Pelaaja

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Pelaaja ("Player") is a Finnish video games magazine published 12 times a year by H-Town. In the Finnish gaming magazine scene Pelaaja is a newcomer, challenging mainly the well-established Pelit magazine. Pelaaja covered both PCs and consoles, but since October 2005 the magazine focuses on consoles. The PC coverage was in a separate magazine named PCPelaaja. Its editor-in-chief was Miika Huttunen. H-Town decided not to continue publishing PCPelaaja in spring 2007 and transferred the staff involved to work on the Peliplaneetta.net website.

Number 42 of Pelaaja-magazine

The editor-in-chief of Pelaaja is Thomas Puha. Its permanent staff includes among others Miika Huttunen, a veteran of the Finnish electronic gaming scene and Janne Pyykkönen, who is also the editor in chief of H-Town's Pelaa! magazine and the editor of Aamulehti newspaper's weekly videogaming content. The art director is Lasse Erkola and some of the frequent collaborators include Miikka Lehtonen, Tero Lehtiniemi and Jukka O. Kauppinen.

The magazine is more akin to European and American videogames magazines than Finnish ones with its focus on exclusive coverage on the latest games and extensive interviews with members of the development community. Game reviews are also a big part of the magazine. The magazine's motto is "for the love of gaming" as the magazine's staff are hardcore gaming enthusiasts, which is evident in the passionate writing the magazine features. The magazine was started because the people working on the magazine felt there was no high quality games magazine available in Finland which would focus on videogames rather than the PC. Another feature is the international vibe of the magazine via Japan- and US- based writers contributing to the magazine.

Pelaaja focuses heavily on its art direction, which is handled by Lasse Erkola, with additional design from Thomas Puha and Sami Rouhiainen. The magazine was redesigned in summer of 2005 and re-launched in October 2005.

Puha and Huttunen are known to cable television and public broadcasting channel viewing audiences for both their games related program appearances and their program featuring neat webpages.