine can do is create a common point of reference in an industry of niches -- sort of like a monthly convention in your mailbox. Sometimes, you knew a little bit in advance what period you would find in an issue (like a Courier theme year or a WI FoW section) and other times, as random as a die roll (MWAN).

No matter what showed up, something (or many somethings) in an issue was going to be interesting, even if it was not your favorite or your current 'hot' period. If it was well-written, so much the better.

Now, with specific-period blogs or other social-media outlets like TMP, you can indulge your favorite period all the time without ever looking at any other period. This cocooning, at least to me, is the primary challenge facing a general-interest magazine, especially if it is a mag for our hobby.

Russ, interesting point. I find blogs great, but they (sometimes) suffer from too much specificity and lack of editorial input.

I find the mags a great "general" read and update on this hobby of ours – blogs I end up stumbling across, losing etc, so they are not as consistent to me.

And a you say, blogs are often single focussed, so it is easy to lose sight of other things.

Finally, not all blogs update regularly, so at east a mag is monthly.

Each have their place, but I would miss mags.