Next Generation Issue 001 (January 1995)

Next Generation was a US videogame magazine published by Imagine Media. It was affiliated to Edge magazine from the UK, and shared editorial staff. Next Generation ran for 85 issues total (January 1995 to January 2002), and this included the 1999 redesign where they also shortened the name to NextGen. The content was "more focused on game development from an artistic perspective." Interviews featured many of those that worked in the videogame industry and were typically more focused on questions about gaming in general rather than about the details of the latest game or system they were working on. You really did not find entire pages covered with screenshots, the magazine's layout and design was very simple and clean. You would not find walkthroughs, or cheat codes either. The magazine did not use bylines (the name of the one who wrote the article), aside from the regular recurring columns. The editors explained that they felt the magazine's entire staff should share the credit or responsibility for each article and review, even those written by individuals. I really liked these differences, being a departure from most other gaming magazines. I would keep issues around because they had so many different articles I would go back to. Next Generation had a heavy matte laminated finish cover stock, unlike the glossy paper covers of others. They moved away from this cover style in early 1999, only for it to return again in late 2000.

Highlights From this Issue: There is a 6-page interview with Trip Hawkings, President of the 3DO Company at this time. A look at the 32X and the Neo Geo CD launch, 3Dlabs new GLINT chip. Some of the regular columns were "Arcadia" by Marcus Webb, an ongoing look at the coin-op industry. And "Generator" from Mark James Ramshaw with a look behind the scenes of game development and rumors. There's an article on videogame violence. We have a brief look at all the consoles out and coming soon, like 3DO, CDi, N64, PlayStation, and Saturn. We have a lot of previews, followed by a number of reviews. Some platforms get several one-paragraph reviews, but a few others are a little longer. Several from 3DO, with a handful of Jaguar, CD-i and Sega CD. Even a few from Genesis and SNES. The reviews were never really in-depth, you didnt see full page reviews (at least not this early), but it was more about the articles and featured interviews. Previews used a full-page layout, so you got more info there. It's a very different feel for a gamming mag, but I enjoyed it so much I would get a subscription.