Arcades are fun, except you have to get to them, and take plenty of quarters. Dedicated game devices are kind of cool, too, except they can cost a lot and really only do one thing well. Loading Windows 98 on your PC, though, transforms your computer into a virtual playground, where your favorite games are just a click or two away, all day and all night long.

The sales pace for PC-based games has been picking up in recent years. The enhancements that come with Windows 98 should help advance the PC even further in the gaming-platform ratings. Here's why.

Built-in DirectX 5.0 technologies maximize multimedia
Windows 98 builds the latest version of high performance DirectX multimedia technologies right into the operating system, so game developers can easily take advantage of these advances. The results are good news for gamers.

Any new game developed using DirectX APIs not only has superior graphics, state-of-the-art 3D images, positional surround sound, support for speeds up to 100 frames-per-second with daisy-chained graphics accelerator cards, and enhanced Internet gaming capabilities, it's also guaranteed to be compatible with any PC running Windows 98. Installation's designed to be easy, too. Why fry your brain on set up when you need every neuron firing to play a winning game?

Have you ever wanted your game console to push back when you hit a wall? DirectX support for tactile enhancements like force field joysticks adds a whole new, physical dimension to the thrill of a good game. Now the controls in Flight Simulator feel a whole lot more like the ones in a real plane.

Some DirectX 5.0 controls, like those for streaming media, are built into the Internet Explorer browser, too, to make your Internet gaming faster, richer, and more interactive, even when your opponent is half a world away.

MMX support boosts speed and performance
Lots of computers sold today are loaded with Intel's high performance MMX processor. Windows 98 supports MMX-aware applications. DirectX controls take advantage of them, making your games faster and more responsive.

USB support makes it easy to accessorize
There's good reason people are talking about Windows 98 doing for hardware what Windows 95 did for software: making things much easier. Support for Universal Serial Bus (USB) makes it painless to add game-enhancing hardware to your PC--so painless you don't even have to turn the computer off to get a new joystick up and running. (That's called "hotswapping.") It's just as easy to plug in killer speakers, a second keyboard or an extra mouse. USB makes it easy to turn your machine into a multi-player game station.

Multi-monitor support opens new vistas
Some of the coolest things you can plug into your Windows 98-based PC are monitors--lots of monitors. Windows 98 supports connecting up to nine different display devices to a single PC. Let your imagination play with that one for a while. Say you're in the cockpit of a high flying jet. One monitor shows you your controls. One acts as a window on the left, another shows you the view to your right--are those enemy aircraft out there? Take a look at monitor number four for an aerial view. Or imagine a game that gives you objective and subjective--Doom and Myst--points of view on different monitors at the same time, or lets you see through the eyes of several different characters at once.

The other fun thing to do with multiple monitors is keep your work on one, your e-mail on another, and a game on a third, so you can move back and forth between them whenever you want. Just don't let the boss catch you playing 3D Baseball until your presentation's done.

If you're under eighteen, make that your homework.

Windows 98 encourages innovative game design
With all the enhancements in Windows 98 that can make your gaming experience better, just think what it will be like as game developers release new software that take advantage of features such as multiple monitor support. Universal open architectures give game creators a solid platform to build on, so they can put their talents into out-there innovations and effects, instead of spending their bandwidth reinventing the wheel every time around.

With that kind of support in place, you can expect the next generation of PC games coming down the road to take your playing to new heights.