Tag Archives: future publishing

Apart from Edge. Which is up less than half a percent year-on-year.

More »

Coming this fall, players and fans of World of Warcraft will be able to subscribe to the game’s very own print magazine, through Future Publishing.

World of Warcraft: The Magazine will be released quarterly with 148 pages per issue and will be totally ad-free and will run $39.95 a year.

The first issue launches tomorrow at BlizzCon and if you happen to be at the event and sign up for the new mag, you will get a free plush murloc.

Full press release is posted below.

More »

Future has confirmed to VG247 that longstanding UK PlayStation mag PSW has closed.

It had a final ABC of 24,118.

The publisher has redeployed one member of the team within the business and is currently in consultation with the magazine’s other four team members.

“It’s always incredibly sad when we close a title as established as PSW, but the decision was taken in response to decreasing demand,” said Future games boss James Binns.

“By focusing our efforts on Official PlayStation Magazine and a single independent PlayStation title in PSM3, we can strengthen our position in delivering the number one and number two print titles in the sector.

“We continue to invest in our traditional print brands, but games is a rapidly changing sector, so our portfolio needs to constantly evolve to meet the needs of consumers in a vibrant and diverse market.”

The publication was launched by Computec in 2000, and was later bought by Future in 2003 along with Computec UK’s other games titles, such as Xbox World.

Future said yesterday that it is declining to publish six monthly ABC figures this year.

Future games portfolio boss James Binns has told VG247 that the publisher’s decision to not audit its magazines this summer is a matter of saving money.

“We’re not auditing our Games portfolio this half-year – instead we will be publishing full year figures for Jan-Dec 09 at the start of 2010,” said the exec.

“On a company-wide level, Future made the decision to ABC only three titles from our UK portfolio. Our choices to ABC are always taken to reflect the commercial requirements of each magazine.

“Like many businesses, our particular focus this year is on aggressive cost-management, so we have only paid for those titles with a very clear commercial need to be audited.”

It was reported earlier that Future had made the decision to keep its sixth monthly figures private. As far as we’re aware, this is the first time in the company’s history – it was formed in 1985 – it has failed to publish these figures for its games titles.

Still. Roll on 2010, eh?

In UK industry circles this is a proper megaton: MCV’s reporting that Future won’t release six-monthly ABC figures for its mags this week as expected.

Future normally releases January 1 to June 31 sales figures for all its titles every August.

Full-year figures are still expected in February next year.

We’re dropping a mail over now.

Future US president Jonathan Simpson-Bint will leave the company on August 31, the exec’s announced, to form his own company.

He said in an internal note that he believed now was the right time to end his 18 years with the firm.

“I’ve never made any secret of my desire to start my own business and — like a lot of people — I believe that the current economic climate is actually a great time to start a business,” he said.

Future is actively searching for his replacement, Simpson-Bint wrote.

In the interim, an executive team — led by CFO John Sutton — will manage the company’s day-to-day operations.

More on Folio.

Future Publishing is wondering why its rival, Imagine Publishing, has not released circulation figures since launching Total PC Gaming in 2007. As you do.

Speaking in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, James Binns was curious as to why the publisher had yet to reveal an ABC for the title.

“What’s interesting in the PC market is we had a competitor launch that hasn’t revealed ABCs yet,” said Binns.

“Total PC Gaming has talked up quite a big talk and they’re 16 issues in now and haven’t owned up to their copy sales. If it was still 16 issues in and I was still hiding – it’s weird for them to boast so much and then show so little,” he added.

Imagine’s Managing Director Damian Butt rebutted, saying the reason why an official figure hasn’t been released was that the magazine simply wasn’t established enough yet.

“We would always be at a massive competitive disadvantage against those rival magazines that have had years to build up subs and export sales”, he said.

“Which as you can see from the ABCs for PC Gamer and PC Zone are quite considerable.”

Circulation numbers are down with Future’s offerings, though, and news of lay-offs in the US was confirmed today.

Future’s confirmed to VG247 that 19 staff have been laid off from its US operation today.

“Our colleagues at Future US have today announced 19 redundancies across its teams in San Francisco and New York,” said a UK spokesperson.

“These changes were made in line with Future’s stated strategy of focussing on structure and costs in a severe global economic downturn.”

It’s unknown which sectors of the company have been impacted.

The above statement was issued internally to the company today, and we’ve been directed to the San Francisco office for further details.

Future is the world’s largest publisher of games magazines, which yesterday announced less than stellar circulation figures for its UK books.

It is also the publisher of the GameRadar Network, which contains mainstream sites CVG and GamesRadar.

Future’s claimed that its GamesRadar Network – a group of 16 websites, including GamesRadar, CVG and N4G – is visited by more than 10 million unique users per month.

The figure, said the British publisher, represents a 40 percent increase compared to 2007 traffic.

Future said that the 10 million number was arrived at through “internal HBX and Google Analytics audits”.

ABC figures today showed that Future’s print magazine portfolio saw drops on a majority of titles.

Press release after the break.

More »

ABC figures have shown that the majority of Future’s games mags dropped in circulation last year, with only the Official PS Mag, PSW and ONM recording any increases.

All the figures, 2007 to 2008, as compiled by GamesIndustry:

• Edge – 31,304 to 28,898
• GamesMaster – 51,389 to 40,940
• OPM – 46,018 to 53,644
• PSW – 21,826 to 24,118
• ONM – 58,754 to 58,795
• OXM – 66,894 to 63,908
• Xbox World 360 – 31,698 to 31,030
• PSM3 – 26,885 to 26,202
• PC Gamer – 38,654 to 32,619
• PC Zone – 22,297 to 19,023

Future’s announced a deal with Panini that will see the second issue of it’s Girl Gamer magazine included in Bliss and Mizz. Girl Gamer is an extension of the UK Nintendo Official Magazine, the first issue of which saw a print run of 340,000. In UK terms, that’s massive.

“The universal appeal and accessibility of Nintendo’s DS and Wii consoles means that more and more teenage girls are playing games,” said Girl Gamer and Official Nintendo Magazine publisher ‘Big’ Lee Nutter. “Future’s partnership with Panini’s Bliss and Mizz magazines gives us fantastic reach into this audience, delivering relevant game content to 840,000 readers of the print and digital e-zine edition of Girl Gamer.”