Reviews - 2002 year demo review: Alter Ego, Reject, Laya, Lovemaker, Harm, Abyss Of Madness, Losing Victoria, Inbetween, Summermilk, demo21, Black & White, Traffic Of Death, Invasion, The Loop.

<b>Reviews</b> - 2002 year demo review: Alter Ego, Reject, Laya, Lovemaker, Harm, Abyss Of Madness, Losing Victoria, Inbetween, Summermilk, demo21, Black & White, Traffic Of Death, Invasion, The Loop.
Demo Review

elph / CPU

elph> Lately, I began to feel the
lack of professionalism when reading some party stuff reviews.
It's about demos in particular. It
is either funny and frivolous, or
just unprofessional. Anyway, such
reviews make me think, that someone should do only what they are
competent in, or learn for more on
practice as those, whom I've invited to review the 2002 year's 
demos and who are still perceiving the knowledge of the making. 
As for me, they are experts in each

sphere of the art they are presenting and, an important thing, 
understand. So, it is always interesting and instructively to 
know opinions expressed by Miguel, Diver and Flying.


Alter Ego

Miguel> Dicks-dicks here,
dicks-dicks there, everywhere
dicks-dicks ... It becomes quite
clear from the very start of the
programm that this is a Hooy Programm release. I wont say 
anything about the content of this megademo

but the music is the thing that I
should pay attention to. It is far
from ordinary european oldscool
spectrum music that I've heard. I
don't know what was the reason for
putting this unusual music into a
demo made in europe, but I like it
as a varied and full of ideas
track. I think that the author is
self-confident and he made exactly
what he wanted to:) But there are
some defects in this tune. As in
the majority of western modules
samples are slightly distorted,
that makes'em to sound not so good
as possible. And the logic of combining the track is a little 
different from that I used to call 'High technics'.


Diver> Hm, it's a good idea to use
Yerzmyey's graphics along with
standart chunks, because it can be
applied just fine. If you haven't
paid attention to Yerzmyey's crazy
visions you can see them here, because the second part of the 
demo contains the old works and some

new. As for me, Yerzmyey's style
looks funny - expression, crazy
smiles and quite qualitative contours.

Flying> Another work of the group,
which is known for it's original
style and sense of humour. It seems that the main purpose of 
demomaking for HPRG is fun, nothing matters in means of getting 
into this condition, while others try

to concentrate on powerful programming. And this demo is not an 
exception from this rule. 

Technically, the most diffucuilt
effect in a whole demo is a spinning 3D dick-styled sausage with
gouraud shading. And the main problem here is that polygons 
must be sorted because the object is not a

convex one. Besides this, I should
mention about precise calculations
used here, the edges of the object
don't shiver, as it could be using
8-bit mathematics.

The other effects are usual: a
chunk plasma, the attribute analogue of which was made by
Baca / DMS in Brain Surgery in
1997; sinusoids, which RST7 used
in 1995 ... But that plasma used as
a background for amasing
Yerzmyey gfx (coloured dog is really cool) looks good indeed.

Of course, this demo isn't a masterpiece, but this fact seem to 
be not very important for HPRG. The

Demo has it's own style and that
is the main thing.

Reject

Miguel> No comments.

Diver> Not bad oldschool design,
clear and accurate, but nothing
special at the same time, cos the
author is a musician at first, not
an artist. Probably, the main purpose of this product isn't 
design or gfx, but music, jokes and

texts.

Flying> All I can say about this
demo was said by the author in the
final scroll:)

This demo could be called 'a demo
without a coder 'as you can remember Funtasy from Funtop'98:)
However, the idea and it's realization are good enough. 
'Originally' designed greetings for each of four

platforms made in each platform's
style - it's very cool.

Laya

Miguel> Baze roxx:) Confident and
qualified. I think it's a talant.
Although I'm not a fan of music like that, but I'm pleased with 
its quality.


Diver> Though it contains no
graphics, just a set of converted
b / w images, I cannot leave this demo aside of this review, 
because high designed demos in 2002 can be

counted by fingers. And Laya design can be called 'high quality'
accurate synchronization with
great music, well applied layer
principle, a couple of hi-res features, weird slogans:). Anyway,
looks lovely, but I still can't understand what's described on 
those layers-looks like porno, insects

and brains:).

