Relax 22
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− | + | ==Editorial== | |
− | + | <pre> | |
− | + | * EDITORIAL * | |
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | R3L4X M4G4Z1N3* OCTOBER 1997 edition (issue | ||
+ | #22), the magazine for the generation with an eye for | ||
+ | the FINER details in the CBM 64 scene, was brought | ||
+ | to you by PHUTURE (Software & Marketing), your fa- | ||
+ | vourite disk-magazine releasing game label. | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | --------------------------- | ||
+ | |... internal affairs ... | | ||
+ | --------------------------- | ||
+ | In the tradition of scene history the regular Venlo | ||
+ | meetings in The Netherlands have archieved a quite | ||
+ | good reputation during the glance to the scene, bet- | ||
+ | ween 1988 and 1991 those mini-parties have been | ||
+ | quite attractive to be visited by the CBM 64 scene. | ||
+ | Lots of new releases and to meet top acts of the | ||
+ | Belgian, Dutch and German scene next to visitors | ||
+ | from other countries enriched the events always to | ||
+ | be something special. | ||
+ | At the regular Venlo meetings one was normally cap- | ||
+ | able to get the latest warez especially prepared for | ||
+ | for the meeting which was hold regulary once a | ||
+ | month, in fact more software got released than today | ||
+ | in a full month. It was no surprise that almost all | ||
+ | groups have used this event for distribution purpo- | ||
+ | ses, even magazines like 'Sex'n Crime' have been re- | ||
+ | leased regulary there, so this meetings have become | ||
+ | quite attractive for people looking for hot software. | ||
+ | One of those Venlo meetings, to be more exact the | ||
+ | one in September 1989, has been elected to be the | ||
+ | place where Relax Magazine #1 has been introduced | ||
+ | to the scene. 8 years later we can proudly announce | ||
+ | that history has been written. Relax Magazine was | ||
+ | NOT born nor planned in September 1989, it got RE- | ||
+ | LEASED at the third Saturday in Venlo/The Nether- | ||
+ | lands, archieving and deserving the status of being | ||
+ | the OLDEST still released and existing scene maga- | ||
+ | zine of ALL scene platforms, unlike what other jea- | ||
+ | lous unreliable sources may claim. The project 'Relax | ||
+ | Magazine' was been already born several months be- | ||
+ | fore the initial release could take place what is for | ||
+ | sure a quite natural phenomenon as certain arran- | ||
+ | gements can not and could not have been realised | ||
+ | over night. THE MASTER has been responsbile for the | ||
+ | first outfit used for five full issues, the at the time | ||
+ | still rather unknown IRONCAT, a member of the Swiss | ||
+ | group Wolfen, has arranged the legendary 'The Look' | ||
+ | theme in the notorious Future Composer and last but | ||
+ | not least TPA of X-Ample Architectures, perhaps | ||
+ | more known for the game graphics drawn under his | ||
+ | real name THOMAS HEINRICH, has been responsible | ||
+ | for the very first Relax logo. Now back in October | ||
+ | 1997, in total eight years and a month later, Relax | ||
+ | Magazine is still around in order to report about the | ||
+ | scene. | ||
+ | Unfortunately times have changed dramatically and | ||
+ | the scene is losing lots of the magic day by day. AT&T | ||
+ | has blacklisted all major US boards which were online | ||
+ | so that the proud board scene life went down. Even if | ||
+ | other phone companies could have been abused, a | ||
+ | fact which should have been known to experienced | ||
+ | board sceners, and regarding the fact that some | ||
+ | numbers have been changed already the activity le- | ||
+ | vel can not really defined as risen again. | ||
+ | As a reaction to the current situation we have | ||
+ | skipped the board charts section for good since | ||
+ | creating board charts containing about 75% of all | ||
+ | votes mainly submitted through the Internet is not | ||
+ | exactly what we would dare to define as the ultimate | ||
+ | solution. Seeing homepages like "Second To None" | ||
+ | offering complete board functions it is just a question | ||
+ | of time that the action will move almost completely into | ||
+ | the Internet, Relax Magazine will take these Internet- | ||
+ | boards into consideration to create release charts | ||
+ | when the system has been perfected and has found | ||
+ | the acceptance within the cracking scene. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Observing the upload activity on The Digital Dungeon, | ||
+ | the MOST POPULAR CBM 64 related FTP-system, one | ||
+ | could start believing that only the oldie groups or | ||
+ | labels in alphabetical order like Cyberpunx, Motiv 8 | ||
+ | (Quality), Nostalgia and Remember are the only active | ||
+ | factors trying to keep the scene busy and alive. The | ||
+ | first votesheets have already arrived with Remember | ||
+ | and Nostalgia taking over the top positions, indeed a | ||
+ | situation to get tears in the eyes, but ofcourse a | ||
+ | clear sign for the current cracking groups and the | ||
+ | lack of quality cracks which are really bug-free, what | ||
+ | is the impression one can get after the flood of qua- | ||
+ | lity versions released in the past three months. Fur- | ||
+ | ther aspects can be found in the society chapter of | ||
+ | this edition. | ||
+ | Having today's preferences in mind the motivation to | ||
+ | invest lots of expensive sparetime into scene related | ||
+ | projects is lowering with an every single issue, there | ||
+ | has never been before a similar situation like in the | ||
+ | past four months, a situation clearly showing that the | ||
+ | activity level of the average scene related person | ||
+ | has decreased dramatically. Keeping the sad situa- | ||
+ | tion for our beloved computer platform in mind it is | ||
+ | quite astonishing to see certain individuals and | ||
+ | groups investing lots of energy in the attempt to rule | ||
+ | the ruins, the left-overs of a once magnificent scene | ||
+ | with rather questionable methods. Real life must be | ||
+ | rather hard for those creatures investing tons of | ||
+ | dark energy to see a few people adoring them in a | ||
+ | dead scene, continously lying, story telling and mani- | ||
+ | pulating to create a sort of reputation which is total- | ||
+ | ly unimportant these days because without an active | ||
+ | scene and a vital competition a charts position does | ||
+ | not mean anything anymore. | ||
+ | |||
+ | THE HUNT 97 can be presented as either complete | ||
+ | failure or success, depending on the point of view a | ||
+ | person prefers to choose. NOT a single scene rela- | ||
+ | ted person was able to solve all the quests prepared | ||
+ | by the staff. | ||
+ | Regarding the fact that the average scener has en- | ||
+ | tered the scene in 1993, and those persons even | ||
+ | dare to define themselves shameless experienced | ||
+ | today, it was no surprise at all. Ofcourse it was an | ||
+ | impossible mission for sceners who entered after | ||
+ | 1992 as most of the questions couldn't be answered | ||
+ | by downloading and reading old magazines as some do | ||
+ | just to claim they know what was going on, neverthe- | ||
+ | less we expected that some of those who claim to be a | ||
+ | part of the scene for about 7, 8, 9 or 10 years | ||
+ | should have been in the position to solve the quests | ||
+ | and to answer the questions. | ||
+ | One might start complaining about the fact that the | ||
+ | competition has held to suit the needs of the Internet | ||
+ | community but regarding the situation in the scene | ||
+ | where to look up for people being in the position to | ||
+ | compete in The Hunt the answer can only be in the | ||
+ | Internet, the place where atleast some scene "oldti- | ||
+ | mers" can be found. | ||
+ | The Hunt was meant as a competetion, a competition | ||
+ | we won without any remarkable competitors partici- | ||
+ | pating. Not a single person of the ones who dared to | ||
+ | compete was even close to get the full score by sol- | ||
+ | ving all quests. What was the reason? Lack of inte- | ||
+ | rest or the high level of difficulty? The answer might | ||
+ | be found somewhere between both answers, that's | ||
+ | the mirror for the scene these days. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Finally after about eight months we sadly detected | ||
+ | for the very first time that a person tried to submit | ||
+ | manipulated votes by using the online voter at Relax | ||
+ | Online. It is no surprise to see that specific person | ||
+ | from Turkey already known for his bad behaviour and | ||
+ | weak style by defining one of the main editors of this | ||
+ | publication as racist and nazi, what have been some | ||
+ | of the more polite expressions, without having just a | ||
+ | single proof for his stupid claims, but it seems to be | ||
+ | rather popular these days to act like this. | ||
+ | Nevertheless within 10 minutes three mails arrived, | ||
+ | two applications for a possible THE CBM 64 scene | ||
+ | e-mail directory registration and one filled digital | ||
+ | votesheet from the online voter on Relax Online, sent | ||
+ | with a faked e-mail address but with an interesting | ||
+ | X-MAILER. It is no surprise that the votesheet | ||
+ | contained various #1 votes for the group, its | ||
+ | members and productions. Exactly the same | ||
+ | phenomenon appeared with a paper votesheet, too. | ||
+ | Perhaps it is unknown for some sceners that a few | ||
+ | votesheet spreaders, a preference for Relax | ||
+ | Magazine votesheet spreaders, take care about their | ||
+ | work and are capable to identify the hand-writing of | ||
+ | their contacts! Random or pure LAMENESS? | ||
+ | Ofcourse there is no secure method to avoid people | ||
+ | cheating votesheets in any form, covering both | ||
+ | paper and digital votesheets. We have been thinking | ||
+ | about consequences and security but after all there | ||
+ | is NO totally secure method. We have decided to check | ||
+ | out suspicious votesheets even more careful before | ||
+ | taking them into consideration to create our charts | ||
+ | chapter(s) in the future. Suspicious votesheets from | ||
+ | anonymous e-mail services like Hotmail will be | ||
+ | immidiately deleted if the sender is NOT personally | ||
+ | known as reliable and genuine user to us, honest and | ||
+ | FAIR people having access to a steady Internet | ||
+ | account do NOT need to hide behind questionable | ||
+ | e-mail aliases. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Due to the fact that Relax Magazine has become 8 | ||
+ | years old we decided to add a special gift on the disk, | ||
+ | quite useful for a minority and useless for the | ||
