N zone

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N zone
Logo N-Zone.png
description Video game magazine
Area of ​​Expertise Nintendo
language German
publishing company Computec Media ( Germany )
Headquarters Fuerth
First edition June 1997
Frequency of publication per month
Sold edition 12,100 copies
(Publisher's information)
Editor-in-chief Katharina Pache
Web link videogameszone.de/n-zone
ISSN (print)

The N-Zone is an on Nintendo specialized video games magazine of Computec Media . It covers topics such as previews, tests and hardware for the latest Nintendo game consoles. Hans Ippisch , formerly editor-in-chief of the magazine, is now active as commercial director. The editorial team consists of Katharina Pache (management), Lukas Schmid, Johannes Gehrling, Matthias Schöffel, Peter Bathge and freelancers. The same editorial team is also responsible for play⁴ magazine and was so until it was hired for XBG Games magazine .

History and content

The first edition of the N-Zone, driven and brought into being by Hans Ippisch , who previously also headed the Amiga Games and SEGA Magazin as editor-in-chief, appeared on May 28, 1997 and put the focus on the newly released Nintendo 64 by adding the Magazine presented previews of upcoming games, published tests for current games with a rating in the percentage system and provided very detailed complete solutions for N64 games that have already been released. The latter took the lion's share in the early years, dwindled increasingly in the GameCube era and has only been kept short occasionally since the Wii era, actually more as a tips & tricks format. The same applies to import tests: while in the N64 era it was almost a matter of course to evaluate new games with import tests as soon as they were released in Japan or the USA, this became the exception rather than the rule on the GameCube, and so it is today (probably also due to the significantly closer release periods of the individual regions) no more import tests for years. Further content has always been the news, various reports and letters to the editor. From 1997 to 2002, the back of the booklet cover consisted of four trading cards to cut out, with short tips and tricks on current hits.

For the one-year anniversary issue 13 came in a complete silver look, later almost every annual anniversary was celebrated with a competition. The magazine stayed true to its beginnings for a long time, but from the 08/1999 issue it was decided to stop reporting exclusively on the Nintendo 64 and also to carry out tests on new Game Boy and Game Boy Color games, albeit on a very small scale. to publish. From the end of 1999, the Pokémon phenomenon also reigned in Europe to an unprecedented extent, with the N-Zone taking advantage of the hype. A detailed Pokémon column with constantly new reader tips, drawings, posters and stickers that are always included, in issues 29 (10/1999) to 56 (01/2002) consistently with Pokémon on the cover, almost always as the main motif By far the most successful period of the then very popular N-Zone, which also fully included the Game Boy Advance from the release.

For the release of the Nintendo GameCube , the N-Zone was completely restructured from issue 05/2002. A new logo, more professional cover, bound instead of stapled pages, a new font, a clearer layout and even more competent reports led to what was possibly the most sovereign time of the "best-selling Nintendo magazine" at the time - away from the role of the colorful Pokémon sheet, which is also the sister magazine Kids Zone also took. The 100th edition, 08/2005, came with four different covers for the anniversary. After the introduction of the Nintendo DS , the N-Zone experienced another upheaval with the release of the Nintendo Wii : Hans Ippisch resigned as editor-in-chief and made room for his successors, a light instead of dark layout and a new font aimed at a more contemporary look. While Nintendo had its greatest successes with the Wii and DS, interest in the N-Zone declined. The reasons for this were that the latest upheaval was received less positively, the Internet competed strongly with video game magazines as a new source of information and with the new success of the Nintendo Wii, new Nintendo magazines also came onto the market. In the end, the N-Zone even had to give the label “Best-Selling Nintendo Magazine” to the competition, the “Official Wii Magazine”. From 03/2009 the logo was “The best-selling monthly Nintendo magazine” and from 11/2009 until today it was “Germany's largest Nintendo magazine”.

With interest in the N-Zone declining, more and more established reporters were leaving the magazine. As of the 03/2010 edition, the pages have generally been reduced in size to save paper costs. Under editor-in-chief Christoph Kraus , who had already worked under Hans Ippisch, the Nintendo 3DS and 2012 the Wii U also appeared in 2011 , but did not help the magazine back its old fame, instead criticism was voiced that the magazine had now swelled unnecessarily. Kraus, who left the editorial team after the 03/2013 issue, was almost exclusively responsible for the content. As a result, the N-Zone was completely turned inside out and, above all, returned to stapled magazine pages as in the N64 era. The new team under the editors-in-chief Thomas Eder and Viktor Eippert created structure, sovereignty and critical reporting again. This upward trend saved the N-Zone from discontinuing the magazine, but now the general interest was lower in contrast to the Wii age due to the flopped Wii U console and the resulting lack of software. The 09/2016 edition was supposed to be the first N-Zone to be a game for a Nintendo console without a test. With the current Nintendo Switch, however, increased interest in Nintendo products and the N-Zone returned.

List of expenses

Circulation statistics

In the fourth quarter of 2008, the average monthly circulation according to IVW was 18,247 copies. That is 21.9 percent (= 5,126) fewer issues than in the same quarter of the previous year. The number of subscribers fell within one year by 15.3 percent to 6,313 subscribers. At that time, 34.6 percent of readers subscribed to the magazine. The N-Zone peaked in the second quarter of 2000 (April to June) with an average of 110,399 issues sold per month.

At its own request, the N zone withdrew from the IVW census in the 3rd quarter of 2009. In 2017 the publisher announced a circulation of 13,400 copies, which was reduced to 12,100 copies in 2020.

Number of issues sold each month

Number of subscriptions sold each month

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Computec.de: Media data 2020 , accessed on December 8, 2019
  2. IVW.de: ivw.eu
  3. Computec.de: Media data 2020 , accessed on December 8, 2019