Flying> This small demo continues
the line which Baze has started in
The Loop. The same style -
chunks, one main effect for the
whole demo, very exact music synchronization and a plenty of 
small details, which seem to live their

own life and make the whole demo
complete in the same time. It looks amazing altogether. Of 
course, considering only technical stuff,

neither Laya, nor The Loop is
tight in code, it is not neccessary in both demos. But at the 
same time I can't expect 'lame' programming from Baze:) As Baze 
said: "I made these work basically for

myself ". Nevertheless, many people
can acquire a lot of positive vibrations while watching Laya and
The Loop.

Lovemaker

Miguel> In this demo I do appreciate that the main idea really 
matters for skreamer. He tried to realize the feelings he had 
at that time, and I think he succeeded.

And he was not interested in what
the scene would tell about it, he
just made the demo about himself.
That roxx! So and music is filled
with that anxiety, so nervous and
irregular, it makes me feel the
same. Very impressive.

Diver> Author says that this is a
pure nocode stuff. Damn, it's bad
when gfx is made not by an artist,
so in addition it becomes a pure
nographics too, though there is something like gfx: did anybody 
understand what's placed on the beginning screen? This is a 
DOLPHIN :) However, reviewing this demo

considering just gfx or design
might seem stupid, cos the result
of such review could be rather
strict - 'lame', especially comparing with the next work. And if
Laya is the first example of extreme nographics realization, 
the piece of the fine design, then Lovemaker is another 
nographics realization, it's an expression, sensual drive, pure 
emotions. 

Flying> Demo (16kb intro, to be
correct) is designed in a easy to
recognize style of skrju. Minimalism in gfx, a set of sound 
effects instead of a melody in music, good code, tight 
synchronization, psychodelic text, which is not so easy to 
understand for most of people - all this is a result

of a creativity of a couple:) of
young sceners, amazing the scene
with their extraordinary releases
and behaviour. I think, that skrju
is the most outstanding event on
Spectrum scene for last few years,
the people who gave another life
to our Speccy. Almost everything
that they make causes a storm of
opinions, even close to a scandal,
and at the same time makes scene
to react in the right direction -
the direction of creativity.
Hmm ... Let's get back to the demo
:) Lovemaker.

I think, that this demo could be
named as "How to tell a story of
an unlucky love using three sprites, a
font, a few samples and a short
text ":)) Maybe it's too long for
a title, but it's close enough to
my opinion about this work. Now,
looking at this intro, one can
see, that skrju understood the
main principle of a good intro very well - to make as more as 
possible using a very few of elements. This principle was 
implemented at the high quality level, resulted in a few 
minutes of action leading the audience into the deepest 
thoughts. Uneven, original, ragged music combining with 
accurate synchronization brings the main demo affection. No 
need of difficuilt effects here, cos they would corrupt the 
whole picture, drawn using a little piece of code. So,

greeting to skrju, I wish them to
entertain us with such works again
and again.

Harm

Miguel> I wouldn't say that I'm a
Key Jee fan ... And how can i judge
the music if it is unfinished? Of
course, Nik-O tried to make it more complete, but it's not the 
way, so ... That's all ...


Diver> Here is another extreme
piece, probably, the worst comparing with two previous works. 
It seems that authors relied on gfx and code only, or maybe 
they just can't design like Baze and feel like skreemah. What's 
about gfx - it's good. And it is due to pROF

rather than Diver as someone could
have thought, cos Diver is just a
well experienced performer ... and
noone have noticed that the final
picture which had been rated very
inadequate on the ascii'02 party
is a pure nocopy, excellently realized, so many others can envy.

Flying> Serious work, pretending
to be one of the best Speccy demos
in technical aspect from famous
4th Dimension and their talanted
partners - Triebkraft.

Really, CyberJack / TBK made the
whole speccy scene understand,
that not only Placebo and Brainwave can work with 3D object at
3.5MHz and 128kb memory of our
Speccy. His code is generally recognized as the most optimized 
and the fastest for 3D objects which

has ever been used in Speccy
demos. Although, the difficuilty
of 3D scenes, amount of effects
and features used by Placebo in
their demos is much higher, and
Brainwave, showing their abilities
in multicolour still shocking everybody, but I should say that 
they had made their masterpieces not

from the very start of their creativity. So, technically, Harm 
is a high quality demo, and it should

be seen not only from outside, but
from inside too (through monitor)
:) I think, every coder will be
pleased using both ways of observation:)

One more detail, which I should
mention here - Harm authors showed us again, that the new effect
is a quite forgotten one. As a
fact-greets are no more than a
combination of horizontal scroll,
blob and environment mapping,
which we could have seen before separately in other demos thru 
the past few years. But anyway, this

mixture of well known effects resulted in a new good looking 
picture, no matter of it's simplicity (And maybe due to this). 
As for me, I like the effect that authors

call 'double stretch'. It can be
found in many demos on the other
platforms and if realised well is
a very good looking effect, as it
is in Harm. The only drawback, basically considering the demo 
effects, is that they are similar to Placebo ones. And this is 
boring. Actually, who cares how the effect

looks in code when there is the same action at the screen?

