WHAT IS...
A
GOOD DEMO...
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According to STS point of view after being at Error In Line 3
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As Error In Line ended a couple of weeks ago, I thought this article could
be of some use especially since this party brought a LOT of ST demos of ALL
kinds : old school, new school, stylish stuff, brutal code and more ! As some
of these demos have already reached us (lots of stuff still missing tho) it may
be interesting to try and see what actually makes a demo a GOOD one ! Of course
this article is fully impregnated with my opinion and you don't HAVE to agree
with me, the more opinions, the best ! That's what we call democracy !
So this is my VERY selfish point of view on the releases or demos seen at
EIL3. This article is not meant to offend anyone and I would be sorry if it did
but since I'm a truly demo lover I thought my comments could be of some use :)
Please don't tell me you're going to stop doing things because of this because
everyone knows I'm a lamer, so who cares anyway ???
MOVING INTO DARKNESS : new school fx, great msx, great gfx and overall - as
always in my humble opinion - a great mood : Evil and his fellows managed to
bring us great fx (esp the mapped pillar screen !) with messages and lots of
nice and dark pictures ! You surely know I am -no- cuddly bears and naked women
lover so of course I liked the whole atmosphere of this demo ! Dark stuff added
to nice fx give us a full demo with a real "standing" ! it's not even about
judging skills but about how you feel when watching the result : well I just
LOVED it and have been watching this demo about a dozen times already !!
ILLUSION : yeah I know that this long awaited demo isn't available yet and I
REALLLY hope it's gonna make it soon since this demo was presented at Place To
Be Again back in 1994, the very first Coding Party I attended ! Too bad I fell
asleep after two sleepless nights and hence missed the compos :( You are going
to think I'm a nostalgic lamer and I assume that, since enjoying this demo at
Error In Line 3 (after some floppies troubles :) really made me go gooseflesh !
I almost felt like crying to say the truth ! Now you can say - the way I did
with Moondog and Modmate back at Unconventional - that I'm a nostalgic lamer !
Yes, I LOVED Illusion and it brought me back a decade before when I would have
given my life to defend the Fuji flag ! now I can only hope that we can ALL
enjoy the demo pretty soon !
GRIMEY : the first EIL 3 entry by Reservoir Gods to be made public ! First
there is the music I really love ! I've never heard such music before : a kind
of jungle based tune, with loud bass and heavy synchro effort with the fx (very
nice looking stuff too). I guess that every one will not like it but this demo
definitely has a peculiar touch that makes it sound and look different from
anything else ! At last something new ! I hope to hear and see more from DAMO
now !
POSH : crazy coder Defjam is back and ready to kick some asses ! As always
he manages to push all limits far beyond everything else (in my humble opinion)
tho POSH crudely lacks polishing, unlike demos like Darkness, but coders don't
give a shit about design hey :) It strongly reminds me of Holocaust demos (tho
they always were stylish) with brutal code at its best : you want it faster and
bigger ? Defjam will do it ! A pure code demonstration that shows that our
small STs still have the guts for more stunning fx ! POSH isn't out yet but I
hope Defjam is working on better design. I have to admit he has original ideas
tho like the torus fx mixed with various pictures. This is a TRUE demonstration
of CPU power !
HALLUCINATIONS and FANTASIA are more old school demos than new school but
this is in no way a bad thing ! It's a good reminder that nice colors DO matter
a LOT ! No borders removed for sure and most fx have been seen before but old
school means to me mixing nice looking fx and gfx and surely these two demos
won't contradict this point of view. No sky rockets but good demos for sure
with strong talents on all sides : fx, gfx and msx ! old recipes always work as
we say :)
The "_" demo by ESCAPE brought once again some fresh air to the Falcon Scene
tho to be honest we were NOT that surprised this time, opposed to their HMM
release back in 1999. Still this demo, without a name or called "underscore" ?,
brings a mystic atmosphere mixed with great msx by 505 ! In my opinion this is
not a demo anymore, it's an experience ! Fx look great but aren't so surprising
anymore, esp maybe for the awesome bee part :)
BEAMS by tSCc brought something different tho strongly based on a peculiar
atmosphere rythmed by Mc Laser's tune ! I don't remember a lot about this demo
esp as it hasn't been made available yet as I write this but I'm REALLY waiting
for it as it showed very unique fx and above all an -AWESOME- soundtrack all
mixed together in a perfect harmony ! A bit like "_" but with a completely
different feeling... Can you see me drooling ? I hope not :)
To wrap it up, let's finish with a few words about ECHOS, the 96Kb entry by
DHS/Evolution/New Beat. To speak the truth I only have a basic Falcon and
surely the intro doesn't look so smooth on this config but it shows that some
people are still focusing on the future of Falcon while most of us are eagerly
waiting for the CT060. Nice effort, can't say more since I have NOT seen the
intro run on the planned machine :)
Last words :
Well if you have read this article correctly you must have understood that
you and I will like all different kinds of demos ! Sorry if I didn't name all
of them but I thought it was kinda useless :) There are demos I mostly liked
because of their soundtrack (Grimey, Beams), others that I liked more for the
atmosphere (Darkness) or overall design (Fantasia, Hallucinations) or even the
shock of seeing such impressive code (Posh !) but I don't want to reduce all
these demos to this !
Once again, this is my VERY personal point of view and I -AM- pretty sure
you've enjoyed ALL demos the way I did for different reasons. Dunno if I'm the
only one who's observed this but never before has a Fuji party brought so many
different styles of demos ! Yes we are ALIVE and, yes!, we can bring a lot of
FLAVOURS ! Thanks to everyone who's still active and was involved in Error In
Line 3 entries !
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