PSM Issue 25

Features:

• Start (Editorial: With big names jumping to PS2, is the PS1 doomed?)
• PSM's Video Game Toy Mania '99 (Game-inspired toys are exploding; PSM gets to play with all of them and brag about it)
• Letters (Reader questions and other stuff)
• Pause (Question of the month: "Why hasn't Lara taken it all off yet?" ie: if the ESRB has a Nudity descriptor, why isn't anyone taking advantage of that?)
• Top This! (Challenges based on Driver and Um Jammer Lammy this month offer a slew of action figures, light guns, controllers, and other peripherals to those capable of rising to the occasion)
• Marketplace (Sell, trade and buy without setting foot anywhere near Wall Street)
• Reset (Coming next month: a Final Fantasy tribute, part 2 of the Legacy of Kain walkthrough, and a guide to get Regina through Dino Crisis without becoming Tyrano-chow)

Monitor (News, gossip, rumours, juicy goodness):

• Sony's Metreon Opens (one big traffic jam down from the PSM office, it turns out)
• Square Update (Saga Frontier? Vagrant Story? Legend of Mana? Chrono Cross? Dew Prism? Oh yeah, Square's just getting warmed up...)
• New 989 Games (The PlayStation sports lineup continues its' EA-inspired tradition of new games in the same franchises every year. Woo hoo...?)
• Bleem! Ships, Sony Still Sues (The PlayStation emulator really gets Sony's panties in a bunch...who would have thought?)
• Rumors (Robocop, Time Crisis 3, EA's Koudelka, new Dragon Quest makeover, and an Extreme Golf game?!)
• Peripherals (PSM editors put their asses on the line, literally, to test out the Universal Rocket Seat Massager and the Interactive Battle Chair, then give a quick nod to Nyko's RF Max 900 AV switch, and Interact's Concept 4 racing wheel)
• Chasing the PS2 (New tech demos, an announcement of a Tokyo Game Show reveal, a list of who's making what for the next-gen system, Sony's online strategy [hint: there isn't one], and a couple screenshots from launch title Kessen)
• Q&A (PSM throws Core's Director of Operations, Adrian Smith, into the inquisition chamber...he responds by spilling his guts on Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation)
• Checkpoint (PlayStation game release schedule and sales numbers)
• Banzai Chibi-chan's Nihon Game Otaku (Otaku supreme Banzai Chibi-chan waxes loquacious about gaming goings-on in Japan)

Reviews:

• Chessmaster II (4/5)
• Konami Eighties Collection (3/5)
• Driver (5/5)
• Echo Night (4/5)
• Rising Zan: The Samurai Gunman (3.5/5)
• NFL Xtreme 2 (2.5/5)
• You Don't Know Jack (4/5)
• Um Jammer Lammy (4.5/5)
• Tarzan (4/5)

Previews:

• Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation
• Ready 2 Rumble
• Thrasher - Skate & Destroy
• Vigilante 8: Second Offense
• CTR: Crash Team Racing
• Fighting Force 2
• South Park
• Army Men: Air Attack
• Fear Effect (still called Fear Factor at this point)
• Gekido
• Medal of Honor
• Mag 3 (released as Killer Loop)
• Eagle One: Harrier Attack
• Resident Evil 3: Nemesis
• Metal Gear Solid: The VR Missions
• Spyro 2
• Ace Combat 3: Electrosphere
• Jet Moto 3

Strategy (Killer tips for navigating the roughest gaming waters):

• Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver walkthrough

Code Junkies (Cheating your way to victory, one Konami code at a time...):

• Driver
• Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete
• Chocobo Racing
• Gex 3
• Formula 1 '98
• R-Type Delta

Ads (in order of apperance):

• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater
• Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver
• NFL GameDay 2000
• Army Men: Sarge's Heroes / Army Men: Air Attack
• Thrasher: Skate and Destroy
• Sears NFL GameDay 2000 free t-shirt
• Tiny Tank
• G. Police: Weapons of Justice
• Wipeout 3 soundtrack
• Madden 2000
• Ape Escape
• Dino Crisis
• South Park
• Driver
• Gallop Racer
• Final Fantasy VIII
• 007: Tomorrow Never Dies
• Soul of the Samurai
• Demolition Racer
• Silhouette Mirage
• Crusaders of Might & Magic
• Championship Motocross featuring Ricky Carmichael
• BMG Music Service
• Jet Moto 3 sweepstakes
• NCAA GameBreaker 2000
• Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
• Bass Landing
• Grand Theft Auto 2
• Hot Wheels Turbo Racing
• PSM subscription card
• R-Type Delta
• Shadow Man
• Final Fantasy VIII action figures
• Star Ocean: The Second Story
• Dino Crisis FuncoLand dog tags and mission map poster pre-order bonus
• Monster Rancher 2
• www.thegamestop.com website
• WCW Mayhem
• WWF Attitude
• Croc 2
• 1-900-772-4PSM phone line
• Rising Zan: The Samurai Gunman
• Thousand Arms
• NFL Blitz 2000
• Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver / Fighting Force 2 / Fear Factor (released as Fear Effect) / Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation

Noteworthy Stuff:

• The pull quote from Adrian Smith's interview? "Lara's all soft skin now, so she looks a lot better, a lot smoother." And just in case you missed that, here's a pic of her lounging about in a bra and panties, because there isn't a nude code, but we like to tease.
• Adrian Smith ends the interview remarking that they've put something into Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation that will make gamers lust for a nude code even more, but that it's a key part of Lara Croft's character. I presume he's talking about the early part of the game, where you're playing as a teenage Lara working with Von Croy. And that's...even more disturbing.
• Marketing research group NPD puts Lunar: The Silver Star Story Complete as the best-selling PS1 game for May/June of 1999. Retailer Electronics Boutique puts it at number 2 for their stores, just behind Driver.
• Chibi's drifting a little into hentai territory with his Phantom Menace editorial. "...who cares about [Jar Jar Binks] when there's the delicious Queen Amidala to ogle at!" Dude...she's fourteen in the film. Buy an eroge and get it out of your system.
• Japan's Consumer Entertainment Software Association isn't making any friends by trying to ban the sale of used video games. They're using the same stodgy, worn-out arguments then that companies are using today.
• Persona 2: Innocent Sin tops the list of Japanese best-sellers, proving they know RPGs better than anybody else.
• That is one metric butt-ton of Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete Gameshark codes in Code Junkies.
• PSM remarks in response to a reader who is worried that game developers might charge full retail prices for games and then charge additional money for downloadable updates, "That probably won't be the case [...] The publishers can still make a profit selling downloads online." Oh, PSM, if only you could have looked ahead about ten years...you'd understand why we're all crying with laughter.
• That is one stunning piece of Parasite Eve fan artwork in the Letters section!