.Start.of.DemoNews.097......................................................... ______/\___________________________ __ ________________ ___ /\_______ \____ \ ________ _ _ ______ \ / \| \ ________ | \/ ______/ / | \ _) \ \_/ \ | \ / \ \ _) \ | \______ \ / | \ \ | \ | \ / \ \ /~\ \ / \ \_____ /_______/___| /________/ \____\_____/_______/_________/________/ \_____/ |____/ | DemoNews Issue #97 - July 30, 1995 | Size : 52,303 ------------- | Subscribers : 1455 DemoNews is a weekly newsletter for the demo scene. | Last Week : 1433 It is produced by Hornet at the site ftp.cdrom.com. | Change : +22 | =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Uploads Articles Review of Progression Music Disk............Ryan Cramer Fast Tracker v2.04 Review...................GraveDigger Music Contest 3 Results.....................Snowman The Japanese Demo Scene.....................rot-N Interview with Zodiac.......................Ryan Cramer Advertisements PMODE/W v1.20...............................Daredevil Subscribing Closing =-[Uploads]-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= =----------------------------------------------------------[File Information]-= All files listed below are on ftp.cdrom.com or one of its mirrors. Ratings are completely subjective and do not necessarily reflect opinions of the demo scene in general. ftp.cdrom.com too slow? Try our mirror at ftp.luth.se. You may even upload to this site under /pub/msdos/demos_upload. =---------------------------------------------------------------------[Demos]-= Location /demos/alpha/1995 Size Rated Description =-------------------------------- ---- ----- ---------------------------------= /a/akm-bomb.zip 12 * Bomb by Arkham /a/akm_dob.zip 40 *+ DOB not by Arkham /e/excuse-1.zip 1030 ***+ [1/2] No-Excuse by Omicron /e/excuse-2.zip 791 ***+ [2/2] 1st Place Icing '95 Demo /h/hardboil.zip 20 ***+ Hardboiled by Reality /m/mousetro.zip 31 *+ Mousetro by Solar Designer / BPC /p/pha_mure.zip 53 ***+ Murel by Phenomena /p/prp-aa.zip 308 *** Artist Alliance BBS by Propaganda /p/pureness.zip 1433 **** Pureness by WaterLogic (1st TS95) /r/rekku.zip 130 *** Rekku intro by Orange /r/rty_flux.zip 17 ***+ Mindflux BBS by Reality /s/sametech.zip 70 **** Sametech Annihilation by COM:SEX /s/sck-econ.zip 25 ** E-Connect BBS Intro by Shock! /s/starbbs.zip 95 **+ Star BBS Intro by Oxygen /s/startro.zip 18 ***+ Startro by Reality /w/wkd-cww1.zip 38 ** Wicked BBS Intro by Conway /z/zntrphy.arj 1456 *** [1/2] Zoantrophy by MiST /z/zntrphy.a01 596 *** [2/2] 1st at DeMoBit '95 Party Somewhere in Holland '95 (Demos) /g/goldorak.zip 1124 *** 1st Goldorak by Real-Time /a/an-mod0.zip 344 ***+ 2nd Model 0 by Analogue /i/img_spoo.zip 440 [n/a] Spoon by Image (WINDOWS DEMO!) /s/spoonfin.zip 441 [n/a] Spoon (update) by Image Somewhere in Holland '95 (64k Intros) /a/acme-syw.zip 56 ***+ 1st Smoke Yellow Weed by Acme /n/nameless.zip 68 *** 3rd Nameless by LaSerDance /a/acme-byn.zip 52 ** Acme Blows Your Nose by Acme /a/acme-sux.zip 28 * Acme Sucks by Acme /b/bhmorbid.zip 67 ** Morbid by Bunghole Productions /c/cornetto.zip 25 * Cornetto by Cornetto /k/kaboom.zip 46 ** Kaboom by Sentinel /m/mass-jwl.zip 61 ***+ Jewelry by Massive Bush Party ][ '95 (64k Intros) /b/bunny.zip 58 ***+ Bunny by SRK /b/burma.zip 64 ***+ Burma by Proxima /c/cdz_cdz.zip 46 ** Condem by Condenz /c/crap.zip 23 * Crap by Phrenetics /d/dandruff.zip 37 ***+ Dandruff by YeTi /f/formor.zip 38 ** For Morroskvld by Illuminati /s/so.zip 61 ***+ So? by Xenon Develop. (Bush Party) /v/visions.zip 59 **** Visions by Sorrox =-------------------------------------------------------------[Music:General]-= Location /demos/music Size Rated Description =-------------------------------- ---- ----- ---------------------------------= /disks/1995/0-9/7mod-cbr.zip 1241 **+ Music for the m. C.Brown Records /songs/1995/mod/0-9/4getpast.zip 133 ** Forget The Past. ? /songs/1995/mod/p/pollette.arj 360 ***+ J'ai Pollette .. The REW /songs/1995/mtm/e/esp_mchn.zip 53 **+ Minimal(remix) Watchman/ESP /songs/1995/mtm/e/esp_trth.zip 203 *+ The Liar's Truth Watchman/ESP /songs/1995/s3m/0-9/2-ult.zip 132 ***+ Ultimate Perfor. Prance / dbduo /songs/1995/s3m/b/briliant.arj 491 ***+ Brilliant The Peric /songs/1995/s3m/c/cutmastr.zip 251 *+ Cut master, cut Hannibal Lecter /songs/1995/s3m/d/dj3_sm.zip 276 ** Sound Mind DJ Cubed /songs/1995/s3m/d/ds-aluni.zip 240 ***+ The Alunis Proje Dead Silence /songs/1995/s3m/d/ds-intrw.zip 157 *** Wrong Soul,Inter Dead Silence /songs/1995/s3m/d/ds-kryah.zip 164 *** Lands of Kryah Dead Silence /songs/1995/s3m/d/ds-tab.zip 75 **+ Tab Dead Silence /songs/1995/s3m/e/epi-frgt.zip 50 * Forgetting Me aradia/EPI /songs/1995/s3m/e/epi-lite.zip 47 *** Light Headed szalemandare/EPI /songs/1995/s3m/e/esp_debd.zip 126 ** Debassed v1.1 Elemental+Watchm /songs/1995/s3m/e/esp_eyes.zip 406 ** Eyes of Despair Watchman/ESP /songs/1995/s3m/k/k_monot.zip 114 *** Monotone karl/Kosmic /songs/1995/s3m/l/lp-dragn.zip 59 **+ DragonWarriorMus LordPegasus /songs/1995/s3m/l/lresort.zip 212 *** Last Resort cerebral neuros /songs/1995/s3m/n/newbegin.zip 133 **+ A New Beginning Mhoram /songs/1995/s3m/n/nicklbag.zip 336 *+ Ladybug Hits ... Hannibal Lecter /songs/1995/s3m/p/painkilr.zip 286 * PainKiller Aradia /songs/1995/s3m/p/phist.zip 250 ** Eagle Phist Hannibal Lecter /songs/1995/s3m/p/p_ecstxy.zip 389 **+ Ecstaxy Primal /songs/1995/s3m/r/repress.zip 356 ***+ Repression Siren /songs/1995/s3m/v/vclm-oph.zip 182 * Night Song (Cru. Vegetablecalm /songs/1995/s3m/v/vo-atlan.zip 262 ** The Rise of Atl. Voyeur / flip /songs/1995/xm/0-9/180.zip 630 *+ Tekno13 Robodude /songs/1995/xm/k/k_synerg.zip 