+ | majority. Relax Magazine 22 is only complete | ||
+ | distributed with a Rayden modded DMC v4.3 editor | ||
+ | that will suit the needs of people enjoying stereo | ||
+ | sound via two seperate SID chips on the CBM 64. | ||
+ | Further information about the stereo SID chip can be | ||
+ | ordered at Rayden's address. | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | | ... Votesheet Spreaders and News suppliers ... | | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | The PAPER votesheets have been spread, as usual, | ||
+ | by our very own ZAPOTEK, VIOLATOR and DR. SOFT, | ||
+ | who all are serving as AUTHORIZED mail distributors, | ||
+ | aswell as by RACOON who enlarged the squad. | ||
+ | The DIGITAL VOTESHEET has been spread by using | ||
+ | Motiv 8's mailing list. | ||
+ | |||
+ | The NEWS have been supplied and confirmed by | ||
+ | Burglar, Comanche, Curlin, Derbyshire Ram, Despair, | ||
+ | Jazzcat, Sebaloz, Midfit, Westbam, Vip and other re- | ||
+ | liable sources. | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | This edition's content looks like this: | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | As usual GLOBAL REPORT is covering the most inte- | ||
+ | resting news out of the scene. The RELEASE CHARTS | ||
+ | and the YEARLY RELEASES are having a closer look | ||
+ | at the activity of the cracking groups releasewise. | ||
+ | The MAIL CHARTS are now only the commulated votes | ||
+ | from the votesheets, the old mail (mega) charts con- | ||
+ | ception can be found in the MEGA CHARTS chapter. | ||
+ | NETGUIDE is a new but self-explaining chapter, focu- | ||
+ | sing to the Internet. SOCIETY is having a closer look | ||
+ | on the biased release strategy of cracking groups | ||
+ | these days, quite useful for sceners who have joined | ||
+ | the scene in 1993 or later. GAMES PEOPLE PLAY is | ||
+ | giving answers to questions asked or initiated by the | ||
+ | concurence, a must for people looking for information | ||
+ | instead of manipulation. DEMO REVIEWS contains an | ||
+ | overview about some demo releases, an introduction | ||
+ | for the mail scene about the project "We Are Family" | ||
+ | and reviews of demos created by Lepsi and Panic. | ||
+ | PARTY RADAR is hosting the results from scene par- | ||
+ | ties and ofcourse information about THE PARTY 7. | ||
+ | LOST FILES is the entertaining chapter with sarcas- | ||
+ | tical but not always serious meant humorous views on | ||
+ | current scene happenings. In the ADVERTISEMENTS | ||
+ | chapter you will find, as usual, lots of addresses. | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * Credits for our October edition * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | PROGRAMMING FUBEN/OXYRON | ||
+ | ADDITIONAL THE IGNORANCE/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 | ||
+ | ADDITIONAL LYNCHBIT/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 | ||
+ | SOUNDTRACK DANKO/CENSOR DESIGN | ||
+ | BITMAP GRAPHICS RRR/OXYRON | ||
+ | CHARACTERSET SKID ROW/CHROMANCE | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | Title Author | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | "Principle" Danko/Censor Design | ||
+ | "Relax" Danko/Censor Design | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * How to contact the Relax Magazine staff? * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | Snail mail: xxxx xxxxxxxxx | ||
+ | -------- xxxxxx | ||
+ | xxxxxxx | ||
+ | xxxxxxx | ||
+ | |||
+ | Internet: xxxxxx | ||
+ | ------- xxxxxx | ||
+ | xxxxxxx | ||
+ | |||
+ | Boards: THE ESCAPADE (EHQ) | ||
+ | ------ | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * Where to download the Relax Magazine? * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | THE ESCAPADE ++49/5341-395697 | ||
+ | THE DIGITAL DUNGEON ftp.scs-trc.net | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * RELAX (MAGAZINE) ONLINE * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | RELAX ONLINE http://home.sol.no/&zapotek | ||
+ | RRR/Oxyron xxxxxx | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * The Relax Magazine staff consists of * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | MAIN EDITOR MARC/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 | ||
+ | MAIN EDITOR RRR/OXYRON | ||
+ | MAIN EDITOR VIOLATOR/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 | ||
+ | CO-EDITOR FUBEN/OXYRON | ||
+ | GUEST EDITOR ECO/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970^EXCESS | ||
+ | GUEST CONTRIBUTION ANONYM/PADUA | ||
+ | CORRESPONDANT DR. SOFT/ALBION | ||
+ | |||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * Authorized Mail Distribution * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | ZAPOTEK/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 | ||
+ | VIOLATOR/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970^LEPSI DE | ||
+ | DR. SOFT/ALBION | ||
+ | RACOON/HITMEN)LEPSI DE | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * DISCLAIMER * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | RELAX MAGAZINE does not take any warranty for | ||
+ | text sources supplied by freelancers or guest edi- | ||
+ | tors. Articles, reports or any other submitted text | ||
+ | sources must NEITHER represent the opinions NOR | ||
+ | reflect the suspension of the Relax Magazine staff. | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER * | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | -. The binary CBM 64 version of the Relax Magazine | ||
+ | /0 is PUBLIC DOMAIN and may be spread FREELY | ||
+ | around the world as long as either the Relax archive | ||
+ | or the unpacked production itself is getting spread | ||
+ | AS-IS without any modifications. | ||
+ | |||
+ | This production must NOT be sold in any form to gain | ||
+ | profit without a written permission from the authors. | ||
+ | Any form of distribution on CD-Roms, IOMEGA-ZIP or | ||
+ | YAZ (and compatible) disks is STRICTLY forbidden! | ||
+ | |||
+ | Any parts of the binary and the HTML version, may it | ||
+ | be articles, graphics or musics, may NOT be used | ||
+ | without a written permission from the authors. | ||
+ | ------------------------------------------------------------ | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | Best regards on behalf of the entire staff, | ||
+ | |||
+ | RRR/Oxyron | ||
+ | ---------- | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | * R3L4X M4G4Z1N3* * | ||
+ | PAST TO PRESENT, 1989 - 1997 | ||
+ | |||
+ | October 31st, 1997 | ||
+ | --------------- | ||
+ | |||
+ | |||
+ | </pre> | ||
==Global Report== | ==Global Report== |
Latest revision as of 05:38, 20 August 2009
Contents |
[edit] Editorial
* EDITORIAL * ------------------------------------------------------------ R3L4X M4G4Z1N3* OCTOBER 1997 edition (issue #22), the magazine for the generation with an eye for the FINER details in the CBM 64 scene, was brought to you by PHUTURE (Software & Marketing), your fa- vourite disk-magazine releasing game label. --------------------------- |... internal affairs ... | --------------------------- In the tradition of scene history the regular Venlo meetings in The Netherlands have archieved a quite good reputation during the glance to the scene, bet- ween 1988 and 1991 those mini-parties have been quite attractive to be visited by the CBM 64 scene. Lots of new releases and to meet top acts of the Belgian, Dutch and German scene next to visitors from other countries enriched the events always to be something special. At the regular Venlo meetings one was normally cap- able to get the latest warez especially prepared for for the meeting which was hold regulary once a month, in fact more software got released than today in a full month. It was no surprise that almost all groups have used this event for distribution purpo- ses, even magazines like 'Sex'n Crime' have been re- leased regulary there, so this meetings have become quite attractive for people looking for hot software. One of those Venlo meetings, to be more exact the one in September 1989, has been elected to be the place where Relax Magazine #1 has been introduced to the scene. 8 years later we can proudly announce that history has been written. Relax Magazine was NOT born nor planned in September 1989, it got RE- LEASED at the third Saturday in Venlo/The Nether- lands, archieving and deserving the status of being the OLDEST still released and existing scene maga- zine of ALL scene platforms, unlike what other jea- lous unreliable sources may claim. The project 'Relax Magazine' was been already born several months be- fore the initial release could take place what is for sure a quite natural phenomenon as certain arran- gements can not and could not have been realised over night. THE MASTER has been responsbile for the first outfit used for five full issues, the at the time still rather unknown IRONCAT, a member of the Swiss group Wolfen, has arranged the legendary 'The Look' theme in the notorious Future Composer and last but not least TPA of X-Ample Architectures, perhaps more known for the game graphics drawn under his real name THOMAS HEINRICH, has been responsible for the very first Relax logo. Now back in October 1997, in total eight years and a month later, Relax Magazine is still around in order to report about the scene. Unfortunately times have changed dramatically and the scene is losing lots of the magic day by day. AT&T has blacklisted all major US boards which were online so that the proud board scene life went down. Even if other phone companies could have been abused, a fact which should have been known to experienced board sceners, and regarding the fact that some numbers have been changed already the activity le- vel can not really defined as risen again. As a reaction to the current situation we have skipped the board charts section for good since creating board charts containing about 75% of all votes mainly submitted through the Internet is not exactly what we would dare to define as the ultimate solution. Seeing homepages like "Second To None" offering complete board functions it is just a question of time that the action will move almost completely into the Internet, Relax Magazine will take these Internet- boards into consideration to create release charts when the system has been perfected and has found the acceptance within the cracking scene. Observing the upload activity on The Digital Dungeon, the MOST POPULAR CBM 64 related FTP-system, one could start believing that only the oldie groups or labels in alphabetical order like Cyberpunx, Motiv 8 (Quality), Nostalgia and Remember are the only active factors trying to keep the scene busy and alive. The first votesheets have already arrived with Remember and Nostalgia taking over the top positions, indeed a situation to get tears in the eyes, but ofcourse a clear sign for the current cracking groups and the lack