Demo graphics are made well too,
no doubts this time, especially
when you see the credits with
Diver/4D and pROF/4D in the list.

And now music. As for me (though
I'm not a specialist here) it is
poor. The melody is very simple
and unexpressive, and it's not the
single drawback. The main problem
is that starting from the 2 / 3 of a
demo, synchronization begin to disappear and this process 
continues till the end. It seems that

authors just left it on itself (it
is worth of party version, but
unexcusable for final release).
Then, I think, Key Jee had chosen
the wrong tempo for the soundtrack
it is slower than the action on
the screen, an this circumstance
makes the demo look slower and the
CyberJack's optimization - useless. You can compare Harm with
Refresh by Extreme - the slower
3D scenes are more spectacular due
to the drive produced by the soundtrack made by Visual. So, it 
would be nice to see all of components of a good demo compiled 
together in the next works of these groups to bring us a real 
piece of art!


Abyss Of Madness

Miguel> Ahim is Ahim, there's
nothing left to say. His style (or
maybe just the only way to do something in music) is well known,
especially for russian sceners and
users. I only had to clean the
technical drawbacks (they can be
found in every Ahim track) before
sending it to RGI and to help with
fixing after that. And so I did.
But a little later I was shocked
with the result. There is a good
question - what's the use of the
fast track when the demo effects
are too slow not even for music,
but for the whole demo, which
can't be called neither oldschool
nor newschool. It's another
school, I think, the school of ANTIdemoism:) And the main task 
of this ANTIdemoism is to strike upon

the rest of demomakers, make them
see the other side. But I think
that's good, it's just the example
of what shouldn't be done in any
circumstances. Real abyss.

Diver> Really funny. To repeat a
STOLEN screen for six or even seven times saying that it was 
made by another two dudes ... I can not remember anybody doing 
like that, it is very original! I recall some facts

of stealing the fragments of a
screen, recolouring, mixing and no
examples of dealing in such impudent way. It makes me compare 
this demo with Lovemaker by skrju.

This is the case when I'm at 200%
agree with Raver saying that
english text fits the demo better
than russian. And if you're taking
gfx made by somebody else it's better to ask the author about 
it's use beforehand like skreemah did

with bizk's characters used in Lovemaker. What else can I say?
Crap ...

Flying> I had a very strange
impression after seing this
demo ... On the one hand, it has
nothing special in code - all of
the effects or their modifications
can be found in demos from mid ninety's. Graphics also brings no
pleasure (by the way, almost no
graphics is used). Besides, obvious faults in code, resulted in 
a black screen for 5-10 seconds or

stopping effect (things which are
not accepted in any demo), are irritating me. The ending is 
clumsy, music wraps bluntly and epilogue

appears. The effect that looks
like 'Life' game with it's length
reminds me the last effect of Excess demo by Zer0 (as you can
remember, it was released at Enlight'97).

However, on the other hand, the
whole demo brings the positive emotions (more positive than 
Harm, which was the concurent for Abyss

Of Madness at Ascii'02). I can't
say what exactly makes me feel
so ... Maybe lyrics, that produce
the atmosphere of mystery and
heed. Maybe effects that aren't
diffucuilt to make, but they appear in the right places and in
the right form. Maybe it brings
the freshness among the majority
of demos made in a past few years
leading in one direction - 3D
graphics. And finally, I just loved greets - very simple and 
very beautiful.



Losing Victoria

Miguel> Ordinary european music.
Nothing more.

Diver> Why nobody had such idea to
exhibit his work at Assembly before? Oldschool demo compo at 
this party is held since 2000. But there is a need of a 
representative of your work and a real michine to

run it. On the other hand, CC / CAFe
parties are usually held at this
time too. So I can understand why
nobody had competed at Assembly,
although we must not forget about
the possibility of such performance. Gasman didn't manage to
join the oldschol compo, 'cos he
had his spectrum dead at that
time, so he performed his work in
wild compo and the results were
not too bad-7th of 13. I could have thought that Summermilk is 
a copy of Losing Victoria, but there was no possibility of such 
remake in a short period of time between

Assembly and CAFe, where the
demo by skrju was presented. I
guess both (Gasman and skrju)
authors have the similar way of
thinking. However, Losing Victoria has no outstanding desing or
even gfx, nevertheless, it looks
pretty.

