Keep your fingers flying in your free time with the Sierra Arcade Pack, featuring After Dark Games, 3-D Ultra Pinball, Lost Continent, Fastest Pinball in Space, and 3-D Ultra Minigolf. Each is gorgeous and progressively challenging, offering something for kids, newbies, and experienced arcade players--and keeping them all interested for many an hour. The After Dark set of 11 mini arcade games can be installed as a screen saver or run at any time, and they provide enough reflex, word, spatial, and trivia problems to keep even your resident genius engaged. Try saving tenants from a burning building by detonating adjacent rooms in Roof Rats or unscramble words in Fish Schticks, then relax with a few hands of After Dark Solitaire. The graphics are cute and well designed throughout, and each game is quirky and interesting, though the sounds do grate after a while.
The two pinball games are dramatic and impressive; the 3-D perspective is an integral part of each table, and the sights and sounds are intricate and lush. Moving away from the boxy look of real-life tables, these feature balls running through more or less naturalistic settings that still feature everything you'd expect from a great pinball game--flippers, bumpers, lights, and surprises--but go beyond your expectations to create some wild challenges that will puzzle the experts game after game.
Finally, the 3-D Ultra Minigolf course (all 18 holes) is a bit less serene than a day at the amusement park. Sure, there are a few classic holes to get you started, but before long you have to contend with crazy machines and creatures intent on pushing your score into the stratosphere. Observation and timing are crucial to make it anywhere near your par for the whole course, and you'll find yourself returning over and over to try to beat your best score.
If you're easily distracted, stay away: the Sierra Arcade Pack is guaranteed to keep you from your thesis, thank-you letters, or expense report. --Rob Lightner
