"POKEMON GOLD & SILVER" 2000 Promotional CD-ROM

What we've got here is a tiny little CD-ROM (and I mean tiny; the overall size of the entire disc is under 70MB) that was released in the year 2000.

It was made by Nintendo / GAME FREAK to promote the upcoming "Gold" and "Silver" titles in the "Pokemon" game series, as well as promote the upcoming "Pokemon: The Movie 2000".

It's got a few wallpapers, some music tracks, video clips, and other goodies reminiscent of Promo CDs of the time.

Perfect for a little nostalgia trip!

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.ISO Format

"WHERE IN AMERICA IS CARMEN SANDIEGO?: THE GREAT AMTRAK TRAIN ADVENTURE" 1998 CD-ROM

Here's a bit of software so rare that absolutely nobody online, anywhere, has it available for download.

In 1998, Amtrak was in danger of losing their funding. They decided to take what they dubbed "the McDonald's approach" and get kids interested in their product (namely, wanting to go on trips across the country).

They worked with Broderbund Software to develop this, a "Carmen Sandiego" game wherein the player chases Carmen and her fellow crooks nationwide via - what else - Amtrak trains.

It's surprisingly fun, and I thoroughly enjoyed it as a kid. The game has loads of animations and videos sprinkled throughout, including cameos from the "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?" PBS TV game show, most notably Lynne Thigpen reprising her role as "The Chief".

As stated earlier, it appears nobody has uploaded an ISO of this long-OOP title to the 'net. For years I've searched numerous "Carmen" fan sites, old PC game sites, shady torrent sites, you name it. So it looks like this is a great opportunity for "Carmen" fans who didn't get a chance to play this rare gem to finally take a crack at it.

As is the case with all older software, it may take a bit of fiddling/troubleshooting to get it running on modern PCs and Macs.

So are you up to the task, Gumshoe? If so, download the ISO and get to sleuthing!

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"X-MAN" ("RUN AGENT RUN") Pac-Man "X-Files" Clone Game

In the mid-90's, a software company called "Parroty Interactive" came and went. They pumped out a few pieces of software, each filled with minigames centered around a specific movie or TV show. Of these, they created "Star Warped" (a parody of "Star Wars") and "The X-Fools" (a parody of "The X-Files").

On the "Star Warped" disc, there was a demo for one of the minigames for the then-upcoming "X-Fools" disc, a PAC-MAN clone called "X-MAN". For the official release, the game's name would be changed to "Run, Agent, Run" (my guess would be to avoid confusion with another "X" property involving Mutants).

In the game, you play one of four stages, each one based around a classic episode of the "X-Files" TV show. You choose either Mulder or Scully (sometimes referred to in the included audio clips as "Mully" or "Scudder", even though the voice actors hop between using the 'real' names and the parody ones), and run around collecting folders (actual X "files", har har). Your power-up isn't a Power Pellet though, it's a gun, in which you have several seconds to shoot down the monsters roaming around the stage.

It's easily the most fun minigame on either of these discs, so thank The Little Green Men that it can be removed and isolated as its own launchable game!

Just launch "XMAN32" and you're good to go. If it won't open, run Troubleshoot Compatibility, and even when it launches and you get an error message, just hit "Continue". Trust me, it'll run on Windows 10.

However, if you complete the game and get a nice high score, you might want to Screenshot it, because once you close the game, your score'll disappear like a UFO into the night sky.

Enjoy!

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X-MEN: THE PHOENIX SAGA 1996 Interactive CD-ROM Comic Book

 

In 1996, Toy Biz launched several Marvel Comics character action figures that came with accompanying interactive CD-ROMs. Working on both Windows and Mac computers, they took classic stories and shoehorned in narration and footage from then-current Marvel animated series. They were a bit sloppy, but they were still highly entertaining.

And each one even had an intro from "The Man" himself!

Sadly, these unique little CDs were never digitized. Fortunately, I saved at least one - "X-Men: The Phoenix Saga" - and copied it in its entirety to an ISO!

The disc needs to be unpacked, and while it works perfectly fine on older computers, ones running Windows 10 may require some fiddling. Still, it's a real treat once you get it running.

EXCELSIOR!

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