PlayStation Nation
URL: http://pwp.usa.pipeline.com/~toenail/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
From its introduction in September till the end of 1995, Sony¹s PlayStation sold an estimated 500,000 units, proving itself a wildly successful gaming platform. Given half a million people and an estimated 1.73 friends per PlayStation owner, that makes,...let¹s see,...1,365,000 people who are regularly playing PlayStation games! By contrast, Belize only has a population of 214,058. By that calculation PlayStation devotees -- the PlayStation Nation, if you will -- could easily take over that sunny Central American country; PlayStation Nation, after all, comprises mostly young people with honed reflexes, while the citizenry of Belize is handicapped by all those infants and elderly. Think of it: A whole country full of PlayStation gamers, it would be the biggest test market in the world. Well, the PlayStation Nation Web site is not advocating anything like that; the site¹s creator and contributors -- Toenail, Shroom, and Scarecrow -- are too busy playing and reviewing PlayStation games to plan any large-scale invasions. The core of this site is devoted to very qualitative game reviews based on the simple criterion of whether a game is worth buying. The content is kept focused, with an area for hints and a news section covering the latest games and developments regarding PlayStation. While some gaming purists refuse to ever look at hints or cheats, the majority of players will find this section useful. The news section is worthwhile for more than just the latest video games, as it also covers business topics in the industry. Toenail, the Web master, has designed two versions of the site to accommodate both Navigator and Internet Explorer users. The Navigator version takes advantage of VRML plug-ins with a 3D logo, while The Internet Explorer rendition employs Microsoft specialties like marquees and embedded wave files, giving each page an audio introduction. The different versions of the site make it a great way for discerning surfers to compare browsers.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

The Chess Connection
URL: http://www.easynet.co.uk/worldchess/home.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The Chess Connection is the site of sites for chess fans, as it publishes chess columns from various British publications, such as *The Spectator*, *The Independent*, and *The New Statesman*. While it¹s a great repository for game stratagem, it would be nice if the Connection included an online archive. The Chess Connection Shop has the one of the more interesting uses of Frames I have seen.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

President `96
URL: http://www.pres96.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
President Œ96 is an online game simulating the current, real-world presidential campaign. In the President Œ96 world, however, there is no incumbent president, just 4 Democrat, 4 Republican, and 2 Independent candidates. Players join the campaign staff of a candidate and advise them where to stand on the issues (only 8 issues in the Pres Œ96 world), and how to react to news stories that appear on the Web site. It¹s a fascinating interactive experience where staff cooperation is essential to have your candidate win. The time frame is concurrent with the real elections, so join a campaign soon.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

Virgin Interactive
URL: http://www.vie.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Virgin Airlines, Virgin Megastores, Virgin Records...will we ever stop seeing new Virgin enterprises? Virgin, Great Britain¹s answer to Microsoft, has put together some really cutting edge Web page design in its efforts to get into the hearts and minds of people all over the globe. The latest entrant is Virgin Interactive, the computer game division. Of course, with Virgin, computer games mean Sony Playstation and Sega Saturn, along with the old standards of PC and Mac. Virgin distributes a number of titles, including such award winners as The 7th Guest and Command & Conquer. And once Burst, the newly formed games development group, gets its titles out, Virgin Interactive will have some amazing exclusive content. The developers of the Web site are definitely keyed into the different levels of Internet user. The home page offers three alternatives for exploring the site; Normal mode is just text and graphics; Shocked, of course, gets you a few Shockwave elements; and Ultra-Shocked is where the site designers pulled out all the stops in music and animation. Unfortunately, the bandwidth required to run in Ultra-Shocked mode is impractical for anyone without a direct connection to the Internet via T1 or better. Nevertheless, the structure of the site is the same no matter which option is chosen, so people going the low-bandwidth route only miss out on the sound and action. The core of the site is, of course, the game titles. With over ten games featured, and even more for sale, Virgin does a pretty good job of pulling at the old purse strings/wallet chain. Each featured game has its own area of content, including a description, screen shots, movie files, and demos. The *In The Werks* section features games that are in production, a great resource for getting early notice on releases. The site looks great, with squeaky clean graphics and an overall aesthetic that I might, if pressed, describe as post-industrial/dental. The shocked versions make use of a wild menu bar of TV monitors flashing, scattered images interspersed with index headings for the site. At the same time, a techno soundtrack accompanies the shopper through the pages of games.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

File Factory
URL: http://www.filefactory.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Essentially a file archive for the Total Entertainment Network http://www.ten.net, the File Factory is an aesthetically appealing, solid batch of Web pages set up for the sole purpose of making PC gaming files available on the Web. There are, of course, demo versions of the games that can be played on the TEN network. But TEN didn¹t stop there. These avid gamers put just about every decent game they could find, along with a quick rating, up on the site. There are quite a few different categories of downloads, including the ³Home Brew² section, with levels and patches designed by individuals.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

Playing Chess On The Internet
URL: http://crux5.cit.cornell.edu/~jmk3/john/chess/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Maybe you have a yen to play chess with someone hundreds or thousands of miles away, in real time. This site has the information you need, covering all the basics of getting onto one of the many specialized chess servers out there. Even for the computer and Internet savvy among us, this is an excellent resource, if merely for the list of chess servers. The site itself is an example of nice Web page design, employing frames properly (no small feat), and having its information well-organized.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

Hyperactive2.0
URL: http://hyperactive.com/games/index2.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This is an excellent game site. Not only is it well designed (assuming you like frames and constantly refreshing ads), but there is a lot of content here. There are codes, downloadable demos, tons of screenshots, reviews, some cools links, a letters sections, and news. It covers both PC and consoles, and the news section is remarkably complete -- they don't break news stories often, but they do have a wide variety of stories. The writing is well done, and (surprise!) free of grammar errors. Plus there are servers in Australia and the US. (the site is of Australian origin).
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

Roger Wilco¹s Virtual Broomcloset
URL: http://www.wiw.org/~jess/roger.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
If you¹re reading this because you¹re trying to figure out how to transfer your infommercial to HTML, please go on to the next review. If, on the other hand, you want to see what the web can really offer, read on. For me, this site is what the Web is all about. Basically it¹s a fan site dedicated to the Space Quest series of games from Sierra and the games¹ star Roger Willco. It¹s got FAQs, walk-throughs, spoilers, and other expected stuff, but what is really cool are the fake newspaper articles and things that come from within the Space Quest universe. Words can¹t even begin to describe what an excellent experience this site is. Go there now.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 18

Paolo Marcucci's Shadowrun Archive
URL: http://www.interware.it/users/paolo/sr2/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Here¹s *yet another* role-playing game archive on the Web. But this one has pages and pages of information and resources for the game Shadowrun, which is set in a cyberpunk future. Paolo Marcucci has used the new HTML Frames function to organize his site, and it works very well; I highly reccommend visiting the archive with a browser that supports Frames. The site is based in Italy, but I didn¹t notice any lag in connection time. Wow, are RPGers really all sitting around their basements with laptops these days?
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

The Wacky Hexen Page
URL: http://www.zensoft.com/Raven/Hexen.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Hexen, like Doom, has garnered great popularity among the net set, and Web sites filled with helpful Hexen information abound. The Wacky Hexen Page is indeed wacky, but also provides a very nicely formatted set of cheat codes that helps you overcome any obstacles you may encounter in the game. There¹s also a set of recipes that were somehow extracted from the game, and a very fast search utility for help on specific topics.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Wacky WWW Adventure
URL: http://ugweb.cs.ualberta.ca/~hubick/adventure/adventure.cgi
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Although the concept behind this site is simplistic, the site itself is brilliantly executed and boasts a ton of content. Here you¹ll find an interactive story that begins with a single paragraph ending with you, the protagonist, walking out your front door. Now you¹re afforded 170 choices as to what you want to do next. At least it was up to 170 when I last visited. Since multiple users can add their own choices, the whole affair is fluid ‹ and some of the contributions are naturally infantile.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

