Computers Today, June 16-30, 2001; Read Right

Whether you're a serious astrologer or simply curious about what your future may hold, Ultimate Home Horoscope & Tarot offers a compelling combination of ancient secrets, new-age philosophies, and high-tech methods to accompany you on your search for answers. A four-disk library that does everything from exploring the art of palmistry to replicating traditional I Ching practices, this software may open up spiritual doors you never even knew existed.

RUNS ON: PC with 486 DX (166 MHz or faster recommended), Microsoft Windows 95/98/NT, 8 MB RAM (16 MB recommended), 40 MB hard disk space (80 MB recommended), 2x or higher CD-ROM drive, SVGA display, 256 colours, 640 x 480 resolution (800 x 600 with high colours recommended)
DEVELOPER: Topics Entertainment
DISTRIBUTOR: BPB Multimedia, 20 Ansari Road, New Delhi
PRICE: $ 29.99

Ultimate Home Horoscope & Tarot comes complete with four separate CD-ROMs, including The Oracle of Changes, Birth Horoscope Interpreter, The Art of Palmistry, and Tarot Magic, all of which must be installed separately. While this may make for a tedious installation process, the upside is that you can choose which applications you wish to run, while ignoring the ones that may seem less relevant to your interests. That said, it's important to point out that each of these applications is worth installing, if only for the beauty of the graphics and sound effects. We were especially impressed with the images on The Oracle of Changes application, where the program is set up to look like a clandestine cave, complete with dark shadows and ornate details.

One issue we did have with this application was the user interface. Navigating through this disk was rather difficult. Navigation buttons were unclear, and in order to exit the program, we had to hit Control-Alt-Delete, because there was no visible exit option.

KID PIX DELUXE 3RD EDITION
Initiation into Art
A Creative, multimedia experience.

Kid Pix Deluxe 3 is a brand new product built on the same great philosophy: to provide kids with the an open-ended, creative art and multimedia experience. Kid Pix Studio Deluxe gives kids six unique painting, drawing, and animation projects to choose from. Kids can draw and paint with Kid Pix itself; animate and play with Stampimator, Moopies, Wacky TV, and digital puppets; and showcase their work with a slide show.

RUNS ON: PC with Pentium 233 MHz chip or faster, MS Win 95/98/2000/Me/ or NT 4.0, 32 MB RAM, 100 MB hard disk space. Macintosh: PowerMac 233 MHz processor or faster, System 8.1 or later, 32 MB RAM, 145 MB hard disk space.
DEVELOPER: The Learning Company
DISTRIBUTOR: BPB Multimedia, New Delhi
PRICE: $ 29.99

Packed with fun tools and unique projects, Kid Pix Studio Deluxe empowers kids and encourages them to develop their creative and artistic skills. Kid Pix creations can include backgrounds, animations, stickers, stamps, text, music, imported photos or movies, self-recorded sounds, and more. The interface is fun, easy-to-use, and lively with sound and motion (the buttons wiggle and the brushes squish when you use them). In fact, there are 2,500 stamps, more than 1,200 graphics, cool sounds, and much more.

Once you have a finished picture there's a whole new set of options-make a slide show with great visual and sound effects; export it as a movie or flash animation for the family Web page, or share it with all your friends and relatives through the Kid Pix E-mail Center. This program is really is for kids of all ages. The negative point is that the program is poorly documented. There is no clear way to bring back saved pictures to work on them after the original session.