Dreamcast Magazines (esp. France, Germany and Italy)

[lozz]

Hi all,

Newbie here, so apologies to the admins in advance if I should be posting this elsewhere!

I've recently been looking into the various Dreamcast magazines that were published during the consoles heyday (for no other reason than curiosity).

I've found that there are some excellent full-run scans of certain mags available online - such as those for the official UK and US editions. However, from what I can see, a huge number of magazines have not yet been preserved. It seems a shame to me that this is the case, and I am interested in the possibility of taking some steps to resolve this (either by donating, or scanning).

My initial searches (covering this website as well as places like the Internet Archive, SegaRetro and the Out-of-Print Archive) lead me to believe that scans of the following issues of European and North American DC mags are currently unavailable anywhere:

DC Magazine (Spain) 4, 5, 6
DC Tips (UK) 1
DCM (USA) 1-4
Dreamcast Arena (Italy) 2-16
Dreamcast Galaxy (Italy) 1-10
Dreamcast Kult (Germany) 1-14
Dreamcast Losungen (Germany) 1-2
Dreamcast Magic (Germany) 1-9
Dreamcast Solutions (UK) 4 & 10
Dreamcast Trucchi e Soluzioni (Italy) 1-3
Dreamzone (France) 1-9, 11-20, 22-23, 26-28
Game Dream (France) 1-18

Before I set out on a labourious task of potentially donating and/or scanning some of the above magazines, I was hoping you folks could let me know if you happen to have an answer to either of the following questions:

1. Are you aware of any websites that are currently hosting scans of the specific magazine issues listed above? 

2. Are you aware of anyone who is actively undertaking a project to scan and upload any of the magazine issues above? If so, please could you share their name and contact details?

Of course, any other relevant information or comments would be most welcome, but I am particularly keen to get some clarity on what is already available and what may be in the pipeline (to avoid duplication of labour).

Cheers,

Lozz

[JonnyCGood]

This is one of the major french sites and it lists several dreamcast magazines:

https://www.abandonware-magazines.org/

 

There's also several German projects that don't do complete scans, but they do catalog german video game reviews and are quite complete. Here is one example:
 

 

https://ninretro.de/

 

 

And funny enough, Maniac magazine is still up and running, and they've been transferring their reviews from their 0's print magazine to their website over the years.

https://www.maniac.de/systeme/dc/
 

[lozz]

Thanks for those links. The French website appears to have scans of four issues of Dreamzone online, but not a full run. I might check in with them and see if they are planning to scan any more issues in the near future.

[JonnyCGood]

12 hours ago, lozz said:

Thanks for those links. The French website appears to have scans of four issues of Dreamzone online, but not a full run. I might check in with them and see if they are planning to scan any more issues in the near future.

Keep in mind that the archive mag project creates "Readable" scans, but they're not great. They're nice for reference, but I'd prefer better scans for posterity.

Also when it comes to french mags, I'd love to see more issues of Gameplay RPG, which (Despite its name) covered adventure games and Role playing games.

https://www.abandonware-magazines.org/affiche_mag.php?mag=235

[lozz]

Hi all,

A little update on this project. I now have a full run of Dreamzone (29 issues) and a near-full run of Dreamcast Arena (13 issues) in my possession. On top of this, I also have single issues of the Hong Kong-produced magazines DreamWave and Dreamcast Express. Aside from the odd issue of Dreamzone and the first issue of Dreamcast Arena, none of this material is preserved yet.

I've decided that it is unlikely I will be able to scan these myself - I lack the necessary equipment (most of the mags are larger than A4), time and determination. I would feel a lot more comfortable handing them over to someone who is already experienced and is likely to do a good job.

So, the question is, are there any scanners who would be willing to take any of this on? I am willing to donate the mags and should be able to cover shipping costs too. I'm in the UK so my preference would be somewhere in Europe, but I would be open to Worldwide scanners if not.

If I can't source any volunteers from the mag scanning scene, then I'm considering two alternatives a) donating them to the Video Game History Foundation in the hope they will scan them, b) gathering a few donations from within the Dreamcast scene to employ the services of a scanning company in the UK.

Any thoughts on the above would be most welcome.

P.s. I wrote a rambling article on the whole Dreamcast mag situation last year that may be of interest to some https://www.thedreamcastjunkyard.co.uk/2022/05/dreamcast-magazines-appreciation-and.html?m=1

Cheers,

Lozz