420 *** Synergistic Khyron/Kosmic /songs/1995/xm/r/rivendel.arj 212 **** Rivendell The REW /songs/1995/xm/s/spinwhip.zip 378 *+ Spin Whipping satyriCON =--------------------------------------------------------[Music:Non-Reviewed]-= Location /demos/music Size Description =-------------------------------- ---- ---------------------------------------= /programs/players/cp14.zip 1022 Cubic Player v1.4 by Niklas Beisert /programs/players/cp14l.zip 241 Cubic Player v1.4 lite by N. Beisert /programs/trackers/digitr23.zip 117 DigiTrakker v2.3 by Lard/Rew(Nostology) /samples/gusperc.zip 1454 GUS MIDI Percussion Patches from Roland /samples/proteus1.zip 2033 Proteus 1/XR Synthesizer samples [1/3] /samples/proteus2.zip 1825 Proteus 1/XR Synthesizer samples [2/3] /samples/proteus3.zip 729 Proteus 1/XR Synthesizer samples [3/3] /samples/roland1.zip 2898 Roland SCC-1 Sound Canvas samples [1/2] /samples/roland2.zip 1917 Roland SCC-1 Sound Canvas samples [2/2] /samples/s3msmpl1.arj 608 Miscellaneous S3M Samples (in SMP form) /samples/sw-441a.zip 7435 Korg X5 - 44.1khz samples /samples/sw-blp.zip 2217 Korg X5 - Bass/Solos/Pads/Effects /samples/sw-brwbl.zip 2241 Korg X5 - Woodwinds/Brass/Pads /samples/sw-cust.zip 2357 Korg X5 - Custom patches /samples/sw-d50c0.zip 2650 Roland D50 - ROM card 1050-00 samples /samples/sw-d50c1.zip 3278 Roland D50 - ROM card 1050-01 samples /samples/sw-drums.zip 1063 Korg X5 - Drum patches /samples/sw-pad1.zip 1659 Korg X5 - Pads and Effects /samples/sw-piagt.zip 2012 Korg X5 - Pianos, Guitars, and Organs =----------------------------------------------------------------------[Code]-= Location /demos/code Size Rated Lang Description =-------------------------------- ---- ----- ---- ----------------------------= /demosrc/fcsp2src.zip 32 ****+ A FC's Starport 2 Intro source /graph/plasma/plasma3.zip 16 *** A 320x400 interleaved plasma /graph/sprites/edispr20.zip 66 *** Sprite editor (in french!) /graph/sprites/spriv103.zip 30 ***+ Sprite editor by Discordis /libs/dfmake.zip 39 *** C File concatenation library /memory/rumb117i.zip 57 *** Gives upper mem without EMM /text/tim486.zip 36 **** A Database of CPU timings /utils/bin2arr.zip 29 *+ A C Converts binaries to includes /utils/clay235.zip 167 **** Great 3D object editor /utils/f3d150.zip 322 *** Makes 3d objs. from TT fonts /utils/flos.zip 61 **** DemoPerson's command shell /utils/hsi2arr.zip 68 ***+ C RAW to C-readable array conv. =------------------------------------------------------------------[Graphics]-= Location /demos/graphics Size Description =-------------------------------- ---- ---------------------------------------= /pictures/ajtjpg.zip 2478 AJT graphics pack by Infiny Prod. /pictures/mk-ritua.gif 439 Picture by Mr. Krinkle /pictures/oddy.zip 239 Atrophy /pictures/singgirl.zip 46 Singing Girl by TMK/INF at Bushparty 2 =-------------------------------------------------------------[Miscellaneous]-= Location /demos Size Description =-------------------------------- ---- ---------------------------------------= /hornet/traxw/traxweek.008 33 TraxWeekly #8 /hornet/traxw/traxweek.017 33 TraxWeekly #17 /hornet/traxw/traxweek.018 86 TraxWeekly #18 /hornet/traxw/traxweek.019 102 TraxWeekly #19 /party/asm/1995/a95inv.zip 743 The Assembly 1995 Invitation Intro =-[Articles]=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= =---------------------------[Review of Progression Music Disk]--[Ryan Cramer]-= _____Introduction At last! The long awaited Progression music disk from Necros has finally been released. I will tell you right now, this *is* the best single artist music disk ever produced in the PC demoscene. No other music disk has ever approached the quality of music that you will find in Progression! _____Interface The music disk has a very simple, yet easy to use interface. In the background is a beautiful picture and logo drawn by Xten of iCE. In the foreground, we have a list of six songs and an information box for each song. Everything is extremely clean! You can change songs by using your up or down arrow keys. One thing that I especially liked about the interface was the fact that when one song finishes, it moves on to the next. This is an extremely useful feature that I wish more music disks would incorporate! My only complaint about the interface is that if you want to jump to a song, you will have to scroll down to it and for every time you hit the arrow key, it will load up the entire song. This means that if you want to jump down to the fifth song, your going to have to load the first four while your trying to get there. Other music disks could learn a lot from this interface, its beautiful, simple, and easy to use. _____Music Ok now to the important stuff. The music in this disk is really incredible. When you hear it, you will not believe that it is tracked! This is some of the most realistic sounding music that I have heard. Necros really shows his stuff in this music disk, and I think that this music proves him to be one of the best in the PC music scene. Of course, many of you already knew that. :) The music in Progression makes most other scene music seem like child's play. What you are listening to on Progression is equal to or above the quality of much commercially published music that you might purchase at the record store. In the past, some of Necros's songs didn't have the best quality samples. That is no longer the case, the samples used in the songs on Progression sound like they are straight from a CD. In fact, Necros played and sampled much of the guitar used in the disk. What you are hearing in Progression is as realistic sounding as it gets on the