Wargames Illustrated Goes... Dynamic!

I spotted the "last" White Dwarf today at Tesco's, I had been tempted to buy it as some kind of momento but leafing through it decided it was the usual crap so left it on the shelf. I came home to find my copy of Wargames Illustrated 316 had arrived including details of their new "dynamic" electronic edition.

Now I am a convert to electronic magazines, not only do they save space, but you can "carry" them with you wherever you go on your e-reader as well as enlarge the photos to see detail you cannot in the paper copy.

WI is my last paper subscription and I had intended to convert this when it runs out following their recent announcement of an e-copy, I already subscribe to the electronic editions of Miniature Wargames and Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy.

Today, Wargames Illustrated pushed the envelope making the electronic copy superior to the paper one, not just a copy of the paper edition. They call it "dynamic content" which means that they are using the possibilities offered by the electronic medium that paper cannot do. Examples include "swipeable" photo galleries behind a photo, video, expanded paragraphs and the ability to rotate photos of painted figures through 360 degrees as well as the slightly more common embedded hyperlinks.

I downloaded the free trial issue (about 20 pages from issue 316) and was so impressed I signed up to an electronic sub then and there! There are a few things that are not perfect, you can't rotate video into landscape on the iPad, the embedded photogalleries cannot be enlarged and not all the URL's (in ads) are converted to hyperlinks (this last point is surprising as it requires minimal work), but overall I was impressed and quire excited about the possibilities (any chance of animated maps?!).

WI have also released some (non-dynamic) period compilations of articles (drawn from the Battlefront era) that whilst I have in my paper magazine collection (somewhere), are useful to have to hand and represent decent value at a couple of quid. It would have been great if they too had been dynamic but they are still good to have...