Video Games & Computer Entertainment's 1988 Awards (February 1989)

Video Games & Computer Entertainment,
February 1989 (Guess there wasn't room on the
cover to mention the awards article.)

From Video Games & Computer Entertainment's (VG&CE) February 1989 issue, the 10-page article scanned below is titled The Year's Best Video and Computer Games: Our Editors Pick the Outstanding Cartridges and disks of 1988. Magazines do have to write articles a bit in advance though this one seems to be far in advance as it must have hit newsstands in 1989 and features games released between September 30, 1987 and October 1, 1988. It may come as a surprise to see a hockey game as the computer game of the year and while it is not one I've played, it is designed by Ed Ringler and he made some great games. I own basketball and horse racing games he developed that have a lot of depth and simulation aspects. VG&CE didn't give the top sports award to that game though so I'll assume they simply didn't want to give one game multiple awards.

My favorite computer game of 1988, the role-playing title Wasteland, got an honorable mention under the adventure award. Brian Fargo worked on that game and the winner of the category, Neuromancer, and he got his name mentioned again for Battle Chess, an honorable mention for Best Computer Sound & Graphics. I am surprised by the top selection for video games which went to Sega's Super Zaxxon 3-D. I've not played that version of Zaxxon though I'd expect it's simply an arcade port that requires the Master System's 3-D glasses. In the video game section I did notice one error on the 7th scan (page 62); the screenshot for Nintendo's Pro Wrestling is incorrect, that's actually the Sega Master System's wrestling game which shares the same title.