NannyMUD
URL: http://www.lysator.liu.se/nanny/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Kathy Tafel
NannyMUD¹s home page is more extensive than Elendor¹s. This may be more indicative of long Swedish winters than any real necessity for such depth of content. That, and it¹s been around for almost six years. NannyMUD is medieval in theme, with magic thrown in for kicks. The home page explains the environment, some of the quests, and the technology used to create the MUD. There are also pictures of most of the wizards and even some mere mortals. The MUD itself seems much more goal-oriented than Elendor.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Pop Rocket
URL: http://www.poprocket.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Pop Rocket, known for their CD game, Total Distortion, has hit the Web with a vengeance. Featured is info on their game, as well as several Shockwave-based arcade-style games that come from -- or are at least inspired by -- Total Distortion. These guys know Director better than almost anyone on the planet, and this site is largely a technology demonstration for their new business, building Shockwave games and interactive ads for web sites. Anyway, it's kind of fun. 3,2,3
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Small World Software Web Sports Game
URL: http://www.smallworld.com/games/sports_games.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
There are many different kinds of sports fan; there are those that dream of being the quarterback, the defensive kind that identify with the shortstop or goalie, and then there are the control freaks who would be the true kings of the sports world: the owners. Small World has six games on their Web site where players can own basketball, baseball, football, and hockey teams. Throughout a ³season,² players pit their team against others. The strategy comes in picking and trading team members. And for the high-brow types, Small World has a golf game. The bad news is that it costs a whole $40 to own a team for a season.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

GameSpot
URL: http://www.gamespot.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
GameSpot is all about reviews of games for for PCs, with some news thrown in. It sounds like a narrow topic, but it isn¹t. Just ask anybody that plays PC games. For one thing, there are all sorts of gamers, from the kids who grew up with Doom to the older military experts who appreciate the exquisite detail of a good flight simulator. GameSpot covers all the categories, with reviews of interactive movies, action games, role-playing, and more. The reviewing criteria is professional and consistent, and reviews include information about what kind of machine the game was played on.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

The Riddler
URL: http://www.riddler.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
No fanzine style here ‹ this is a 100% corporate sponsored trivia and word gaming site. You watch ads, win virtual ³caps² which you can later trade for prizes ‹ everything from Snapple stuff and Riddler mouse-pads to a Toyota 4X4. The puzzles are pretty fun (some Java, some not), and the site is slickly designed, (and the games are pretty fun), but I found that the service ran a little too slow, and I got sick of all the ads. Still, it¹s fun to collect and trade the caps, even though you know you¹ll never beat the geeks who live on this site, winning everything.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Games Domain
URL: http://www.gamesdomain.co.uk
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
I wouldn¹t go so far as to say this is the ultimate PC gaming site on the Web, but it¹s pretty close. Content is divided into 6 categories, and is a mixture between local and remote resources. The usual section headings are in place, like ³What¹s New² and ³Downloads,² but one whole section, the ³Games Domain Review² is an online magazine in and of itself, with game reviews and industry news. That said, another section called ³Games Information² is considered the real core. There are games FAQs and tons of links to other game sites in this area. The most ingenious part , to my mind, is the ³Universal Hint System,² a hint database that can help gamers past the sticking point.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Multiplayer Game Connection
URL: http://www.mpgn.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The popularity of 3D shoot-em-up games like Doom isn¹t based so much on the gameplay, as it is the possibility of multiple players; the thrill factor goes up a notch or two (or three) when you¹re playing against human opponents. The Multiplayer Game Connection attempts to bring this kind of fun to slower, strategy oriented contests, games that allow you to do such things as play turn-of-the-century robber baron (Empire Builder). The advantage of board model games, of course, is that they can be played well on slower connections. Specialized software is, however, needed to play on MGC, and there¹s a $9.95 a month charge for unlimited play time.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

GamePen
URL: http://www.gamepen.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
GamePen is one of those ultimate computer gaming sites that can provide all the resources any gamer needs. People with slow Internet connections that can¹t really spend the time aimlessly surfing from site to site might as well just go here. The latest games are pretty well covered, along with news about upcoming releases. Another excellent time-saver is the ³Therapy² section, a sort of running report covering the dialogue in the various newsgroups that relate to gaming. The top of the home page is a little confusing as far as what¹s available here; scroll down a bit for an easy-access site map.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Conquest of the New World
URL: http://conquest.interplay.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Advertising has reached new levels with the World Wide Web, putting the same amount of material in front of the consumer as a television infomercial. Interplay has set up the Conquest of the New World site as a way of showing off all the aspects of the game. Using a lot of Shockwave files, it illustrates all the strategy points of the game, such as exploring, trading, lying, and stealing. Each screen covers some aspect of our politically incorrect forefathers¹ takeover of North America. Beautifully designed, the site is one elegant commercial, that even includes a little Shockwave game that really makes you want to play Conquest.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

CleverMedia Shockwave Arcade
URL: http://clevermedia.com/arcade/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Surfing with Shockwave? Check out the arcade (formerly Gary¹s gallery), especially the Space Pirate game: it¹s a great demonstration of the capabilities of Director in the hands of a good programmer. Space Pirate is a neat little game which basically follows the model of the venerable Galactic Trader, except in Space Pirate you get to steal and plunder. You navigate around the galaxy, picking up crew members, buying, stealing, and selling goods, trying to avoid getting arrested or having your crew mutiny. It¹s fun and best of all just a mere 200K Shockwave file. This kind of economy in programming hasn¹t been seen since the days of 20 megabyte hard drives. That¹s not the only incredible feat of programming at the site: have a look at the 60K game called Pretty Good Golf which actually has 3 different courses.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

I.C.E.
URL: http://www.iiinc.com/ice/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
With all the talk about the big companies starting to get into the online, multiplayer game area (ie: TEN, Mpath/XBand, ENgage, even‹ gasp!‹Microsoft), people often lose sight of the fact that it's the little guys‹the die hard gamers‹that have driven the market to this point, and many of them are not interested in the dumbing down of online multiplayer gaming that will occur as it goes mainstream. For them, there are sites like I.C.E. It's a local (Baltimore area) server that offers a server for playing WarCraft II, Descent, Doom, and Terminal Velocity. There are also tips and hints, personal pages for members, a newsletter and more. Well worth checking out, even if you're long distance.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Utopia Technologies
URL: http://www.utopiatech.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Now this game developer is pretty cool. Utopia is one of the first totally virtual companies we've seen. Everyone works out of their house, meets on IRC to chat about the state of the company once per week, and was recruited over UseNet. It's like a net success story, or will be, once Montezuma's Return (their 3D light-sourced Quakelike game) is released successfully. The site itself provides some nice info about the game (according to our sister publication PC Gamer, these guys have a killer 3D engine on their hands), about the company, and like all good personal sites (this is the most personal company I've seen), provides links and more. Check it out.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

The Beta Game Lab
URL: http://www.igc.net/~nbarone/main.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Software development time has been so compressed in recent years that even average-level computer users find themselves using beta software. Beta used to be feared for its system-crashing bugs, but Netscape has exposed a whole generation to beta software with its hundreds of Navigator releases. Gamers who really want to be on the edge, and play for free, have to be open to beta tests. And, anyway, who wants to wait for the next Doom-killer? The Beta Game Lab is simply a clearinghouse for beta tests. The site author follows the gaming news, and visits company sites, to keep abreast of all the test games being offered on the Internet.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 17

Casady & Greene
URL: http://205.179.133.2/C&G/Welcome.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Casady & Greene are among the last of ³Mac-only² developers. Their stuff is known for high quality, great value and excellent functionality, and their web-site features this same quality. It¹s well organized, looks great, has a perfect mix of art to content, and features the fascinating home page of John Calhoun, one of the best Mac programmers around. Even if you have a PC and can't download one of the fully operative demos of Casady & Greene's software, you should check this out to see the way a corporate web page should be done. Awesome. ***blue light
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

