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July 1998 Editorial
Original Publishing Date (y/m/d): 1998-07-01

Hi,

Summer, hot, ugh... Heard there was fire warnings in US, well it is not that hot here although annoyingly hot. Today it rained. My city tops the top ten of places in Sweden which has had most sun during the past two weeks. Anyone want to hear more about the weather? Anyway...

The pinball briefly mentioned in last months editorial was ofcourse MAP (Microsoft Arcade Pinball). There's is a link to an article about the pinball on the news front page if you haven't yet read it. Looks like an interesting project. MAP will have seven different tables, all simulations of real tables. I'm a little dubious about the choice of tables to simulate, but having in mind that the tables were chosen because the pinball is supposed to tell the historical evolution of real tables... Well I find the idea unusual and interesting, looking forward to when it will be released.

Last month I noticed Pin-Ball Games was on the way with a new pinball, Pinball Soccer '98. It might have been released though I've only seen a demo of it so far. The demo was rather mediocre, nice graphics, not so good feeling and in overall just a below average pinball. Though I'll wait for the final release to say anything... final. There pinball also featured a multiplayer table (screen cut in left/right half, play in rounds during time, most score during round wins round, something like that), which you supposedly can play over networks in the full version (has the star trek internet support been released yet?).

Otherwise the remaining summer months seem to to be rather quiet. BRUSA wont come before the end of the year. Have read October, November for it, let us just hope the release is worldwide the same time this time, just a little sidejoke on the previous two worldwide releases. ;) MAP might come during third or early fourth quarter 98 (what a guess). Still waiting for the Europe/US release of LittleWings pinballs.

And I'm still waiting for a patch to appear for my keyflip, come on, release a patch for timeshock! I'm "a little" annoyed on the keyboard since my D key got stuck and then my Space key started producing 2-3 spaces on each light hit on it. I figured this was due to bread crumbs or something so I thought, "I'll have to open it to clean it", so I did... not so clever since this made things worse and as a fact all I had to do was remove the plastic key tops directly from the keyboard by bending a little with a screwdriver. So I closed it up again and picked of the D and space key and cleaned away the small bread flings. It works kind a ok now apart for that the space key keeps on functioning only for some days then I have to remove its plastic top and push a little thing and flip back the plastic top, then it works ok a while... annoying, guess this thing isn't meant to be opened. I do still think this keyboard can be fun when playing pinballs supporting it and some older where it works naturally, though maybe not an accuate simulation of the real pinball controlls.

Just as a little finishing side note, especially meant for all of you Quake fanatics, John Romero has mentioned in a interview that he have really found inspiration in pioneer programmers such as Bill Budges (programmer of Raster Blaster and Pinball Construction Kit)!

the best to you all!