MEMORIES
FROM ATARI
PARTIES
As we grow old, we grow numb and nostalgic. Being already numb, I didn't pay
too much attention to the second feature :) But now that I look back over my
Atari years (not meaning in any ways that it's over !) I realize that I have
attended quite a lot of Atari parties where I met nice people who later became
friends. All parties were not great for sure, still I was there. Let's see if I
can recollect interesting memories from these parts of my life.
Party Number 1 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : PLACE TO BE AGAIN
Date : August 1994
Location : Mont de Marsan, South of France
Distance : about 900kms
The very first party I attended was actually really huge esp for a party that
gathered legendray ST crews such as Diamond design, Holocaust, Dune, ACCS and
many others. I don't * even * remember non Atari crews (but surely there were
some :). Above all I remember spending two sleepless nights, talking with
Sceners for the first time, playing ATARI games, watching demos... I remember
that on the first night (even before the party actually started), a guy came
to us. He had run out of gas and spotted some light from our gymnasium. We
offered to give him a hand and then returned to our beloved machines :)
What happened on the third night ? Well I had been awaken for about three days
and suddenly felt tired (no shit) so I took a nap before the compos started. I
never should since I woke up on the following morning and completely missed
the compo :( Damn was it when I started being a lamer ? :p
On the plus side, this party also gave me the incredible opportunity to meet
and talk to Niko. He kindly showed me about 300 piccies he had made !!! Seeing
the first ones (kinda really ugly monster with mirrored body), I came to think
that I wasn't that bad :)
Party Number 2 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : MEGAFUN 5
Date : November 1994
Location : suburb of Lille, North of France
Distance : about 700 kms
This party was my first meeting with someone I sincerely consider a valuable
friend tho a lousy gfa coder :) Sure this is Thyrex ! I stayed at his parents
place before we moved to the party and they were just great (and still are).
they welcomed me as if I was a member of their family and I will always be
grateful to them. The party itself was small but friendly as about 20 people
were there, in that school room. Later some guys played football in the yard,
while Sergent Slayer (another cool friend) tried to understand how that damn
coffee machine worked :)
That was also the first time I played and tried Jaguar games : AVP found me
hooked from the start and I remember yelling when some nasty alien jumped at
me while I was desperately looking for ammo :). Last but not least I was taught
some antialiasing secrets by Pegase, back then gfxman in Adrenaline. I could
name all the people at the party but there were mainly guys from NLC,
Adrenaline and Atrocity. Quite a bunch of nice loonies !
Party Number 3 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : STORK ???
Date : summer 1995
Location : Tampere, Finland
Distance : a few thousand kms :)
In summer 1995 I had to achieve a two month training period abroad. Having
made friends with Jani Penttinen aka Creator of AGGRESSION I decided to try my
chance and I got the opportunity to work as a game translator at HOUSEMARQUE,
then makers of SUPER STARDUST.
Let's go to Finland then ! On my first day with my very friendly host, we went
to a party organised for Setok's birthday if I remember well. That was the
first time I came into contact with Swedish and Finnish sceners such as guys
from XTREAM, AGGRESSION, DHS and some others I may have forgotten. That was
really nice (except for the realtime article trial on a Finnish keyboard :).
Not much happened there but definitely I had to meet more foreign Atarians !
Btw do you where Wiztom of AGGRESSION got his nickname from ? Well I won't
unveil the secret, just know that it implies a drinking party and a carpet
that wasn't meant to welcome some vomit :)
Party Number 4 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : GIGAFUN 96
Date : August 1996
Location : ??
Distance : ??
It took me some time to try and grab memories from that party : at that time I
was in the army (in France you still HAD to in 96 !). Thyrex had a great laugh
when he spotted me with my extra short hairtcut :) If you've ever met me, just
try to fancy me with almost no hair and try not to laugh to death.
