30 Years of PC Games: Former Editors Reminisce – Part 1

Petra Fröhlich: “You can hardly expect more from your professional life!”

In November 2014 I shut down my editorial PC – almost eight years ago. And although I was very, very, very determined to get this last day over with with dignity, the emotions won out and the tears flowed in torrents.
After all, up to that point I had spent more than half my life with one and the same employer. I was allowed to accompany the beginnings of later global corporations like Blizzard Entertainment editorially – and was there when circulation and sales of PC games literally exploded in the 90s.

The fact that I was even allowed to switch to the editor-in-chief at the turn of the millennium was the temporary culmination of a chain of extremely happy coincidences and fateful moments. Because in the summer of 1992 – I had just come of age and was still at school – I happened to hear an appeal on the radio: a Nuremberg publisher was looking for freelance authors who would “test” computer games. If I had turned on a different channel at that minute or failed to write down the phone number, the story would have ended at this point.

30 Years of PC Games: Former Editors Reminisce – Part 1 (3)

Source: Petra Fröhlich



The following three years went as follows: lessons at the vocational school in the morning, picking up test samples from the publishing house in the afternoon, playing in the afternoon, typing in the evening and handing in the finished text including screenshots on disk to the editorial office the next day.

Afterwards, I actually wanted to study journalism with a focus on economics, but the publisher’s boss said succinctly: “Study? You can always do it later.” Which of course hardly ever happens. And so it happened that I started as a young editor at PC Games in August 1995 – and a little dream came true.

As a result, I’ve been at the heart of the rise and fall of glorious studios and publishers, munched sandwiches over lunch with famous game designers like Peter Molyneux, traveled to trade shows and events, and in the hallways of the publishing building met the colleague who, a few years later, changed my surname would trigger. One can hardly expect more from his professional life.

The media landscape has of course changed dramatically in recent years – and with it PC games. Many colleagues I used to work with and some of whom I hired are now working in completely different fields and industries. But that a magazine brand “holds out” as long as PC games is absolutely extraordinary. I will always be proud to have been able to contribute a modest part.

Happy Birthday – and only the best for the next 30 years!

Also interesting: Take part in the big competition for 30 years of PC games!

Robert Horn: “Many nice anecdotes and memories”

My time at PC Games (2006 to 2013) contains many nice anecdotes and memories. My first printed review (Sid Meier’s Railroads), epic sneak peek trips to my favorite developer Valve in Seattle (the diary for that is still online), an unforgettable meeting with developer legend John Carmack at id software in Texas, a controversially high rating Portal 2 (for me still one of the most perfect games of all time) or the wonderful reader meetings at the Games Convention (back then)/Gamescom (today).

30 Years of PC Games: Former Editors Reminisce – Part 1 (4)

Source: Behrendt and Rausch



Back then, I built a memorial myself rather involuntarily. In a somewhat pompous strip poker game test (yes, we still had to test that kind of crap back then, thanks go out to Mrs. Petra F.) I just mixed up “she” and “you” and made our readers aware of it self fondling lechers. My colleagues found what they were looking for, the “Horn of the Month” was born. From then on, the editors’ most embarrassing spelling mistakes were mercilessly recorded and commented on with relish in this quickly created section – including an annual vote for Horn of the Year.