War and Strategy Games
URL: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/POde/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This is the business. If you care at all about war games and strategy games, from a passing interest in Command & Conquer to a dedication to old-school strategy board games, you should already know about this site. The webmaster is obviously dedicated beyond all expectation, and this site includes daily updates and more content than you could possibly digest at one sitting. It¹s all done with a minimum of graphics to keep things fast, too. Overall, the keywords for this site are information and enthusiasm, both of which are in abundant quantities.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Hank's News
URL: http://www.happypuppy.com/hleukart/news.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Hank¹s news is a page devoted to providing links to hot new shareware demo¹s of PC games, along with some extremely short commentary by Hank himself (sometimes original, sometimes lifted from some other source). It¹s a great one-stop shopping site for someone who just picked up their PC and is looking to load up on the latest shareware masterpieces. Doom freaks should also check out Hank¹s homepage; he is the author of the ³official² Doom FAQ v6.66 as well as a book on hacking Doom. ***blue light
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Hyper@ctive
URL: http://hyperactive.com/games/index2.html or http://hype.com.au/games/index2.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Bremser
Online incantation of an Australian gaming mag, this site is sharply designed, and full of well written on-target reviews and previews, as well as some news and plenty of downloadable demos. On the downside, the previews section was pretty spotty and the news was fairly out-of-date. I get the idea that Hyper@ctive is expanding rapidly (the site has want ads for writers and Web people), so maybe by the time you read this, it will have staffed up and hit its stride. Hope so, Œcause this could be a great site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Duke Nukem 3D Arsenal
URL: http://rat.org/duke3d/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
FAQ¹s, codes, links and maps for the hottest new Doom-esque multi-player game. There¹s a chat room too. Cool.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The McCannical Pinball Page
URL: http://pilot.msu.edu/user/mccannr1/pinball/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Yowza. This is the most complete pinball site I have ever seen, with plenty of FAQs, tip sheets, rule cards for various games, links to other sites and a bunch more. If you like pinball, you¹ll dig this site. That noted, if you¹re looking for hip, hi-tech web sites, this isn¹t one of them. It has only a modicum of graphics and is mostly text. Some scans of promo sell sheets, etc., would have been cool. Oh well. This is rad just for the info.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Track
URL: http://www.boston.com/sports/thetrack/cgi-bin/horse_race.cgi
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
If this is the future of online games, we¹re in troubleŠ As a fun element of the Boston Globe¹s online boston.com domain, you get to pick a horse (they¹ve got cool names like C++ Biscuit and Man-O-WAIS), bet some money, and see if it wins in an animated race. As a technology demo, it¹s cool (the animation was pretty smooth, even at 28.8); as a diversion it¹s fun a couple of times, mainly because of the horse names. As a game it¹s perfectly dismal, but enough fun to check out once.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Braintainment Center
URL: http://world.brain.com/index.cgi/UN/Index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
When I discovered that this site hawks a game called THINKfast, I initially concluded that The Braintainment Center is a mere software promotion venture. Further exploration, however, revealed much more material. Most of the content describes new concepts on how the brain works, and justification on how THINKfast can improve cranial operations. Interesting stuff; certain to raise some skeptical eyebrows. An online intelligence test may make visitors feel inferior. It certainly had this effect on me.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Tankers Homepage Strategic Simulation Gaming and Military History
URL: http://www.webspace.com/~tanker/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
War games are probably a guy thing. Moving cardboard counters that represent tanks, squads, airplanes, or ships around a board with the intention of outmaneuvering an opponent (commonly referred to as ³the enemy²), all the while imagining the smoke and fire of battle, sounds pretty ridiculous on the surface, but it taps into some subconscious death struggle motif. The four or six hours it takes to play a game get swallowed by the intense concentration, the seriousness with which you contemplate moving the right elements of your forces to make a breach in the enemy lines that can be exploited. Paul J. Calvi Jr. has been war-gaming for more than a decade. He¹s also a graduate of the U.S. Army Armor School and the Armor Officer Basic Course at Ft. Knox. More recently, he¹s been working as a Web master. His HTML programming skills and his interest in military strategy have led to the Tanker¹s Homepage, which is probably the most complete source of war game information on the Web. There are game reviews, club listings, game release information, and articles on strategy and game design. Surprisingly enough, most traditional board war games haven¹t been converted into computer format. ³The conventional wisdom has been that a computer game couldn't simulate the complexity of a board game,² says Paul, ³but I think that is a bunch of nonsense.² Because war games take a lot longer to learn than most games, computer game companies ³seem to believe that a realistic war game will not appeal to the masses.² But a few recent arrivals on the computer war game scene have given Paul hope that the next two years will see a big expansion in the market. The Tanker¹s Homepage has more than just games, however. A substantial portion of it is taken up by military history. Included are book excerpts and papers discussing wars from the Civil to the Gulf. One of the most fascinating areas are the veterans¹ stories ‹ accounts from soldiers, sailors, and airmen about their combat and non-combat experiences. Rounding it all out is a section with reviews of war-related movies. Following the open discussion nature of the Internet, Paul publishes submissions, and runs two boards where users can post and reply on the site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Diplomatic Pouch
URL: http://www.csn.net/~mhand/DipPouch/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Diplomacy, a game like Risk only more complex, was easily adapted to a play-by-mail version years ago, and almost any game that can be played by mail can be played by e-mail. This site has instructions and resources for e-mail Diplomacy, as well as a regularly published Œzine with various articles about strategy and rules in the game. The Showcase section features some games currently being played, so visitors can follow their progress. A well-designed site, with lots of content but skimpy on interactivity.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Happy Puppy Game Downloads
URL: http://www.happypuppy.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
It may be ugly, but if you're looking for a jam-packed site filled with forums, cheats, downloads, reviews, and the latest info on games, this is, as they themselves say, the number one spot for PC games on the Web. Run by a group of old-school gamers, this is a site for people who remember the way PC gaming used to be -- not a lot of hipster flash, but plenty of meaty content. Plus, it's called Happy Puppy. What more do you want?
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Throttle
URL: http://members.aol.com/blackgate/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This is a web-mag for fans of traditional pen, paper and dice role-playing games, done by the proprietors of Black Gate Publishing, whose flagship product is a game that seems loosely based on the Immortals of the movie Highlander. Along with a dash of Libertarian philosophy for good measure (complete with link), there are also articles on the 36 types of plots for RPGs, the role of the woman adventurer, English titles in the 18th and 19th centuries, game reviews, links to company web-sites, and lots more stuff that will be of interest to the serious RPG fan.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Bitmap Brothers
URL: http://www.bitmap-brothers.co.uk/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The Bitmap Brothers site promotes more than just games, it personalizes the creation of the games. Sports fans have their Dennis Rodmans, movie buffs have their Martin Scorseses, rock and rollers have their Mick Jaggers, so why should it be any different for computer gamers? Instead of ³the next big game² from Sony or Nintendo, with the Bitmap Brothers you know who created it. The site includes a ³softography,² that shows a consistent design aesthetic in all the games, and probably helps sell old titles as well. Games include Speedball, The Chaos Engine, and Xenon.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

PC Multimedia & Entertainment
URL: http://www.mortimer.com/users/pcme/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
This is really a fan site masquerading as an online magazine. Game reviews dominate the project, which seems to have a single editor, judging by the solitary byline. And while there¹s a lot of good information about a wide variety of games, the editor seems to be enamored of all of them. Ratings were pretty generous across the board. Also working against it, the home page is not very well designed, being too long and unorganized for easy access to the site¹s areas.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Frame[zero]
URL: http://www.framezero.com/home.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
This fledgling game company is currently developing a CD-Rom called ³Neurosis,² which ³brings the player on a discovery of characters still trapped in an endless string of bizarre scientific research from the Vietnam era.² Frame[zero]¹s dark vision is illustrated by a string of screen shots which you can click through. ³Enemy of Evil² is another game Frame[zero] has developed for the Web. I couldn¹t get very far with it, but the idea is that the player wakes up underneath a bed in a hospital room, and tries to figure out how they got there. Clicking on various points of the image on the page takes you further into the adventure.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

