35 years ago this October, British publisher EMAP launched Mean Machines magazine, a console-focused spin-off of CVG, its leading multiformat monthly.
Spawned from the CVG 'Mean Machines' section created by Tony Takoushi in 1987, the magazine would become one of the most commercially successful of its era. It lasted 24 issues before the decision was made to split the magazine into Mean Machines Sega and Nintendo Magazine System. A few years later, Mean Machines PlayStation would be the final publication to use the name.
Launch editor Julian "Jaz" Rignall has recently posted on social media about the anniversary, and it would seem that he and fellow staffer Rich Leadbetter (now the boss at Digital Foundry) have something planned to mark the occasion.
"Two not entirely unrelated things," says Rignall. "This year, it's the 35th anniversary of MM. Yesterday, @digitalfoundry.bsky.social and I had a long-anticipated catch-up, which turned into a highly productive 2+ hour mega-chat. It was like turning the clock back 35 years. So anyway. Watch this space..."
Rignall adds that both he and Leadbetter "feel it's important that we do something that feels worthwhile. Something cool and celebratory that has that inimitable MM flava but doesn't feel like a shambling mockery of a cheap-ass pastiche of what MM once was. It has to be funny, too. No funny. No go."
Rignall recently released a book which chronicles his life in the games industry, published by Bitmap Books.