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Here's what you should ask Santa for
It's going to be a bumper festive season for computer gamers. JULIAN VON PLATO looks at what you might find in your stocking this year
WITH FIFA 99, Sidewinder Freestyle Pro, Creative 5X DVD, Touring Car Championship, Mixman and others all available, where do you start? Too many games, not enough time or money to buy them all. Choosing the best for Christmas is not easy. There are a lot of great games and great toys out.
The big game for Christmas has to be FIFA 99. But I've just got World Cup 98, you may say, why do I want another soccer game? Well, its better than any soccer game, and you're an addict, so the more the merrier. Next in line is Populous The Beginning. which brings real-time strategy to a new dimension. Using a unique 360-degree rotating globe in 3-D you are able to navigate the globe with ease. Populous is an ancient world in which you are the shaman (an ancient priest). Using mystical powers and spells you set out to conquer the world and become a god. This game is great fun for the whole family and, played over a LAN, can provide hours of entertainment. For all aspiring musos, Mixman is the one to go with (check out the review on Mixman). For all those Flight Sim fanatics, Microsoft has released Combat Flight Sim, which did not disappoint me - I just keep crashing, so I'm not very good. WW2 Combat Flight Sim is one of the best around and now instead of just flying around you can blast the enemy out of the sky, which makes it a little more fun. Some of the best toys are the SideWinder Freestyle Pro and the Creative PC-DVD Encore 5X with Dxr2 and the Cambridge DeskTop Theatre 5.1 speaker system. SideWinder Freestyle Pro is the latest game controller from Microsoft and the best which I have ever used. SideWinder Freestyle Pro comes in a packaged bundle with Microsoft's Motocross Madness, one of the best motocross games I have played. The Microsoft game controller is perfect for arcade-style driving, flying and combat games. The internal motion sensor lets you control pitch and roll just by tilting the controller in the direction you want to go. You can also switch to digital control for a traditional game pad feel. The Creative PC-DVD Encore 5X with Dxr2 is the latest DVD from Creative Labs. Everyone keeps telling me DVD is the future so I guess it must be. The price of the DVD movies is a lot less than Laserdiscs. Nu Metro will be bringing out a range of DVD movies for Christmas, retailing at about R129 a movie. The Cambridge DeskTop Theatre 5.1 speaker system offers affordable, highperformance surround sound for DVD movies, games and music. DeskTop Theatre 5.1 consists of an integrated multi-channel amplifier, five compact, shielded satellite speakers (left and right front, centre, left and right rear channels and a subwoofer, all of which deliver extremely rich, high-end Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound). This is going to be an awesome Christmas. So have a merry Christmas and partying New Year.
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