Famitsu 0367 (December 29, 1995)

Is there a pattern to their covers? Most of them have their mascot with gaming characters and then we get these random idol covers.

I believe the pattern is - print an idol cover whenever Matsushita Susumu (the artist of all Famitsu covers) doesn't have time to complete a piece.  It's amazing he churned out covers as often as he did, week after week, decade after decade.

Nowadays, his output is far less, and the idol covers have been replaced by the same lazy reuse of promotional artwork that nearly all magazine publishers use.