"INCOMPLETE WORKS"
GLAY CD-ROM "COMPLETE WORKS" [Mac/Win version] Review by aciel

Even though Canis tried to help me by telling me to download the IBM Voice Player in the CD-ROM [which I DID to no avail], I just cannot view DISC1 properly. The problem is in the SongPlayer.exe file in the contents of the CD-ROM. If you try to run the CD-ROM, a "Director Player Error" pops up which says "List expected for handler #count" [whatever that means]. Even though I downloaded the GLAY COMPLETE WORKS VOICE PLAYER [Setup.exe] in the Voice folder and the IBM ViaVoice Command Runtime Version 4.3 [Setup.exe] in the ViaVoice43 folder, this CD-ROM still won't run and the same pop up problem occurs. Even if you download the Japanese version of QuickTime 3.0.2 that they offer you in the GLAY COMPLETE WORKS menu, on top of the other two downloads, this CD-ROM just will not run. I can't get it to run. I downloaded Internet Explorer 5 because it's supposed to come with the Director Player [right, Canis?], but the COMPLETE WORKS DISC1 still won't run. What else can I say? The same error always occurs. If you can tell me how to fix this problem, cuz I've had it up to here with this problem, you're more than welcome to do so.

Now, I have to say that even though I can't view this CD-ROM properly, I've seen most of its contents already. How did I do that? Simple, go to [My Computer], right click on the GLAY COMPLETE WORKS icon and Explore its contents. If you already have the correct version of QuickTime installed into your PC, you can view the CMs and video clips in the "qt" [QuickTime] folder. The qt folder contains 3 folders: m, opening, and video. The "m" folder contains 2 "multi-angle" video samples, one of the HIT THE WORLD concert video [HOWEVER], and the other of the pure soul "Summer of '98" Stadium Tour [SOUL LOVE]. The "opening" folder contains a movie clip of the opening of the CD-ROM. And the "video" folder contains 4 folders: a [albums], s [singles], v [videos], and x [xtras]. The "a" folder contains CM clips of each album they released, starting with SPEED POP down to pure soul. The "s" folder contains CMs of each single that they released, starting with Freeze My Love down to Winter, again. The "v" folder contains sample clips from each music video that they released, starting with Video Glay down to the pure soul "Summer of '98" Stadium Tour. But they give only 2 video samples from each music video. For example, HIT THE WORLD only contains samples of Kuchibiru and Freeze My Love even though there are 18 songs in the video. The "x" folder contains 2 folders, which contain a CM each. The first folder contains a CM for Glay's Arena Tour '97 HIT THE WORLD, and the second folder contains a CM for Glay's Dome Tour '99 in the Tokyo Dome.

Then there's the sound folder. Inside the sound folder is the music folder which contains audio samples of all their albums and all their singles. Of course if you have all of their albums and singles, you don't even need to go here but let me tell you about it anyway. The music folder contains 2 folders: a [albums] and s [singles]. The "a" folder contains a folder for each of the albums GLAY has released. If you know all of GLAY's albums in order by heart, like me, you would know that album number 3 is BEAT out. Each of the album folders contains all the songs from that album. But you will notice that songs which repeat themselves do not appear twice. For example, in the album folders of this CD-ROM file, BELOVED only appears in the Review album folder, not in the BELOVED album folder [to save disc space]. So if you think that a song is missing from an album folder, it's not. You just have to look for it in the right place. It's the same with the "s" folder. This contains samples of the B-sides of the singles they released. But notice that the 11th single, Kuchibiru is missing because Kuchibiru is already in the Review album folder and Haru Wo Ai Suru Hito [its B-side] is in the BELOVED album folder. Anyway, this sound folder contains samples of all the songs that GLAY has released in their albums and singles. But they are only SAMPLES [1 or 2 minutes only] so you don't really get the whole song. You'd do better to buy the album, period.

DISC1 contains: TOP MENU, ALBUM/SINGLE/VIDEO, TRADING CARD, SONG PLAYER, HISTORY [i.e. Biography], MEMBER PROFILE, MULTI ANGLE [range], and a VOICE PLAYER [for Windows only].

DISC2 is less complicated than DISC1 and if they had done for DISC1 what they did to DISC2, there wouldn't be any problems with running this CD-ROM altogether. You see, you don't need anything installed to run DISC2. It's that simple. Just put it in and run it. Even if you don't have Japanese font in your PC, you will still be able to understand what to do. DISC2 only contains the magazine interviews, desktop pictures, and a screen saver. The desktop pictures is comprised of one picture of each member plus a group picture. The interviews is a whole database of magazine interviews that they've done from 1994 to 1999. Just click on the year you want and they'll show you a list of magazine interviews available from that year. But let me be honest with you folks. It's NOT complete. I have magazines with GLAY on the cover that are not even listed in that database, and I know that it's incomplete. For example, BPASS 12.1996 issue which has 22 pages on GLAY [and they're even on the cover of the magazine] is not listed there. Rock iT! magazine, where I got my HIT THE WORLD pics and interviews from, is not there. Shoxx magazine, which had GLAY on the cover and their A-Z is not there. And this database doesn't do for individual interviews either. For example, Teru was on the cover of SHOXX magazine in 1996, but it's not listed there. Hisashi has been on the cover of GiGS, Vicious, and Shoxx, all in 1997, but it's not listed there. And the list goes on. I mean, it's nice that they took the bother to put several GLAY interviews there [which I don't all have] but it's really not very complete. I expected something better than that. COMPLETE WORKS is complete works, y'know. Not half the works!

