Japan's Game Magazines

Japan's Game Magazines
	Let's focus on Japan's game magazines today.
	Japan's "Weekly Famitsu" is famous.
	Publishing weekly and it's said to be the best seller.
	Said to be...
	Japan is a funny country. The mechanism basically won't expose the number of sales. Publishers are allowed to make up any number they wants.
	You're talking about the "Nominal Circulation".
	"Nominal Circulation" is that the publishers saying whatever they wish. I heard that in some cases, the number would be 10 times different from the reality. You know, with a larger number, publishers can set a higher price for advertisements. That's why they are blowing.
	Huh.
	Nowadays, we've got some magazines which would announce the actual number of how many they've printed. This is the real stats from printing shop. But that's not the selling figure. Printing many doesn't mean selling many. Nevertheless, it's more accurate than the stupid "Nominal Circulation".
	Weekly Famitsu's "Nominal Circulation" is 0.5 million for each issue.
	Though I don't know the exact number, I suppose the actual circulation is 0.3 million.
	It would be helpful if they announce the exact number.
	Forget about the "Nominal Circulation", Weekly Famitsu is hottest in Japan. That is, other magazines' share decrease and become mania-targeted.
	Dengeki PlayStation is famous too. Actual stats from printing shop is about 0.13 million for each issue.
	There are many magaines with the name "Famitsu" or "Dengeki". Usually they combine the name of a console, and set their targets on each console's users. Recently we only have these 2 brands of game magazine.
	We've got much more in the past...
	Afterall, Weekly Famitsu is most influential, so it can organise many scoops. Usually 1 week faster than other magazines.
	In order to promote effectively, game companies just fond of giving scoops to Weekly Famitsu, with highlights in return.
	Also, Weekly Famitsu has a Cross Review system with a maximum 10 points from each reviewer. It's not remarkable for such system as all other magazines and foreign net media are doing the same thing. But for some reaasons Japanese just make a thing of Weekly Famitsu's review.
	4 reviewers giving points so the maximum is 40 points. It started from the year 1986 so lasted for over 20 years.
	With its long history, old game users just respect the review.
	That's right.
	As a result, Weekly Famitsu becomes the only choice for Japan's game magazines. As we can collect information through Internet and game magazines are no longer essential, brands of game magazine just reduce. Weekly Famitsu is fighting hard actually.
	I wish other magazines could fight harder though...
	We would talk about the problems induced when there is a giant in the industry next time. But the general situation of Japan's game magazines is just as we said.