of quality cracks which are really bug-free, what is the impression one can get after the flood of qua- lity versions released in the past three months. Fur- ther aspects can be found in the society chapter of this edition. Having today's preferences in mind the motivation to invest lots of expensive sparetime into scene related projects is lowering with an every single issue, there has never been before a similar situation like in the past four months, a situation clearly showing that the activity level of the average scene related person has decreased dramatically. Keeping the sad situa- tion for our beloved computer platform in mind it is quite astonishing to see certain individuals and groups investing lots of energy in the attempt to rule the ruins, the left-overs of a once magnificent scene with rather questionable methods. Real life must be rather hard for those creatures investing tons of dark energy to see a few people adoring them in a dead scene, continously lying, story telling and mani- pulating to create a sort of reputation which is total- ly unimportant these days because without an active scene and a vital competition a charts position does not mean anything anymore. THE HUNT 97 can be presented as either complete failure or success, depending on the point of view a person prefers to choose. NOT a single scene rela- ted person was able to solve all the quests prepared by the staff. Regarding the fact that the average scener has en- tered the scene in 1993, and those persons even dare to define themselves shameless experienced today, it was no surprise at all. Ofcourse it was an impossible mission for sceners who entered after 1992 as most of the questions couldn't be answered by downloading and reading old magazines as some do just to claim they know what was going on, neverthe- less we expected that some of those who claim to be a part of the scene for about 7, 8, 9 or 10 years should have been in the position to solve the quests and to answer the questions. One might start complaining about the fact that the competition has held to suit the needs of the Internet community but regarding the situation in the scene where to look up for people being in the position to compete in The Hunt the answer can only be in the Internet, the place where atleast some scene "oldti- mers" can be found. The Hunt was meant as a competetion, a competition we won without any remarkable competitors partici- pating. Not a single person of the ones who dared to compete was even close to get the full score by sol- ving all quests. What was the reason? Lack of inte- rest or the high level of difficulty? The answer might be found somewhere between both answers, that's the mirror for the scene these days. Finally after about eight months we sadly detected for the very first time that a person tried to submit manipulated votes by using the online voter at Relax Online. It is no surprise to see that specific person from Turkey already known for his bad behaviour and weak style by defining one of the main editors of this publication as racist and nazi, what have been some of the more polite expressions, without having just a single proof for his stupid claims, but it seems to be rather popular these days to act like this. Nevertheless within 10 minutes three mails arrived, two applications for a possible THE CBM 64 scene e-mail directory registration and one filled digital votesheet from the online voter on Relax Online, sent with a faked e-mail address but with an interesting X-MAILER. It is no surprise that the votesheet contained various #1 votes for the group, its members and productions. Exactly the same phenomenon appeared with a paper votesheet, too. Perhaps it is unknown for some sceners that a few votesheet spreaders, a preference for Relax Magazine votesheet spreaders, take care about their work and are capable to identify the hand-writing of their contacts! Random or pure LAMENESS? Ofcourse there is no secure method to avoid people cheating votesheets in any form, covering both paper and digital votesheets. We have been thinking about consequences and security but after all there is NO totally secure method. We have decided to check out suspicious votesheets even more careful before taking them into consideration to create our charts chapter(s) in the future. Suspicious votesheets from anonymous e-mail services like Hotmail will be immidiately deleted if the sender is NOT personally known as reliable and genuine user to us, honest and FAIR people having access to a steady Internet account do NOT need to hide behind questionable e-mail aliases. Due to the fact that Relax Magazine has become 8 years old we decided to add a special gift on the disk, quite useful for a minority and useless for the majority. Relax Magazine 22 is only complete distributed with a Rayden modded DMC v4.3 editor that will suit the needs of people enjoying stereo sound via two seperate SID chips on the CBM 64. Further information about the stereo SID chip can be ordered at Rayden's address. ------------------------------------------------------------ | ... Votesheet Spreaders and News suppliers ... | ------------------------------------------------------------ The PAPER votesheets have been spread, as usual, by our very own ZAPOTEK, VIOLATOR and DR. SOFT, who all are serving as AUTHORIZED mail distributors, aswell as by RACOON who enlarged the squad. The DIGITAL VOTESHEET has been spread by using Motiv 8's mailing list. The NEWS have been supplied and confirmed by Burglar, Comanche, Curlin, Derbyshire Ram, Despair, Jazzcat, Sebaloz, Midfit, Westbam, Vip and other re- liable sources. This edition's content looks like this: ------------------------------------------------------------ As usual GLOBAL REPORT is covering the most inte- resting news out of the scene. The RELEASE CHARTS and the YEARLY RELEASES are having a closer look at the activity of the cracking groups releasewise. The MAIL CHARTS are now only the commulated votes from the votesheets, the old mail (mega) charts con- ception can be found in the MEGA CHARTS chapter. NETGUIDE is a new but self-explaining chapter, focu- sing to the Internet. SOCIETY is having a closer look on the biased release strategy of cracking groups these days, quite useful for sceners who have joined the scene in 1993 or later. GAMES PEOPLE PLAY is giving answers to questions asked or initiated by the concurence, a must for people looking for information instead of manipulation. DEMO REVIEWS contains an overview about some demo releases, an introduction for the mail scene about the project "We Are Family" and reviews of demos created by Lepsi and Panic. PARTY RADAR is hosting the results from scene par- ties and ofcourse information about THE PARTY 7. LOST FILES is the entertaining chapter with sarcas- tical but not always serious meant humorous views on current scene happenings. In the ADVERTISEMENTS chapter you will find, as usual, lots of addresses. * Credits for our October edition * ------------------------------------------------------------ PROGRAMMING FUBEN/OXYRON ADDITIONAL THE IGNORANCE/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 ADDITIONAL LYNCHBIT/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 SOUNDTRACK DANKO/CENSOR DESIGN BITMAP GRAPHICS RRR/OXYRON CHARACTERSET SKID ROW/CHROMANCE Title Author ------------------------------------------------------------ "Principle" Danko/Censor Design "Relax" Danko/Censor Design ------------------------------------------------------------ * How to contact the Relax Magazine staff? * ------------------------------------------------------------ Snail mail: xxxx xxxxxxxxx -------- xxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx Internet: xxxxxx ------- xxxxxx xxxxxxx Boards: THE ESCAPADE (EHQ) ------ ------------------------------------------------------------ * Where to download the Relax Magazine? * ------------------------------------------------------------ THE ESCAPADE ++49/5341-395697 THE DIGITAL DUNGEON ftp.scs-trc.net ------------------------------------------------------------ * RELAX (MAGAZINE) ONLINE * ------------------------------------------------------------ RELAX ONLINE http://home.sol.no/&zapotek RRR/Oxyron xxxxxx ------------------------------------------------------------ * The Relax Magazine staff consists of * ------------------------------------------------------------ MAIN EDITOR MARC/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 MAIN EDITOR RRR/OXYRON MAIN EDITOR VIOLATOR/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 CO-EDITOR FUBEN/OXYRON GUEST EDITOR ECO/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970^EXCESS GUEST CONTRIBUTION ANONYM/PADUA CORRESPONDANT DR. SOFT/ALBION ------------------------------------------------------------ * Authorized Mail Distribution * ------------------------------------------------------------ ZAPOTEK/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 VIOLATOR/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970^LEPSI DE DR. SOFT/ALBION RACOON/HITMEN)LEPSI DE ------------------------------------------------------------ * DISCLAIMER * ------------------------------------------------------------ RELAX MAGAZINE does not take any warranty for text sources supplied by freelancers or guest edi- tors. Articles, reports or any other submitted text sources must NEITHER represent the opinions NOR reflect the suspension of the Relax Magazine staff. * COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER * ------------------------------------------------------------ -. The binary CBM 64 version of the Relax Magazine /0 is PUBLIC DOMAIN and may be spread FREELY around the world as long as either the Relax archive or the unpacked production itself is getting spread AS-IS without any modifications. This production must NOT be sold in any form to gain profit without a written permission from the authors. Any form of distribution on CD-Roms, IOMEGA-ZIP or YAZ (and compatible) disks is STRICTLY forbidden! Any parts of the binary and the HTML version, may it be articles, graphics or musics, may NOT be used without a written permission from the authors. ------------------------------------------------------------ Best regards on behalf of the entire staff, RRR/Oxyron ---------- * R3L4X M4G4Z1N3* * PAST TO PRESENT, 1989 - 1997 October 31st, 1997 ---------------
