Bungie, those mad geniuses who defined Mac gaming with Pathways Into Darkness and the Marathon series, recently redefined gaming on both platforms with their real-time tactical 3D simulation Myth. (If you haven't heard about Myth by now, you should probably consider moving out of that cave.) One of the many cool things about Myth is that it's identical on Macs and PC's, and in fact, when Myth players do battle over the internet, everyone's on a level playing field (so to speak).

That's what makes Myth such a great arena for a platform war! Bungie's organizing a contest in which 250 randomly-selected Mac players will compete against 250 randomly-selected PC contestants. The single best player from each platform will then go on to the final showdown, live and in person, at the GenCon Game Fair in Milwaukee, where they will battle for the honor of their respective computing platforms. Yes, of course it's a silly way to settle the argument of which kind of computer is better-- but it's a silly argument in the first place, isn't it? And even better, the champion from each platform wins a new computer, so there's no hard feelings. (In theory.)

Sadly, though Yours Truly was a beta tester for this awesome game, none of us has had enough time to play more than a couple of times a week; with our limited skills, we'd be poor defenders of the platform. But we sincerely hope that at least a few of our faithful viewers are good enough to take on the rampaging legions of PC players. (If you plan to participate, please drop us a line via our Feedback page; we're very interested in how this whole thing turns out.)

Are you as sick of hearing about Columbus as we are? Okay, we would be a little more receptive to the whole thing if anyone knew just exactly what it's supposed to be (Set-top box? NC? Space-age all-purpose food preparation center?), but for now let's assume that it's a low-cost set-top unit that will allow consumers to play DVD's and enhanced CD's, and also to surf the 'net and maybe run a few games and other applications. If that description is fairly accurate, it sounds like Apple's going to have some competition in this "information appliance" field.

MacInTouch pointed us to this ZDNet article, which describes several possible high-tech amenities that may enter our homes in the next several years. Most interesting is the bit toward the end, which states that a "high-profile manufacturer" is paying a company called Multimedia Convergence Corp. to create a "TV set-top device" that combines "DVD, web browsing, gaming, and high-speed data and telephone capabilities." This unit is expected to enter manufacturing this summer and will cost less than $500. Who's Apple's competition here? Or could the "high-profile manufacturer" be Apple itself? We'll apparently know in a month, when the name of the company is made public.

Whether or not this is even relevant depends on whether or not Apple has killed the Columbus project outright in the first place, as had been reported by Apple Recon. More recently, though, Mac OS Rumors claimed that Columbus was being killed only to re-emerge in a Mac OS Lite version, as opposed to the original flavor which allegedly ran some other proprietary software. As far as we're concerned, it's still early enough where all of this is conjecture. There's a slim chance that Apple/Steve will talk a little about this project at the Worldwide Developer Conference in a week or so, since Mac OS Lite is reportedly a hot topic for that particular gathering-- but we're not holding our breath.

It's not often that you get the see the word "desperate" applied to software giant Microsoft in the press these days, but it does happen every once in a while. Take, for example, this Bloomberg News article, which reveals that Microsoft is recruiting companies to join in on a press conference next week, intended to show the world how badly the entire computer industry (and the U.S. economy) would suffer if Windows 98 is delayed. This event, expected to take place in New York possibly as early as Tuesday, is one way in which Microsoft is "desperately trying to garner support" in light of potential antitrust action by the Justice Department and the attorneys general of thirteen states.

If the Department of Justice and/or the attorneys general are planning on doing something to block the shipment of Windows 98, they've only got about eleven days left in which to make a move; though Windows 98's official release date is June 25th, Microsoft is expected to ship the software to manufacturers on the 15th of this month. We don't think anything's actually going to happen, but that's just our opinion on the matter.

Personally, we at AtAT don't pretend to understand exactly why, if Windows 98 doesn't ship on time, the whole industry loses $15 billion in revenue. (Indeed, none of the people quoted in the article actually states precisely how a Windows 98 delay really costs them money.) Does that mean a similar amount was lost when Microsoft shipped Windows 95 a couple of years behind schedule? Software delays happen-- it seems to us that whether it's because unforeseen bugs crop up at the last minute or because the U.S. government decides you're not playing fair shouldn't make a real difference on the resulting effect of the delay. Still, whatever floats your boat. We'll know within a couple of weeks whether or not anything's going to happen.