MindSports
URL: http://www.mindsports.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
I don¹t really know sports trivia, so I was pretty lost playing these games. Nevertheless, I was able to win one baseball game on ³Bullpen Ace,² and score a field goal on ³2 Minute Warning.² Beyond just being baseball and football trivia, however, each game is set in the proper context. I liked the football field graphics on ³2 Minute Warning² the best. Answering a question correctly makes the little players on the field move closer to the opposing team¹s goal. Kind of reminds me of those vibrating toy football games with the magnetic players. Remember?
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Metacrostics
URL: http://www.hypersphere.com/ac/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
If you¹re familiar with acrostics, and enjoy solving the little brain-twisters, then Metacrostics is sure to turn you off of them forever. If you¹ve never cared much for Word games, skip to the next section. This site contains a selection of the most out-of-control acrostic-type puzzles I¹ve ever seen. Oh sure, the first page tries to make it sound easy by supplying instructions, but that¹s just to suck people in. Pretty soon you¹ll be scratching your head, trying to figure out which 5 letter word some weird limerick is defining. The site is well designed with a magazine-like quality, and you¹ll end up hating it.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Geisen
URL: http://teleparc.com/en/game/geisen/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Ostensibly a site for all those ³ I-love-games, I-love-to-chat kind of people,² it seems a little short on participants. Can¹t blame it on a new launch, because message archives go back to April, not that there¹s a whole lot of messages there. Geisen is like a big, super-deluxe office building that nobody has rented space in yet. The only content is video game news and a section about a big costume players convention. Judging from the graphics, Costume Players are all the rage in Japan, where girls dress up as their favorite anime and manga characters. This will probably be a hit for all the teenage male video gamers out there, but don¹t expect any information about actual games.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Aftershock: Arcade Alley
URL: http://www.ashock.com/html/arcadealley.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Up for some classic video arcade action like Space Invaders and Frogger? If you¹re one of those people with fond memories of your Atari 2600 or who pumped quarters into games like Q*Bert and Centipede down at the mall, then you¹ll overwhelmed by nostalgia for the good old days at Arcade Alley. Aftershock¹s programming is impeccable. Their games look and sound just like the originals, and you won¹t waste any quarters playing them (although you probably have a lot more quarters to spend now). Aftershock is dedicated to bringing more replicas of classic games to the Web, so watch this space; it¹s going to turn into a full arcade, just like they had at the mall.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

Riddle du Jour
URL: http://www.dujour.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Few sites supply a reason to come back every day, but with Riddle du Jour it's in the name. The riddle section of the site features a new riddle, of the "what am I?" variety, daily. Coming up with a correct answer will win the submitter some pretty decent prizes, such as pens, hot sauce, t-shirts, etc. Then there's also the honor of having the whole Web know what a braniac you are. The riddle is only a portion of the site; there's also Ce Jour, or what happened on this day historically, and trivia of the day, with yet more prizes.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

The Gamer's Alliance
URL: http://www.proaxis.com/~jarvisd/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The 12 to 20-year-old Doom-style computer gamer will be among her/his element here, reveling in the pages devoted to particular games (Quake, DukeNukem 3D, etc.), complete with player listings and rankings, add-ons, and tips. The slant is toward network play and there are a couple of pages devoted to helping newbies find their way into multi-player games. The Quake or Duke-jaded will at least find the news of new games coming down the pike interesting. The rest of us might be a little bothered by the misspellings littering the site, and I found the MIDI sound files embedded in various pages particularly annoying.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 16

LucasArts Entertainment Company
URL: http://www.lucasarts.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
The LucasArts web pages are a lot like the games the George Lucas multimedia empire produces ‹ exceptionally well done technically, but lacking, sometimes, in any kind of spirit. Anyway, what you¹ve got here is about exactly what you¹d expect: screen shots; downloadable demos; a catalog of available merchandise; a tech support section with trouble shooting guides and an online recruitment section. I don¹t know, maybe I¹m just tired of licensed Star Wars games, but I found this web site profoundly unmoving. If you want to know everything about the latest LucasArts games, come here. If you¹re looking for something soul-enhancing, something like THE FORCE, maybe, look elsewhere.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Mac Flight Simulators
URL: http://www.xmission.com:80/~morrison/MFS/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Tom Morrison has collected an extensive collection of links to every Mac Flight simulator site on the Internet (as far as we can tell), from Graphic Simulatons to someone who has a Mercury space mission simulator. He also has news and gossip (current and archived) about Mac flight sims and links to several FTP sites and the Flight Simulator FAQ. A great one-stop directory for anyone who wants to play pilot on the Mac. Not super deep, not super ornate, but very complete ‹ you¹ll get what you want quick.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

The Cheats Page
URL: http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~cjm2/cheat/cheat.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This is a very small site with lists of cheats for about eight different PC games. Not bad, but not much that couldn¹t be found elsewhere. There are also some links to other sites. From Chris¹s homepage there are more links, including one to Games Domain, which is cool. I don¹t know why, but for the Doom cheats, he thought white text on a light gray background was a good idea. To be fair, the page is under construction, so it may be worth another look by the time you read this.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Warlords II Players
URL: http://www.princeton.edu/~rfheeter/w2home.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
As mentioned in the Warlords II FAQ, this is thee site on the Internet for Warlords II players, Mac and PC. Warlords II being, of course, the cult favorite strategy game from SSG. The site is basically a very long nap-on-the-scroll-bar page with a ton of links to places with more storage space for scenario archives and listings of people wanting to play Warlords II via e-mail. If you like the game, you¹ll like the site. It¹s well organized and complete.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Killer Instinct 2 by ICE
URL: http://www.mindspring.com/~luisp/ki2/index2.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Addicted to Ninetndo/Rare¹s 2D arcade fighting game? Think Killer Instinct is the ultimate quarter snatcher? Then you¹ll do well checking out this page, which has all the fighting moves, combos, fatalities, humiliations, etc. for every character in the game, as well as general info about the game. So in-depth, it¹s a little frightening.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

King Link & Games
URL: http://www.whiterock.com/kinglink/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This site is wicked confusing, slow, and hard to navigate. That said, it does have an extensive mirrored library of easily searchable games (with descriptions) for many systems as well as links to just about every search engine on the Internet. So, I guess its worth checking out, just be prepared for a little confusion at the outset. What ever happened to ³about [this site]² pages??
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

The Pinball Archive
URL: http://pinball.cc.cmu.edu/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Closely related to the newsgroup rec.games.pinball, this Web site stores the collective wisdom of people serious enough about pinball to discuss their passion on the Internet. I spent a few hours going through the rule sheets posted here, finding the ins and outs of my favorite machines. Besides just offering rules, the site also lists the easter eggs hidden throughout various games. For some wacky reason, the site includes a search utility ‹ I guess so you can get back to the tables as soon as possible.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Poker Variants
URL: http://www.wolfe.net/~peter/poker/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
When I used to play poker in college, I thought it was a pretty complex game, capable of confusing newbies as each dealer called a different game from a repertoire of about 10. Looking at this site and seeing the many games I¹d never heard of has just made me feel like a newbie. Peter Sarrett, who maintains the site, has the games divided up by type, such as ³draw² or ³stud.² The programming is about as basic HTML as you can get, and there are no pictures at all, except for some ASCII diagrams of card layouts.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

The Electric Playground
URL: http://www.elecplay.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
This online magazine features news and reviews on console games (like the PlayStation and Saturn) as well as PC info. The site is well laid out, but not updated as frequently as some others, like Happy Puppy, Next Generation Online, or Game Spot, to name a few. Still, for an enthusiastic view of the industry, as well as the occasional hot preview (they jump on some things that a lot of people miss), this is a worthy addition to your bookmark list.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

This is X Band!
URL: http://www.xband.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Interested in the X Band dedicated gaming service, for PC games, or the X Band multiplayer gaming service for 16-bit console games like the Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo? This site gives you the skinny. X Band PC isn't up and running yet, but it should be by the time you read this, at least in Beta. Plus, they have a spiffy graphic design sense. Worth a quick visit on that basis alone.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