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* GLOBAL REPORT * ------------------------------------------------------------ Facts, facts, facts, ... Welcome to THE news journal you can care about because WE do care about the content. The seek for proven information has found its end as you have finally found your favourite and most RELI- ABLE HOST around the globe in this lonely universe. Fantasy stories, expections or own opinions about the latest happenings in the world we use to live in can be found in several wrong places, this is the pla- ce for getting PURE information, prepared and collected and proven by EXPERIENCED and QUALI- FIED reporters, always hunting for the latest in the CBM 64 scene, the place we still use to life in. It is divided into two seperate parts, illegal and legal scene, instead of seperating the Polish news section into a special chapter like in the last issue. The deci- sion for the seperation was to introduce the activity and to show that it is posible to take care about the entire scene on an advanced level, too. In the future we will continue using the system introduced with this edition, starting global report always with the major cracking groups. The American phone company AT&T has been respon- sible for the decreasing action on the US boards and made several non-American board sceners unable to call out by BLACKLISTING these few major US boards that are still online, namely THE DUNGEON, THE BASS PLANET AND DEADZONE. The only groups capable to present an acceptable and regular board presence have been in alphabetical order ALPHA FLIGHT 1970, DYTEC and SUCCESS & THE RULING COMPANY. The simple but effective solution, abusing to one of the many other phone companies, seemed to be a rather hard quest for some so-called experienced board sceners. Most boards have already changed numbers still the activity did not return in the formerly known quality and quantity. * ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 * ------------------------------------------------------------ The German cracking group has passed a rather SLOW summer releasewise, a situation normally defi- ned by other groups as summer break while certain persons wanted to be informed about a crisis and the decay of the most successful cracking group of the past two years. These impreachments can NOT be confirmed. Alpha Flight 1970 belongs in this dark pe- riod of the US boards to the few groups to be found calling out on a regular level. With the decreasing temperatures lifesigns in form of releases have been sent out, too, just to prove the opposite of the cur- rently cruising rumours spread by doubtful perso- nalities. New in the rows of the flight is ECO, a talented music composer, who joined in as double member remaining in Excess, too. There has been a rumour saying that Eco, and NOT Echo who is a quite different person, has joined Motiv 8. This is totally wrong and based on a misunderstanding. MARC has finally married his all-time love Silvia on September 26, 1997. He has and still is spending most of his sparetime decorating the expanded flat and can't be as active as in former times at the moment, a situation which will certainly change after finishing decorating. ALG has left his second group Lepsi Developments in order to join Samar as double member while VIOLATOR has left Nostalgia in order to enlarge Lepsi Develop- ments. BALDHEAD decided to join Street Children as triple member, serving them as programmer. RUG RAT, sysop of Edge Of Midnight, has been moved to the inactive list as long as his board is down. THE ESCAPADE, European headquarter for the flight, went offline for a few days due to the fact that Xenox was moving houses. Meanwhile it is back online using the same well known number as before. ANTIDOTE, next to Triad and Wrath Designs aswell Scandinavian headquarter for Alpha Flight 1970, can be reached by dialing a new number, ++46/457-26471. CALYPSO, formerly known as one of the few remai- ning mega swappers, finally left the flight due to a missing inspiration for scene activities in the future. FLASH, who requested to be set on the inactive list, has decided to get more active again and left Alpha Flight 1970 to join the Polish based group Kreciki Design to be his fourth group/label announcing his actual membership. Current Alpha Flight memberstatus looks like (= 23): ALG, Archangel, Argos, Baldhead, Caledonian, Chash, Chrysagon, Danzig, Eco, Goldhand, Ignorance, Lynch- bit, Mad Hatter, Marc, Ned, Rayden, Styx, The Heretic Violator, Wizard, Xenox, Zapotek and Zatt Alpha Flight worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): THE ESCAPADE ++XX/XXXX-XXXXXX ANTIDOTE ++XX/XXX-XXXXX WWW http://www-studbo.hit.no/&u952487 * CHROMANCE * ------------------------------------------------------------ As usual it has been rather silent around the Hunga- rian based group. Nothing really negative and nothing really positive can be reported, just like a few years ago certain members decided to look out for a more promising future out of Chromance based on diffe- rent motivations. Gangsta's Paradise, Chromance and Onslaught's FTP- site, was facing some problems in form of HD space this summer. With lots of account owners being in va- cation the incoming e-mails did fill the system quickly, parts of GP have been moved to a temporary direc- tory to keep things working. At the end of the vaca- tion things have been fixed and worked on a normal basis again. The system can be reached by a new URL offering all the advanced WU-FTPD functions again. Several members have left the Hungarian posse in order to look out for new aims in other groups. Right after leaving Onslaught Galland renamed back into his for handle MIDFIT and was supposed to work as NTSC fixer, coder and cracker. Just a few days later he left for lately returned group Legend. SKID ROW de- cided to leave aswell, celebrating the long expected re-union with his long time group mate Skinhead in the rows of the fantastics. Last but not least CUBE- HEAD prefered to return to his former comrades in Onslaught. Current Chromance memberstatus looks like (= 23): Deviant, Druid, Garth, Jaydee, Jinx, Joyride, Lion, Macx, Mr. Wax, Natas, Pete, Rough, Scratcher, Skud, Sphere, Spermbird, Stash, Syco, Zakk and Zar Chromance worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): BASS PLANET ++X/XXX/XXX-XXXX VIRTUAL LIGHT ++XX/XXX-XXXXX GANGSTA'S PARADISE c64.rulez.org WWW (HALL OF FAME) http://www.agt.bme.hu/hof * FANTASTIC 4 CRACKING GROUP * ------------------------------------------------------------ It just looked like an episode taken out of another endless daily soap opera. In fact it was a story out of the real scene life, delivered by the so-called 8-bit cosa nostra to fill the partly boring summer gap without any real highlights. Three men left, three men returned and later on one of them left for good. The doors have been opened several times, the doors have been closed several times and an old headquar- ter has been re-fitted and taken back into action. SKID ROW, known for his skills as programmer, NTSC fixer and graphic artist, decided to cooperate with his long time scene and group companion Skinhead and teamed up with the fantastics. With DESPAIR ano- ther potentional NTSC fixer enlarged the group. Des- pair explained to Relax Magazine that he will re-start his fixing activity for F4CG as soon as he has got a functional NTSC equipment, having shown interest in fixing with "Ice Guys" one of the few major titles on the CBM 64. The affairs about the 8-bit cosa nostra have been rather entertaining and did fill the summer gap per- fectly with DMC, FUNGUS and SNEAPER leaving the group on August 20, 1997. Sneaper commented his very own decision on Second To None like this "COZ OF THE LACK OF SUPPORT FROM THE LEADING F4CG MEMBERS I DECIDED TO LEAVE THE GROUP ON THE THE 20TH OF AUGUST 1997." while PLAYBOY coun- tered "I AM QUITE DISAPPOINTED BY THE THREE GUYS. I GUESS THEY DIDN'T EVER GET THE POINT OF BOTH SCENE AND F4CG.". However, matters have been solved internal in 12 hours. During the period the three deserters seem to have got the point of both scene and F4CG and were allowed to re-join the group. Nevertheless the situation did not change so DMC, unhappy with the conditions, finally left the fan- tastics for good and prefered to enlarge the endless memberstatus of WOW. FUNGUS seemed to enjoy the game of leaving and re- joining so he practised it once again with Carcass, indeed a fine strategy to keep the scene press busy and motivated. Considering a long time about the final decision and after having left the former Italian group for a few days quite a while ago DERBYSHIRE RAM has left the group, too, in order to restart working with his for- mer group mates HOK, FREESTYLE and JACK ALIEN in the oldie label REMEMBER. Next to this activity a membership is a "normal" scene group is supposed to be announced in the early days of November. SIXX has been moved into the inactive status due to a missing phone connection making it unable to stay in contact with the 100% netbased group. INTRUDER, once ranked as the number #1 mail trader, has sent out once again. After having bought some CBM 64 equipment from Robocop/Atlantis the remai- ning interest in the CBM 64 scene seems to celebrate another revival. Intruder decided to join Remember, too, but so far only as double member, serving in the mail distribution of the highly appreciated oldie label. The long time vansihed FTP-site INTERPARK as been brought online again back in early September, located on the known server in Italy. The service is available under the original old address, too, URL is unchanged ftp://bbs.cc.uniud.it. Current F4CG memberstatus looks like (= 21): Bitman, Despair, Devil, Fungus, Goz, Maja, Motley, Mr. Alpha, Neotec, Newscopy, Playboy, Skid Row, Skinhead Sliver, Smasher, Sneaper, Solar, Stasi, Total Chaos, Walker and Zyron F4CG worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): FTP: INTERPARK bbs.cc.uniud.it WWW http://www.algonet.se/&motley/propa.htm * HITMEN * ------------------------------------------------------------ Hitmen continued what they have started during the last months by recruiting further well known (Ger- man) scene profiles to be able presenting a rather impressive memberstatus. The Playstation section seems to become rather successful, too, with lots of CBM 64 related persons of several groups to be found in the memberstatus. Hitmen continued the seek to recruit well known Ger- man scene profiles. MAGIC MAN, former member of groups like 4712, Yazz, Array, Crazy, Enigma and Avantgarde joined in as programmer, considering to bring the legendary magazine Mamba back into busi- ness. WEASEL, former member of Frontline, Matrix, Crazy, Lotus, Crest, Enigma and Avantgarde is sup- posed to prove his skills as cracker once in a while. In Sweden SLEDGE has left the old legend FairLight in order to team up with Hitmen and running WAREZ AQUARIUM as a true hitman only. In early October the bulletin board system got a new number, please note ++46/867-32424 to get a connect. Back in full effect Magic Man has already shown inte- terest in organising a project in the tradition of the good old "DEMO OF THE YEAR" conception, a mega cooperation demo in first case for old and well repu- tated groups only, using the project name "WE ARE FAMILY". A mailinglist has already been installed, sub- scribe