[demo] Electric Night by Dune and SMFX

Here's the winner of this year's Atari Falcon demo compo at Silly Venture. It could have benefitted from a more tight pacing in my opinion, but otherwise it's undoubtedly a top notch Falcon prod with great style. I especially dig the underwater scene.

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[demo] Ancient Wonderworld's Amiga Summer Favourites

Round two of clearing the backlog of great demos that have been released in the recent months. Today, I'll be taking a look at 3 of my favourite new Amigaaaaaaaaa demos.

Exhibit A: "Omnimetatheorem", a very solid 64k intro for Amiga AGA by Software Failure. While the "transparent polygon" effect is nothing new on AGA, the facts that this is a 64k AND was put together by a single person (ham) makes it worthwhile. Second place in Euskal's combined intro compo.

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So you think you need AGA to do threeedeeee? Well, have a look at "e255" by Bomb, Sanity, and Dreamdealers, then. This demo for the classic Amiga 500 (with harddrive support, 1MB chipram, and 1.5MB slowram, though a final version for lower specs has been promised) is not just pretty impressive in terms of it's code, but is also fresh-looking and super stylish. Well-deserved first place at Evoke's "alternative demo" compo.

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Last but by no means least, I've got another AGA prod here. This one is by no other than the mighty Ephidrena, making a comeback after 4 years of absence from the scene. Well-paced, timeless visuals, superb music, and first place at Solskogen's oldskool demo compo, here's "Neonsky".

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[demo/album] The Chiperia Project Issue #5

Yeah I know, I'm massively behind on all the great demoscene releases of the past month. This is partly due to me having been on vacation, but also due to lack of motivation in recent times. But fear not, I have no plans on giving up Ancient Wonderworld for now.

Anyway, time to start clearing the backlog. Mid June saw the release of another installment in the Chiperia musicdisk series for the classic Amiga computer. And once again, it is an absolutely top-notch collection of original Amiga chiptunes (in the original sense of the word), made by some of the best musicians in the scene. I'm simply amazed how these folks can keep up such a consistently high quality.

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[demo] SaboTagE by Paradox

Almost 10 years in the making, here's a new Atari STE demo by Paradox. SaboTagE tells a story set in a not-too-distant post-apocalyptic future, where global communication is controlled by a few mega-corporations (huh? I thought that was already the case...). The story itself could have been more developed in my opinion (especially the ending falls somewhat flat compared to the grand opening), but top-notch music, quality graphics, and never-before seen effects make for an overall very solid release.

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[demo] We Were @ by Oxygene

Fantastic new Atari STe demo, came in first in the wild compo at STNICCC.

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[demo] Satan Stole My Atari by Lamers

Let's interrupt the Chaos Constructions galore for this lovely new Atari STe demo by Lamers. Perhaps not the greatest prod on earth, but it sure is a hell of a lot of fun, and thus, well deserved first place at Riverwash's oldskool compo.

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[demo] Oh Five! by Pacific

A very joyful Amiga OCS/ECS production from the Pacific crew. Top notch synchronization, and an awesome rasta plasma sphere in the middle. Second place at Gerp's Amiga demo compo.

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[demo] Be Kool Fool by Focus Design

Wazzup folx, everything Kool? Check out this absolutely Kool Amiga AGA prod from Focus Design, which won the Amiga demo compo at Gerp this year.

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[demo] pulse by Checkpoint

Time to get word out about this Atari ST beauty before it starts to smell ;) Here's the second place in the Atari compo at Summarhack 2015. It's maybe worth mentioning that this lost to DHS' streaming music entry by just 1 point.

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better video at dhs.nu

[demo] Binary Roads by Software Failure

Nice 56k Amiga AGA intro by Software Failure. Nothing too spectacular, but well paced and cheerful. First place in the combined intro compo at Euskal 2015.

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Btw for the next 10 days or so things will be a bit slower than usual on here, as I'll be going to Germany to play at the Ohrbit Festival in Duisburg, among other things.

[demo] Travel by Resistance

Sorry for the silence folks... real life was getting a bit in the way recently, but I hope to make up for it in the coming days.

So, today we have a neat Sega Megadrive/Genesis demo by Amiga veterans Resistance. Actually not so veteran at all, as this is not only the groups' first Megadrive dempo, but supposedly it's also Nainains' first forray into coding.

Not that many effects to see here, but the graphics and music are slick, and on top of that, some fresh Sega stuff is always highly welcome of course. The demo came in 3rd at Solkogens' oldskool compo, by the way.