computer. However, these are no pre-fab songs like we've been hearing from some musicians lately. These songs are actually tracked and not just re-makes of something that was originally produced outside of the tracker. Necros has already proved his tracking ability in the past, and the tracking in Progression is some of his best. The music disk consists of six songs which include two excellent guitar tunes (The Crossing & Collage), one hard jazzy tune (Metroplex), one techno/demo/newage type song (Point), one hard "groove oriented" unique tune (Isotoxin), and a grand finale of a song called Grey Note which sounds so live that you will not believe it! As you can see, the disk includes quite a variety of music. There is something there for everyone, however I think that you will find all of the songs to be equally enjoyable. My personal favorites were "Collage" and "Point". The song "The Crossing" was actually Necros's Music Contest III entry, and it will no doubt take one of the top places in the contest. [The song placed 2nd in the Veteran division] _____Conclusion Score, 10 out of 10. There is no question that this is one of the best music disks ever produced in the PC scene. The quality of the music is consistent throughout the entire disk, there are no shortcomings! If you don't already have Progression, get a copy of it right away. Start the disk, lie down, and concentrate on the music ... you will be moved! This music disk definitely raises the standards! Necros can be contacted via email at: necros@axs.net. You can find Progression on ftp.cdrom.com either in the /music/disks directory or the /incoming/music/disks directory under the filename: fm-prog.zip Ryan Cramer / Renaissance - rcramer1@osf1.gmu.edu =----------------------------------[Fast Tracker v2.04 Review]--[GraveDigger]-= _____Introduction Triton has released version 2.04 of their "Fast Tracker," the tracker that is mouse-driven and saves in the MOD and XM (eXtended Module) formats. Some of its features include: easy configuration, FT Nibbles (the game we all know and love), and a sample editor. This version was tested on a GUS Max with 512k of RAM. _____Configuration Upon first loading this tracker, fresh out of the zip file, the default colors were horrendous. However, I merely had to click on "Config," then "Layout," and select a different color scheme (I recommend "blues") to remedy the situation. The mouse pointer is configurable as well, but the default pointer seems to be the best. You can also choose between two designs of "busy" mouse pointers, which are activated when the CPU is in use. The two choices are a clock with a swinging pendulum, and an hourglass which fills up and flips itself when it runs out. _____Sample Editor The sample editor is perhaps the best element of the program, in my opinion. Although FT 2.03 allowed the user to switch to 16-bit sampling, it would crash. Thus, the switch has been disabled in the new version. (Among the bugs pointed out by the authors is "16-bit sampling doesn't work on the GUS") It offers a selection between Line and Mic inputs, configurable sampling rate, and sampling volume. My complaint of the sample editor is that it always shows the file length in hex, which means if one is sampling with the intentions of using the samples in another tracker which has a limit on the file size, it is difficult to get the filesize correct. If you want to loop your samples, you are in luck. The FT on-board sampler allows forward looping (as used in trackers such as Scream Tracker 3) and ping-pong looping (the looped segment is played back and forth instead of in a continuous circle). [This is also known as bidi (or BIDIrectional looping)] Also, to get the smoothest possible loop, there is an editing command called "X-fade." This command will operate on the looped portion defined by editing the sample (depending on the type of looping being used) to create a smooth overlap instead of a noticeable click. _____New Features Among new features in version 2.04 are a CDROM sample dumper, keyoff command using the capslock key, and a dos shell. Samples can be transferred directly from a CDROM drive, which allows for the creating of error-free samples. This is implemented by clicking on the button which is labeled 'CD-Dump' in the main row of buttons. Many users had a problem using the 'keyoff' command because Fast Tracker was coded on a Swedish keyboard. The program does offer selectable code pages as defined by country, and this new feature allows everyone to be able to use a keyoff. One of the greatest additions to this release of FT is the Dos Shell. Joining the ranks of most other trackers with dos shells, FT previously separated the user from their machine with only limited dos support commands intended for purposes of loading and saving. However, the first time I ran FT2, I remember shelling to DOS by clicking on a button. But, after that very first time I ran it, the DOS shell button disappeared, and I have not been able to find it since. The coders managed to remove the mouse requirement when running PMP, the XM/S3M/MOD protected-mode player. Users were puzzled by the mouse requirement while the player had no interface of any sort. The authors had previously stated that the reason a mouse was required was because their VCPI code was all integrated, and removing the mouse portion was difficult. _____Conclusion Overall, the design and layout of Fast Tracker can be a bit confusing. Everything is on one screen, and the lack of hotkeys makes the transition from other trackers which do support hotkeys, a rather difficult one. However, popularity of FT continues to rise, and