Except for a powercut during the first night, this party wasn't unique in any
ways, still it was nice meeting Thyrex again after two years. I also attended
this party with a great friend, Eric, who had never had any contact with any
Sceners before. He was just curious about freaks like you and I, so we went
along. I think he really liked the craziness of what he saw :)
Party Number 5 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : VOLCANIC PARTY 3
Date : February 1997
Location : close to Clermont Ferrand, south of France
Distance : about 700 kms
Here comes the lame part... I really can't remember why I attended this party.
Maybe because of the party fever that was growing warmer inside me. Also some
French Atarians such as the guys of Supremacy or Typhoon were to be there I
guess. This party was set up by French PC crew MENTASM. They gave us as an
introduction a really nice animated sequence introducing their mascot, some
kind of coooool dinosaur. Maybe I am getting confused with a later edition of
this party, but I cannot check it and who cares ? Not much to say about it :
many, really many, PC lamers or gamers. Atarians were such a minority that
only few people actually noticed us with our strange machines.
Party Number 6 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : VOLCANIC PARTY 4
Date : February 1998
Location : close to Clermont Ferrand, south of France
Distance : about 700 kms
Hum... Another edition of a lame PC party ? Really I cannot find excuses to
explain my presence to this party :( Again a 95% only PC party with the usual
lamers (really stupid a behaviour they had to us !!). All compos entries were
kind of sucky to death, fast and boring 3D stuff showing so little imagination
that the whole Scene spirit was aching at it. Let's skip it !
Party Number 7 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : INTERJAM 98
Date : May 1998
Location : close to Karlsruhe, Germany
Distance : about 250 kms
My first REAL Atari party abroad ! For that one only BouB and I represented
the French scene. On that matter I have to mention that BouB cheated on me as
I paid gas and other expenses for the both of us. He later offered to give me
an FPU as payment but he NEVER sent it, no need to say more about this lame
attitude (esp as I lent him my monitor so that he could work on his Falcon
Command and Conquer clone that never made it :).
Fortunately I have more interesting memories about that party : first I met a
lot of German Atarians like guys of tSCc, Moondog and above all... a newcomer
nicknamed 505 :) At that time nobody knew him and later on I sent him an
interview sheet for the following issue of Toxic Mag. I don't know if you
remember it, Nils, but from then you've become a real friend to me and I hope
we'll be friends for the many years to come !
This party was rich in ST releases with a Syntax demo, another tSCc 4kb (the
fish screen), another Mod Compilation and issue of UCM if I'm right. Also Grey
was there to present TIME OUT which is still a great Falcon demo ! I felt a
bit lost among these sceners as they already knew each other but I think
that's when I decided that the Atari spirit was still alive, maybe not in
France but better drive a few hundred kms more and meet friends, than waste
your time in a boring PC party.
Party Number 8 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : JEM
Date : August 1998
Location : Strasbourg, north east of France
Distance : about 200 kms
Another bad memory I'd rather skip for life, but let's try to tell you why.
This party was organized by some ATARI association headed by Rayban and Speedy
some lamers that can still be met these days on #atari.fr. First of all let me
tell you what the letters JEM stand for : Journees Europeennes du Multimedia,
in other words European Days of Multimedia. Does it sound as sucky in English
as it does in French ? I sincerely hope so !
Thyrex was there once again and this time for business as we were to complete
our long awaited ST megademo Back In France. Erm we had a wrong start as
Thyrex discovered the internet (thanks to a French provider acting as a
sponsor) and spent about 8 hours in a row surfing the web ! I had to remind
him that we were here to complete and present our demo to the competition. A
newcomer named Frost was there too and later on I offered him to join, a
collaboration that didn't last nor bring anything productive.
Still Thyrex and I spent almost three days completing our demo and I remember
playing around whith Thyrex sources, changing colours or typing texts for the
various screens. If you read them again you'll surely notice several typos due
to extra tiredness from me. We finally made it, a few minutes before the
deadline and that's when things turned to nightmare. Actually our ST only demo
couldn't be seen on the video beamer as it was * NOT * planned to support ST
connection. What ? Are you telling me that the Atari organizers hadn't planned
to see ST stuff ? They told us that they'd find a solution but nothing came
out until Thyrex and I heard the organizers announce in public that "LOUD!
decided to withdraw their ST entry". We were both angry and disappointed at
such crap but couldn't do anything. Our demo Back In France was released as an
unpresented entry later on. Surely you can guess how sad we were...
