PiQ no more

PiQ Magazine, ADV's replacement of NewType USA, has ended it's publishing run after just 4 issues. You read right. Four issues. The July issue, which just hit the stands is their final issue.

Direct from the PiQ website:

"It’s unfortunate that we’ll never get a chance to see how successful PiQ could have been, but a combination of low advertising revenue, poor business management and a lack of proper marketing and promotion all hamstrung the magazine from the start. We, the editorial/creative/production staff, did the best we could to put together a quality publication, but as we’ve discovered, without a good financial backing, it’s all an exercise in futility."

I don't know what all that mess means, other than it seems like ADV really dropped the ball on this one. As if they didn't even care if the mag succeeded or not. Personally I was really enjoying the mag, and as soon as I drop by the bookstore, I'll have all four issues. Where NewType focused solely on anime, manga, and Japanese...stuff...PiQ had a much broader range. It still talked about anime, there were still manga previews, and there were still articles on various things Japanese. But mixed in with the otaku fan fare was information for geeks of every flavor. There were articles on everything from the new comic book movie hitting theaters to female roller derby. So instead of buying, I don't know, 5 different magazines to cover everything (like NewType, Game Informer, Dragon Magazine, etc), you bought one that had everything you needed to know.

A lot of NewType fans really hated it, I think. PiQ chased away the hard core otakus who didn't care about the newest Adult Swim original (although to be perfectly honest, I don't either). And I'm certain that hurt their readership. I'm not sure how you advertise these sorts of things. I walked into my comic book store one day and there it was, Deunan Knute gracing the glossy cover. I was immediately hooked, but if it hadn't been displayed in such a way that I couldn't help but notice it, helped along by my excitement for a new Appleseed, I never would have known it existed.

Sorry to see you go, PiQ Magazine. You were a great magazine, full of well written articles (though even in just 4 issues I did notice some repetition), an amalgam of all things geek. Perhaps ADV will give it another shot, but in the meantime, there's always Otaku USA.