Feature: The 12 Worst Game Magazine Covers Ever! Subscribe to this RSS feed
The Worst Videogame Magazine Cover Ever!
1. Electronic Gaming Monthly, September 2002
EGM is a wonderful mag and I wish it many bountiful years in the future, but I think even the editorial staff would agree with me that this is among, if not the worst game-magazine cover ever devised.
For the longest time, an unwritten rule amongst mag editors was to avoid doing Resident Evil covers -- they always sold poorly on the newsstand. Well, of course they sold poorly on the newsstand! All the 90s-era mags used gross-out zombie illustrations more suitable for Fangoria than a game rag for their RE cover art, and the results were never easy on the eyes. This eczema-afflicted zombie just happened to be the ugliest one of the bunch.
It wasn't until Game Informer's 2004 RE4 cover (which, in an amazing example of thinking outside the box, featured the game's hero instead of a monster) that the stigma finally disappeared for good. Shame no one thought of it sooner...
Kevin Gifford is the author of GameSetWatch's weekly "Game Mag Weaseling" column, which covers the latest in the videogame industry's printed page. He owns more issues of videogame magazines than your dad does of Penthouse.