Flying> This demo is remarkable
just because the fact that it is
the only work, made on ZX
Spectrum and presented at the biggest European demoparty
Assembly'2002. Was it worth of being there and presenting our 
platform on a worldwide scene, or the first effort has failed? 
Looking at the results of this party

(Losing Victoria took 7th place
among 12 works in compo)-it may
look not too big achievement. Though considering the fact that 
this work had to be presented not in

Oldschool demo compo, but in Wild
compo (because Gasman was late
with registration), it becomes more impressive.

And even without this fact, Losing
Victoria - is a very nice and
well-made demo. Though there is almost no gfx (only one 
picture) and no effects:)) (practically, 5 effects and only one 
among them is an independent, the other are subsidiary ones) - 
demo looks fine and brings a lot of pleasure. Its

style looks similar to demos from
skrju for me. Although, unlike
skrju with their alternative
works, it's much lighter and free,
as it was made for relaxation and
rest. I think the main reason of
such effect is the melody, though
visual images are bringing their
influence too. The only flaw of
this demo - the ending, it's absence, to be more correct. Music
just stops and everything disappears. Anyway, Losing Victoria is
a very good work, that's for sure,
and it is worth of notice.

Inbetween

Miguel> A demo from Placebo causes the deepest emotions to 
appear deep inside of me. But time to time they become weaker 
and weaker, from the times of Dogma, I think.

That demo was the finest thing
that Placebo did ever, I think.
One can mention Napalm, which
was a breakthru in demomaking, but
Dogma ... As i recall the Chaos
Constructions party in 2000, I put
the vote in my votelist right after the start of Dogma because I
was surprized with it. Then, next
year, followed with Life Forms,
which was done great, but imho it
is weaker. And then, this year,
everybody became a witness of inability of Placebo to make 
something new, as they did some time ago. Inbetween uses the 
same engine, which irritates the majority of sceners ... So, i 
can make the conclusion that Inbetween was done for the party 
only as a real chance to win again, 'cos it uses

a still powerful engine.

Musically it has nothing new, the
Sair00s' style is the same. What's
the use of changing style without
changing the rest of the demo? And
now is another interesting question - who's gonna make a 
soundtrack for their new demo if they will make something new? 
I'm sure that Sair00s is not capable

to make a new engine and music for
it simultaneously. On the other
side - there's not so much active
musicians in Russia who could make
a real demo track so it could fit
the power of Placebo. Who will be
the chosen one? :))) We'll see ...
But I hope Sair00s will try as
hard as he can to make the music
by himself.

Diver> All things can be estimated
in different ways - relatively and
absolutely. Camparing with the
other demoscene releases of 2002
year Inbetween is a hit, along
with Summermilk and Laya, the
hit with its own unique features.
Paracels' gfx this time is neither
worse nor better than last year. I
don't see any breakthru, it's
rather the same level as the last
work, the certain balance, but
it's hard to estimate objectively.
I think it's because of the number
of ideas and the same technique.
As they say about my gfx - it became worse, as it is no longer 
worth of my abilities. But I'm confused

about that-why they think so? Maybe it's because I started to 
copy not only scene works, but even those which are less 
spectacular, or maybe it's because of the progress

absence, who knows?

Now back to Paracels ... Inbetween
logo is almost shocking, Paracels
is doing everybody in this genre,
imho, including pROF. The
mask-contour animation is just the
piece of fine art. Then - Ragin '
and 2 screens in Atlantis theme
are great, but don't fit the demo
theme as usual with pixel gfx:)))
I especially appreciate Paracels
for Atlantis Of My Dream and the
previous demo picture that I called just Atlantis - they are 
made in interesting way, cos everybody

is tired of the large scaled faces
like Ragin ':), it's quite clear
that faces can be drawn out very
well. I was pleased with techiques
used in these two screens, there is
no overtexturing as before. As I
know the last two screens - Horizontal Attitude and Watching 
Far Beyond are copied (i hope not converted) from 'Demoscope' 
by Creative Minds (Amiga) and that's why they are placed in the 
end of the demo. These works are balanced

with Paracels' in February last year's remixes from Lifeforms - 
Lifeforms title screen ('Cosme' by Made)

and the Placebo team looking
downwards (from 'Elektroniks' by
Doomsday). I cannot judge objectively being in the same 
situation as Paracels. Scene is what we are

making of this conception, and if
I made scenecopy sometime ago and
now a simple copy then I can't say
that gfx from Inbetween sucks, only Rion can say this. Design is
the same as usual for a such demo
engine. I'm not a god of code but
as I know it's very hard to achieve better results with effects 
having nothing in common with each other. The only solution is 
to use gfx as it was done in Lifeforms.