Party Number 9 ---------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : VOLCANIC PARTY 5
Date : February 1999
Location : close to Clermont Ferrand, south of France
Distance : about 700 kms
Okay call me stupid or something ! Why did I attend another edition of this
lame PC party ? No idea to be honest. As before very few Atarians here. Still
the guys of Sector One were there and that's when I met Edo, DmaSc or Exyl,
really good and talented friends ! I also met CyberFranck, now known as ZED,
an Atari newcomer and brother of CosmosH (hi Herv‚!). But this party really
got me sick from the start : tho about 400 people were awaited, more than 900
actually showed up ! On the first night, the organizers announced that the
place couldn't fit more attendants and that you should phone your friends and
tell them not to drop by. There was also a lame notice in the toilets telling
us that if any damage was to be done, the party would be cancelled with no
refund. Erm no good signs to start with...
Heat was almost unbereable in there with all those PCs running Quake or
similar shit. Pc sceners didn't even try to get to know each other !! I tried
to find good reasons to survive till the end, talking to the few Atarians who
were there or with former Atarians like Zappy/Holocaust or Patapom/Hemoroids
who, now on PC, were getting bored by all this. This party found me convinced
that no French party would ever draw me in ! The Atari Scene was somewhere
else and surely it was time to see what was going on abroad.
Party Number 10 --------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : ERROR IN LINE
Date : April 1999
Location : Dresden, Germany
Distance : about 700 kms
As the party "grand opening" was getting closer, the list of attendants grew
larger, bringing the whole active Atari Scene to one spot : Dresden. I mailed
a lot of Frenchies to get them to come over but in the end only Frost and Edo
joined into this journey. I first drove to Frost's the day before the party
and spent the night there. The day after we picked Edo at Strasbourg station
and headed for Germany. Our ride was smooth except for the crappy quality of
highways (that when you know that these are the oldest in Europe :)
The party place - the now famous "underground" - welcomed almost 100 people
mostly hardcore Atarians. The presence of Polish guys was a nice surprise too
with lots of vodka :) I won't tell you more about the party itself as most of
you were actually there. It was greaaaaaaat ! Many people to talk with, great
friendly atmosphere with the Dutch occasionnaly trying our courage with home
made food which proved quite tasty in the end :)
Everything was nice except for the food we had brought with us, courtesy of
Frost's parents who thought we would starve. As a result they gave us a full
chicken, cheese and several parts of apple pie. A part of our survival package
didn't quite make it till Dresden and the now melted cheese surely signalled
our presence to German people... Yes it was us :p
I will always remember Grey showing me the final version of BREATH desperately
trying to hide it from curious eyes. He almost got an heart attack when he
tried to install it onto my harddrive before the demo was recorded as a compo
entry. Uh ? Yup the demo just did NOT run ! An Grey who always wants to bring
the best was about to shed a tear :( Well the demo would have to be run from
floppy (is it slower on floppy ? I don't think so but Grey had his idea).
Later on, some days indeed, I found out that my HD driver sucked a lot and
just refused to load some prgs. So Grey : it wasn't your fault nor your MB
fellows ! Now the demo runs fine from HD but you must know that by now.
To put in it a nutshell, EIL was just *perfect* : people were cool, organizers
just ruled and did their best to keep us fully satisfied and they made it
flawlessly. I only wish more Frenchies had been willing to drive till there
and show their skills but I know many of them later wish they had. A lesson
for the following edition ? Hey how do you know about that ???
Party Number 11 --------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : SILLYVENTURE 2000
Date : April 2000
Location : Gdansk, Poland
Distance : about 1,500 kms !!