The Gamer¹s Ledge
URL: http://www.gamepen.com/ledge/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Although there is some info here on cheats for games, and a little bit of news, and some nice links, the real emphasis here is on reviews, and, more importantly, demos. There is almost a CD-full (over 500 MB) of PC downloads available at this site, and that alone makes it a good one-stop shopping spot for gamers with a fast connection and a desire to play the latest games.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Gamer¹s Zone
URL: http://www.worldvillage.com/wv/gamezone/html/gamezone.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Part of the World Village, "a virtual community focused on the home computing experience," it has game reviews, features, a site-of-the-day page, live chat and downloads. You can also play non-Java games, including a 3-D maze game and the old "dots" game we used to waste time on in high school. Although the site of the day is up-to-date, not much else is. That¹s unfortunate, as the infrastructure here looks solid. Most of the reviews are old, with only a few features. Similarly, the downloads are not the hottest commercial demos, but straight shareware. In a sense, you know, that¹s kind of refreshing. Ultimately, however, while the games are nice technology demos, even on a T1 connection they¹re too slow to be playable.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Casino Card Games
URL: http://ns.marble.net:8081/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Joseph
This is a weird one. It¹s called Casinos of the South Pacific, and on it you can play 5 games ‹ 5 dice slots, ³J² slots, 3 x 3 slots, Poker and BlackJack. It¹s just for fun, of course ‹ no real cash or anything ‹ and the page stores the high scores. The games are pretty fun. Some require JAVA, some don¹t. For me, the question is why? Why are these games here at all? There¹s no answer or explanation given on the site. So never mind, I guess. Just check `em out. They¹re fun.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Voyeur II
URL: http://spider.media.philips.com/voyeurII/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
³Sex, Murder....and audience participation.² Oooh...it¹s so provocative. Teasing us with Hollywood¹s time-tested lures, the Web site ad for the sequel to 1993¹s Voyeur CD-Rom presents images of barely-clad couples in compromising positions, people struggling for guns, and Dennis Weaver. The most promising part of the site was titled ³Enter the world of the voyeur,² and it had some good intro content to the story of Voyeur II, but not enough. The entire Web site felt like a movie trailer, one that doesn¹t give any indication what the movie¹s about. As far as Voyeur II goes, all I really know is that Dennis Weaver is in it.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

The Gonzo Games Page
URL: http://thunder.indstate.edu/h5/jngonzo/.games.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Ah...a breath of fresh air. With all the emphasis these days on getting a multiplayer gaming network running over the Internet for twitch and shoot games like Doom and Quake, it was a real treat to see a bunch of links to original Web interactive games. Hunt the Wumpus, Battleship, Ferret Frenzy, and Dig Zone are all there. These are games from the early days of the Web, when killing time meant a Minesweeper site. No hourly charges, either, just a lot of page reloads. And for you video fanatics, there are links to sites dealing with Sega games as well.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Bingo Zone
URL: http://www.bingozone.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The beloved game of churches and Indian reservations, Bingo has found its way onto the Web, and the Bingo Zone not only offers different varieties of the game, but also cash prizes. There are probably plenty of Bingo experts out there that would recognize the different kinds of Bingo games here and appreciate the diversity. The games they run are fully interactive, including players from all over the world. On weekends, the games start every 30 minutes, and run 24 hours, but on weekdays, they are only from 10 AM to 4 AM Eastern Standard Time, which should be enough for most players.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Legacy Software
URL: http://www.legacysoft.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
You know those sites you run across sometimes that have no real reason for existence except for the fact that someone at the company obviously said "damn, we need a Web site?" Well, this is one of those. Ok, maybe its not *that* bad. Legacy is an LA-based edutainment software house, that just completed it's IPO, has a hot new title out, Emergency Room (first in a series of real-world job titles), and they're even hiring. How do I know this? Because even though their site interests me about zero percent, it is well laid out and provides a wealth of info on the company.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Eclectic Pastiche
URL: http://personal.riverusers.com/~thegrendel/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Scrabble information, programs, and resources. The preceding has been an executive summary of Eclectic Pastiche as it relates to the gaming category. For embellishment, see the following. It's not fair to stereotype people, but the Eclectic Pastiche is the perfect example of a site designed by a Unix user. Didn't bother much with graphics or easily accessed content. While the scrabble sections are pretty comprehensive, the resources listed there are in no perceivable order, just piled on top of each other. The site author is something of a writer, so you might want to look into his poems, stories, and essays, like the one called ³How-2 Meet Women².
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Auric's Ultima Online Home Page
URL: http://users.visi.net/~auric/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
In the early '80s, fantasy role playing games meant sitting around a table with dice, pads of paper, and pencils. In this age of advanced computer games and the Internet, role playing games can involve people from all over the globe participating in a working social world, with a little bit of monster killing thrown in. Ultima Online is one such game, and Auric uses his Web page to document what goes on there. He's got some basic description of what it's all about, some chat rooms for players, and a list of all the guilds. One of the more touching parts of the site is Auric's account of how he got into playing Ultima.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 15

Bridge on the Web
URL: http://www.cs.vu.nl/~sater/bridge/bridge-on-the-web.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
HmmmŠ BridgeŠ played around the worldŠ byŠ well, by a lot of people, even if you and I don¹t know any. And this is their site. Many of the documents here are in PostScript, so you¹ll need a reader (they provide a link to a PC one, but no Mac), but aside from that, this appears to be a very complete accomplishment, with lots of links to PC bridge game sites, info about tournaments, etc. It¹s pretty plain looking, but has plenty of information that will no doubt be of interest to Bridge players worldwide.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

The Ultimate MultiPlayer Game Page
URL: http://www.aros.net/~orme/multi.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0796
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Very much under construction when I visited, this page has links to popular online game services as well as pages about popular multi-player games, like War Craft II, Command and Conquer, Descent II, Duke Nukem 3D, etc. The pages themselves have a skitch of info and plenty of links to more. Looks promising, but it has a long way to go.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

Bill Burcham's Champions Gallery
URL: http://www.sjhs.org/billrb/champions/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The wacky world of role-playing games that began with Dungeons and Dragons has expanded to include many different genres, including, now, superhero comix. The game Champions lets players design custom superheroes and other peripheral material. Bill Burcham has created a Web archive where players can share such creations. The site¹s design and concept are solid, but the lack of contributions suggests the page is unknown ‹ or the game just doesn¹t have that much popularity.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

The Planet's Empire Archives
URL: http://www.empire.net/~children/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
No fancy graphics, no easy interface, this is a working site set up to support Internet play of the war game Empire. Players rule a country and try to expand its resources by grabbing territory, building up the military, and supporting the civilian population. It¹s for hard-core gamers only, though, as the FAQ casually states ³blitz² games last about 24 hours, and long-term games run two to six months. The client software to play the game is available from this site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

ElendorMush
URL: http://www.where.com/Elendor/Welcome.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Kathy Tafel
Ah, Tolkein! Elendor is one of the most active MUSHes in Middle Earth. It is obvious from looking at the graphics on the site, however, that the Web master spends most of his time in a black-and-white, text-only universe. When I Telnetted into the MUSH for the first time, I was almost immediately paged by a friendly person ‹well, it could have been an orc‹ who offered assistance should I need it. There is plenty of online help, and new users are encouraged to read newbie news. The Elendor MUSH seems like a great place to hang out, although it could be detrimental to grades or marriages.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

A Video Games Homepage
URL: http://pages.prodigy.com/cobain/homepage.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
This video games ³homepage² is as generic as the name sounds. The idea behind it is to feature one new game every month, but when I looked at it the feature consisted of a one-page walk-through of the Beavis and Butthead game. Not only do you waste time downloading the page, you also lose the oppurtunity to explore the game on your own.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

The Queue
URL: http://www.thequeue.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Queue has a lot to offer in the way of enthusiasm and garish Web page design. Queue has even taken the time to implement a Java applet that puts an LED marquee display on the home page. Really,...whoever initially programmed that applet should be shot for aesthetic crimes. For content, Queue has reviews of computer role-play games, but judging by the plethora of stars in the ratings, Queue is too easily impressed. Still, if you want to get some idea of what games are available, this is an informed source. And on the flip side of the game site is some very interesting information on multi-user VR worlds.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

