Ymgve at 23:46, 27 July 2008

2008-07-27T23:46:27Z

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<pre> interviews

WN = WORLD NEWS
WN = WORLD NEWS

A = ANTITRACK/LEGEND
A = ANTITRACK/LEGEND

WN: Salute Alex! Everyone knows you but
anyway some details about you would
be nice.

A: In christmas 1982 a little boy
called Alex happened to find a
Commodore 64 under the tree and
guess what, he's still using the
same computer till now!
(Even the keyboard is the same...
lovely....Ergh!!!!!)

Now, this guy is a bit older ofcouse
(23 years to be more precise...),
and, he's better known under his
pseudo "Antitrack/LEGEND", and
still knows how to handle this
little computer!

WN: You are quite inactive at the time
what's up with you? A Girlfriend?

A: Oh no, I'm not that inactive at
all, but you guys just don't see
what I'm doing, because it's not
a crack and I don't release it.
In other words, I'm frequently
programming little tools and
routines for myself, and I'm
also the only one who can handle
them, so it's useless to release
stuff like that.

But don't worry, every now and
then, there is an original that
is supposed to be difficult or
a lot of work, so then I'm there
again. At this very time just
my versions of "Brubaker" are
finished, for example.

Girls are still allowed to send
their proposal of marriage to
my P.O.Box. Haha!

WN: You was the one who made COSMOS
strong. You was the one who made
Austria famous. Many guys says that
you are the best cracker ever! You
are a legend! So why don't you make
money with your great abilities?
Like Snacky/GP with crack protec-
tions or something like that...

A: I was the one who made COSMOS
strong? Oh no, that must be a
mistake! I rather believe that
SSD/COSMOS was the most active
guy. Cracking has never been a
problem (at least not for me), but
getting the originals, megaswapping
and modeming and having all the
important connections was rather
SSD's job.

So far about cosmos...

About the money, I can happily
tell you that my first game,
"Five-A-Row", already was sold
to GAME ON and I made a profit
of +580 for that one.
Actually it was sold for +1340,
but the music costed +80, the
travel to germany to fetch the
money costed +80 aswell, and
The guy who made the graphics,
who sold the game to MAGIC DISK,
who had the game concept
also wanted to earn...
Ehm... +600, if i'm not
mistaken. Well, and we'll start
another game soon. (But don't
hold your breath, I'm kinda slow
during programming...)

WN: Hannes Sommer told me that you need
8 min for a cartridge crack! Is that
right or just a rumour?

A: Well, I suppose I've been mis-
understood. The whole crack of
"Shadow of the Beast" took an
afternoon ofcourse. You know,
loading, crunching and saving
and linking all the files and
playtesting took this time.
What those 8 minutes were about:
It was the time to study
how the cartridge is
constructed and to choose a
strategy to crack it. All the
other time was only executing
my strategy and in this phase,
no more surprises showed up
ofcourse.

In general, when people ask me
how long it took me to crack
something, I usually tell them
how long I had to study the
protection in order to choose a
strategy to crack it. I do not
consider all the loading,
saving, crunching, testing etc.
as a real "work". Everyone knows
how to handle "Darksqueezer" so
crunching, for example, is
Darksqueezer's work, not the
cracker's one!

WN: You are a good friend of Hannes S.
(the best?). Where have you met him
the first time?

A: When he joined COSMOS ofcourse!
Probably you do remember a few
of his demos. He really was in
COSMOS the first time, but he
decided to become "COSMOS DESIGNS"
Later on, in order to show that
he is completely legal.
(However, he still loves to see
my cracks as usual! Hehe)

WN: Who is in your opinion the best
cracker ever?

A: That's difficult. On the
64, I was more impressed by
the old guys' works around
1985-1988, (Mister Zeropage,
Teeside Cracking Service, Jedi,
etc. etc.), and nowadays? Well,
Rockstar/GP or Horizon/NEI are
brilliant as always, but I
suppose "The best cracker ever"
moved away from c64 quite a while
ago and is rather being found on
Amiga, guys like H.Q.C etc.
I do know some bright local Amiga
people and they do rather fit in
the "Best cracker ever"-category.
(e.g. King George/ex-SUBWAY or
in whichever group he is now).
Far be me, however, to judge
people! I like everyone who's
doing great work, not "just"
cracking, but making music,
graphics, demos, games and tools.

WN: What's your opinion to the lame,
little 20-100 blocks long self-
written games by some coders who
wanna just earn some quick money?

A: Oh well, as my own game is 83
blocks it does fit into this
category! Ofcourse I always de-
lete games like that (My one too...
ooooops!) But if a game is
particularily very bad and it's
getting sold, it's not the
fault of the guy who sells it,
but the fault of the guy who
BUYS this crap!

(Walter Konrad, you are free
to feel guilty now! (Grin!))

WN: Has anyone ever teached you how to
crack?

A: Nope, I found out everything
by myself. Which took quite some
time.

WN: Who was your original supplier in
the glory COSMOS days? and who is
it now?

A: In COSMOS, SSD was responsible
to get the originals, and I can
vaguely remember he had 4 guys
in England who bought them for us.

Nowadays, my fellow LEGEND members
(any of them) might send me some-
thing that is supposed to be
lots of work. I really don't
like to work on simple or non-
existant copy protections, you know.

WN: You are very sympatic and unarrogant
so what do you say to the arrogant
people in the world like Bod/TALENT
or Antichrist for example?
(red. Hey Oliver that was no
offence!)