at MJ^PADUA.ORG and note in the body "SUB- SCRIBE WAF" to receive further information. After a quite promising and euphorical phase the project seems to have slowed down a bit due to sparetime li- mitations. Unlike printed elsewhere DESPAIR did NOT join Hitmen on CBM 64 but the PLAYSTATION section. RACOON did join the Polish demo group Lepsi Developments as a mail trading double member. Current Hitmen memberstatus looks like (= 32): Alchemist, Banshee, Burn, Chaotic, Cupid, Curlin, Deff Diverse, Erol, Groepaz, Hi-Lite, Jack Alien, Jayce, Jinx, Kristian Rostoen, Luke, Magic Man, Marcus, Moonchild, Motion, Peacemaker, Racoon, Rammy, Raze, Sabotage, Seven, Skud, Sledge, Tranziie, Tyron, Vor- tex and Weasel Hitmen worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): THE DUNGEON ++X/XXX/XXX-XXXX MYSTICAL PARADIZE ++XX/XXXX-XXXXX WAREZ AQUARIUM ++XX/XXX-XXXXX WWW http://hitmen64.home.ml.org/ * LEGEND * ------------------------------------------------------------ The will of god returned to the CBM 64 scene, the REAL Legend represented by TRUE and ACTIVE le- genders unlike in the phase when Legend disappea- red from the scene two years ago. Releasewise Le- gend did not return to former strength and activity yet but with the re-introduction of Second To None runned with QCBBS once again the aspiration of inno- vation has touched a once so proud scene. After a short guest performance in Chromance MID- FIT (ex-Galland, ex-Dr. Jones) happily left for the growing will of god. He is supposed to serve them as cracker, NTSC fixer and coder. He has left his se- cond group Nostalgia, too. A short period later Midfit reactivated MANIAC who has taken in as trail member but he left after a few days only to celebrate a re- union with STING, long time companion during his wrong way throught the scene. GENE, former member of groups like Illusion and Bros just to name a few, has been reactivated, too, and will serve as co-sysop of the web-based BBS SECOND TO NONE and public relations man. Last but not least XXX has been spot- ted calling Second To None, too. Second To None has moved locations to a by far faster server in Switzerland and can be seen as the future of BBS systems for all possible scene plat- forms, simulating in the actual phase already lots of options a board has to offer, still some features are still under production. Current Legend memberstatus looks like (= 11): Antitrack, Doc, Fletch, Gene, Goldfish, Midfit, Power- plant, TDO, Uncle D, Westbam and XXX Legend worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): SECOND TO NONE http://b2.welcome.ch/secondtonone * MOTIV 8 * ------------------------------------------------------------ Confusion and misunderstandings have been the headlines for the Danish group. People who were said to be not in the group became genuine members while persons said to be in the group have not been in af- ter all. Motiv 8 has followed the trend to release new quality cracks of golden oldies, too. DASH, who has caused some confusion in the rows of the motivated ones and after an official proclamation saying he was NO member, got finally officially taken in and confirmed to be an authentic member. He did join the forces under very hectic circumstances re- sponsible for the fact that things have been mixed up back in time. Some time later he got caught by the Swedish police for abusing the local telecom service, Swedish Telecom, in form of phone fraud and pbx, and if it is NOT enough for a single person already, for burning CD-Roms for PC and Sony Playstation, too. The police confiscated his, in the opinion of the au- thorities "serious", computer equipment, leaving the CBM 64 for his disposal, so this raid did not really affect his CBM 64 activities. L.A. STYLE has returned to the CBM 64 scene and to Motiv 8, too. At the mo- ment it is still unsure if he will bring his board "The Hidden" back online or not. L.A. Style has become a victim of the justice, too, by having got caused for unauthorised selling of pirated PC software among o- ther incidents last year. Later on GOAT/Disorder teamed up as mail trader, modem trader, cracker and programmer. LARRY decided to quit the scene, therefore "Raveo- lution", his board, went down for good. MENDRAKE, responsible for the scandal around Sacred by faking so-called first releases, the person who rebuilt Uni- ted Artists without permission and who has called himself unauthorized a FairLight member just to name a few masterpieces and highlights of his impressive career, has brought some entertainment into the scene by explaining that ECHO/Excess joined Motiv 8 as double member. ECHO/Excess has left Excess for Plush about a year ago. ECO, what sounds indeed al- most like Echo, did only agree to arrange a few ex- clusive soundtracks for the motivated ones, he did definately NOT promise or agree any form of mem- bership in the Danish group. A few days later Eco fi- nally decided to join Alpha Flight 1970 as double mem- ber to support the group with soundtracks for legal and intro productions. However, Mendrake decided to removed Laxity from his board "The Dragon's Tower" so Motiv 8 will be the only group using this system as headquarter in the future. Nevertheless EDDIE dared to re-open his old board THE GRAVEYARD, running more or less on an experimental basis up to now. To get a connect there dial ++XX/XXX-XXXXXXX, the old number. After being offline for quite a while IN LIVING COLOR has been officially confirmed to be offline, too. Fur- thermore is Motiv 8 searching for a replacement of the FTP-site MOUNT TOKAY, shared with the Dutch cooperation, since the activity there slowed down to non detectable level. Following the trend of releasing new, fresh quality versions from golden oldies a lot of labels have been found, being responsible for a massive software sup- port these days. Motiv 8 did not found another label, Motiv 8 went a different way and presented their quality released using the label M8Q, Motiv 8 Quality. M8Q has already released a quite impressive amount of software, mainly spread using the self-administra- stead mailinglist. Furthermore a special drive got in- stalled on The Dragon's Tower in order to please the increasing amount of oldie lovers. Current Motiv 8 memberstatus looks like (= 15): Bird, Clive, Crossfire, Dash, Eddie, Gerry, Goat, Greenfrog, Ibanez, Iceball, L.A. Style, Mason, Men- drake, Merlin and Nuke Motiv 8 worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): THE DRAGON'S TOWER ++XX/XXXX-XXXXXX THE GRAVEYARD ++XX/XXX-XXXXXXX WWWhttp://www.informatik.uni-oldenburg.de/&grfrog/ Please continue reading in Global Report II. Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
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* GLOBAL REPORT II * ------------------------------------------------------------ Facts, facts, facts... The news coverage continues starting with the remaining illegal orientated groups. There is definately no further long introduction part necessary, so let's continue the flood of information. * ONSLAUGHT * ------------------------------------------------------------ The most interesting news around the Australian based group was the return of the long gone maga- zine Vandalism News which has been released again after having been delayed for about a full year as- well as recruiting another trouble maker continously causing disorder and disruption wherever he can produce himself. Recruiting MANIAC, in alphabetical order former mem- ber of Alpha Flight 1970, Arcade, Dominators, Gene- sis Project, Madonna Cracking Group, Pandora, Pa- ramount and Talent among a few days intermezzo on trial basis in Legend, did grow hot the dispositions, kept the gossip floating and caused lots of hot tem- pered discussions wherever and whenever Maniac appeared. His weak claimings to be a former member of the cooperation of IKARI & TALENT could have been easily proven to be wrong. Not only by members of the refered groups like DOC, EXCELL, FLETCH and XXX for Ikari's part and BOD speaking as Talent or- ganiser and founder but aswell by checking the refe- rence Maniac incautiously named, the Shock! maga- zine. In issue #10 one could find that Sting and Maniac were allowed to join Talent, according to Bod on trial basis only, and got kicked out a few days later. Bad luck. Causing disorder, disruption and claiming to be a legend NEVER pays for itself when there are per- sons in the position to prove the opposite! Maniac is supposed to work as cracker and modem trader in first case. Another new member is TEKTRONICS, the person who is said to hide behind this handle should be Matt, former member of Mystic, who recently re- turned to the scene. His jobs are supposed to be a coder, supplier and graphic artist for Onslaught. CUBEHEAD, a Hungarian music composer, came back from Chromance in order to return to his former Australian group mates, remaining in the music label Oxsid Planetary as double member. The Australians did a major clean up to decrease the memberstatus. At first BIZARRE, who has moved per- manently to Canada, went to the inactive status. He might return by receiving his CBM 64 equipment later on this year. MR. BRAIN, who is active as a warez courier in the PC scene, got excluded from the list aswell as long as he decides to get active again. RAP is the next one taken out of the active memberstatus due to enviromental problems. Living in the southern part of Poland he is supposed to have become a vic- tim of the flood catastrophe this summer having destroyed parts of Poland, Czech Republic and Eastern Germany. RAMIREZ, German original supplier and modem trader has left the scene. Having got an ISDN line he feels unable to call the boards to due the protocols. Onslaught has decided to drop THE BADLANDS, offi- cial FTP-site for Vandalism News and Domination, due to speed limitations and lack of support of the main- tainer, Spockie of T'Pau. He was forced to start his army service, causing that he did not find the time to update the FTP-site on a regular daily basis. However, Onslaught has opened an homepage on Geo- cities, an institution offering web space for free. URL is http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bay/1172 or the shorter alias http://ons.home.ml.org. DEADZONE has been blacklisted by AT&T, like all o- ther CBM 64 elite boards which are currently online, The Dungeon and The Bass Planet, too. This slowed down the board activity, causing that Onslaught could NOT be spotted regulary on the US boards anymore. Not even the immidiately changed number of Deadzone brought the expected return, the situation remains quite silent in the land of the free. Meanwhile Jazzcat hinted to have stopped his activities in the hack and phreak area so Onslaught is said to conserve the still existince resource until a new member has been found to take over the activity. However, Onslaught acutally can NOT