Inbetween additional visual effects are spread quite good, some
of them present in the early beginning of the demo, not only in 
the end as Miguel said. And the allocation of effects and gfx 
is equal to the soundtrack, so I can make a

conclusion that Placebo did the
best they could in this situation.

By the way, design seems similar
to Lifeforms which has greetings
style like My Kingdom (Scoopex + Haujobb, Amiga), and Inbetween 
has the beginning that reminds me of Haupex (Haujobb + Scoopex, 
Amiga). Of course it's great that Placebo had chosen these

great examples of design for inspiration, but i think they did 
it too evidently.


Flying> With this work Placebo try
to show everybody that Speccy abilities in calculating 3D 
graphics revealed in their last demo is not

a limit for 3.5MHz and 128Kb memory. Now objects and 3D scenes 
become more complicated, additional effects appear in this 
demo, animation applied in this work is used not only for 
rotating and moving the objects, but to the objects itself. 
Sair00s, I think, is the leading expert in 3D on Speccy 
nowadays, and he could have written a dissertation titled "The 
principles of 3D graphics realtime calculating using strictly 
limited machine resourses ":)


In addition to Sair00s' code there
is a brilliant Paracels' gfx and
music by Sair00s (again:)) - all
this made this demo a winner at
CAFe'2002.

I think there's no need of discussing Sair00s' code - I'm not a 
speciallist here, also I think not a single speccy coder have 
scanned his code in monitor:) All I can

say, is that I like the effect
which I don't know how to call,
but I've seen it on the other platforms and it's realisation in 
Inbetween look fine. I mean the 3rd chunk effect with a sphere 
rotating in a flashing light. Very fabulous thing! Besides, the 
greetings part is made very originally, mentioning Digital 
Reality doubles my impression! The textures used are carefully 
selected, particularly in effect with

plasma.

Finally, I think Placebo are deserving a status of 
professionals in each member's occupation. So the

result of their collective work is
worthy of the first place. I hope
it's not the last Placebo work and
we'll see them this year.

Summermilk

Miguel> Great demo! I'm sure that
it is the best demo shown at
CAFe'2002 and maybe even for the
whole 2002 year. That's why i put
the highest point for this demo during the vote, while the 
previous demo, Inbetween, got only 3. I had

made the choice i did because of
wild novelty that presents in this
new demo from skrju. I think it is
the next logical step in their
(Skrju) development as the demomakers. They abandoned the 
ordinary way of making the demo, ordinary

way of perceiving its main idea.
They don't give a shit whether you
understand it or not, they just made it the only way they had 
to realize it. 

Ok, now the music. As they say, it
was written in Pro Tracker using
tempo 2. And because the Pro Tracker player which is linked to 
compiled module is not capable to play the tunes written in 2nd

tempo, skreemah had to make his
own. Jtn ^ 4D did this work great
for skreemah, but it influenced
the speed of effects used in demo
(One effect and the rest of design
routines). So, that's why I have a
question to D-Juice: is it a big
need of using 2nd tempo causing
the demo work slower? I think that
it's possible to make drum'n'bass
4 using tempo as the double for
2nd. And then the main high speed
elements of melody (drums in particular) can be done within 
samples. Of course, it's much harder I

think, but it's possible. I wouldn't say anything about that if
I hadn't try. That's all about
technics. Nothing to say about melody for me, I should only 
mention it:)


Diver> No comments here. Except
one - screens with a few copies of
the same flower make me a little
sick, their contours seem to be
not very perfect, maybe something
else ... the best demo of 2002.

Flying> Call me 'minimalism
lover ', but Summermilk is the best
work I've ever seen from skrju
and one of the best demos in such
trend. As usual for skrju-minimum
of code, music adn gfx. Sometimes
it seems, that they don't want to
give all they have and that's why
they share it between the little
pieces:) At the same time, it is
the irreproachable compilation
using the minimum of effects but
resulting in a complex, mani-sided
construction. Moreover, it is based on the story of a man with 
original and extraordinary point of view and the different 
sense of life, realized in a prose rhyme.