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[demo] Gagrakacka Mind Zone by Disaster Area

Check out this brand-new, top-notch demo for classic Amiga. Took first place in the Oldskool compo at Flashback this year. Well, can't go wrong with a name like "Gagrakacka Mind Zone".

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[demo] Reborn by Appendix

I believe I haven't posted this little gem of an Amiga demo yet... first place in the 64k Amiga intro compo at Revision 2015, here is Reborn by Appendix.

Yeah, I've said it before, I normally don't post Amiga AGA prods here, but well... see for yourself.

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[musicdisk] The Chiperia Project Issue #1

Actual Amiga chiptunes are becoming somewhat scarce today. So I'm very happy to announce this lovely new music collection for Amiga OCS/ECS. Featuring some cute works by Wiklund, vedder, TRiACE, Dascon, notorious, and more.

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[demo] Are We Dead Yet? by Dekadence

The time has come again again... what time, you ask? Well, the time to break my usual rule of not posting Amiga AGA stuff (don't get me wrong, I like all Amigas, I just consider AGA somewhat out of scope for this blog).

So, without further ado, here's the well-deserved winner of the Amiga compo at this years' Payback party, 'Are We Dead Yet?' by Dekadence, for the unexpanded Amiga 1200.

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[demo] Prods from GCWDDI

Finally the video captures from the Global Convention of Worldwide Demo Developers, Inc. have started to roll in. Well, actually they appeared a few days ago already, but I failed to notice since I gave up checking daily a while ago. Aaaanyway... here we go. Might as well post them all, except "Part Deux" by Evolution, which has still not been capped (if it actually isn't vaporware altogether).

There was only one compo at this ominous Atari party, with some pretty restrictive rules. Prods had to be coded within 48 hours iirc, and could use only one bitplane.


1st place: Baby, instant soup doesn't really grab me by KÜA and Reservoir Gods, for Atari STe

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Tied for 2nd: Remote Entry #2 by Spice Boys, for Atari ST

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Tied for 2nd:  Who Made You Judge Judy And Executioner? by Excellence in Art, for Atari STe

My favourite prod from the compo.
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4th place: A few dots by SPKR, for Atari ST

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The captures were provided by STEve, who recently set up a neat Atari themed blog at ataricrypt.blogspot.co.uk.

30 Years Atari ST and NES

So right now all the tech sites and nerd blogs are drooling zombi-like over the current CES' massive output of soon-to-be-outdated hipster gadgets. But can you remember a time when CES was actually cool? A time when companies presented new technology there that even 30 years later would in some respects still be unrivalled by anything that came afterwards?

January 1985 must have been such a time. At that year Atari, under the recently assumed leadership of Jack Tramiel, presented it's first 16-bit computer, the ST (actually a 16/32-bit hybrid, hence the name Sixteen Thirty-two). Thanks to Tramiel's less-than-favourable reputation, and with Atari being close to bancrupcy at the time, reactions were sceptical at first. But consumers knew there were in for the real deal (except those who for some reason bought that other machine starting with A... you know which one I'm talking about, right? Yes, the Acorn Archimedes of course xD). In less than a year, the ST turned around the company's fate.

Fast forward 30 years. The ST userbase is still a significant force to be reckoned with, and a solid amount of new music, gfx, and demo productions are released every year. And to this day, the Atari ST remains the only computer that has 100% accurate MIDI timing. So, here's to another 30 years!

On a side note, Nintendo was also at CES that year. There was little reason to suspect that the unassuming lead gray contraption they were presenting was already a huge success in Japan and would eventually become one of the worlds best-selling home consoles of all time...

NES prototype, photo by gingerbeardman

[demo] Fleisch Bitte GmbH Ad 2/3 by Up Rough

Harharhar... More Fleisch Bitte ads for the Amiga OCS/ECS.

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Download/discuss

In case you missed the original Fleisch Bitte GmbH ad, you can find that here.

SGDK 1.00 / XGM Music Driver for Sega Megadrive

SGDK, the Sega Megadrive/Genesis Development Kit, has reached version 1.00. With it comes an exiting new music driver called XGM. It supports 4 channels of PCM playback at 14 KHz along with the usual 5x FM, 4x PSG channels. Programmers will also be happy to know that it runs entirely on the Z80, leaving the 68000 free for game/demo logic.

SGDK comes with a utility called xmgtool, which can be used to convert .vgm files to the format required by the XGM driver.

A test rom with various sound examples can be found here. More info is available on the SGDK project page.

[demo] Sunglasses at Night by Ghostown & Whelpz

A stylish oldskool Amiga (OCS/ECS) demo by Ghostown & Whelpz. 2nd place at Riverwash 2014 combined demo compo.

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