Hey everyone - so we're looking for a contributor (or contributors) to help us catch up (using our Entry Helper!) on recent Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 releases.

Our regular helper on these ended up stepping out later in 2018, so although we're getting the major releases, we're missing a lot of the others. We'd really like to archive digital info from them for posterity - and as you can see on Switch, there's a lot of neat stuff coming out.

Your job - should you choose to accept it - is to enter the URLs of the recent game pages in our 'Entry Helper' after you hit Contribute, then add any other platforms for the game based on a little research, pick some genres, and... that's it. Not too complex! (Feel free to PM me with questions!)

As per tradition, I present to you the database visualization! Made possible by the MobyGames API.

Previous editions:
January 2018 - June 2017 - January 2017 - January 2016 - January 2015 - January 2014 - January 2013 - January 2012 - January 2011 - January 2010 - January 2009



(Click to enlarge)

An explanation: each coloured shape in the graph represents a platform. The horizontal axis is time. The vertical axis represents the number of games released. So the height of a shape on a given point in time indicates the number of games released for that platform that year. The total height of the graph on a given point in time shows the total releases that year. The graph is meant to represent new game releases and thus excludes DLC, Special Edition and Compilation items. It does include each game for each platform it was released on.

Notable changes since last year:
- There are quite a lot of new platforms. In fact there are now so many that Excel refused to render the graph due to a hardcoded limit. I had to switch to LibreOffice to make the graph.
- Because I'm now excluding compilations, DLC and Special Edition releases, there are generally less releases per year visible. In particular 2017 ends up with 1000 games less than lass year's graph! My apologies to those who spent lots of time and effort to document DLC, but I just felt it was cluttering the graph!
- My pet project this year was documenting games from the late 60s and early 70s. Which shows as a tiny bump in an area of the graph that was previously almost flat.
- It looks like we didn't keep up with new releases as well as last year, judging from the drop-off in 2018.
- The coverage gap of 2016 has been filled it appears.
- Feel free to point out other interesting info in the graph!


[All data taken from MobyGames. Of course, the graph is only as complete as our database is. Come help us if you can!]

The year is almost over, so it is time to name your favorite games of the year! As it is MobyGames tradition, all games you have played are acceptable, not only 2018 ones.

Now the holiday season is approaching, MobyGames would just like to wish all of its contributors a very happy 2018, and a merry 2019, too!

As our database stats and daily requests for API access show, we continue to have the largest set of credits, screenshots and covers with open access anywhere online - and THANK YOU if you are a net contributors to it! Now, let's roll on, 2019...

As threatened for a while, contributors are now allowed to upload magazine ads that they've scanned onto MobyGames! We're really excited to build a database around these, since there's nowhere online that you can see them all in one place.

Some quick guidelines: Magazine Advertisement is now a promo image 'type'. So to add them, simply go to add 'promo images', create a new promo image group called Magazine Advertisements, and title each image with the magazine name, country, issue, and date. [Fabricated example: Sinclair User (United Kingdom), Issue 73 (September 1994).]

(If there are already some magazine ads uploaded for that game, then just add them to the existing promo image group. There are also a few edge cases, so feel free to discuss them in comments. And good luck!)

Congratulations are in order for the following MobyGames users for some new milestones:

- Riki has made it to 150k MobyPoints (9th in the all-time list.)
- Kam1Kaz3NL77 is now at 100k (14th all-time!)
- Harmony made it over 20k, an excellent achievement based on many obscure titles.
- Cavalary is at the 10k milestone - congrats there, too!

PS - Side note - we need some new 'Featured Game' reviews. Add some here, if you have a chance!

MobyGames contributor Ms. Tea has been a member of the site for some time, but has majorly stepped up contributions this year, adding a bunch of interesting & rare titles, so we wanted to thank her!

Some notable additions include the very rare Cookie's Bustle, an odd Japanese PC mini-game fest, as well as bizarre Nuon skydiving title Freefall 3050 AD and odd unofficial Genesis game Smart Mouse, among many others. Hurray!

It's increasingly tricky to keep up on MobyGames user milestones, but a quick shout-out to 3 regulars that I wrote down recently (& presumably isn't too out of date!)

Firstly, Patrick Bregger made it over 200,000 MobyPoints, and is currently 3rd all-time - much appreciated! Secondly, Pseudo_Intellectual has been on the site for nearly 15 years & made it over 60k Points in the past few weeks, woot. And thirdly, new contributor Leeona is already over 45k MobyPoints, in less than a year, many of them for Australian cover art we didn't have - SUPER impressive work, y'all.

Just a quick note - if you are a regular contributor to MobyGames, or would like to help us out after having contributed, we're looking for new approvers!

Your job (should you choose to accept it) is to scour the submission queues for info and verify that the user-submitted data is correct before it goes up on our website. We're also looking for existing approvers to expand their scope to new queues/platforms. Either way, please PM me and I can sort you out!

As we cruise through the summer months, wanted to highlight a couple of notable MobyGames contributors who just reached new milestones in terms of MobyPoints:

- GTramp, who has added all kinds of things but has been particularly strong on screenshots (13,000 so far!) has made it over 60,000 MobyPoints.

- mars_rulez, who is invaluable for adding brand new releases for PC and digital console, just made it over 40,000 points. So many thanks to him, too!

Do we have necessary requirements for user to enter tech specs for a specific game? Well, one obvious way is to go add the game or tech specs, and see if it's available.

Now, the easier way is simply to visit this updated 'Tech Specs' page and see if anything is missing and how data is grouped. That page lists all tech specs that currently exist on MobyGames, regardless of the platforms to which each spec is attached.

Feel free to comment on potential issues in the forum thread attached to this post!

In the past few days a couple more platforms have been added, so a brief introduction is in order...



Galaksija (left) was a do-it-yourself (DIY) computer made in ex-Yugoslavia in 1983. It used monochromatic monitor and text-mode graphics (two year later Galaksija Plus introduced hi-res mode with polygon graphics). How to assemble the computer was done in a magazine so everyone's computer looked a bit different. You wanted a joystick to play games? Take a soldering iron and build yourself one. That was the principle for upgrades. Here's a brief showcase of how the games looked on original Galaxy computer.

Amazon Alexa (right) has great many skills. Many of those skills are categorized as games and it was only a matter of time until it found itself on MobyGames. While many skills are entertaining, not all are actual games. Skill groups help determine that a bit, but best way is always to try it out, seeing how they're all free. What does Alexa game "look" like? Well, a word speaks 1000 of pictures ;))