Game Informer, one of the longest-running U.S. print magazines focusing on video games, is shutting down. The outlet published a statement Friday on X (formerly Twitter) that announced the closure after 33 years.
After 33 thrilling years of bringing you the latest news, reviews, and insights from the ever-evolving world of gaming, it is with a heavy heart that we announce the closure of Game Informer.
From the early days of pixelated adventures to today’s immersive virtual realms, we’ve been honored to share this incredible journey with you, our loyal readers. While our presses may stop, the passion for gaming that we’ve cultivated together will continue to live on.
Thank you for being part of our epic quest, and may your own gaming adventures never end.
The Final Level: Farewell from Game Informer 🕹️ pic.twitter.com/tmrEB2TE7U
— Game Informer (@gameinformer) August 2, 2024
At the time of writing, the Game Informer website is down. I was reading the subscription page for this article and it suddenly refreshed to a white screen with just the statement on it.
According to Kotaku, all staff were called into a meeting with GameStop HR and were told they were being laid off and the publication was closing immediately. At least one employee was on a work trip at the time. Game Informer’s head of video Alex Van Aken posted on X that there are some people on staff that haven’t heard the news, at the time of this writing, and that somebody “higher up” spilled the news.
There are still people on staff who don't know what's happening yet there's a tweet that someone higher up posted spilling the news. I'll have some stuff to say later today, but yes, everyone at Game Informer was laid off about an hour ago.
— Alex Van Aken (@itsVanAken) August 2, 2024
The magazine was published and owned by GameStop ever since an acquisition in 2000 with Game Informer’s previous owner, FuncoLand. It was available as part of GameStop’s PowerUp Rewards Pro program. However, the constantly embattled GameStop business often hit Game Informer, with multiple rounds of layoffs over the past decade. The last was in 2022, around the time the company wanted to pivot to crypto and NFTs and became a “meme stock” and its share price soared (a thing that just recently started happening again, although not to the level of the original trend).
Game Informer was one of — if not the last — mainstream print magazine covering video game news published in the U.S. Other countries like the U.K. still have publications like Edge and PC Gamer that are available in print.
In March, editor-in-chief Matt Miller announced that Game Informer was getting its own standalone subscription. The statement noted how tough it’s been to get a copy of each monthly issue over the past few years, and that the team understood it was coming during a hard time for the industry.
“Even a brief look around the gaming industry right now can be sobering. Hard times, layoffs, cancellations, and closures have impacted thousands of game developers and publishers, as well as other outlets like us that celebrate games. We haven’t been immune to that hardship,” Miller wrote.
The last Game Informer issue would’ve been about The Casting of Frank Stone, an upcoming single-player title in the Dead by Daylight universe being developed by Behaviour Interactive and Supermassive Games. The previous issue that got sent out to subscribers featured many interviews with developers on Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Its last published exclusive was about Squirrel with a Gun.
Magazine content director Kyle Hillard wrote on X that the team was in the middle of putting together the next issue. “A frustrating turn of events (especially considering we were about 70% done with the next issue and it was going to have a GREAT cover).”