TV Land Rock¹em Sock¹em Robots
URL: http://www.tvland.com/index_tvtoylandIII.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Although there isn¹t a whole lot to this fully interactive online game, the subject matter makes it an easy winner among the Generation X set. I mean, Rock Œem Sock Œem robots! Who didn¹t see the commercials and play the game at a friend¹s house? Or -- speaking to the particularly privileged -- own a game themselves? The Web version is a little slower, and players must take turns choosing which kind of punch to throw, but for nostalgia¹s sake, you can¹t help feeling good when you¹ve ³knocked his block off.²
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

The Cheater¹s Guild
URL: http://www.inetport.com/~kenb/cg.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0996
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
A nifty little fan-page, it gives you a list of hundreds of PC titles, with detailed codes for each one. One purpose, simple layout, well-executed. There are also some postings from readers, a game-of-the-month, book-of-the-month, cheat-of-the-month and dirty trick-of-the-month, as well as a couple of downloadable PC utilities of the naughty fun variety. The layout leaves a little to be desired, but hey, the editor just got married, so I guess we can cut him some slack.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

Video Game Yellowpages
URL: http://www.gamepen.com/yellowpages/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Good
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
A list of sites is a list of sites is a list of sites. If it¹s going to be of any real value, it should be comprehensive, or at least have some unique listings. Neither is the case with the Video Game Yellowpages. All of these links can be found on Yahoo!, albeit in different categories. And I missed the unofficial fan pages. There was a section for them, but it only listed 20 or 30 sites. Now I know there¹s a lot more than that devoted to just Doom. Sure it¹s a lot of stuff to catalog, but if your going to use a yellow background...
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

Snakeyes Warcraft II
URL: http://www.jax-inter.net/users/snakeyes/index.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1096
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Oh, the concerns of youth. Thoughts of car payments and health insurance never enter the minds of children; they¹re interests are otherworldly. The world Snakeyes spends his time in, according to his Web pages, is WarCraft II, where human armies fight a never-ending war against orc armies. The Kali gaming network supports multi-player WarCraft II games, where Snakeyes can be found with either the Vipers Fang or Dragons Fire clans, both of which have a home on his Web site. There isn¹t too much in the way of content on this site, just a young man¹s enthusiasm for war.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

Internet Chess Library
URL: http://caissa.onenet.net/chess/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1196
Content Quality: Excellent
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The best way to learn chess is by example, and what better examples are there than Fischer, Smyslov, Karpov, etc.? While not the prettiest site to look at, but the ICL is one helluvan archive. A lot of it isn¹t optimized for HTML. In fact, the majority of the material here is text documents and applications, which can be accessed via the FTP server. (You can, at least, view the file directories with your browser.) Slick graphics shouldn¹t matter much to the serious chess afficionado, though, who¹s used to reading chess notation and knows where ³e3² is on the board. You will need to learn standard chess notation if you want to recreate any of the tournament and masters games stored here.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

NetStakes
URL: http://www.netstakes.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 1296
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
As with the Publishers' Clearinghouse Sweepstakes, there is no obligation to buy anything to enter a contest at the NetStakes site, and you even get to pick which prize you want to win. How can they just give away stuff? Well, NetStakes is in the business of promotion, helping companies make themselves known to generate business. A common strategy in promotion is to have contests for relatively worhtless merchandise, which was what I was expecting here, but much to my delight I found a Sea-Monkey Ocean Zoo as one of the prizes, and registered immediately!
Overall Rating (out of 18): 14

The Virtual Multimedia Interactive Mystery Theater
URL: http://www.cris.com/~bumm/intro.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Good
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Rule Number One: When constructing a voluminous interactive story with image maps, use a *very* fast server. Rule Number Two: Provide players with clear-cut objectives. Rule Number Three: Make sure *all* your links work. Rule Number Four: If you include sound files, make sure they¹re worth their download time. And finally, Rule Number Five: Don¹t link to pages with big graphics that don¹t advance plotlines. This site broke every rule.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 13

Jackpot
URL: http://www.initiative.com
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Sure, nobody reads instructions, but they are helpful to have around to skim and find out generally what you should be doing. This ³Jackpot² site opens up with an ugly picture of a slot machine that says ³Play & Win U.S. $100.00.² Clicking on the picture spins the reels, but there is no indication of what you need to win. Repeated clicking spins the reels again, so presumably you could click it all night and win that $100.00; that is, if there really is any money to be won.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 13

American Gaming Network
URL: http://www.betnet.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0896
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Very much a site "under construction," this site is maintained by a company that runs high stakes mega-bingo games at Indian Reservations across the country. Like the idea of quasi-legal gambling over the web? Watch this space.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 13

Games Galore
URL: http://www.mindspring.com/~krause/gg/gg.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0696
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Chris Charla
Did you ever see a site so outdated, you wondered if the person who created it died or something? That¹s this. If you¹re looking for a sparse amount of info on console systems (like the PlayStation) that¹s only just over a year out of date, combined with a paltry collection of links and some horrible fawning reviews, look here. Oh yeah, there are also huge graphics to download of exciting images like floppy disks and Sony battery changers. I¹m convinced whoever did this site did it just to try and leech some software from big companiesŠ ³uh, yeah, I got a Web zine, send me some games, OK?² Stay away, this blows. ** RED LIGHT! THIS SUCKS!
Overall Rating (out of 18): 12

* * * THE LABYRINTH * * *
URL: http://www.new3.com/labyrinth/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
As Web mazes go, this one is well-constructed and fairly nice to look at. If capitalism gives you a rash, the prevalence of advertising might become an annoyance, but if you complete the maze in the least amount of moves, you could win a prize! Also, there is usually a choice of mazes to enter, and new mazes come online frequently.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 12

Hyper Trivia Challenge
URL: http://www.hype.com/game_show/hyper.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Is it any wonder that one of the hottest Web games is based on one of the hottest TV game shows? Except with Hyper-Trivia Challenge, a Web version of ³Jeopardy,² everyone¹s a contestant, no one¹s a spectator. Actually, Hyper-Trivia Challenge has no affiliation with the TV show: You don¹t have to stress over time limits and having other contestants beat you to the button, you don¹t have to worry about looking like a fool to a nationwide TV audience, and you don¹t get to win a lot of real money. Well, maybe the TV show has an advantage on that last part. It¹s a pretty simple set-up. The first screen asks you to register, which merely means you enter a name that can be put in the hall of fame if you¹re smart enough. The next screen allows you to bet from $100 to $1,000 in each of 10 categories. From there, you¹re presented with the answers to which you have to figure out the questions. Most of these answers come from popular culture and aren¹t quite as intense as the stuff on the TV show. Once the results come in, you go to a final jeopardy kind of challenge, where you can bet everything you¹ve previously won on a single question. Hyper-Trivia Challenge¹s origins are typical of a lot of the Web. According to co-creator Greg Rubidge, the creators of the site originally had set up ³a modest E-publication with local (Toronto) information and some other quirky stuff...² This Toronto Web site grew until they had to break it down into smaller parts, with the arts and entertainment section renamed ³Hype!² The people at Hype! developed the game for a large brewery (this is Canada we¹re talking about) as a promotion to get people onto their site. The brewery decided to go for something a little bit more corporate, which was probably a big mistake. According to Greg, they had ³47,000 accesses (not hits) for the last 10 days of August (1995).² This is definitely enough traffic to call the site a success, by anybody¹s standards. The maximum score possible on the game ‹20,000 ‹ is achieved by betting the maximum on each question, getting all of them right, and betting everything on the final jeopardy challenge. Unfortunately, the game has found my Achilles heel and I will never get a perfect score, because it always seems to put in two sports questions.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 12

The Sprawl Homepage
URL: http://sensemedia.net/sprawl
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
Cyber-pundits have long evangelized the virtues of virtual communities. You know the spiel: sharing, bonding, nurturing a sense of togetherness in a post-modern hell. It¹s just one big sticky group hug. But some Intermaniacs just want to have fun. Enter The Sprawl, a comfortable intersection between gaming and community building. Within The Sprawl, players can navigate RPG-like environs, help expand the environs, and chat with other residents. Compared to similar areas, this site boasts superior imagery and well-conceived organization, which fosters smoother navigation.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 12

