Give Your Eyes a Treat with This Art-Filled Video Game Magazine

All images courtesy of 'A Profound Waste of Time'

Every so often, it's enough to simply share a little love on this internet of ours. This is one of those moments.

Magazines, we're so frequently told, are a dying medium. Sites like this are to blame for declining circulations and growing disinterest, apparently. That's not quite the whole story, but the stats don't lie: in Britain, titles like Edge and GamesMaster have seen their readerships fall off a cliff in recent years.

A Profound Waste of Time is a new magazine from the UK, focusing on—says its successful Kickstarter campaign blurb—"a bold new video game culture magazine, a lovingly produced home to great writing on the medium and its accompanying narratives". Which sounds swell to us.

The project—driven by London-based graphic designer Caspian Whistler, with consultation provided by Read Only Memory's Darren Wall (ROM's most recent book is The Bitmap Brothers: Universe, an excerpt from which can be found on Waypoint here)—has raised over £20,000 from close to 700 backers.

Supporters will need to pay at least £20 to receive the physical magazine—but at a time where Frank Ocean can charge $80 for his own Boys Don't Cry publication, is that really such an outlay? Yes, obviously. But isn't it pretty?

Contributors for the magazine are drawn from across the gaming spectrum, covering developers and critics alike. Amongst the names that leap out are Vlambeer's Rami Ismail, Hotline Miami artist Dennis Wedin, sometime VICE channels writer Laura Kate Dale, and Owlboy designer Adrian Bauer. The terrific Shovel Knight cover art—which glows in the dark on a limited-edition special version of the issue—is by Dam Mumford.

"Our aim is to redefine what a physical video game magazine can be," is the admirable mission statement of the A Profound Waste of Time team. "[The magazine] will dissect the virtual worlds that inspire, unite and challenge us." That's the sort of M.O. Waypoint can get behind, so good luck to all involved. More information here.

Check out some (potentially concept) images from issue one of A Profound Waste of Time below.