by Sean W. Makiney

Created on: September 26, 2007

Intro

The Gametap website (http://www.gametap.com/) is an on-demand gaming service instantly downloadable to your PC. They offer classic video games of the past from console, PC, and even stand up arcade hits, along with a few newer titles. Many of the older games were and are still fun to play.

Many of the games on the service are free. However, for full access to everything they have to offer you need to subscribe to a monthly (or annual) fee of $10 per month. Presently, subscribers have access to more than 900 different games, I know I would never be able to play them all.

Most of the games are older than 2 years old. Which makes it very easy to overlook these games as dated or overplayed. They are high quality games from some of the names in business and enjoyable to play at a fraction of their original cost. This is very nice. Walking through their titles there were games I realize now that I missed and have enjoyed taking the plunge in trying them out.

Creating an Account

GameTap main website has a few areas to get started but with so much happening on the front-page you quickly can get lost. I was lost for a moment thinking, "Do I need to subscribe now? Or can I take a look around?" I expect this to make first time visitors lost as well.

When you join, there are many offers available to you; at the time I took the buy one month/ get one month free offer. I did this because I am normally not impressed with the free trial periods. I am always just more than a little annoyed at the limitations these trails always come with. The sign up form is your standard, name, numbers, credit details etc All pretty much as easy as everywhere else.

Downloading

After signing up, you download a 40mb GameTap installation file and begin the install. After installation, you are presented with a log in screen. Next, you choose a few games to play. With a broadband connection, the download does not take long at all for some early smaller titles. Some of the more recent larger games can take allot longer but you are still able to download and play them faster now than you used tom even having the disks. One of the drawbacks however is that you must be connected to the internet whenever you want to launch GameTap and play any of the games you have subscribed to.

Playing

To play a game, it has to be downloaded to your system and saved to your hard drive. You only need to download a game one time. However, if you want a new game, be ready to wait, as I mentioned above, some of downloads depending on your broadband speeds can take a while.

Playing games through the GameTaps works almost exactly like the original.

If you have more than one PC, you are in luck. One GameTap account can be installed on two PC's, nice for families with more than one system or more than one kid.

Summary

GameTap is an inexpensive way to play the games that you might have missed the first time around. There are only two issues and neither keeps me from using the service. One, the continuous internet connection makes gaming away from home a little hard. And two, the longer download times for larger games means I set up downloads to happen at night.

The gaming options are just massive, and include many fantastic games. With pricing starting at $10/month, for the avid or casual gamer, you cannot go wrong.

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