A: Well, I just leave them alone.
I'm glad to say that I've never
swapped or talked much with
anyone being arrogant. As soon as
I notice that someone is
behaving badly, I drop him like a
hot potato, or I put down the
phone, or I just walk away. No
need to waste my time on stupid
people.

WN: Why have you joined LEGEND after
ACC's dead?

A: I was never in ACC, I was in
711, then COSMOS (again). Well,
simply because I had quite many
friends in LEGEND, and I did
realize LEGEND will be the best
group sooner or later, which is
obviously is at the moment!

WN: What do you say to our nationl
soccer team? (In icehockey and
handball we rule no doubt!)

A: "Yes thats true, the match started
very bad, i sang our national
anthem wrong, in the second
strophe....- at least our
cabaret people can make great
fun of it. Otherwise, I really
don't care, because I do not like
sports at all. Lazy me!

WN: At last some words about mags please
(best,World News,...)

A: About mags! Oh no! Well, I miss
"Mamba" a lot. It always contained
the newest, and it always was very
fair. (Even to Sex'n Slime!! Hehe)
I do read "Shock" sometimes, but I
haven't got the nerve to check
all the mags. "World News?"
Well, it reminds me quite alot
of "Emanuelle". probably you
mag editors should do a few
mags together in oder to keep
down the number of mags?
(The big mag-cooperation...
viele koeche verderben den
brei Hehe...)

WN: Well, let's stop here with all this
shit. Sorry for soo much questions.
keep Austria ruling.... bye friend..

A: It wasn't shit. so long....

WN: Yeah! sure it wasn't! Thanks for
interview..

INTERVIEWER WAS BLACK PRIEST
INTERVIEWER WAS BLACK PRIEST
----------------------------------------
----------------------------------------
WN = WORLD NEWS
WN = WORLD NEWS

C = COLOURFUL / ORIGO
C = COLOURFUL / ORIGO

WN: Salute Ville! Let's make a special
interview for our readers' pleasure.
First some serious facts please.

C: - I'm 17
- I've one life to go
- I just don't know
- I'm living in a country which is
suffering of an incredible econo-
mical slump
- I can cry
- I've never been normal (they say)
- I can swim
- I can move my both hands at the
same time
- I do

(red.: Ehmmm? Yes!)

WN: Well, what's up with you at the
moment? On what are you working
right now and what can we expect in
future from ORIGO (Destino told me
about another demo).

C: I'm just doing just fine. I've been
able to break my old 64 and at the
moment I don't have one, right now
I'm coding my 1st demo on Amiga. You
can expect whatever you want, but do
not count on it to happen. Probably
we'll go on on both 64 and Amiga, I
am going to code on Amiga for 64,too
(That is, "translating" my finished
code from Amiga to 64).

WN: Many guys think that a cool effect
must be coded by a real hero coder.
But you sure agree when I say that
not the best looking effects
include the hardest code. So please
tell all non-coders which effects
are really hard to realize.

C: Nothing is "hard" if you just can
figure out the baseidea and describe
the part to yourself first in your
mind.

WN: Is it true that BX/ORIGO is your
cousin?

C: Yes, he is. (...isn't he? do you
know something I don't?...)

WN: Hannes Sommer (Mc Sprite)/COSMOS
told me that you've started to make
a hires fli-editor. Right? Have you
ever finished it until now?

C: It was done already for "Eldorado"
(the PIC was actually drawn with
it), I won't publish it 'cos though
it's ready for me, it ain't ready to
you (and never will be...) (I'm just
too lazy to "design" it.)

WN: Well, I really wonder why so few
groups use samples in their demos.
CONTEX got famous with samples for
example. What's your meaning about
that? (Too little memory left?)

C: Keep up the good work. (What?!..)
it's just too limited serie of ef-
fects one can do with using samples,
besides it takes a hellish tough
equipment to make samples sound good
enough on 64, and the better samples
you have,the more memory and raster-
time they eat.

WN: Which coder will be the newcomer of
1992 in your opinion and who was/is
the best coder ever?

C: There are many "new" cool demogroups
(e.g. FAIRLIGHT), can't name anybody
'coz I haven't seen enuff demos to
have material for a fair opinion.
Still maybe the best coder in my
opinion is David Braben (64 - Elite,
Amiga - Virus etc.)

WN: In the timeperiod between 1988-1992
the demo quality made a major jump.
Do you think that in future the
demo quality will still raise or
have we reached a dead point where
no new effects will be created?

C: Of course the progress will go on,
in theory the so-called "elite"-
coders have reached a certain level
and are one step ahead others, they
have "new" ideas and are able to
realize them, too. Let's just hope
they won't drop 64...

WN: Hmm, when Iraq was in war with the
states, you could read in every
note "Fuck Saddam" or something
like that. Now with the Yugoslavia
conflict many more people died but
no feelings are shown in the scene
(except Maduplec/CREST). What do
you say to the Yugoslavia conflict
and to the reaction in the scene?

C: I think you should ask that from
some who reacted to Iraq-conflict.
I didn't, and I haven't and won't
react to conflict in Yugoslavia any
better. (Sorry..?)

WN: Some traditonal feelings about mags
please. (best,world news,...)

C: Only some traditional feelings.

WN: OK, time is over again. Hope you've
enjoyed the interview and I also
hope to see soon another ORIGO demo.
However keep live going.... bye...

C: ?.. !.. Bye...

INTERVIEWER WAS BLACK PRIEST
INTERVIEWER WAS BLACK PRIEST

with help from Destino/ORIGO
----------------------------------------
----------------------------------------</pre>

World News 15 Interviews - Revision history

Ymgve at 23:46, 27 July 2008