The longest and craziest Atari roadtrip for sure ! Before leaving, I was to
welcome famous black haired French barbarian : Zerkman :) He slept at my place
and we headed for Dresden on the following morning. We were to meet Nils and
his brother Norman at the previous EIL partyplace. Nils was actually our third
passenger into this journey. We spent the night at his place where he served
us strange but really good homemade food. Later Joe Cool and Spion joined in
and we shared interesting talks before we decided it was time for some
sleeping.
Day 2 : As we tried to pack Nils stuff into my small Polo, we started to think
that this Tetrislike situation would drive us mad :) A few hundreds kilometers
farther I stopped to refuel and check my tyres pressure. The nice girl at the
station shop told us that such machine was to be found in the backyard so
that's where I took my car. The so usual checking quickly turned into a pure
nightmare. First the tube socket didn't fit my tyre and as I insisted I had
the opposite result as I saw my tyre grow flater than ever !! There was no way
that damn machine would help at all. At some point I gave up and turned to my
fellows as we had to think of a solution. Nils thought of using some gas spray
sold in the shop to pump up my tyre. The only bad thing was that the spray was
mostly meant to fix damaged tyres ! In other words my tyre socket would be
glued to the top... what really didn't find me happy with ! Eventually, the
station manager came over, seeing us as hepless as lost, and managed god knows
how to get my tyre back into business with the same stubborn machine !!! We
got started after that episode and several kms later when we stopped again I
spooted a regular pressure machine. I was really amazed at finding out my
mistreated tyre pressure was really too high !!! Erm it could have blown up on
the highway, really !
The rest of our trip to Gdansk was without surprise, which was good news
actually :) We even managed to find the partyplace at night and with the help
of a Polish pedestrian who could hardly speak English. The party itself
doesn't need more comments, report to SV2K can be found in some former issues
of Alive or UCM.
There were fewer people than expected surely because many didn't know what to
expect from such trip in a remote and no so safe sounding country. Most of us
were very eager to pay for the guarded parking lot option, indeed !! Polish
people were not aggressive to us, maybe except for some - probably - drunk
young guys who tried to enter our high school nest to know more about the
freaks hidding in there :) Some Polish also tend to have knifes when walking
around, erm some local tradition or something ?
Day 3 :
I still have some cool and amazing memories about that party : the incredible
work done by Grey with a real tourist tour, just for us ! Our frequent rides
to midtown in search for food, meeting shopkeepers who could not believe we
actually bought that much food (and beer :). Above all, it seems like handing
out a credit card is some kind of heresy in Poland people always stare at you
as if you were labelled Public Enemy. Still the girls at the nearby gas
stations were really cute (as most Polish girls appeared to be to me !).
Finding decent food was almost impossible and the small places we ended up
served some food whose real contents I am quite not sure of. And what could I
say about coffee then ? It was like hot and liquid shit and we decided that
beer was definitely healthier :)
Going back : it was already time to get back from that nice tho a bit deserted
party where Polish guys just didn't talk to us, because of their lame English
I think. The trip back home was almost smooth except for a lot of disturbing
traffic jams and slowdowns on the highway. We stopped at Dresden at 10 pm and
then we had a decision to make : on the following morning, meaning a few hours
ahead, I was to work and couldn't afford to abuse Nils hospitality anymore.
Were we to rest for a while or hit the road again ?
The last part of the trip was really speedy in spite of growing tiredness. We
finally reached my place (yep I didn't forget to bring Zerkman back home :) at
about 5:30 in the morning. Zerkman went to bed while I unpacked my stuff,
seeing no point having a sleep 2 and a half hours before going back to work.
At 8 am a long workday started as I had 10 hours of lessons ahead. Needless to
say that I fell dead on my bed later that day :) Maybe this 19 hour long drive
also got me overtired, who knows ? :)
Party Number 12 --------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : UNCONVENTIONAL PARTY
Date : September 2000
Location : Legensfeld, Germany
Distance : about 600 kms
Why did I drive 700 kms all alone in my car to attend this modest and mostly 8
bit interested ATARI party ? Surely because I knew I'd meet again some friends
over there, a good enough reason to me. The party itself doesn't bring many
memories except for the over active 8 bits Atarians and the strange games Mad
Butscher got us convinced to take part to :) I won't bore you again with the
ATM incident as you can read about it in previous issues of this mag.
