Finally – More Knight Rider Music!
It’s finally happened. After years of stonewalling, Universal has given Don Peake the go-ahead to release a new album of Knight Rider music. Shown here, this special limited-edition album (of which only 1,000 copies were made) is a special gift to German fans of Knight Rider, who are arguably even more rabid (and more organized) that fans here in the United States. On the disc are 70 minutes of selections from six episodes, including “White Bird,” “Let It Be Me,” “Mouth of the Snake,” “The Scent of Roses,” “Junk Yard Dog” and “Halloween Knight.”
I can tell from that list that this is not going to be another simple album of incidental music; all of the above episodes contained special cuts of unique and stylized music, beyond the usual Knight Rider theme. The only downside to that is that there may be a distinct lack of “traditional” Knight Rider cuts, in other words, tracks containing samples of the theme and its mainstay accompaniments. But since the cover art says “Volume 1,” I’m hopeful we can expect at least one follow-up album. Personally, I’d like to see a disc containing the best of Knight Rider’s chase, action and suspense sequences!
These discs will be available exclusively at the Knight Nationals in Vandalia, Ohio next weekend, at least until Don Peake is able to put together an American release. I have at least one source who has agreed to pick me up a copy of the album. I anxiously await this new treasure—and hope it will be as pleasing to the ear as Don’s last soundtrack collection!
Hurricane Charley
Wow. I’ve just been through a hurricane!
Thankfully, we live far enough southward on the Gulf Coast of Florida to have been spared major damage from Hurricane Charley as it roared overhead. We actually made out really well compared to the city just 40 minutes north of us. And just a bit beyond that, in Punta Gorda, there’s total devastation. Homes destroyed, people killed. We’re talking about a Hurricane Andrew-style aftermath here. (Andrew was the infamous Category 5 storm that cut through the state in 1992, killing dozens and destroying many billions of dollars worth of property.)
This whole thing came up incredibly fast, didn’t even look like it was going to severely impact Florida until two days before, and left no one with any clue it was going to hit Punta Gorda until about three hours before the fact. Originally, Charley was forecast to make landfall in Tampa, but it didn’t happen. Instead, it veered east and took out southwest Florida directly. Tampa felt next to nothing.
The Ultimate Doom
This time it’s for real! Doom 3, the long-awaited third installment in id Software’s hallowed Doom series of PC games, has finally landed. I admit I haven’t posted here in quite a few days because, well, I’ve been busy playing it, among other things I’ve been tied up with. Eventually, though, I wanted to make my way here and post my official thoughts about the game, so here goes.
I’m just about halfway through the game now. And it is amazing. Just as my jaw dropped on January 6th, 1994, when I first saw the original Doom running on my computer, it dropped again last Wednesday when I finally got Doom 3 installed and loaded up. Let me sum up the gameplay by saying that Doom 3 feels like the offspring of Doom and System Shock 2. It has some of the suspense and mystery of the latter, and some of the hair-raising action of the former. It makes for a highly competent marriage of two very enviable characteristics in FPS games, and although I’ve read reports of some people who do not like the new Doom for whatever reason, I’m certainly not one of those people. Frankly, I think id has created a masterpiece, a great tradeoff of both old and new concepts, and included something to please everyone. The key here is that Doom 3 probably won’t please everyone completely, but it does enough things well that I think the end result is one of the more entertaining games of the 00’s.
I’m not sure if I’d call today’s entry a “review” of the game—although by the time I get done, it may well be—but it is a gathering of disjointed thoughts and adventures I’ve experienced in my last week of gaming. I figure there are enough objective, point-by-point reviews of the game floating around the Intarweb by now that you don’t need my version of the same product. Instead I’ll let more of my anecdotal evidence tell Doom’s tale for you. For your dose of objectivity, I’ll try to fill in gaps I feel are not covered by many reviews out there, as evidenced by the questions I see over and over on various message boards. And since almost all of my readers already have played and enjoyed Doom 3, I’m not trying to sell the game to you through my words. I thought it would be more interesting to relate some things I’ve experienced along the way.