be found on the US boards regulary and it is just the missing presence which can only be reported about, NOT the existance of unused re- sources which could bring a group into the position to call out. Current Onslaught memberstatus looks like (= 23): B-Wyze, Carlos, Cubehead, Deekay, Digahole, DJ Kat, Donar, Doom, Grafee, Homeboy, Insane, Jason, Jazz- cat, Jolz, Maniac, McByte, Meff, Morbid, Moses, Shok- ker, Sting, TBH, Tektronics, Trouble and Vengeance Onslaught worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): DEADZONE ++X/XXX/XXX-XXXX SANITARIUM ++XX/XXX-XXXXXX FTP: GANGSTA'S PARADISE c64.rulez.org WWW: THE SLAUGHTERHOUSE http://ons.home.ml.org * SUCCESS & THE RULING COMPANY * ------------------------------------------------------------ ALCHEMIST did fly across the lake and visited good old Europe, to be more precise Amsterdam in The Ne- therlands, to meet his group mates and to have a good time over here. However, the Dutch cooperation enlarged their activity in the Internet once again. L'TRIMM has left WOW to join the team of his Cyber- punx and Talent group mate Count Zero. L'Trimm is supposed to work as cracker for the Dutch coope- ration remaining in Cyberpunx as double member. Tollfree numbers are getting installed to increase the action on the boards, a necessary step in the cur- rently very quiet situation. Hopefully the new number ++1/888/536-4306 will be a helping hand in order to realise the idea. Next to hosting the most popular and most frequen- ted CBM 64 related FTP-site "The Digital Dungeon" the Dutch cooperation has invested some time into WWW related projects and could proudly present a nice group homepage and a section for the magazine Frontpage including an all-time charts online voter. Furthermore "SPANKERZ HEAVEN", running on an early version of Burg-BBS, Burglar's answer to QCBBS, is actually tested by certain beta-users. If you are interested in testing the system apply at [http://www.scs-trc.net/apply.htm]. Current SCS&TRC memberstatus looks like (= 23): Action Jackson, Alchemist, Allitaice, Bacillus, Burglar, Coolhand, Count Zero, Credo, El Banditos, Funxilla, Gazza, L'Trimm, Micron, Moren, Mr. Ammo, Nightshade, Replay, Spectator, Splatterhead, Stake, Superstition, Trax and Tristan SCS&TRC worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): THE DUNGEON ++X/XXX/XXX-XXXX THE DUNGEON ++X/XXX/XXX-XXXX MYSTICAL PARADISE ++XX/XXXX-XXXXX WWW http://www.scs-trc.net WWW: SPANKERZ HEAVEN http://www.scs-trc.net/sh FTP: THE DIGITAL DUNGEON ftp.scs-trc.net FTP: MOUNT TOKAY woland.iit.uni-miskolc.hu Following please find the information of more to the legal part of the scene connected groups. * ALBION * ------------------------------------------------------------ Regarding the situation in the legal part of the scene Albion does for sure belong to the few more active with different demo and magazine releases all over the year. Their latest release has been EXCALIBUR, ranked third in the Gravity 1997 demo competition. In January 1998 Albion will release its 5 years birthday celebration demo. After a quite silent period on the CBM 64 based on Amiga activities programmer YANS will be back in ac- tion. HAWK, a member of Proxima, teamed up as gra- ic artist. The Polish composer WACEK is meanwhile a member of the groups Arise, Albion, Coma and Lepsi Developments aswell as of the music labels Amorphis and Oxsid Planetary. This is indeed an impressive amount and for sure a negative record in the CBM 64 scene since it clearly shows that a membership in a group seems not to mean anything anymore, other- wise the phenomenon multiple group memberships can NOT be explained. Meanwhile OLSEN became the offi- cial leader of the music label Amorphis again. UNLOCK has moved houses what decreased his CBM 64 activities a little bit aswell as the fact that he has actually not monitor to allow any CBM 64 activity. Ne- vertheless he can be reached by e-mail, please con- sult the e-mail directory at RELAX ONLINE for the valid e-mail address. Current Albion memberstatus looks like (= 19): Agoth, Cosmo, Crimson, Dr. Soft, Eclipse, Hawk, Jetan Kerk, Kmeg, Kotas, Lucky, Magic, Olsen, Quamus, Questor, Stilgar, Unlock, Wacek and Yans Albion worldheadquarter(s)/board(s): WWW http://biotop.umcs.lublin.pl/&ptracz/albion.html * ARISE * ------------------------------------------------------------ Arise has released another dentro completely pro- duced by Wacek, who can be found in the membersta- tus of various scene groups and music labels alrea- dy. Luke is currently working on Arise's second huge demonstration. New in the team is RODNEY, who followed his former Camey comrade Luke, to serve as music composer. Rodney did prove his talent already by winning the Intel Outside4 music competition. DUX has left Arise just a few days in the group to concentrate on his actitivy as programmer in Frac- tion. Current Arise memberstatus looks like (= 10): Barman, Bimber, Browar, FHM, Gorzalek, Luke, Rod- ney, Sensei, TSL and Wacek * LEPSI DE * ------------------------------------------------------------ Lepsi Developments has officially renamed into Lepsi De. For those wondering about this unusual decision it got explained that a shorter name is offering more variety and options for the graphic artists while drawing logos and graphics. The Polish demo group continued their massive support for the scene and released with "3D HIGHLIGHT" another trackmo that got ranked third at the this time disappointing demo competition of the Assembly party in Finland aswell as by releasing another dentro at the Gravity 1997 in Poland. The warez rush will not stop! The second is- sue of their English magazine Design is due these days, a dentro called "ZOOM8 POWER" is just waiting for a party to be released. For The Party 7 a pro- duction called "SENSATION" is announced, for the Polish winter party a sort of out-of-Sensation like production entitled "STUNDARD". Lepsi De could proudly announce the membership of a few high ranked mail traders to take care about mail distribution. VIOLATOR/Alpha Flight 1970 and RA- COON/Hitmen both joined as double members. BAX, next to Lepsi a member of Fatum, joined No Name as triple member to work as music composer. Unlike stated elsewhere GREGFEEL did NOT quit the scene but Samar only, remaining in Lepsi and Unreal as double member. Contrary to all rumours WACEK did not leave Lepsi, too, remaining in total six groups and labels guaranting that he will never be out of work scenewise. A lot of members have been moved to the inactive status, starting with BRAX, CSEZSO, JB, MR. BA- LOON, PHANTOM and ending with WORM. The decision was made after checking the activity level and listen- ing to reports about damaged hardware the inactivi- ty. ALG, a quite talented graphic artist, has left Lepsi in order to join Samar as double member next to his membership in Alpha Flight 1970. Samar will be re- sponsible for the production of ALG's graphic collec- tion. Current Lepsi memberstatus looks like (= 20): Bax, Blender, Gawain, Gregfeel, Katon, Lego, Leo, Levi, Lynchbit, Madrom, Nazgul, Nemo, Racoon, Seba- loz, S.U.C.K., Valsary, Violator, Wacek, Zatt and Zielok * STREET CHILDREN & EXON * ------------------------------------------------------------ Cooperations could have been found in the cracking scene very often but that demo groups have ever started a steady cooperation is quite unusual. As in Poland nothing is really impossible this is no real surprise after all. BALDHEAD/Alpha Flight 1970)Kreciki Design joined in as programmer and triple member just to see FLASH joining in return Kreciki Design, too. Meanwhile Flash has left Alpha Flight 1970 after requesting to be pla- ced on the inactive list due to time limitations. These limitations seem to have gone due to the activity in meanwhile three different groups and one label. SUN- DANCE/Exon has been recruited as graphic artist before the cooperation did take place. XENOX decided to leave the Polish group and to con- centrate his rare sparetime for any activity around Alpha Flight 1970. Current Schn & Exon memberstatus looks like (= 20): Archangel, Baldhead, Bedrich, Cobra, Cooper, Corwin Cyclone B, Everlast, Flash, Habib, Kitana, Mad Hatter, Micro, Noise, Oldguy, Simone, Sundance, Volcano, War- lock and Wizard * TENGU * ------------------------------------------------------------ Things around Tengu are going slow at the moment, no remarkable activity releasewise could have been detected. BIGOS, programmer, and DEINONYCHOS, mail trader, joined from Sataki to strengthen the group. Meanwhile KILLER, scenewise active as mail trader and sampling music, teamed up with Kreciki Design as double member while PROVOKATOR joined Smash De- signs as mail trader and double member. Current Tengu memberlist looks like (= 12): Astovel, Bigos, Corwin, Deinonychos, Fangorn, Killer, Killer, Kosa, Ksin, Lydon, Pardon, Provocator and Replay * SINGLE NEWS AND RUMOURS * ------------------------------------------------------------ * The cover group FACTORY has got a few new mem- bers, too. After BISHOP as cover designer with CENTRAX as spreader another Samar member en- larged the label. Current Factory memberstatus looks like (= 04): Bishop, Centrax, Flash and Micro * A certain WARLOCK did enlarge the status of FAITH for a few days, then he decided to leave the group again to prefer the membership in WOW. SAHIR did join as mail trader and double member in the rather active demo group Samar. Current Faith memberstatus looks like (= 10): Jones, Kat, Nylu, Ophis, Pajda, Pentol, Praiser, Sa- hir, Talbot and Troll * AXON has started to create a homepage for FATUM while PABLO, after some time of inactivity, returned to become more active again. LEMING joined Medium as triple member. Current Fatum memberstatus looks like (= 13): Axon, Bax, Gopher, Grabba, Leming, Marco, Mr. Wegi No True, Pablo, Psychik, Shaggy, Talbot & Wedlock * After clearing certain misunderstandings CONDIC finally enlarged the forces of NIPSON but unfortu- nately JAKEC, their main swapper, finally left for the Amiga scene. Current Nipson memberstatus looks like (= 06): ASL, Condic, Dolph, Jesper Kyd, Luke and Rico * DUX as left his second group Arise to stay in FRACTION only, main coder Alpha renamed into IN- HABITOR and AGENT X joined as organiser. The yet unknown SHELL finally teamed up as programmer. Kordiaukis left to stay in Samar and Kreciki only. SAPPER restarted his scene activity. Current Fraction memberstatus looks like (= 19): Agent X, Chash, Cobra, Cucumbeer, Djinn, Dux, In- habitor, Martens, Pasthor, Quesar, Sage, Sapper, Sarin, Sensei, Shell, Szikers, Vampire, Vigo and Wedlock * JURGEN/Fraction joined KRECIKI DESIGN as coder. BALDHEAD and FLASH set up a deal to enlarge the status of their first groups. PRINCE/Vaudeville joined to join the Adwarp PL staff. SAHIR/Faith has left for Samar. Current Kreciki memberstatus looks like (= 16): Axon, B.M., Baldhead, Cancer, Dee Jay, Divine, Fe- nek, Flash, Jurgen, Killof, Kordiaukis, Prince, Raffi, Sensei, Simone and Wedlock * CENTRAX became the new co-hq of SAMAR while SAHIR/Faith joined in as mail trader as KORDIAUKIS left all groups except of Kreciki to join in, too. Current Samar memberstatus looks like (= 26): ALG, Aristo, Bishop, Butt-Man, Centrax, Daf, Dune, Falcor, Glover, Goldhand, Gregfeel, Isildur, Kordi- aukis, Levi, Maverick, Mr. Fiz, Neck, Ramos, RMTL, Scarlet, Scatee, Stinger, Timix, TTL, Valsary and Zeor * Rude left WOW for ROLE to join as coder and mail trader, followed by FADE/Tycoons and MEDIATOR. ZAK joined Proxima as double and SCORPE joined Panic as triple member while LEMING left Role. That have been all news and information we were able to collect for this edition. Keeping in mind that due to the summer a lot of persons and groups have de- creased their activity the amount and coverage is hopefully still on an advanced level. Many thanks have to go again to DR. SOFT, our correspondant in eastern Europe, for his investigations and massive information support. Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Release Charts
