PGA Championship Golf 2000, £29.99
Golf has always been popular in video game format. The PC has probably the best selection and undoubtedly the best two golf games on any format. The latest in the PGA Tour series from EA sports and the Links series of games are the two heavyweights of this genre and there is little between them.
PGA Championship 2000 from Sierra obviously intends to break this monopoly with its latest swing at a golf game. It has some very nice features. There are 13 courses to choose from (plus 150 downloadable from the Internet). In tournament mode you can hear the cheers for other golfers, there are also left-handed golfers and SmartSwing technology learns your style of play if you choose to swing your golf club by manoeuvring the mouse.
It comes with its own course architect, so anyone with plenty of time can sit down and design their own golf course. But while PGA Championship has a lot of clever ideas, it appears to have forgotten about some fundamental aspects of the game.
It seems impossible to exit a game once you have started, you can't have multiple camera views on screen, and you can't see a shape of the hole you're playing on before or during your time on it.
It is a good game and enjoyable for a quick round every now and then but unfortunately its competitors are in a different class.
Recommended: Pentium 300mhz/32MB/Win 9x/
Nintendo recently revealed its next generation console at Space World 2000 in Japan. Initially dubbed Project Dolphin, the new console has been officially named the "Gamecube". For the first time, Nintendo games will not be in cartridge format. Instead an 8 cm Nintendo Gamecube Disc based on Matsushita's Optical Disc Technology Approx with 1.5GB Capacity will be used.
It is expected to be released in July next year in Japan, and maybe in time for Christmas of that year in Europe. As opposed to Sony's new PlayStation and Microsoft's X-Box, the Gamecube is not being positioned as multi-purpose digital entertainment devices. The Gamecube's sole aim is to be a games machine. Mario, Zelda and Metroid games are expected to be among the first games released on the new machine.
Lara Croft will be visiting these shores when the latest Tomb Raider game comes out before Christmas. For the first time there will be an Irish section to the game. Lara visits Ireland as a 16-year-old girl in what is a series of flashbacks. Visiting the home of her family's Irish butler in Co Kerry, Lara, although unarmed for this section, will have to dodge enemies and interact with other characters.