many of its users are quite die-hard about it. Triton has done well with this upgrade in fixing many quirks with the program as pointed out by its users. I hope they will continue to release upgrades in order to fix more bugs, such as the 16-bit sampling on a GUS, true SMP sample saving (When saving a sample in SMP format, it actually saves in SAM format), better S3M loading support (panning commands aren't recognized), as well as other bugs which they mention themselves. GraveDigger / Hornet - gd@ftp.cdrom.com =----------------------------------------[Music Contest 3 Results]--[Snowman]-= _____Introduction Have you waited long enough? On the newsgroups, in e-mail, on IRC, on the phone, the people are yelling, shouting, screaming "Where are the results for Music Contest 3!?" The results are in, so enjoy! All voting has been carefully checked for accuracy and authenticity. One judge had to be disqualified due to odd voting patterns. Overall, everything went quite smoothly. Due to academics, I have been unable to complete the mc3final.exe today as expected. The results are printed below, but the comments and subscores have been ommited. They _will_ be released next weekend. I would have delayed the release of all results until next weekend, but I felt a lynching coming on... _____Veteran Results Rank Author Song-ID Rated | Rank Author Song-ID Rated ---- ------------------ ------- ----- | ---- ------------------ ------- ----- 1 Jase E-94956 9.024 | 34 Bedlamite E-39342 7.205 2 Necros E-29812 8.841 | 35 Thanatos E-89842 7.197 3 Nemesis E-98842 8.697 | 36 Freejack E-98442 7.158 4 Leviathan E-95642 8.515 | 37 Hades E-48866 7.153 5 Big Jim E-95264 8.347 | 38 Soundwave E-56172 7.089 6 Markell Moss E-45554 8.309 | 39 Falcon E-34854 7.077 7 Shikando E-98138 8.206 | 40 Breeze E-59438 7.037 8 Ryan Cramer E-79942 8.138 | 41 Replay E-59874 6.899 9 Bar E-69547 7.989 | 42 DJ Tek E-29612 6.888 10 Firelight E-74556 7.964 | 43 Lord Pegasus E-98942 6.862 11 Esper Division E-43864 7.957 | 44 Khyron E-54752 6.846 12 Future Assassin E-09344 7.953 | 45 Bert E-40259 6.840 13 Blanka E-93442 7.882 | 46 Chris Whitney E-86224 6.828 14 Teo E-91347 7.858 | 47 Phoenix E-79362 6.781 15 Asyntote E-69447 7.857 | 48 Dark Wolf E-89072 6.639 16 Vizz E-91944 7.854 | 49 Wally E-93746 6.604 17 Crusader E-89562 7.837 | 50 Hollywood E-67384 6.516 18 Krystall E-79014 7.809 | 51 Audiokraft E-43053 6.437 19 SLiCE E-09161 7.800 | 52 MALY E-24755 6.418 20 Hukkart Live E-91042 7.797 | 53 Tatekuni Ito E-40752 6.400 21 Octoque E-92148 7.766 | 54 M. Janiszewski E-29932 6.183 22 Jester E-93343 7.658 | 55 PeriSoft E-99452 6.149 23 Zapper E-29044 7.598 | 56 Grave Digger E-19024 6.056 23 Lloyd Yoon E-04045 7.598 | 57 Rama E-86234 6.027 24 Primal E-69962 7.581 | 58 Mhoram E-12242 5.984 25 Epeius E-93244 7.556 | 59 Draygen E-98742 5.708 26 Sirrus E-92442 7.535 | 60 Mild E-84962 5.313 27 welti E-93542 7.484 | 61 The Soulman E-44753 5.296 28 Vivid E-45153 7.463 | 62 The Crow E-12342 5.000 29 Stalker E-49812 7.459 | 63 TheHacker E-62822 4.945 30 Rasto Skultety E-84657 7.437 | 64 Thor E-93612 4.909 31 Nexus E-98343 7.435 | 65 Quarex E-14325 4.832 33 PrOtOcOl E-19124 7.396 | 66 Mr. Crazy Head E-19424 4.264 32 Psibelius E-06427 7.346 | 67 E.v.Y. E-39413 4.216 _____Rookie Results Rank Author Song-ID Rated | Rank Author Song-ID Rated ---- ------------------ ------- ----- | ---- ------------------ ------- ----- 1 Mayhem O-95444 8.740 | 34 Human O-98462 6.602 2 Morph O-09144 8.188 | 35 Joel P. Thornton O-39962 6.591 3 Spyder O-40052 8.144 | 36 Shao Khan O-89144 6.554 4 Tangerine O-95760 7.984 | 37 Fly O-44159 6.547 5 Zoso O-74452 7.889 | 38 Festa O-40156 6.520 6 Clef O-93946 7.843 | 39 Mute O-41852 6.470 7 Luv Kohli O-95342 7.832 | 40 claim O-34052 6.425 8 Zeus O-93162 7.798 | 41 Bozart O-64054 6.382 9 Atlantic O-19646 7.580 | 42 Shrike O-29342 6.250 10 Pirat O-97093 7.552 | 43 Beppu O-59642 6.236 11 The Pope O-39244 7.500 | 44 jUicE! O-67287 6.224 12 Aquatic Nuisance O-89442 7.489 | 45 Kenzaburo Ito O-48752 6.164 13 Shuffle O-69647 7.437 | 46 AmusiC O-78080 6.077 14 Kal Zakath O-34652 7.378 | 47 Castile O-09746 6.010 15 Airon O-40853 7.370 | 48 Nero O-92512 5.964 16 Nas-T O-99849 7.303 | 49 Fredrik Lundqvist O-71789 5.926 17 Riders O-14876 7.298 | 50 Austin Huang O-79642 5.877 18 Monaco's O-94151 7.293 | 51 Kapper O-79742 5.831 19 Blackwolf O-89712 7.237 | 52 Populus O-69144 5.786 20 Undertaker O-92042 7.222 | 53 Andre Uesato O-90651 5.763 21 Darth O-92712 7.217 | 54 Sopepos O-59241 5.724 22 Chaotic Mind O-49516 7.191 | 55 Devious O-90352 5.720 23 Daf O-07223 7.140 | 56 Swift Rain O-92662 5.712 24 Malakai O-09524 6.945 | 57 Thomas Lundgren O-78489 5.671 25 NecroMancer O-70942 6.891 | 58 Synergist O-49312 5.604 26 Neuropsy O-79842 6.851 | 59 NightStrike O-41152 5.420 27 Karl O-29142 6.847 | & Red Penguin 28 Daedalus O-79242 6.814 | 60 White Owl O-59344 5.409 29 Heaven O-94257 6.795 | 61 b0bby O-39544 5.407 30 Vector O-95944 6.780 | 62 Brantley Lancaster O-98642 5.072 31 Cerebral Neurosis O-91432 6.777 | 63 Miss Saigon O-37752 4.942 32 MASTERWho O-41252 6.747 | 64 VooDoo O-99361 4.766 33 Vladimir The Wik O-47483 6.658 | 65 Charles Odom O-98242 2.786 _____Conclusion All results have been checked and there is little chance of error. If you have any questions or comments concerning the results, feel free to send me mail. However, it may take a few days for a response. Look for mc3final.zip at an ftp.cdrom.com near you next Sunday. Snowman / Hornet - r3cgm@ftp.cdrom.com =------------------------------------------[The Japanese Demo Scene]--[rot-N]-= [This article was taken from the comp.sys.ibm.pc.demos newsgroup] Hello. I'm rot-N. If you feel this is hard to read, please remember English is my 2nd language :-) I'd like to show you Japanese demos. Well ..... no ... None. Nothing I can introduce to you. Instead of showing you Japanese demos, I will report why there is no demos produced in Japan. Main PC used in Japan is PC-98 series. This PC was designed to use in Japanese office. Their display have 16 colours 640x400 pixels in a screen. But that screen display device is not upgradable, and their screen resolution is fixed to 640x400 pixels, they don't have low resolution mode. (for example 320x200 pixels 256 colours). PC-98s hi-resolution graphic screen (640x400 16 colours) is 2 times slower than PC-ATs mode-13h (320x200 256 colours) graphics. And they have less colours. 