This party strongly reminded me of past Mega Fun parties with a bunch of nice
loonies gathered by passion and willing to get to know about their neighbour.
Btw as I spent some time out, reading on a bench, it doesn't mean I got bored
at all ! But being the only French meant being lost in an unknown language sea
of words, which turned to bring some headache afterwards.
This party didn't bring anything significant to the Scene but it was a great
gathering of ATARI friends, the kind of party worth a 700 kms drive.
Party Number 13 --------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : ERROR IN LINE 2
Date : April 2001
Location : Dresden, Germany
Distance : about 700 kms
My comments on this party may seem short. Hey that was *only* some months ago
and you can find several part reports in the EIL2 Alive Special. Let's try to
find something new here.
First noticeable memory is that story about my car rear window smashed to
pieces. Some godlike punishment ? Could be yep ! That same day I bought a PC
to be used for my computing lessons. So far I had used my father's old PC but
the crappy accessories he kept installing, were really getting on my nerves so
I made a step forward and spoiled money on this crappy machine. The monitor
included in the bundle was 19 inches wide and was into a huge cardbox, adding
to the already too big carbox containing the rest of the demon. My Polo boot
soon decided it was too small to welcome them and my best efforts only found
me closing the boot door and finding out that some corner of a cardbox needed
more space. That was enough to destroy the whole window !! Windows killing car
windows isn't it ironic ? I phoned several garages but due to the next day to
be non worked, they couldn't replace my window before two days... Seems like
some ATARI god had punished my fool intention to buy a PC. Weeks later that
same PC fell to pieces and was returned to the after sales services of
Continental Edison who decided after a month or so that they were just too
busy to fix it. The next day, I asked for refund and started from zero again.
Today I have another PC which runs fine but nothing more, except for insane
error messages of course...
Back to the party itself : it went really smooth and friendly, right from the
sart when we settled down close to Paranoia. I already bored you with the air
mattress incident so let's see what's left. I did not see any naked girls in
the bathroom up there, tho I overstayed in the shower waiting for girlish
voices in vain :)
The party was good, the pizzas were good and the beers too ! It was all quiet
but once again very friendly and no other incident occured except for my
credit card which refused to work when at the trainstation... Since then I've
changed bank btw :)
Party Number 14 --------------------------------------------------------------
::
Name : PARACON 3
Date : December 2001
Location : Selters, Germany
Distance : about 400 kms
Since I didn't write a full Paracon 3 party report I'll use this space to tell
you my own views about this event. I first met Matt' Us Alem also known as
Kephy on irc. I picked him up at the local station, after work, and brought
him back to my place. The following noon, after finishing my lessons, I met
ST Cooper who was waiting for me at the same railstation. After 2 non stopped
working days, I drove the all of them to Nieder Selters or something sounding
like that :)
We only met one final incident, when heading for the highway exit. The Paracon
Instructions read that this curve was "tricky" but it turned out almost fatal!
As I steered on the right, I spotted in a thenth of a second, a second way on
the right : the exit !!! Damn it was almot a 180 degrees curve ! Seeing that
my speed was too high to run a chance, I stopped as soon as possible, ending
up in the gas station I had confused with the exit. Now stoppped, we had two
solutions in mind : either drive on and take the next exit or... risking a run
out there in reverse. I put my "warnings" signals on and went to the exit,
ready to face opposite cars (we actually met one and went thru fierce horning)
but we shortly found ourselves on the right way :) Driving was peaceful after
that.
As we reached the party place, I checked my watch and told my Atari mates that
all shops usually closed at 4pm on Saturdays in Germany. Enough time to buy
some food and lots of beers tho we were told that International credit cards
were not accepted !
