RPGFan

articleissue
onesource = April 2008
notability = April 2008

Infobox Website
name = RPGFan
url = http://www.rpgfan.com
type = Gaming (RPGs)
owner = Cerberus Media Group
author = Mickey Shannon
launch date = 1997 (as Lunarnet)

RPGFan is a website devoted to electronic role-playing games for console and PC, both domestic and imported. Its content includes previews, reviews, and news of recent and upcoming RPG releases. The site also contains RPG screen shots, editorials, fanart, fanfiction, and website links for users to contribute to.

RPGFan was launched as LunarNET in 1997, then changed its name to RPGFan in 1999, and is now a subsidiary of Cerebus Media Group Inc.

Staffing has changed immensely over the course of RPGFan. Current general content is managed by the webmaster, John McCarroll. The soundtracks section is managed by Patrick Gann, the reviews section by Damian Thomas, and advertising and business operations by Stephen Harris. RPGFan offers banner advertisement programs for game publishers and developers on a monthly basis.

History

On December 1997, Mickey Shannon established an RPG-centered website called LunarNET. At first, the site contained news, release dates, an editorial list and archives, but after its first redesign new sections were added, such as reviews, previews, links, pictures and FAQs. In 1998 LunarNET received attention from larger gaming websites after publishing rare "Final Fantasy VIII" screenshots and a video from the latest "Sonic" game, "Sonic Adventure", the quality of which had been better than in other "Sonic" videos on the Internet.

After two years of operation, LunarNET was renamed to clarify that the site focused on RPGs in general and not just the "Lunar" game series. On March 3, 1999, the site was relaunched as RPGFan. Until February 2000, RPGFan had been redesigned once; additionally, it had obtained several new editors, although Mickey Shannon, the original founder, announced that he was going to leave RPGFan, later stating, “I eventually lost interest in games, and I'm still not really sure why, but eventually quit in March or so of 2000”. Despite the claim, he recreated LunarNET, which, unlike the previous version, was exclusively dedicated to the "Lunar" series.

In 2000, RPGFan could no longer use the server of the GameFan Network. A replacement server was provided by GameGlow Network. However, GameGlow was shut down only a couple of months later, and RPGFan had no choice but to use the server of a small company named EasilyHosted.com (that, in fact, already hosted the sites connected to GameGlow’s server). After some misunderstandings concerning unpaid bills of EasilyHosted’s owner, RPGFan was temporarily put on the server of a friend of the owner. While using this particular server, RPGFan was redesigned to its current form. In 2001 the site signed a one year contract with CIHost. [cite web | author= | date= | url=http://www.rpgfan.com/features/rpgfan/ | title=RPGFan: The History | publisher=RPGFan.com | accessdate=2007-07-04]

In April 2008, the website published their 1000th article in the Soundtracks section of the website. [cite web | author=Patrick Gann | date=2008-04-18 | url=http://www.rpgfan.com/news/2008/1141.html | title=1000 Soundtracks Reviewed | publisher=RPGFan | accessdate=2008-07-21]

References

ee also

*Computer RPG
*PC games
*Console games

External links

* [http://www.rpgfan.com/ RPGFan]
* [http://www.live365.com/stations/80941 RPGFan Radio]
* [http://www.rpgfan.com/boards Forum]