Publisher giant, IGN – Ziff Davis, is going through some rough times, and has done the impossible: closing down popular gaming web sites.
Both UGO.com and GameSpy.com – gamer entertainment web sites that operated for years successfully – are getting shut down.
UGO posted a “Game Over” farewell on its page, stating:
“I’ve spent many years of my life trying to turn UGO.com into something entertaining for you guys. Hopefully you stopped by recently to watch one our funny videos. Or you found yourself debating one of our nerd culture lists, read a movie review or pondered the age old question “Who would win in a fight, a minotaur armed with a trident or a centaur armed with a crossbow.” Could be you tried to win something off our homepage or you Googled “Hot Girls” and found a couple of pics you liked. I don’t really care how you got here, just as long as you were entertained when you did.”
Meanwhile, GameSpy issued a similar farewell statement:
“GameSpy, as we know it, began in 1999. Today, 14 years later, it has reached the end of the road. We had a good run, and we want to sincerely thank all of you for reading and joining in discussions with us. It’s been fantastic. […] Why is this closure happening, then? It’s a business thing, and like most business things it’s not easy to explain or understand unless you spend all day crunching numbers and paying bills. Which I don’t. So here’s the simple version that even I can comprehend: Ziff Davis wants to run an efficient, focused company, and managing several different sites that all cover videogames isn’t exactly the model of efficiency. Even though GameSpy had its own unique voice that was separate and distinct from those of our sister sites, and there has always been value in that, it’s hard to argue with that logic. Even if it does totally suck.”
As if that were not enough, IGN is closing down 1UP.com as well:
“Ziff-Davis announced that as part of a restructuring of its new property IGN Entertainment, three of IGN’s smaller secondary sites — namely, 1UP.com, Gamespy.com, and UGO.com — would be “winding down.” As is often the case with such reorganizations, some of 1UP’s staff was laid off while others will be moving over to work as contributors at IGN.com. No timeline was given for 1UP’s closure or if its servers would continue to run indefinitely.”
All three web sites had millions of monthly visitors; it is unclear what will happen to the web site content and domain names; these are definitely signs of a bad economy.
This post is 100% true!
