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From: black@ll.mit.edu (The Glomph)
Subject: World-Class CD-ROMS for Windows -- opinions?
Message-ID: <9407301935.PN24628@LL.MIT.EDU>
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Date: Sat, 30 Jul 94 19:35:37 -0400

I've tried a whole bunch of CD-ROMS since I got my monster P5-90
machine.  Most of them are awful.  The worst are just mediocre games
copied over from floppies, no use of the capabilities of CD-ROM capacity.
Personal biases follow for calibration--

The best:  MYST and 7th Guest, with Rebel Assault somewhat behind.   Lots of 
creative rendering, great use of sound/music.  I will get anything like these!

Reference: (Sorry, Gates-haters-) MS Bookshelf & Encarta.  Unbelievable depth, 
I love the Dictionary which has real diction!  It even says "Kwajalein" 
correctly!   Also in the top-notch category are the DeLorme map disks, Street 
Atlas & Global Explorer.  All of these fully exploit the medium.

Bad: Empire State Building, from the (deservedly) deceased InterOptica. Boring,
         useless, and factually incorrect.   Bleah.  Ditto for other boring 
         cross-linked text disks with a few gratuitous images & maybe a video 
         clip.

HoHUM: Outpost.  The packaging is the best part (like a lot of breakfast 
cereals)  Otherwise, a bad port of SimCity with a few nice non-interactive 
space animations.  The sounds/speech are technically good, but annoying.
Bleah.

Better-Than-OK:  Corel Photo-CDs (especially at $18!). They look GREAT on a 
good monitor & video board.
 MS Art Gallery: Clunky design, wish they had 
used 24-bit JPEG instead of the fixed 256-color palette to cover everybody!
Still, the content and organization make this a must-buy if you care about art.
MS Beethoven: Worth a try.  Wish they used a better recording, but OK.

OK, more than enough blather.  
I'd like to see opinions on CD-ROMS in the must-see category, as referenced to
the above!      Thanks!

Jerry Black,   Kwajalein, Republic of the Marshall Islands