Amiga Action
Chichester's entry into a crowded market, and what became of it
Launched from Sussex by Gollner Publishing in October 1989 against Future, EMAP and Europress, and running to June 1995 — by which time it had been bought by two of them in turn: Europress around mid-1991, then IDG at the end of 1994.
Amiga Action ran from October 1989 to June 1995. It was launched by Gollner Publishing Ltd of Latham House, Quarry Lane, Chichester, under publisher Hugh Gollner — and it did not stay there.
It is the only title in this Vault’s magazine set to begin at that house, and it began as one of the few British computer magazines here published by neither Future, EMAP, Europress nor Newsfield. It ended owned by the successor to one of them.
Into the busiest market there was
October 1989 was a hard month to launch an Amiga games magazine. Already on the shelf were CU Amiga (EMAP), Amiga Format (Future, two months old), Amiga Computing (Europress) and Amiga User International. Within two years Amiga Power and Amiga Shopper would join them, both from Future.
Amiga Action lasted five and a half years in that company, which is the fact worth recording about it.
It is also, once again, an October launch — eleven of thirty-nine British titles of the period share the month.
⚠ This entry is built from the issues held and their colophons. This library holds no account of Gollner Publishing beyond what appears in its own magazine.
It did not stay with Gollner
The colophon moves twice. By February 1992 readers’ letters go to “Amiga Action, Europress Interactive Ltd., Europa House, Adlington Park, Adlington, Macclesfield SK10 4NP” — the Chichester magazine had been bought by Europress and moved to Cheshire, with both names appearing side by side through the second half of 1991.
By March 1995 the credit block reads “CREATED BY… IDG Media Ltd, Adlington Park, Macclesfield”. Amiga Action was among the eleven titles Europress sold to IDG at the end of 1994, so its last few months belong to a third publisher again.
⚠ Not to be confused with the Amiga Action supplement bound into the Italian edition of The Games Machine by Xenia Edizioni in 1992-93 — a 13-to-32-page section, not a magazine in its own right.
See also
- Commodore Amiga
- CU Amiga, Amiga Format, Amiga Computing, Amiga Power, Amiga Shopper — what it was up against
- Europress, IDG — the later publishers
- Magazine distribution