CJS's Unofficial Descent WWW Page
URL: http://web.one.net/~cjs/descent.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Poor
Aesthetic Quality: Poor
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
It¹s good that CJS calls this an ³unofficial² page, because the creators and distributors of Descent would have good reason to be peeved if this single page of links was misidentified as ³official² material. Granted, the links send you to useful content like the Descent Cheat Utility ‹ anybody who¹s gone careening around the mining tunnels of Descent will appreciate the extra help that the Cheat Utility provides. But, overall, this site offers no intrinsic content, just pathways to richer territory.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 12

DOR-Cino The Doronomo in Hartford Casino
URL: http://www.linnet.com/~dkramarc/casino/casino.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The Doronomo Casino has BlackJack, Craps, Roulette, a Slot Machine, and Video Poker, and you get $500 to play. It¹s all a pretty ingenious diversion, without all the noise and crowds of the Vegas casinos. The money is completely virtual, which is good, because the odds on the video poker game were really lousy. I ended up losing all my money at the roulette wheel. For those with high online time payments, I should point out that versions of these games are available as stand-alone software.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

Reinventing America Introduction
URL: http://pathfinder.com/@@gphXyhEjlAMAQNVd/reinventing/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
Loosely fitting the description of a game, Reinventing America is closer to a social experiment. The idea is to create a virtual America wherein anyone willing to play the game (free of charge) will be able to answer surveys and generally voice opinions on real issues facing America. In the end, the ³game² results will be tallied and presented to Congress in the form of a proposed reform act. Undoubtedly an exciting new way to play on the WWW, Reinventing America is an important site for all those interested in saving the United States from certain doom.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

The Essential BTech3056 Resource
URL: http://btech.netaxs.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
This is the real deal. If you¹re into BattleTech, then you absolutely must visit this site. From individual faction news to lists of multiple BattleTech FTP and WWW links, this site pretty much has it all for BattleTech players. If you¹re not already familiar with BattleTech, then you¹ll want to find out a little about the game before visiting this site, as it¹s definitely not for beginners. If you¹re already into the game, however, you¹re sure to find what you¹re looking for on this nicely organized and thorough page.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

The home of Virtua Fighter
URL: http://www.digiweb.com/webm/vfhome/vfhome.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
Whether you¹re already a Virtua Fighter expert or just getting into the game (phenomenon?), you will want to check out the Home of Virtua Fighter. Complete with move lists, FAQs, background info, and character art, this site¹s got it covered. Created by true Virtua Fighter fanatics, this is the quintessential VF and VF 2 site. Treated with the utmost respect, the Virtua Fighter legacy lives on in grand fashion at this site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

MacDOOM Park
URL: http://www.gac.edu/~bgustafs/macdoom_park.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
When Doom II arrived for the Mac, friends of the *other* platform finally got a chance to contribute to id Software¹s cultural phenomenon. Now Mac-oriented Doomheads can surf an excellent site that properly represents the Doom gestalt. MacDOOM Park excels with brevity, and offers wild background textures, cool button icons, and concise, valuable content items, including cheats, downloadable files and links to other cool Web pages (check out Ah, Hell, a commentary on Doom from a feminine perspective). Just one gripe: Since the site *looks* so cool, one would expect more technical bells and whistles.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

Rolling Good Times OnLine
URL: http://www.RGTonline.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Kathy Tafel
RTG is a gambler¹s dream. The site has a plethora of articles on all aspects of gambling, from betting on horses to casino games. You can vote on your top 10 gambling sites on the net, read reviews of various casinos, find out about laws governing gambling on the Internet, and follow along with the ³Great Video Poker ADVENTURE.² The article, ³Poker Gets in Touch with its Feminine Side,² was especially amusing, with suggestions for alternate names for the game like ³Pokthem² and ³Prod Them All.² If you play too much, though, you may want to check out Gambler¹s Anonymous (http://www.social.com/health/nhic/data/hr0900/hr0916.html).
Overall Rating (out of 18): 11

Ravi's Paintball Page
URL: http://www.sojourn.com/~rchopra/web/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Ravi is a paintball fanatic. Ravi knows how to write a Web page. The two together make up for one intense paintball Web site. And, as opposed to a lot of other Web sites, the graphics are very nice. Ravi has a lot of equipment information on his page, which will probably have more appeal to experienced paintball gamers, and he also has a section for selling used equipment. Don¹t shoot me, Ravi, but I¹ve got to say that your first page is too long.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 10

Terminal Velocity Paintball Team
URL: http://ntquest.wustl.edu/~terminal/tv.exe?tv
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
A paintball team site, these pages list results from many paintball tournaments. These listings might be a little cryptic if you¹re not the betting type. Besides the team member profiles, which are a little spare, there is a decent selection of action photographs, which should give the paintball virgin some idea of what it¹s like, and reignite the passion of the initiated.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 10

Streams and Brian Present Piercing Mildred
URL: http://streams.com/pierce/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
The beginning paragraph of the FAQ gives the most concise answer to why and what this little online game is all about: ³Borne of the 90s' two favorite pastimes ‹ Body Modification and the Internet.² Piercing Mildred is the perfect game for those of us who are entertained by the pierced multitudes walking the streets of America¹s cities. And you can win real prizes for the best piercing and scarification. Because of the continuing nature of the game, this can be a great once-a-week diversion.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 10

The Web Maze
URL: http://www.stewnet.com/Maze/StewsMaze.cgi
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Excellent
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Brilliant programming, but what¹s the point? Well, there¹s advertising. This little Web game has something like 147 rooms, and you choose which door you want to go through. I found myself just going in circles, but it would have been pretty easy to map. The creator of the maze, Stew, is offering advertising space on the wall of the maze, so if you get lost, you can always take a link out to an advertiser¹s site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 10

B.J. Zanzibar's World of Darkness
URL: http://silver.ucs.indiana.edu/~adashiel/wod/wod.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Excellent
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Don¹t let the name fool you. The World of Darkness isn¹t the online interpretation of some angst-ridden existentialist¹s world view. Likewise, B.J. Zanzibar is simply a pseudonym, or, in this case, a keyboard name. I¹m sure some of you old-timers are saying ³duh² at this point, but it must be made clear that World of Darkness is actually a role-playing game (RPG), as well as an über-game system for a collection of individual games titled Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, Wraith, and Changeling. B.J. Zanzibar is Abe Dashiell, an avid gamer, computer consultant and recent graduate of Indiana University. As with many RPGs, Dashiell¹s game provides a fluid system in which players at home can create and manipulate characters, settings, and courses of action. Armchair Machiavellis can also implement rules variations. Dashiell gathered together as many RPG resources as he could find, and placed them in this single, huge site. Most of the material has been gleaned from the Internet, where it was originally posted on the newsgroups alt.games.whitewolf and rec.games.frp.storyteller. Dashiell emphasizes that World of Darkness is vastly different in comparison to the fantasy RPGs that follow the Dungeons and Dragons model, in which players spend their time killing monsters and finding treasures. He calls World of Darkness a ³sociopathic vision of our own world. Everything seems normal on the surface, but you don¹t have to dig very deep to run into something rotten.² The person in charge of a World of Darkness game is called a ³storyteller,² and players¹ characters are supernatural creatures such as vampires and werewolves. Players also tend to be older than most RPGers, and more interested in character interaction and development. On this site, there are three to six sections for each game, with a multitude of articles in each section. Anyone involved in creating a World of Darkness game will find tons of valuable material here. It is all organized extremely well. Dashiell took the trouble to learn how to build HTML Frames, and incorporated them into the structure of the site. His Frames facilitate an index that resides on the left side of the page, so now you can jump from one section of the site to another. Subtopics are displayed along the bottom for easier navigation within a game section.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 8