Poor granny ...

And again I repeat what I've said
in Lovemaker review - skrju are
very original, they are not as
others, they are not ashamed of being themselves and not afraid 
of being misunderstood.


If talking about technical side of
the work, I should say, that everything is done on a high 
quality level. Maybe, synchronization

might have been more accurate, but
it doesn't matter here.

Finally, the black crystall on the
red background, which edges become chunked when outside the 
borders (I hope you know what I'm talking about) - that's 
really cool! Right on, guys!



demo21

Miguel> The main track of this demo is made in Sair00s style, it
just pretending to sound like soundtracks from Placebo demos.
It's for me ... One can disagree,
but anyway, the explanation of
this fact is very simple - people
are trying to make something really good and powerful, at the 
same time they follow (maybe unconsciously) the current leader 
in demomaking-Placebo. So, we get the music like that. I don't 
know what Sair00s think about this, maybe he

like the fact that he made a trend
in demo music, but I wouldn't like
it if I were the trendmaker:)) Maybe it happened because of a
little differences in Sair00s' music itself ... Anyway, I think 
that any musician must have his own musical solutions. 
Technically, I should pay attention to samples,

again samples.

Diver> Having no artist or a person able to make more or less 
quality gfx is a bad thing. In case of no credits posted in 
this demo I could say that there is no gfx.

But the presence of 'artwork' section makes me pay attention to
this fact. What can I say-artwork
is entirely converted from pC,
anyway, this part of 'artwork' was
done very carefully. And they use
it in a right way, as the effect
and messager backgrounds. All images are selected in accordance
with the demo theme (which is good
enough), though it would be better
to use handdrawn nocopy gfx to make the whole product more 
outstanding. Design could have been be more kewl with the 
messager moving upon the effects (it is harder to

realize, but looks greater). At
last, it's better to release the
demo complete, maybe with some
drawbacks, then do nothing as we
did because of the very serious attidude to the final result. 
And finally, I guess the word 'artwork' describes something 
different than converted pC gfx ...


Flying> "Strange demo" - that was
the first thought after seing this
work made by Eye-Q. I suspect the
presence of a theme here, taking
into consideration the text messages, that suddenly appear from
time to time, but I can't get the
point. Anyway, I could't put them
together with action on the screen
to see the full picture. Of course, this work shows the progress
that Eye-Q made after their last
work (Absolute Lame at CC'001),
but it looks very poor, especially
for a whole year since previous
party. This demo contains a couple
of good effects, but they can be
hardly seen among the rest of
technically and visually poor effects.

Also, the set of chunk effects and
converted pictures, interrupted by
suddenly (and in the wrong time)
appearing copper bars, looks very
clumsy. I think that somebody from
Eye-Q had found the old sources
disk and decided to put those old
effects in this demo. But dealing
like this doesn't make a straight
line out of all effects used here.
Besides, two of them (DNA spiral
and something like two bitplanes
plasma) are destined to produce an
epileptic seizure:) No good,
guys! :)

On the other hand, I liked the synchronization with music. I 
suppose, that music was specially written for this demo and not 
taken from some old music disk. Of course, we all can find the 
better examples of such synchronization,

but it's the most positive aspect
in this demo.

In conclusion, I should say that
in the overall progress of Eye-Q
as demomakers this demo is an important step and I think, that 
in future they will amaze us with

another interesting works. But
this demo itself is not adequate
for 2002 year, especially taking
in concideration that it's not the
first Eye-Q work.

Black'White

Miguel> It looks like the author
wanted to make a powerful track,
as in usual newschool demo nowadays. But the lack of ideas and
low technical level didn't let him
to do so. And this is not about music only - the rest of the 
demo is too ordinary and technically unprofessional.


Diver> This demo had the close concurancy with the previous 
one, so i'll compare them between each

other. There's no artist here as
well. Maybe Black And White (the
name of the demo) was chosen due
to the b / w images used, but I
don't think they are handmade. However, all is done great, all
titles, images, i like its quality, but, imho, all this stuff
was converted, again, using ordered dither this time. It's 
possible to make more quality handmade gfx, for example, by 
using brightness. Moreover, it has

nothing in common, no theme can be
revealed from this graphical accompaniment for me. Design is 
much weaker, we see only the following strict ordered 
combination: effect, image, title and so on. That's why despite 
the accurate b / w gfx B'W looks much weaker

than demo21.