Later on, Zerkman and I started drinking beer while the party was gradually
living on. People here were mainly from Paranoia, Escape, tSCC, Checkpoint,
FUN plus the few Frenchies we were :) Some people were working, coding or
composing stuff for the compos but I preferred to look around and talk to some
fellows. I have to admit that the week pressure added to an excess of booze
rushed me to bed quite early, tho I have no memories from this part of the
party. Later on, I heard about what I did during the msx compo :) Hey why
shouldn't BURRRRRRRRRPS! be considered as a realtime entry ???
On the following morning, I woke up in a damp sleeping bag... I knew there
were some leaks problems with the heating but didn't think I would also get
wet :( Luckily a fat breakfast was awaiting me downstairs with coffee, hot
bread, butter, cheese and various kinds of ham, hum my favourites !! Enough to
get me fully awaken ! Later Paranoid showed some nice games on his Dreamcast
and we ended with a full * Chu Chu Rocket * demonstration with Dynacore. This
second - and already last - day combined lots of talks with some demonstration
all in a very friendly atmosphere ! time passed by fery fast until it was time
to say goodbye. I greeted all the great friends I had met during the few hours
I had been able to attend there, and then we left.
Our trip back went smoothly, with no incident and my two guests left shortly
after. I don't know what I could add except that tho shortened, due to work,
this party was really cool and friendly !
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In the long process of remembering all these events and trying to bring old
and odd memories to the surface, I have voluntarily skipped two parties :
first the UKONX - or something like that - organized by some Amiga crew in
Vesoul about 40 kms from my place. Since some ATARI dudes were to be present,
meaning Sector One and Chuck (who refused to shake hands with me !!) I paid
them a few hours visit to check on them :) In summer '99, I also attended a
small CPC party called Ze Meeting in Bassoues, a deserted spot right in the
south of France, where I met CosmosH, his brother (again) and some friendly
CPC freaks. These two events being of little interest to this article, I just
thought it was useless to bore you with them.
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Writing this - hopefully not so boring :) - article is not only a nostalgic
look at my Atarian years but it also helped me draw this conclusion : Times
have changed a lot and more than once, once big and feverish our Scene has
gradually been reduced to a small community. At the first parties I attended I
felt like having an ATARI was some sort of magic "password" to the unknown and
mysterious world of Sceners. As a newcomer, I was so happy to meet legendary
people I considered as ST gods ! Most of them proved as human as me and talked
to me with no prejudice, neither did they look down at me. Still the heart of
these meetings was the ATARI, not the people hinding being nicknames. Great
times for sure but where the human factor was easily put aside.
From the unforgettable Error in Line, the Scene "essence" or "pure" existence
changed to something more familylike. No Scener pretended to be the best and
not talk to you because you were of an inferior "class". It was just about a
bunch of guys, mostly friends, gathered to party and talk to each other. Fewer
people for sure, but people you could rely on, talk you, exchange ideas with.
That's the scene I want to belong, being a member of the great family, equally
regarded as my fellows, not because of what I have done before. I always feel
happy, but intimated, when someone comes to the 'famous' STS :) It feels good
but I never keep this feeling going and try to show newcomers how to follow
the path I have walked over the years. Some of us, and they are more numerous
every day, just decide to pay a visit to an Atari friend for fun, not even
working together on a secret project or talking Atari all day long. As I write
this, I also realize that at the last parties, my Atari was barely switched
on. At the Paracon3 it even stayed in my car. Did I miss it ? No !! I can use
it every day, the way I'm doing tonight, but the friends there, well I cannot
meet them that regularly so that I am *always really* happy to see them again,
know about their life, problems, dreams and so on. Real friends to put it in a
nutshell !
Then I see no reason why I should stop being involved in such a creative and
friendly community. Of course time knows limitation and right now I am working
both on this issue of Alive plus on some gfx for a long awaited demo that'll
be out as soon as I can kick myself into a faster and stronger state of
activity. Luckily, I am on holidays so that I can dedicate most of my spare
time to these activities.
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