Partner Shop
Enjoy our articles? Add us as a preferred source on Google:
Golden Age aims to revive the wit, energy, and strange charm of classic video game magazines without simply copying them.
A Familiar Voice Returns to Print
Some video game magazines didn’t merely review games; they made the whole hobby feel louder, stranger, and more exciting. Golden Age is an attempt to bring that feeling back, led by veteran editor Jaz Rignall and his longtime collaborator Paul Glancey.
Rignall’s name may not be instantly familiar to every modern player, but readers who grew up with British gaming magazines will recognize the fingerprints. During the 1980s and 1990s, he launched and ran a string of influential publications, including Zzap!64, Computer and Video Games, Mean Machines, and official magazines devoted to Sega and Nintendo.
That list alone explains why a new magazine from Rignall carries a certain weight. These were not quiet, polite publications that sat neatly on a coffee table. They had opinions, attitude, eccentric writing, and enough personality to make a trip to the newsstand feel like a small event.
From Classic Magazines to a New Beginning
The path back to magazine publishing wasn’t immediate. After his earlier editorial work, Rignall moved to the United States and helped launch IGN.com, among other projects. Yet the desire to create a proper video game magazine never went away.
For years, he considered returning to the format. The hesitation was understandable. Print gaming magazines have changed dramatically, and there’s always the uncomfortable question of whether readers still want them in the same way. Rather than rush into a full publication, Rignall first wrote Games of a Lifetime, a book charting the development of the video game industry through his own perspective.
The response was strong enough to change the calculation. What began as a test of whether people still cared about this kind of voice became a reason to consider a much larger project.
Why Not Simply Bring Mean Machines Back?
That sounds like the obvious move, doesn’t it? Pick up the old name, recreate the design, and let nostalgia do the heavy lifting. Rignall sees the trap in that idea.
Older magazines such as Zzap!64 and Mean Machines occupy a very particular place in many readers’ childhood memories. Bringing them back exactly as they were would invite constant comparison with memories that have had decades to become polished and enormous. Even a good revival could feel disappointing because the original impact depended on its time, its audience, and the novelty of seeing games treated with such energy.
That’s a smart concern. Nostalgia is generous right up until it becomes a checklist. A magazine can reproduce the fonts, colors, slang, and page layouts, yet still miss the feeling that made the originals matter.
My first reaction to Golden Age was that it might be another exercise in looking backward, built mostly from callbacks and familiar names. The more I considered the concept, though, the more that impression softened. The project seems less interested in rebuilding a museum exhibit and more focused on using an old editorial attitude for stories that can still surprise readers.
A Magazine Built Around Voice
This is where the new publication hopes to separate itself from a standard retro magazine. Rather than compete with established monthly publications covering classic games, Golden Age intends to concentrate on stories, memories, observations, and odd corners of gaming history.
The subject matter will cover consoles, home computers, and coin-operated arcades from the last century. That leaves plenty of room for familiar territory, but the stated approach is broader than simply ranking old games or revisiting famous hardware.
The tone is just as important as the topics. Rignall has always favored conversational writing, and that style will be central to the new magazine. The goal is informative without becoming stiff, entertaining without turning every paragraph into a forced punchline, and willing to wander into unexpected territory when the story demands it.
Paul Glancey, who previously worked alongside Rignall at Zzap!64 and Computer and Video Games, has joined the project. Their shared history gives the magazine a built-in rhythm, although history alone won’t carry every article. The writing still has to earn its place on the page. That’s the part I’m most curious about.
Meet Golden Age
The publication is called Golden Age, a name that immediately signals its interest in classic gaming while leaving room for a more playful interpretation of the past.
Issue Zero Shows the Direction
Before producing the first full issue, the team created a 38-page PDF known as issue zero. It functions as a dummy magazine: a practical demonstration of the intended format, design, voice, and subject matter.
That approach makes sense. A description can promise a lot, but a magazine is a tactile and rhythmic thing. You need to see how the pages move from one feature to the next. You need to hear the voice in action. Issue zero gives potential readers something concrete to judge.
