The skies are gray above our hobby today as one of gaming’s oldest institutions, Game Informer, is closing its doors. This morning, GameStop abruptly pulled the plug on the Game Informer magazine and website, laying off its entire staff as it was “about 70% done” with the next issue, according to content director Kyle Hilliard.

The official Game Informer X account shared a farewell message titled “The Final Level: Farewell from Game Informer”, found below:

The sudden closure comes after a turbulent period for the Minneapolis-based magazine. Facing pressure from struggling owner GameStop, Game Informer had already gone through multiple rounds of layoffs since 2018, reducing the outlet’s size. In March 2024, Game Informer launched a new subscription, detached from GameStop’s rewards program, for $19.91 a year. Before today’s developments, the GI staff seemed pretty happy with how it was going.

It’s unclear if GameStop plans to issue refunds for existing subscriptions, but it’s not a great sign that the entire Game Informer website has already disappeared. The site now directs to the same closure statement above.

Game Informer was founded in 1991, a time when gaming was smaller, and it was much harder to keep track of everything going on in our hobby. For millions, the monthly edition of Game Informer was appointment reading, not only for the major exclusives on newly announced games the magazine would reliably deliver, but for the breadth of games it covered in a single issue.

If you were a kid in the 2000s like me, there’s a chance you didn’t fully understand how Game Informer got to your door. We started getting mags in the mail after my dad signed up for a GameStop membership—he never cracked one open, but I couldn’t get enough. In elementary school, I kept a thick stack of Game Informers in my desk that I’d pour over at every opportunity. I lacked the attention span to read most of the articles, but I could marvel for hours at the screenshots, page design, and sharply written captions.

That stack got heavier over the years, and while I eventually got rid of some in a move, my favorite Game Informer issues still enjoy a spot on my bookshelf. I still have my 2007 Borderlands issue, back when it was going to look all desaturated and Mad Max-y. I remember reading and rereading my Assassin’s Creed issue so often that the binding fell apart. I always made time for the reader letters and fan art pages—I think I liked that it brought out the personalities of GI’s staff, even if I was too young to learn their names. Game Informer was how I learned that writing about games is a thing you can do as a job. Now it’s gone.

Game Informer’s legacy lives on, though. MinnMax, an independent outlet founded by former Game Informer staff caught up in layoffs, is organizing a Game Informer archival project on its Discord to help preserve the magazine’s decades of work.