Flying> Honestly, I don't want to
review this demo ... The reason is
that it cause no positive emotions
for me. All three effects (attribute or planar analogues) can 
be found in many other demos from mid 90's. Poor music bringing 
no pleasure to me, scanned and / or rendered gfx used with no 
need of such. Can anybody explain, what does the

picture with Eifel tower and a car
in the beginning of the demo mean?
And why after text message saying
"Black stripe-white stripe" we
see a sphere with leaves of a
strange plant "stuck" to it and no
stripes on the screen?

I think these guys found the old
sourses and used them in this demo
with the only reason - to do something for the compo. What a
pity ...

Traffic Of Death

Miguel> At this time CPU refused
to help POS with music. We have
enough of bad feelings about their
own (POS and RGI) demomaking.
So they had found another way out
and asked Nik-O to make a soundtrack for their next creation.
And as I think, Nik-O made really
cool track. But when they began to
fix it with their s_l_o_w_e_s_t
demo the track was perverted, looped more than once and finally 
it lost its primary idea. In conclusion I should say to our 
foreign friends that this demo has a

strong social motivation, antinarcotic propaganda and may be 
due to this social affection POS group became empty inside. No 
drugs! Ehh! Then I say - FUCK THE POLICE, FUCK

THE AUTHORITIES!!! FUCK!!!

Diver> It's hard to say something
good about this demo. It can be barely called a demo ... Pure 
propaganda. Quite clear for me why the authors didn't want to 
take part in demo compo with this stuff, it

is tooo faaar from Smokebomb ...
But on the other hand, gfx is good
enough, Stanly's part in particular, it fits the whole theme,
which is quite rare event in a
demo. The rest of the visuals is
very weak, it makes no strong affection which propaganda must
have. Comparing with Smokebomb
that leads into the deepest thoughts ...

Flying> As I know, this work was
made specially for another compo,
held at CAFe'2002, something like
"Social problems demo compo":)),
but it was the only work there, so
it moved to demo compo.

For me two details are too evident: this demo is quite similar
to Pos WT's last work (Abyss Of
Madness), even some effects are
the same. I think this demo is
much more "wet" then Abyss Of
Madness. I'm sure that this work
fits that "strange" social compo,
but as a demo is very poor. Though
the effects sometimes are more difficuit to realize then in 
Abyss Of Madness (final spinning and morphing text is good, but 
old effect), and music along with gfx is much better, but the 
whole demo doesn't look complete, I think

it's a party version, made in big
rush. Maybe ... Maybe the final release does exist, then I 
apologize. 

One more thing, can't help with it
:))) Can anybody explain me what
does the set of tricolor pictures
within this antinarcotic propaganda mean? As for me, the phrase
"All clear?" in the end has put me
in a deadlock, cos nothing is
clear. Maybe I'm dumb? :)))

p.s. However, I got the final release later, but I've decided to
keep everything that I wrote about
the party version as it is now. I
just want to say that the final
version looks more nicely. Although, the picture "I'm alive,
but envy the dead "is being shown
for a too long time (as for me),
but I think that it's because the
musician lives in an other city
and PoS had to work with the tune
they had at that moment. And again
that strange tricolor pictures:))
At least, you could have corrected
them, guys:)

z80 cheap

Miguel> It's not worth of deep analisis, the only thing I have 
to say is that knowledge is a power.

So you'd better learn before making something to show people. If
anyone thinks that I'm writing
this article because I know too
much about spectrum music and the
music at all, then I'll say that
you're wrong. I learn something
new every time I compose a
track ... So, that's it.

Diver> It's not a surprise that it
has no credits, it's a big shame I
think to be proud of gfx like
this. The final screen has some
initials - SG, that aren't familiar to me. Anyway, such gfx has
just one visual merit - it's nocopy gfx:))) But the quality is 
more than awful. Maybe authors decided to imitate Yerzmyey's 
style, which is too far from this parody.


Flying> While watching this demo I
had a feeling that the authors of
this work are mentally close to
HPRG (about their Alter Ego read
above). First, gfx has something
in common, then intentionally slipshod effects with evident 
mistakes (There's need to use paper in

attribute plasma). Of course, there are a lot of differencies: 
HPRG works can be easily recognized due

to their excessive accents on the
"Fallic symbols", while the
authors of z80 cheap demo concentrated on what we all like
Speccy. And this fact helps to forget about the technical 
drawbacks, demo is filled with positive emotions and I'm happy 
that there are people who can deliver it to the

audience it is quite rare event.