The layout isn’t considered final, and the pages planned for issue one are said to look more polished. That honesty is useful because the preview is being presented as a warm-up rather than a finished product. Still, the early version should reveal whether the central idea has legs.
The intended recipe sounds familiar but not entirely stale: a dash of Mean Machines, a pinch of Zzap!64, and plenty of new material shaped by modern sensibilities. There will be in-jokes, references, and callbacks, but the magazine isn’t meant to survive solely on recognition.
Nostalgia With a Little More Elbow Room
One advantage of writing for adults who remember classic gaming is that the audience has changed. The readers who once absorbed every word of a magazine at age twelve are no longer children waiting for permission to stay up late.
That allows Golden Age to approach old subjects with more freedom. The humor can be sharper, the observations more knowing, and the stories less constrained by the conventions of a youth-focused publication. At the same time, the project is careful not to treat every old phrase or attitude as automatically charming simply because it appeared decades ago.
That balance may be difficult. Too much nostalgia and the magazine risks becoming a scrapbook. Too much modern commentary and the time-machine illusion breaks apart. I’m not entirely sure where Golden Age will land, especially before seeing a complete issue, but that tension could become one of its strengths.
A Work in Progress That Wants to Feel Right
The team has reportedly spent more than a year developing the magazine before showing it publicly. That patience matters. Plenty of retro projects arrive with a familiar logo, a few recycled anecdotes, and the assumption that recognition will do the rest.
Here, the stated goal is tighter writing, stronger presentation, and a sense that the work has finally settled into its own rhythm. The early articles are treated as practice pieces—useful for shaking off decades of editorial dust—while the material written during the following months is described as more focused and funnier.
There’s a mild warning sign in the roughness of issue zero: if the layout still needs meaningful improvement, the final magazine will have to deliver on that promise. Nostalgia may get a reader to open the PDF, but it won’t keep them there. The pages need to look good, and the prose needs to justify the trip backward.
That said, the enthusiasm behind the project is clear. The whole thing seems to have reached the stage where the creators can finally recognize the voice they were chasing. That’s usually the moment a revival stops being an imitation and starts becoming a real publication.
Can Golden Age Make the Past Feel New?
The best retro writing doesn’t simply tell us that the past was wonderful. It explains why certain games, machines, magazines, and moments felt so strange and important at the time. That’s the opportunity here.
Golden Age isn’t trying to resurrect an old magazine line exactly as it was. Its more interesting ambition is to borrow the confidence, mischief, and conversational energy of that era while applying those qualities to fresh stories. Whether it can avoid becoming overly self-referential remains uncertain, but the concept has enough personality to deserve attention.
For anyone who remembers gaming magazines as companions rather than disposable reading material, issue zero should offer a useful first look. It may be rough around the edges, but perhaps that’s fitting. Even the grandest arcade cabinet started with a screen waiting to light up.
Conclusion
Golden Age has a sensible mission: preserve the spirit of classic gaming magazines without pretending the calendar stopped in 1994. Its success will depend on the writing, the design, and its ability to turn memory into something more engaging than a string of familiar names. Can it become a genuine time machine rather than a nostalgia display? That’s the question worth watching.
FAQ
- What is Golden Age?
Golden Age is a planned retro gaming magazine focused on stories, observations, anecdotes, and humor connected to classic consoles, computers, and arcade games. - Who is behind Golden Age?
The magazine is being developed by Jaz Rignall and Paul Glancey, collaborators with long histories in video game publishing. - Is Golden Age a direct revival of Mean Machines?
No. It draws on the editorial spirit of earlier publications but is intended as a new magazine rather than a direct reissue or continuation. - What is issue zero?
Issue zero is a 38-page PDF preview designed to demonstrate the project’s writing style, layout, tone, and general direction before the first full issue. - Will Golden Age only focus on famous retro games?
The planned coverage includes consoles, computers, coin-operated arcade games, unusual stories, personal memories, and unexpected observations from classic gaming history.
Stay close to the next chapter of retro-gaming history by subscribing to the newsletter.