The Official Release Charts for the RELAX MAGAZINE ------------------------------------------------------------ Performed by the MASTER OF LAW... MARC ---- RELEASE CHAPTS RULES v 1.51 -------------------------- * GENERAL INTRODUCTION ------------ |DEFINITION| A PREMIERE upload of a game or pre- ------------ view on the US boards is generally de- fined as FIRST RELEASE, may it be a PAL, NTSC or an already PAL/NTSC fixed 100% working production. In case a game has been peleased in either PAL or NTSC only the first PAL/NTSC fixed version will be the official first release (qee: 6 months rule). --------------- |6 MONTHS RULE| If a production has been relea- --------------- sed either PAL or NTSC only the group presenting a PAL/NTQC fix within SIX months after the first release has been made is getting FULL points, for both GAME ald FIX (see: point system) if just ONE group is responsible, if TWO groups are involved the points will be qhared. --------------- |24 HOURS RULE| In case TWM groups upload a tit- --------------- le on different boards THE group having spread the release FIRST ON MOST BOARDS taken into consideration to create the release charts is receiving the points. If a group presents their version 24 hours after the FIRST RELEASE the release is getting handled as a re-release (see: re-release). ------------ |RE-RELEASE| A release already first released be- ------------- fore and having EXCEEDED the 24 hours rule is called a re-release. * RELAX MAGAZINE POINT SYSTEM ------------- |POINT SYSTEM:| The Relax Magazine* point system -------------- table contains the following cathe- gories: Fullprice Games 6.0 - 8.0 points Budget Games 4.0 - 6.0 points Low Budget 2.0 - 4.0 points PD/Shareware/Freeware 1.0 - 2.0 points Previews 0.0 - 1.0 points Due to the fact that the QUALITY of games in each cathegory VARIES the margin is ofcourse FLEXIBLE, too, as it would be UNFAIR to rate poor and good ga- mes with a similar amount of points. --------------- |PAL/NTSC FIX:| ONE bonus point can be gained by --------------- releasing a 100% (!) working PAL/ NTSC version. When a second group got involved with the PAL or NTSC fix the points will be SHARED! Games which were already PAL released HAVE to be fixed WITHIN 6 months after the official PAL release otherwise NO points will be eiven for the NTSC fix. --------------- |MINUS POINTS:| are a punishment for failures which --------------- don't accomplish to the standarts set for today's cracker geleration and the philoso- phy of the Relax Magazine release charts. Re-releases - 7.0 points Re-release of a preview - 1.0 points NO levelpacking - 1.0 points NO trainer(s) - 1.0 points NO translation - 1.0 points ----------- |NO POINTS| will be given for the following produc- ----------- tions, not fitting into the traditional re- lease charts rulez. Unlike most other magazines we WON'T give points for tools. Those releases will get mentioned but that's all about them. SEUCK GAMES, BASIC GAMES, COMPILED BASIC GAMES and such games that were done using a GAME MAKER aswell as NON-PLAYABLE PREVIEWS will be IGNORED. --------------- |BONUS POINTS:| whenever WE think somebody did --------------- something SPECIAL or OUTSTAND- ING we will add ONE point to the NORMAL amount of points. This might be a complex translation or a com- plex translation of graphics. SPECIAL FEATURES just benefiting a MINOR or limited group of sceners, just as REU (Ram expansion unit) users, is still worth a HALF point. * WHERE TO UPLOAD FIRST RELEASES? -------- |BOARDS| While creating the Relax Magazine* re- -------- lease charts the following boards have been taken in to consideration. The Dungeon 214-342-7281 Dead Zone 215-637-2204 The Bass Planet 609-587-4495 And here we go... * ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 (7.7 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The flight returned from the summer break and re- leased the PAL version of FLIPTRIS (3.3 pts) followed by the unplayable second version of the preview LEGEND OF KYRIL (0.0 pts). Last but not least the fixed version of PENNY (3.4 + 1.0 = 4.4 pts) from Commodore Scene. * CHROMANCE (2.1 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The Hungarian based group only released an average game called 64 LUFF (2.1 pts), a game already run- ning Pal/NTSC. * Disorder (2.1 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Before they died they released PAC MAN (2.1 pts). * Excess (0.2 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ They released the preview of BLOODY STARS (0.2 pts). * F4CG (0.0 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The fantastics started with the fixed version of MR. ANT (2.6 + 1.0 = 3.6 pts), followed by PLASM (-7 pts), a RE-RELEASE! Hitmen released it a few days earlier and F4CG slowing down the music on NTSC and fixing the on a few computers corrupt highscore-saver does not justify a so-called 100% version. With THE- PSOS (- 1 pts), a little preview, another RE-RELEASE made it to the boards. Red Sector Inc. released the FULL game around 1993 under the real name PSY- NOPSIS. * Hitmen (9.1 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ After a more silent period the German cracking crew started a nice warez rush. At first PLASM (3.4 - 1.0 + 1.0 = 3.4 pts), the minus point was given for a part- ly bugging highscore-saver, then COLEE (2.6 + 1.0 = 3.6 pts) and COLEE (2.6+1.0 pts) and followed by four previews called CROSS INVERT 2 (0.6 pts.), LABE ME (0.1 pts), BARREL BUNGER (0.4 pts) and finally MAXI- MUM OVERDRIVE (1.0 pts). Last but not least there was a little useful tool called PICTURE RECOLORATOR (0.0 pts) coded by Bob/Censor Design. * LAXITY (6.6 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Laxity has released the from Didi programmed and fixed WORDS DON'T COME EASY (2.5 + 1.0 = 3.5 pts) from Go 64 and later on 5*5 (2.1 + 1.0 = 3.1 pts). * MOTIV 8 (0.0 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ As usual the Danish cracking group released a com- piled Basic game called SPACE BATTLE (0.0 pts) and a little preview called BRAIN STORM (0.0 pts). * ONSLAUGHT (0.2 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The Australian based group released only a little preview called ON TABLE (0.2 pts). * Role & WOW (0.3 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The Belgian cooperation releasewise came along with the preview of TERMINUS 2 (0.3 pts). * SUCCESS & TRC (6.9 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ The ruling cooperation released the 100% working version of ICE GUYS (6.9 pts), Cherry Software ver- sion. Merged in to a table it looks like this: The official Release-Charts October 1997 ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Hitmen 9.1 02. (4) Alpha Flight 1970 7.7 03. (3) Success & TRC 6.9 04. (6) Laxity 6.6 05. (/) Chromance 2.1 05. (/) Disorder 2.1 06. (/) Role & WOW 0.3 07. (/) Excess 0.2 (1) Onslaught The official Fixine-Charts October 1997 ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Releases ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Hitmen 2 01. (/) Laxity 2 02. (3) Alpha Flight 1970 1 03. (3) F4CG Thanks for their help goes to: COUNT ZERO ---------- DODGER ------ IGNORANCE --------- Yours sincerly, Marc/Alpha Flight 1970 -------------------
[edit] Yearly Releases
* THE OFFICIAL 1997 REdEASE CHARTS * ------------------------------------------------------------ Feel welcomed to the chapter taking care about the releases made in 1996, being filled uith statistics about the first release competition in 1997. The following lines will contain ALL releases made in 1997 from ALL groups taking part in the first relea- se competition. Still it is needless to say that this is the only source covering the release charts on a REGULAR level and basis, once again we are proud to provide the BEST coverage possible in the CBM 64 scene. Infact the idea behind this chapter is not that new but it's definately very informative and helpful for all persons who are interested in detailed information about the releases in 1997 as it will contain game tit- les, fixing or cooperating groups, the points and the status (PAL: PAL only, PAL/NTSC: game was already PAL/NTSC compatible and FIX: NTSC (PAL) fix in- stalled). This overview might be a useful documentation in or- der to avoid re-releases, only to give a short exam- ple. Furthermore it is the place to define your cur- rent position, and ofcourse the position of the con- curence who are all heading for the crown at the end of 1997. The rules that this charts are following can be found in the Release Charts chapter. Here we go... * ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 (67.8 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Scortia 0.2 pts Pal Brave 4.7 pts Fix Remember 3.0 pts Fix Reversi 3.7 pts Fix Upsidedown 4.5 pts Fix Target 3.8 pts P/N Starmerchant 3.5 pts Fix Vision 4.1 pts Fix Merchant (w. Hitmen) 3.5 pts Fix Fugitive 5.0 pts Fix Samber 7.0 pts Fix Mystery 4.6 pts Fix Savage Platform Preview 0.6 pts Pal Bloodhand 4.2 pts Fix Magical Formula 4.6 pts Fix Fliptris 3.3 pts Pal Legend of Kyril V2 Preview 0.0 pts Pal Penny 4.4 pts Fix * CHROMANCE (28.5 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Picman Preview 0.0 pts Pal Undoroid Preview 0.2 pts Pal Interlaced Pairs 5.0 pts Fix Galleon 8.0 pts Fix Twin Terrors 3.3 pts Fix Chronic the Badger V2 0.6 pts Pal Undoroid 3.3 pts Fix Magic Land 0.0 pts P/N Buddha 0.0 pts P/N Legend of Kyril Preview 0.0 pts Pal Mr. Setam 3.0 pts Fix Horsekiller Preview 0.0 pts Pal Last G 3.0 pts Fix Nether Preview 0.2 pts Pal 64 Luff 2.1 pts P/N * DISORDER (4.1 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Dump Preview 0.0 pts Pal Pac It Preview 0.0 pts Pal