VG&CE began as a spinoff of
ANALOG Computing, a magazine published by LFP devoted to
Atari 8-bit computers.
VG&CE was started at LFP by
Lee H. Pappas (publisher), with
Andy Eddy as executive editor (Eddy was a freelance contributor to the first issue of the magazine, which had the cover date of December 1988, just before relocating to
California in September 1988 to become its editor before the first issue hit the streets. During Eddy's tenure at the magazine, there was no one listed as editor-in-chief, simply due to odd staff-titling decisions.) Contributors included
Arnie Katz and
Bill "The Game Doctor" Kunkel, co-founders of the first video game magazine,
Electronic Games.
Tips & Tricks editor-in-chief Chris Bieniek was an associate editor at
VG&CE.
Computer Player editor-in-chief Mike Davila was an associate editor and later executive editor at
VG&CE.
Knights of Xentar writer David Moskowitz was also an associate editor covering news and computer games during the Eddy/Davila/Bieniek tenure.
VideoGames - The Ultimate Gaming Magazine The magazine was renamed into
VideoGames - The Ultimate Gaming Magazine starting with the September 1993 issue and dropped computer game coverage. In an effort to compete with magazines popular at the time, such as
GamePro, the magazine was made more child-friendly with vibrant colors. Issues often featured a videogame cheat printed on the cover, labelled as a "free code;" this ended in late 1994. For much of this era,
Chris Gore was editor-in-chief, and it had a monthly news and gossip column "The Gore Score". The magazine ended publication in late 1996, when
Ziff-Davis bought
VideoGames from LFP and folded the brand. == Spin-off magazines ==