Housebound art lovers can now take a spin through one of the world's great collections on the CD-ROM Le Louvre. The only digital guide authorized by the museum provides brief but illuminating analysis of 100 masterworks, including Da Vinci's Mona Lisa and Raphael's Virgin and Child. (commentary on the latter, for example, suggests the painting was inspired by the death of the artist's mother). Art history buffs won't learn anything new here, but there's enough to satisfy most culture vultures—and probably inspire some to take a trip to the real Louvre. (CD-ROM for the Mac & PC, BMG Interactive, $49.95)
Even the great secret agent himself would probably be impressed by the sophistication of the Web site 007. Created by Kimberly Last, an avid Bond fan, the site provides in-depth commentary on all 19 Bond films. (On Goldfinger: "The tone of Bond became slicker and more sophisticated rather than tongue-in-cheek.") Handy guides to the bad guys and the babes show you how little the superagent formula has changed over the last 33 years. There is also a collection of news stories on the upcoming movie Goldeneye, starring Pierce Brosnan. The site is a good resource for just about every accessory—including replica guns and cigarette cases—a Bond aficionado could want, except, of course, the perfect Martini (shaken, never stirred). (URL: http:// www.mcs.net/~klast/www/bond.html)
>John Romero
DOOM AND BOOM
WHENEVER HE GETS PROGRAMMER'S block, 28-year-old John Romero hops in one of his two yellow Ferraris and heads over to the construction site of the five-bedroom English manor house that he and his wife, Elizabeth, are building in Frisco, Texas. As one of the three founders of id Software, Romero is enjoying the luxuries that have come from creating the wildly successful action games Wolfenstein 3-D and Doom.
Growing up in Northern California, Romero taught himself to program computers at 12 after becoming addicted to Pac-Man. "I wanted to do something like that," says Romero, who left college to pursue a career in computers. Wolfenstein, which lets players battle the Nazi war machine, and Doom, a saga of a lone Marine against demons, work, he says, because the action is faster and the environments are more complex than in other games. He promises that id's next offering, Quake, will be even more elaborate. Players will even be able to simulate swimming underwater. But don't hold your breath: there's no release date yet.
- Contributors:
- Erik Ashok Meers.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