16-colours are not enough for games. So when game publisher made a game for PC-98, they gave up making high-speed graphic routine. But they tried hard to display beautiful colour (colour of skin especially :-) ). Then they thought, the only 2 games that they can use that routine are graphic-ADV and graphic-RPG with naked-Jap-animation girls. Yes. Those kind of games don't require fast graphics routines. Last time I had been to Akihabara (famous electronics town in Japan), I was looking for a software to see what kind of games amateur programmers are coding. Awesome... hmm what's awesome? They are sold in shrinked package. In the package there are manuals floppys and a photo of the game's screen shot. Almost all of that photo are naked- Jap-animation girl's pictures. I think something strange when think about the gamer playing those kind of games in there room alone. (sitting in front of the console , looking display , saying "strip off... take off clothes... " wao :) No need to say, the girl on the screen is not photo realistic. I say again, they are all Jap-Animation girls. Can we call them PC-Gamer ? In the other hand, games for other consoles (NES,SNES,Genesis..etc) are fine. When Programmer write a game for them, he does not need to think about the speed of the screen. There VDPs power is strong enough. So naked-Jap-anim-girl games for those console are minor. But unfortunately amateur programmer can't make games for them. So amateur programmer in Japan knows how to display colours (of the skin :-) on the screen beautifully. But does not have technique to display on screen faster, say to do vecter graphics ... Last time I had been to Japanese book store , I found a book about CG. I expected vector graphics and voxels, but they are all "How to draw Jap-animation Girls" :-) I found "Shading" in that book, but it is "shade of human (woman :-)) body" May be you can find why "OTAKU" is negative word in Japan :-). By the way , European coders have AMIGA and their Mega-Demo culture. When they bought fast 486-PC, they began to make demos for PC. But in Japan, only a few people knows Amiga, and limited person in that group knows Amiga-Demos. The lack of Japanese demo is caused by strange game culture in Japan. (that culture is caused by PC-98s slow screen). So as long as Japanese people using PC-98, they have their own PC-Game culture. You don't need to pay attention to Japanese Games and Demos. Do you want to see naked-Jap-animation girls in the demo, instead of cool shaded vector graphics? Thank you for reading my poor English. rot-N =------------------------------[Interview with Zodiac/Cascada by Ryan Cramer]-= Greetings! This is the first interview that I've done in a long time. Those of you that read DemoNews back in the days (about a year ago) probably recognize my name as I used to do a lot of these interviews. Well I am very pleased that DemoNews is once again back, and we have an awesome interview for you with Zodiak of Cascada! Zodiak is the veteran of all scene veterans. He was probably the very first PC DemoScene musician. His group, Cascada, existed back when there were no other demo groups on the PC. He has seen the PC scene change over the years and is a very fascinating person to talk to. Our interview here covers a lot on the vintage days of the scene. Besides the fact that Zodiak has been in the scene for so long, he also is one of the scene's top musicians. In the charts, Zodiak has always been in the top five musicians in the scene. Anyone that has heard Zodiak's music (which probably includes all of you) knows how incredibly talented Zodiak is. It would be impossible for me to list all of the projects that he has done music for over the years. He has done music for demo's such as Cronologia (the scene's first real demo), HexAppeal, Holistic, and many intros. He also won first place in the The Party '94 and The Party '95 multichannel music competitions. Zodiak also has a music disk with $volkraq coming out soon which will really be nice to hear! I was first introduced to Zodiak's music when I saw Cascada's Cronologia demo for the first time. The music was awe inspiring. The song "DarkDays" from the Cronologia end credits has always been one of my favorite songs. Many scene musicians were introduced to the scene through Zodiak's music (including myself). Zodiak is definitely one of the scene's most respected musicians, and I am very happy that we were able to do this interview for you to read. The interview was conducted via email in early July 1995. Enjoy! RC = Ryan Cramer / Renaissance - rcramer@osf1.gmu.edu ZK = Zodiak / Cascada (Erik Stridell) - zodiak@kuai.se ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- RC: What is your current occupation, age, and where do you live? ZK: I'm in my 19th year and live in a little town called Surahammar, just outside Vasteras which lies about 120 