Paintball Field
URL: http://abacus.bates.edu/~jburke/paintball/p-ball.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
A really superior amount of information on paintball games, tournaments, and equipment make this a great site for the novice to get hyped about playing. The site has a list of just about every paintball gun made, with more detailed information on a selection of them. The site is solidly constructed, but there¹s not much organization to it. The nicely done home page graphic is it for looks.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 7

The Myst Hint Guide
URL: http://www.astro.washington.edu/ingram/myst/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
It¹s one of the biggest selling CD-ROM titles of all time, and for those of you who still have not experienced MYST, there is now a handy-dandy hint guide as close as the Web. Carefully handled so as to not give away too much of the game, the hints offer no more than they need to, and are definitely not as thorough as a walk-through. There is also a handy FAQ included on site, which answers questions about Broderbund (the game¹s publisher) and MYST 2, and contains other general MYST news.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 7

Paintball West Home Page
URL: http://www.hooked.net/users/mbelew/home.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
This online paintball magazine includes product reviews, ³expert² articles on such topics as how to anodize your gun, information for new players, and U.S. and international field listings. While there is a lot of useful, local text, there isn¹t much in the way of graphics or good design. The misspellings in the text also suggest the creator of the site is a little too busy playing paintball to bother with editing.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 6

Paintball Field List
URL: http://marge.phys.washington.edu/paintball/paint-fields.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Wayne Cunningham
Did you know there are six paintball fields in Portugal? For the paintball fanatic on the move, this field list is an invaluable resource. Starting off with an image map of the U.S., it lets you click to listings of paintball fields by state. Or, the international set can look at what Europe and Oceania has to offer. Unfortunately, ease of navigability ends on the first page; everything below is just text listings.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 6

DoomGate
URL: http://doomgate.cs.buffalo.edu/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
This site is essentially a love letter to id, the makers of DOOM and the many DOOM-like games that have followed. The page is clean and easy to follow, much like the game, and if you¹re a fan, then it¹s a great place to visit with like-minded folks. If your not a fan of the game, you simply have no place here.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 6

Mr DooM's Web Page
URL: http://moose.erie.net/~mrdoom/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
Mr. DOOM is exactly what you might expect ‹ a DOOM fan through and through, making himself known via the Internet. The idea behind his site is to essentially bring together other fan(atics) to talk about, read about, and dream about DOOM. There is also a personal challenge from Mr. DOOM to all players in what can only be described as a Death Match. If you think you¹re DOOMy enough, perhaps you¹d like to give it a try.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 6

Virtua Fighter II Page
URL: http://aleph0.clarku.edu/~grace/vf2.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
There are certainly more thorough VF2 pages, but this one isn¹t bad, and if you don¹t find the information you seek at this particular site, the list of links will surely lead you to the answers elsewhere. The most useful aspect of this page are the individual character FAQs and move lists. Overall, you¹re not likely to be blown away from this effort, but if VF2 info and news is what you crave, it¹s not a bad place to start.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 6

The BTech Hangout
URL: http://www.nada.kth.se/~d93-jbo/index.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
While this BattleTech (a futuristic role-playing game much like Dungeons and Dragons in space) site is less than thorough and even less than exciting in many ways, it¹s a reasonably good place for BattleTech fans to gather and discuss their BattleTech ways. If you¹re not yet familiar with the game, then prepare to be immersed in a futuristic world full of imaginative scenarios and in-depth fantasy game play. If you¹re already a participant, then say hello to some new friends.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

Welcome to Eddy's Video Game Home Page
URL: http://neuromancer.hacks.arizona.edu/~eddyt/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
This page is exactly what you might expect it to be. The host is a video game fanatic who¹s ready, willing, and eager to share his video game info with the rest of the world. With everything from gaming gossip to screen shots from today¹s hottest games, Eddy¹s Video Game Home Page is a small but significant addition to the long list of video game sites on the Web.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

History of Home Video Games
URL: http://www.sponsor.net/~gchance/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
Here¹s a stellar example of a site that triumphs by sheer force of its written content. From the droll Pong FAQ ‹ ³Q: What¹s the little white thing on the left side of the screen? A: That is the ³paddle.² It is used to bounce the ³ball.² ‹ to information on Sony¹s state-of-the-art PlayStation, this historical timeline is a good read for all gamers. The Bally Astrocade. The Milton Bradley Microvision. The Mattel Aquarius. Learn about all the ill-fated systems that waxed and waned before Nintendo and Sega developed their market strangleholds in the late 80s.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

Grendel's Gaming Lair Main
URL: http://www.csra.net/jononkeyz/games/gaming.htm
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
If you¹re specifically interested in PC gaming, enter Grendel¹s Lair ‹ or, more precisely, labyrinth ‹ but do so with caution. As of press time, The Lair was rife with ³404 File Not Found² errors and areas under construction. Content (*available* content, that is) includes downloadable game demos; tips, tricks and cheats; and links to slick corporate sites from the likes of id, Interplay and ActiVision. Overall, The Lair is a middling resource for the PC-centric, and wields an amateurish, slightly juvenile, Dungeons-and Dragonsy aesthetic. This may be a turn-off for Mech-heads looking for a more post-modern approach.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

Oh No The Lemmings Games Web Page
URL: http://stud1.tuwien.ac.at/~e8826423/Lemmings.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
Lemmings. Kids, parents, twentysomething hipsters ‹ everybody loves lemmings. These little green-haired cuties dressed in Dr. Denton jammies frolic across all software platforms, just waiting to be rescued by smitten gamers. While this site does in fact provide the down-low on Lemmings minutiae, it¹s poorly constructed. Children ‹ shoot, even adults ‹ may have trouble navigating the confusing barrage of text links. The graphic underplay? That¹s OK. All gaming sites would do well to minimize the artwork, and instead focus on quickly accessed information.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

CyberMUD
URL: http://web.mit.edu/afs/athena.mit.edu/user/r/e/rei/WWW/GAME/intro.html
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Good
Site of the Month: No
Author: Kathy Tafel
CyberMUD is one of the first Web-based games (i.e., it¹s been up for more than a year). While it was certainly innovative and entertaining when it first appeared, the game has had no recent updating. It uses links to implement a choose-your-own adventure, whose plot centers around a real MUD gone mad. EEK! Scary stuff. You should skip this game unless it¹s really, really late at night, or your diet consists of Jolt and Twinkies.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 5

Diplomacy home page
URL: http://www.infersys.com/diplomacy/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0396
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Patrick Baggatta
For those unfamiliar with the game Diplomacy, it¹s an ongoing game played over the Internet (primarily via e-mail), in which a network of players ally themselves with each other and attempt to take over the world. If you don¹t know more than that, expect to be a bit confused at the Diplomacy Home Page. Of course, if you¹re willing to endure the tedious text and insider¹s lingo, you may just be able to work your way into this mysterious society of players. If you¹re already a player, you owe it to yourself to visit this information-heavy site.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 4

Addventure
URL: http://www.addventure.com/addventure/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0496
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Jon Phillips
The site¹s creators encourage you to consider Addventure not a Multi-User Dungeon or Role-Playing Game, but instead a ³shared story.² And, as a shared story, content is only as compelling as the contributions of those involved. Personally, I appreciate entries like, ³You hear a disembodied voice from the heavens say, ŒI am such a moron. Maybe one day I¹ll learn to proofread.¹² Overall, Addventure could offer newbies more helpful instructions. And, as a text adventure, the site is devoid of graphics.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 4

The Game Cabinet
URL: http://www.gamecabinet.com/
Category: Gaming
Issue: 0596
Content Quality: Not Rated
Aesthetic Quality: Not Rated
TechnoSmart Quality: Poor
Site of the Month: No
Author: Kathy Tafel
The Game Cabinet is a bare-bones zine devoted to board games. Each issue contains rules for various new games, reviews of games, and gaming sites ‹ ones in the real world, you know, smoky cafés where old people sit around playing chess, and a few links to online games. The site could use a bit more organization. I had to scroll quite a bit to get where I wanted to go. Hard-core board game aficionados should definitely check out The Game Cabinet.
Overall Rating (out of 18): 4