CONCLUSION: I don't think it's fair to say that this "COMPLETE WORKS" is "complete" when I feel that it's incomplete. GLAY "INCOMPLETE WORKS" sounds more like it. It's INCOMPLETE because:
a) They sincerely forgot to tell you what you need to download in order to view this CD-ROM properly. I translated all the instructions in the manual [link is here] and the only thing that they wanted you to DL was QuickTime 3.0.2. INCOMPLETE INSTRUCTIONS!! It took someone like Canis to tell me how to be able to run this thing properly and I'm still having trouble with it. But neither Canis nor I had any warning signs about this problem when we bought this CD-ROM.
b) Let's face it. This thing is full of samples. Except for the CMs, everything about it is all sample stuff. Short video clips of select music videos and short audio samples of their albums and singles. Of course it's smart marketing on GLAY's part to encourage people to buy their albums and CDs but if you're like me, and you have all this sh*t, and YOU KNOW MORE than what is contained in this CD-ROM, you can't help but feel that it's a bloody waste of your money. Collector's item, yes. Necessary, no. Why bother playing a 2 minute sample of Cynical when I already have a full version on CD? Plus, I also have the romanized lyrics. Let's be a bit realistic about this: Since I'm not Japanese, I'm really not going to look at the Japanese lyrics contained in the CD-ROM and sing from there. I might as well read the Japanese lyrics contained in my albums, singles, or scorebooks cuz it's the same thing. What's contained in my own homepage is more useful to me than what's contained in this CD-ROM. I might as well play my GLAY albums and view GLAD TO BE GLAY and I would be getting a better deal than the COMPLETE WORKS CD-ROM because I can actually read my romanized lyrics and listen to the whole song from my CD instead of listening to just 2 minutes of the song from the CD-ROM and not being able to read the Japanese lyrics in the CD-ROM. Is anybody here getting what I'm trying to say? This GLAY COMPLETE WORKS CD-ROM is for NEWBIES to GLAY!!! Not the experts. If you have all their albums, singles and songbooks, you already have their lyrics and their full song versions. This CD-ROM is nothing new to you. And that's exactly how I feel. And you would know more than what's in this CD-ROM, really you would.
c) The magazine interviews. This is obviously the most INCOMPLETE thing about this CD-ROM. What happened to the Teru and Fumiya Fujii interview in the Popbeat Jan 1998 [which I have]? What about the 2 GiGS magazines which had Jiro on the cover [which I have too]? What about the Monthly Kadokawa Feb 1998 issue with GLAY on the cover? And these missing magazines don't just contain GLAY interviews-they actually have GLAY ON THE COVER. I mean, some of the best mags that I have were not even on the list. That's INCOMPLETE! How can you call this a COMPLETE WORKS if it's not even complete?
d) Let's face it. This will NEVER be a COMPLETE WORKS cuz GLAY haven't broken up. It would be more precise if GLAY had broken up two months ago and then you could put all their stuff together to make a COMPLETE WORKS of everything they have ever done. But GLAY are still kicking it and they're practically going to release a new video in July. That video is not even listed in this CD-ROM. Can you honestly tell me that this CD-ROM is complete if GLAY are going to have a new tour, new video, new single, new whatever 3 months from now? I don't think so. When it was first announced that GLAY was coming out with this COMPLETE WORKS, I was a little bit skeptical because they're not dead (and I was also wondering what this CD would contain that I don't already have). They're going to be doing more than what's contained in this CD-ROM. And I can see it in the magazine interview section. They haven't included all the mags that GLAY have so far appeared in in 1999. Now that's INCOMPLETE.

I'll be honest with you people: the only features that were of any real use for me were the mag interviews that I didn't have from DISC2. If you're interested in looking at the magazine interviews of GLAY that you missed, then this CD could be a little bit useful. The other features, like the GLAY biography, singles, albums, and whatnots, you can get from HAPPY SWING SPACE SITE, you can get from my homepage [and it's in English too!], or you already KNOW. Maybe I'm exaggerating but I really did not even need to look at this CD-ROM because I have GLAY's story, biography, albums, singles, lyrics, [several] magazines, etc. Do I really need to look at this database? I don't think I do.

The most interesting thing about this CD-ROM is probably the layout and design. But whether that's of any use to you people is up to you. How the information is presented in the COMPLETE WORKS is a little more sophisticated than HAPPY SWING SPACE SITE but really, you're not missing anything. Not if you already know the lyrics and have all the albums/videos. And especially not if homepages which give the exact same info exist on the Internet which you can just go to with the click of a mouse.

What this CD-ROM has got going for it is the magazine interview database, the visual/audio SAMPLES, and a look at the trading cards that GLAY released last year [if you're into that sort of thing]. But I already know what all the trading cards look like, I have all of GLAY's albums, videos, singles songs, and several magazines that were not even featured in this CD-ROM. I don't need samples if I have the full songs, I don't need video clips if I have the whole video, I don't really need pictures or magazine interviews if I already have the same thing and more... This CD-ROM is really not for me. It's honestly not for fanatics, and yet, it is because it would be a collector's item. But seriously, I am not benefitting from it at all. That's why I would say that this is for newbies, and maybe also for people who don't have easy access to GLAY stuff.

Before you spend $100 on this thing, just think about my review. Maybe you ought to save your bucks for the upcoming Deluxe Box Set, which reminds me... If this CD-ROM really were COMPLETE, where's the books section?