News The programmer of the arcade adventures Prince of Persia 1 and 2, John Mechner, has been working for the last four years on a CD-ROM adventure called The Last Express. This is set on the Orient Express in July 1914 and you play an American who joins the train at the Gare de l'Est in Paris at the request of a friend. When you get there, you find your friend has been murdered. It's up to you to find the killer and all the time you have is the 3 days of the railway journey from Paris to Constantinople. There are about 30 characters with which you can interact, and these have been added using a rotoscope technique of filming and drawing to give realistic movements. There are several paths through the game, each with different endings. The author has also aimed for accuracy on the layout and running of the train itself, making use of the original blue prints for its construction, menus, tickets etc. 1.8 million units of Command and Conquer : Red Alert have been sold - so it's not surprising that Westwood Studios have plans for add-ons. One of these, Counterstrike, is out now. See Mongoose's handy hint in the Hints section about some more missions hidden within it. Red Alert is evidently also very popular on-line. Two similar games to C&C on the way are Conquest Earth from Data Design Interactive and Dominion from 7th Level. Conquest Earth pits you against invading aliens (always a popular storyline). The art work uses 65000 colours making the displays very detailed. Units are moved via point and click but can also be left to do their own thing! A first-person deathmatch option will be available and the single-player game will feature 30 missions over 15 terrain types. It will run under Windows 95. Meanwhile Dominion runs in SVGA with detailed units and a choice of races to play (human, Merc, dwarven etc) each with its own units. The aim is to build and equip a base, then defend it against all-comers. There will be campaigns or single-player scenarios, even an editor to design your own. There will be full multi-player capabilities. Star Fleet Academy should be out by now and is billed as the first ever Star Trek space battle simulator. You can fly four different Federation ships against 30 different alien ships through 25 missions. William Shatner, Walter Koenig and George Takei all take part in their original Star Trek roles. The programmers have aimed for a realistic display using texture mapping, real time light sourcing and evidently the AI will learn your style as you play and adapt to match it! If that appeals to you, look out also for Independence Day from Fox Interactive. Battle aliens using a selection of 15 planes which are increasingly better equipped until you finally reach the mothership. Missions will take you to various places all over the world including Tokyo, Paris and the Grand Canyon. Yes, it WILL have multiplayer options too - what doesn't these days? An X-Files adventure IS on its way but more details won't be announced until the summer and the game should hits the shelves in December. Anderson and Duchovny will take part, as will other characters from the show, and Chris Carter is writing the script. And the snippets ... Twinsen's Odyssey, the follow up to Little Big Adventure, is due out during the summer. Mageplayer is a forthcoming action game with RPG elements set in an atmosphere of magic. The first GURPS game will be out later in the year - Fallout from Interplay - featuring hundreds of characters in a 3D isometric view. Look out for some from Sierra - Shivers 2 : Harvest of Souls (out now), Outpost 2 and the long-awaited Betrayal at Antara. - o -