kilometers west of Stockholm - the capital of Sweden. My current occupation is...none - I guess you could say I'm happily unemployed. I will most likely be working full time with our (Cascada's) Virtual Reality project as soon as we can get some more funding but until then I guess I'm stuck out here in the countryside... I might take a course in studio-technology in the autumn. RC: Can you tell us how Cascada originated? What were your first productions, and how long ago was this? ZK: Well, there was in fact no demoscene on PC when we started. I think it was sometime in 1989. I had a little group together with Shadowbyte (currently a Codeblasters-member), but I guess we weren't doing much, we mostly played around with his Amiga. We weren't very old I guess... hehe let's see.. - '89, I must have been 13 years old and Shadowbyte was 12!!! I had been swapping programs with Iceman (who later coded most of the Cascada stuff during 1990-93) and I know he could do some stuff in Turbo Pascal so I asked him to do some intros for my group (we actually cracked some games - which was not that hard back then when there were only three new games released per month ;-) ) and later tried to get him to join our group, but he had found a friend in Pharos (who coded everything that Iceman didn't during the same period) who wanted to start a new group. And he could program in assembler (it is important to understand how incredible this was in 1989)! However I was very happy when Iceman called me up a few weeks later and asked me if I wanted to join their new group, Omega. We cracked some games and made trainers during 1989 and half 1990 but then in the summer of 1990 we decided it didn't make much sense so we started to think about making demos on PC like the ones we had seen on Amiga. So after lots of theories in how you could do a music system on a PC we released the infamous X-mas'90 demo which was the first demo ever with a music system. Some people claim that the Future Crew was before but I insist that their slide show that was released a few months before is not a demo, just still pics with music ;-)) It didn't matter anyway because there were no contact between the scenes back then, only national competition - and our competition was the SpacePigs. If you don't count our scrollers and colorcycling bouncing logos back in 1989 for the group Omega, I guess the first real production was out in early December 1990. RC: Cascada is considered to be one of the founders of the PC demoscene, especially with their ground breaking Cronologia demo. Can you describe the demoscene and Cascada to us at that time? ZK: When Cronologia was released, lots of things had happened to the scene. First of all, the bbs-scene had started to prosper. This meant that the days of mailswapping had come to an end. Before that my only contact with the world outside was my mail to Dutch Computer Enterprise (the makers of the Dragnet demo) who supplied me with all the mid-European stuff and with BCG/Sorcerers who got me the stuff from Finland. I like to think I really did the scene a favor at that time, distributing everything over the borders. However, when Cronologia came there had been many new groups popping up and we had had the first PC-only party ever (I think at least) - the SpacePigs/Cascada party in Uppsala in the summer of 1991 where we even had international visitors - Dutch Computer Enterprise. We had shown Cronologia there which was originally called "Time", a mix of part two and three of Cronologia. Then Pharos coded the first part and Iceman the last part and we thought why not do a megademo. We were a bit afraid that it would be considered too big though... it didn't fit on a 360kb disk!!! After lots of messing up and making other parts (that wasn't included in the final version, we had from the beginning seven parts). We had also got some new members, for example Jeffe and Mirage who are still members. I think my biggest mistake ever in the scene was to write my own address instead of Iceman's in the text files. I shouldn't have directed the reactions to myself. I got all the fancy letters (and there were MANY letters!) while Iceman and Pharos who had done the hard coding just got some nice words. This finally caused them to get tired of the scene - so much work for nothing. If Iceman would still have had the spirit I think Cascada would have been a much bigger name today, for example he made a real bitmapvector just a few weeks after Cronologia which he didn't want to release because we didn't have anything to go with it. Imagine a textured cube in January '92! So take this as a lesson, kids! RC: How/When did you get started tracking music and on what platform? What other musicians influenced you at this time? ZK: In early 1990 when Pharos made his music system there was no such thing as a working PC-tracker. So I bought an Amiga. I wanted to do that anyway, all the fancy demo came on that platform. I guess I was very inspired by the early Amiga-demo-music cause that's all I got hold of, I never had the contacts to get new Amiga stuff (and I didn't care much either, I just played around in Noisetracker). So I was mostly inspired by "real" music, which was probably good for me because that made me develop my own style very early. There was just about no techno-music at all back then so I tried to do just plain good songs with the instruments from the ST:00-04 disks.. Then in 1991 I got to be the beta-tester of the SpacePigs' tracker Digistudio (which was later released commercially by Covox) so I started tracking on the PC instead, and all the mods in Cronologia are made in Digistudio (with a noisy resistor-D/A in the LPT port). RC: You have done a lot of fantastic music over the years, what do you consider to be your best work? ZK: Thanks! Well I wouldn't call it fantastic but I admit there are tunes that I am quite happy with. I always tend to tire of them before I'm half finished though and they never ever sound like I wanted them to, but then when I listen to them a few weeks later I kinda like some of them. Believe it or not, but that horrible hard-rock tune in the middle of our first demo, X-mas'90 is one of my favorites. If the samples weren't so horrible it would have been perfectly good power-rock. ;-) Then I "sort-of-like" Reflecter, I was a bit nervous when I made it that it would be just total crap to all other people - maybe I was the only one who would understand it? But I was proven the opposite in the Party4 voting. ;-) RC: What software/hardware/equipment do you use for tracking and sampling? ZK: I currently have a Gusmax which I used to be very happy with but am not anymore as the card itself takes in a lot of noise from other cards which can cause some fuzz and silent clicks. I use FastTracker2 for everything, sometimes I do use USS8 for sampling things in high resolution and sometimes CoolEdit to make flanging, filter and white/brown noise. RC: What experience in music do you have outside of tracking? ZK: I play the guitar in a band which does currently not have a name. I would like to get into the music-industry more. I guess you could say we play the kind of music that comes in between Joy Division and PJ Harvey... To be honest, most of my music-creativity rather goes into that band instead of the tracker-tunes, so that's a reason why I am not usually very productive. Hope you'll all be buying my albums in the future! ;-) RC: What is the future for Cascada and Cascada/VR? Will you be doing more demos (maybe for ASM'95)? ZK: I like to think we will but to be totally honest I doubt there will be any bigger productions from us. I think there are chances that we will release small stuff just to show our routines to people now and then but unless we can find some more coders there won't be any more large releases. So any good Swedish coder who wants to join in, contact me! The next production from me is a musicdisk I'm doing together with $volkraq/Gollum, dedicated to all you fans of guitar music. It was going to be released at the Bushparty but not too surprisingly I didn't make it in time... Guess it should be out soon. RC: Who's better, Pamela Anderson or Erika Eleniak? Give us an objective unbiased comparison. Do you think that Erika will ever return to Babewatch? ZK: Pamela was better until she married that stoopid heavy metal drummer and started to make silly tattoos. Erika was undoubtedly a better actor (like if that would matter..hehe), and her body measures are much more natural than Pamela's. She's by far more woman than Pamela will ever be. And she could weep much better. I agree that Pamela makes it better in Playboy magazine, but she shouldn't wear a swimsuit, she looks better without it. Besides, Erika is a much more beautiful name ;) So ERIKA!!! Come BACK! ALL IS FORGIVEN!!!!! Interviewer's Note: Please note that the above opinions do not necessarily represent those of the DemoNews crew. Some of us have grown more partial to Pamela Anderson, but Erika Eleniak will always be welcome in any one of our homes. RC: You have been part of the PC demoscene since its birth, can you tell us how it has changed over the years, and if it as interesting as it used to be? Oh.. that's a hard one. For my part I think it was much much much more fun before when everyone was always friends with each other, when you released or showed something new you always got positive criticism along with the possible negative one. Nowadays it sometimes seems (at least in the mailnets like GSN and DGI) that it's almost not allowed to really like a demo. Especially the finnish people just can't seem to like the new stuff. Everything sucks. Always. It's so childish! In the beginning of the scene nobody had to brag or show off, everyone knew what had been done and what to expect from each other. But something happened after "Unreal". It's very hard to define what, but the scene became very hard and sometimes cruel, and it's just getting worse. Some people felt that they had to be as cool as the best groups so everyone who wasn't as experienced as themselves were suddenly lamers, and all their work sucked. If I had been working on a demo for many months I wouldn't want to hear that it sucks!! I think many new groups who make demos aren't encouraged by the glory of being on top, they want vengeance and respect. Why do groups have to fight each other??? I don't know what has happened but I have many times found myself wishing it was 1990 all over again. RC: For awhile, Cascada and Imphobia had merged, but soon separated again. What happened, and why? ZK: The reason for the merge was mainly that the only really active person in Cascada at the time was myself, and as we weren't doing anything for the scene I helped Imphobia as I had found a good friend in Jeff (Darkness/IMP). This little co-operation ended up in a merged group. We worked on a demo that was to be released at the Assembly'94, but the time schedule screwed up completely (as it always does when you make demos) so we didn't make it in time and then the coder had to study etcetera etcetera so the demo wasn't finished off. We both tried to make the cooperation work but it was impossible to keep in touch as neither of us even had email back then so I decided to simply leave the group, that