Thanks you guys, exellent work!

Invasion

Miguel> The soundtrack of this demo was taking part in CAFe'2002
music compo, which was 2 weeks
earlier than Paradox party. By the
way, I'm against of such things,
especially when a screen from a demo is taking part in gfx 
compo and that's why everybody have to watch

it 2 times ...

Now technics - I don't like when
the chord is playing much louder
than the rest of instruments. And
the main melodical theme which begins after credits part is 
killing me:)


Diver> Looks like there are no serious problems with gfx used in
this demo. Of course, it's not so
good, but remember PCB who started their triumphant performances
not from 5th Element, as I know,
in the beginning there was Climbatize, it revealed from my 
memory after seeing Invasion. I can't say

this demo sucks, i think that the
authors try to develop their
skills in the right direction. Forget about the russian 
language lyrics here, such drawback can be found in Jaundice 
too, but the last one had its tremendous followers -

Lovemaker and Summermilk. So, I
think a little bit of practice would help the authors with their
next works. And of course, they
should look at the best amiga, c64
and pc stuff more than once to develop their design abilities.

Flying> An average demo, considering code in particualar, though
music and gfx are good enough.
This work has nothing new in code
usual and old enough effects, realized as usual. On the other 
hand, this demo was released complete,

though it's not a masterpiece. However, I think, that the 
authors obtained that experience they need

and I hope we'll see their next
works for our beloved Speccy.

By the way, why did you buried
RST7 and Mic? Remember - Legends never die!

The Loop

Miguel> Again Baze. I think he is
the only one who tries to make a
real PRODUCT, not crap, so and his
music is outstanding among the
rest of european musicians and demomakers, who wish only fun. 
Serious work. 

Diver> At last, the demo which was
made for two years ago already but
had been released only in 2002.
Just before CAFe Baze made everybody on # z80 happy by giving 
the party version of his 'The Loop' into publicity. Poor Baze, 
he was afraid that nobody would understand his work, and this 
time he was right. Mostly, people have stupid

faces while watching The Loop
and describe the action on the
screen with the words something
like: "What a shit". Dummies! What
did you want? Another 3D sausage
with a breakbeat in background?
Considering that there's only few
good sausages I've seen nowadays.
And Baze brought another quality
conceptual product, somehow reminding of c2h5oh, but more 
philosophic 

Flying> The Loop was first shown
at Forever 2E3 SE in march of
2001. But Baze/3SC hadn't released
the party version and explained it
by his desire to make the final
version. A year and a half passed
since then, and in september 2002
everybody could see it released,
again as a party version. Somehow
Baze didn't finish the demo. Though it's better than no release 
at all.


At Forever 2E3 SE party this demo
won the third place. And i think
it deserves the higher rate. Especially when compared with 
Pondlife (1st place) and Heart Beat (2nd).


It's amasing, but this masterpiece
(A real masterpiece) has nothing
difficuilt in code. Maybe somebody
is agaist of including such works
in the demo compo (no pure animation permitted as it is written 
in the rules). Technically, The Loop

consists of one effect (used as a
background), one simple melody and
a dozen of short, primitive animations-that 's all. Anyway, 
compiled together, all this captivate the audience with a 
strange enchantment. You forget about how it was done after 
seing the first minute of the demo, nothing matters the 
samples, music arrangement, the graphics, the code - all this

become insignificant, you just STARE until the final sounds tell
you, that it's The Loop, and
nothing could be said. Such emotions could be revealed only by a
few things in this world, which
authors reached the effect by
their persistence, or by inspiration or just being naturally 
born genius. And this things are different for every single 
person, something you reckon as a genius could be nothing for 
another man. 

As for me, The Loop emotionally
belongs to the row of such pieces
of art as Stairway to Heaven by
Led Zeppelin, Comfortably Numb by
Pink Floyd, Strawberry Fields Forever by The Beatles and The 
End by The Doors.


There's nothing left to say - just
watch.


elph> I think that these are marvellous reviews! Always deep and
full of different emotions. I
hope, that demomakers will read it
and try to judge their works from
different points of view, to see
some drawbacks, perhaps, to achieve the higher level of 
realization of their ideas. Let ideas disturb

your mind!