MCV issue 66 (17 December 1999)

  • Two and a half years before the GameCube launch, High Street retailers were beginning to phase out Nintendo 64 games due to low sales.
  • Details on the UK marketing for Pokémon Blue and Red. Free-standing display units and standees for shops! A four-week TV advertising campaign! A national cinema tie-in to Disney's Tarzan! Wonder how much of this we have evidence of?
  • A feature about the biggest thing in retail in 1999: e-commerce starting to eat bricks-and-mortar stores' lunch. The site gameplay.com (which would become GAME's online store five years later) was attracting major investment.
  • Yorkshire-based studio Runecraft, known for their conversion work, was ramping up. They were currently working on the PSX port of Baldur's Gate. This will never see release.
  • Top of the all formats chart this week: Tomb Raider 4: The Last Revelation, FIFA 2000 and Tomorrow Never Dies.
  • A surprising amount of sexist advertising for a trade mag.

Find it on archive.org: https://archive.org/details/mcv-66-1999-12-17

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