would be the best for everyone. And since Basehead joined Imphobia they've got a brilliant musician anyway, so they don't need me anymore. Going back to question five, I really like the tunes I made for the unfinished Imphobia-demo because they came directly from my head and were really great fun to do. Pity if no one will hear them in the end.. but I haven't lost faith in Imphobia! RC: I'm not sure that everyone understands exactly what Cascada/VR is. Has Cascada successfully gone from a demogroup to a commercial software company? Has this been profitable for Cascada? I think that many demo groups aspire to one day form a company. ZK: Cascada/VR are just the four Cascada members that are currently developing a VR-system; myself, Robban, Roberto(Hellraiser) and Mirage. We have a company but nothing is happening with it. Since 1993 we have been struggling with different contracts with a few companies but we unfortunately haven't yet succeeded to get all the funding right. It has not yet been profitable in any way whatsoever! But we're hoping that it will be in the future. A word of wisdom for all you demo-enthusiasts dreaming of doing what we have done: - Think twice! No, thrice!! Four or five times is not too much!!! Don't think there's any easy money involved in this business. Be ready to work your arse off for absolutely nothing in return. If you make it through there can be lots of money involved, but be well aware of what you're getting into. RC: What are your current musical influences, either in recorded music or tracked music? ZK: That's hard to say.. I don't get any inspiration from tracked music. It might sound weird, but music that gives me inspiration often sounds totally opposite to what I am doing. Usually melodies just pop up in my head or leak to my fingers while playing the guitar. I guess I could drop some band-names, I am a great fan of Indie-pop and alternative rock-music; The Verve, Smiths, Pavement, Portishead, Slowdive, The Stone Roses, Catherine Wheel and so on, but I also like jazz and atmospheric music like Mike Oldfield and Andreas Vollenweider. Of course good old pop like the Beatles and the Box Tops. And Paul Simon rules ok. I guess it's safe to say that I appreciate all kinds of music. RC: Are you competing in MC3? ZK: Unfortunately not, I didn't make it to the deadline. Hopefully next time around. RC: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview! ZK: Thanks, we'll keep in touch!! [End of Interview] ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hope you enjoyed the interview! Zodiak can be reached through email at: zodiak@kuai.se Ryan Cramer / Renaissance - rcramer1@osf1.gmu.edu =-[Advertisements]=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= =------------------------------------------------[PMODE/W v1.20]--[Daredevil]-= PMODE/W is a replacement for DOS/4GW and is fully compatible with WATCOM C/C+. PMODE/W provides you with a number of advantages over DOS/4GW. The following is just a small list of what you can expect: - Extender size is less than 10k - Self contained extender is internal to the EXE - Eliminates the need for DOS4GW.EXE - Fully compatible with WATCOM C/C++ - Fast execution time - Protected mode EXE compression - Low memory overhead - Does not require ANY extended memory to load OR execute - Minimal interrupt latency - Uncompressed PMODE/W programs can run under DOS/4GW without modification - Free for non-commercial use Changes In Version 1.20: - PMWLITE executable compression - See UPDATES.DOC for bug fixes PMODE/W v1.20 has just been released. You should be able to retrieve it from one of the following sources: FTP: ftp://www2.idsonline.com/pub/pmodew/pmw120.zip ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/demos/incoming/code/pmw120.zip [check the "New Uploads" section to see where this file gets moved] BBS: Data Connection BBS +1-703-506-8598 +1-703-847-0861 Charles Scheffold / Renaissance - daredevi@dorsai.dorsai.org =-[Subscribing]-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= _____How to subscribe to DemoNews #1 E-mail to listserver@unseen.aztec.co.za (any subject line will do) #2 On the first line in the body of the mail, write: subscribe demuan-list FirstName LastName Examples: subscribe demuan-list Christopher Mann subscribe demuan-list Snowman subscribe demuan-list r3cgm@dax.cc.uakron.edu <---- WRONG!! The listserver will automatically take the return address of your mail. That address is where newsletters will be sent. You can not specify an alternate address. #3 Send it _____How to UNsubscribe to DemoNews #1 E-mail to listserver@unseen.aztec.co.za (any subject line will do) #2 On the first line in the body of the mail, write: unsubscribe demuan-list Do not specify any address or name when you unsubscribe. The listserver will automatically take the return address of your mail and unsubscribe it. You can not specify an alternate address. If you know that your e-mail address will soon expire, please unsubscribe it. _____Having Trouble? If you have difficulty with the listserver, feel free to write Snowman at r3cgm@dax.cc.uakron.edu. =-[Closing]-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= For questions and comments, you can contact Hornet at: Handle Address Area ----------- ------------------------ ----------------------------------- Dan Wright dmw@inca.gate.net Freedom CD coordinator GraveDigger gd@ftp.cdrom.com columnist, file mover, musician Snowman r3cgm@ftp.cdrom.com organizer, editor (DemoNews), coder Trixter trixter@ftp.cdrom.com coder, web master, file mover ...........................................................End.of.DemoNews.097.