Extend 2.0 pts Pal Pac Man 2.1 pts P/N * ENDLESS PIRACY (0.0 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Babylon Preview - 1.0 pts Pal * EXCESS (1.2 pts) ------------------------------------------------------------ Mystic Mirrors Prv. 0.4 pts Pal 48 Hours Prv. 0.6 pts Pal Deep Void Prv. 0.0 pts Pal Bloody Stars Prv. 0.2 pts Pal * F4CG (9.4 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Wladca -7.0 pts Fix Powertris 3.6 pts Fix Skylight Preview -1.0 pts Pal Tric Trac 2.6 pts Fix Manganoid 3.7 pts Fix Knoorkie 3.9 pts Fix Mr. Ant Preview 0.4 pts Pal Colee Preview 0.3 pts Pal Rundes Leder 1.0 pts Fix Frogs and Flies 0.0 pts Pal Plasm Preview 0.3 pts Pal Plasm -7.0 pts Fix Mr. Ant 3.6 pts Fix Thepsos Preview -1.0 pts Pal * HITMEN (13.8 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ James Fly Preview V2 0.7 pts Pal Tanks Preview 0.5 pts Pal Deep Void 0.0 pts Pal Merchant (w. Alpha Flight) 3.5 pts Fix Cross Invert 2 Preview 0.6 pts Pal Plasm 3.4 pts Fix Labe Me Preview 0.1 pts Pal Picture Recolorator 0.0 pts Pal Colee 3.6 pts Fix Barrel Bunger Preview 0.4 pts Pal Maximum Overdrive Preview 1.0 pts Pal U * LAXITY (7.8 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Outside Preview 0.0 pts Pal The Run Preview -1.0 pts Pal Map Race 0.0 pts P/N Trazz Preview 0.1 pts Pal Utopia Preview 0.0 pts Pal Sweepminer 2.1 pts P/N Words don't come easy 3.5 pts Fix 5*5 3.1 pts Fix * MOTIV 8 (7.6 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Jailbreak 3.0 pts P/N Ripp Off preview 0.2 pts Pal Gurdian 2.0 pts P/N X-Tris 2.1 pts Fix Afterlife 2 0.0 pts P/N Immortility in Space Preview 0.1 pts Pal Four Courners 0.0 pts P/N Micro Machines Preview 0.1 pts Pal Words don't come easy Prv 0.2 pts Pal Space Battle 0.0 pts P/N Brain Storm Preview 0.0 pts Pal * ONSLAUGHT (28.8 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Space Tracker Preview -1.0 pts Pal Crazy Business Preview 0.5 pts Pal Shove Preview 0.1 pts Pal Dominoes 3.1 pts Fix Find the Pairs 0.8 pts Pal Ghosttrap 4.0 pts Fix Trooze 3.7 pts Fix Crazy Business 3.0 pts Fix Penny Preview 0.4 pts Pal The Castle 8.0 pts Fix Ice Guys Preview 1.0 pts Pal Assasin V2 Preview 0.4 pts Pal Cannoncraze 4.8 pts Fix On Table Preview 0.1 pts Pal * Role & WOW (0.3 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Terminus 2 Preview 0.3 pts Pal * SUCCESS & TRC (30.0 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Blood Hand Preview 0.3 pts Pal Xiom 3.6 pts Fix Scortia 3.3 pts Fix Monster 3.0 pts Fix Grav Preview 0.2 pts Pal Remember 2.2 pts Fix Hypercars 3.6 pts Fix Blox 2.6 pts P/N Squares 3.5 pts Fix Alert Preview 0.4 pts Pal Assasin Preview 0.4 pts Pal Ice Guys 6.9 pts Pal * TRIAD (0.2 pts) * ------------------------------------------------------------ Aake 2 Preview 0.2 pts Pal Merged in to a table it looks like this: The official Release-Charts of 1997 ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Alpha Flight 1970 67.8 02. (4) Success & TRC 30.0 03. (3) Onslaught 28.8 04. (2) Chromance 28.5 05. (7) Hitmen 13.8 06. (9) Laxity 7.8 07. (6) Motiv 8 7.6 08. (8) Disorder 4.1 09. (5) F4CG 2.4 10. (10) Excess 1.2 11. (/) Role & WOW 0.3 12. (11) Triad 0.2 The official Fixing-Charts of the year 1997 ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Releases ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Alpha Flight 1970 14 02. (2) Chromance 6 02. (3) Success & TRC 6 03. (/) Onslaught 5 04. (4) F4CG 4 05. (/) Hitmen 2 05. (/) Laxity 06. (5) Motiv 8 1 Yours sincerly, Marc/Alpha Flight 1970 -------------------
[edit] Mail Charts
* MAIL CHARTS * ------------------------------------------------------------ Welcome to one of the most POPULAR chapters in scene magazines, the charts section. RELAX MAGAZINE has changed the charts section staring this issue, presenting "true" mail charts and still the approved mega charts conception in order to present a quite precise information about the charts situation in the CBM 64 scene. ------- |RULES| Please make sure to read the RULES very ------- carefully before submitting your votes. SELF-VOTING is NOT allowed and strictly forbidden! This one and only rule is known since the very be- beginning of public scene charts and has been used by almost all magazines over the years. Nevertheless there are still some persons left think- ing they are clever enough to OUTWIT the system for personal and/or group interests to MANIPULATE the charts suiting their needs. Enclosed please find a self-explaining list with GUIDING LINES to AVOID the public notification for SELF-VOTING! DON'T VOTE FOR: -------------- * YOUR GROUP (avoid to vote for ALL group(s) con- firming your membership) * GROUP COMRADES (avoid to vote for fellow group members including members of ALL crews confir- ming your membership) * GROUP PRODUCTIONS (avoid to vote for any pro- duction of your group, including ALL crews confir- ming your membership) * OTHER PRODUCTIONS (avoid to vote for produc- tions you are REGULARY involved in as a STEADY factor, such as magazine (co-) editors) In order to keep the charts actual please avoid to vote for people having LEFT the scene many years ago as we are NOT presenting ALLTIME charts yet. Furthermore the charts are supposed to present a representative overview about the BEST in their very own subjects and should NOT be influenced by sympathy/friendship votes as we are NOT promoting a MOST LIKED charts system. ---------------------- |HOW TO SUBMIT VOTES?| Relax Magazine actually ---------------------- offers a lot of different ways to submit your votes. Mail traders have the chance the fill in the paper votesheet. Please contact the official votesheet spreaders if you have not received a votesheet yet. Regular board callers have the chance to use the VOTING BOOTH installed at THE ESCAPADE, Relax Ma- gazine EHQ, a quite comfortable and easy way to vote for your favourites. Furthermore it is possible to leave mail containing your votes at Marc's account on our headquarters EDGE OF MIDNIGHT and THE ESCA- PADE or any other elite board worldwide. The DIGITAL VOTESHEET, an idea already adapted by lots of competitors, has been created to allow board and mail scene related voters submitted their votes via e-mail. In case there is actually no copy of the di- gital votesheet available you can submit your votes in a plain e-mail, too. Last but not least the is the ONLINE VOTER at RELAX ONLINE, our quite popular homepage project, another comfortable method to submit your votes, once again suiting the needs of mail and board scene, too. -------------------- |RELAX POINT SYSTEM| Relax Magazine is using the -------------------- TRADITIONAL and APPROVED system awarding the #1 entry with 10 points, #2 with 9 points down to #9 with 2 points and finally #10 with 1 point to keep a transparent and well working charts section. -------------- |STATISTICS: | The following top ten lists have been -------------- created compiling 136 votesheets. Since Relax Magazine is using TWO different mail charts chapters starting from this edition I have de- cided to publish the results only without previously reached editions in issue #21, so ALL entries will be handled as if they would enter here for the very first time as it would be senseless to let positions gained in megacharts influence the overview on TRUE mail charts. Here we go... TOP TEN DEMO GROUPS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Oxyron 867 02. (/) Crest 851 03. (/) Byterapers 814 04. (/) Reflex 721 05. (/) Smash Design 612 06. (/) Lepsi Developments 536 07. (/) Wrath Design 412 08. (/) Active 301 09. (/) Agony Design 217 10. (/) Samar 164 Well, OXYRON took the number one spot but they shouldn't be this high since they haven't released anything since ages. Other groups like COMA and more Hungarian groups should get more votes since they are very active at the moment. Groups just missing the top 10 are ALBION, COMA and GRAFFITY. TOP TEN SINGLE CODER ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Mr.Sex/Byterapers 812 02. (/) Graham/Oxyron 732 03. (/) Crossbow/Crest 692 04. (/) AEG/Smash Design 641 05. (/) Druid/Agony Design 612 06. (/) Quiss/Reflex 563 07. (/) Zorc/Reflex 431 08. (/) Fuben/Oxyron 321 09. (/) MMS/Taboo 312 10. (/) Ed/Wrath Design 204 Well, not much to add here but coders like DRUID, MMS and QUISS shouldn't be that high since they haven't released anything new since ages. ACTIVE program- mers like TRIDENT, OSWALD and MADROM should be higher in the charts ... Just missing the top 10 are CLARENCE, OXIDY and OSWALD. TOP TEN CRACKING GROUPS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Success & TRC 963 02. (/) Alpha Flight 1970 949 03. (/) Hitmen 816 04. (/) Chromance 734 05. (/) Onslaught 612 06. (/) F4CG 603 07. (/) Laxity 512 08. (/) Active 212 09. (/) Excess 180 10. (/) Motiv 8 167 Well, NOT much to add. Would be nice to see some oldie groups here competing with the other cracking groups. And please stop voting for dead groups. Pirates just missing the top 10 are FAIRLIGHT, TRIAD and WOW & ROLE. TOP TEN SINGLE CRACKERS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Jack Alien/Hitmen 893 02. (/) Ignorance/AFL 816 03. (/) Burglar/SCS & TRC 794 04. (/) Moonchild/Hitmen 765 05. (/) Didi/Laxity 612 06. (/) Skinhead/F4CG 576 07. (/) Derby'Ram/F4CG 412 08. (/) Mr.Wax/Chromance 211 09. (/) Sting/Onslaught 174 10. (/) Donar/Onsalught 102 It's nice to see that INACTIVE crackers or persons having left the scene did NOT make it into the top ten anymore. FUNGUS, JAYDEE and REAM should be high- er. "Protection removers" just having missed a possible top ten entry are FUNGUS, JAYDEE and CALYPSO. TOP TEN GRAPHIC ARTISTS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Joe/Wrath Design 761 02. (/) Deekay/Crest/Ons 712 03. (/) RRR/Oxyron 631 04. (/) Creeper/Antic/DC 514 05. (/) Cruise/Taboo 434 06. (/) Electric/Extend 412 07. (/) Valsary/Samar/Lepsi 376 08. (/) Astaroth/Agony Des. 212 09. (/) Rayden/AFL 176 10. (/) Cupid/Padua/Hitmen 104 The top ten lists of graphic artists looks pretty okay I guess but CREEPER shouldn't be that high since he hasn't released anything for ages. Electric won the graphic competition at the latest ASSEMBLY so I he'll be in the top 5 for a whole year. Please vote for active artists and not guys just releasing one pictu- re per year. I think that guys like SEBALOZ, MIKE, ALG and Sliver should be higher in the charts. Artists just missing the top ten are CZESZO, OXIDY and MIKE. TOP TEN MUSIC COMPOSERS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Mitch & Dane/Crest 696 02. (/) PRI/TIA/Oxyron 672 03. (/) Drax/Vibrants/Crest 604 04. (/) PVCF/Reflex 516 05. (/) Jeff/Hype/Camelot 414 06. (/) Praiser/Reflex 376 07. (/) Fanta/Bass/Oxyron 353 08. (/) Syndrom/TIA/Crest 216 09. (/) Trident/Active 179 10. (/) Compod/Taboo 102 Periodly inactive composes like PRI, PVCF and SYN- DROME shouldn't be so high since they haven't done I am missing some guys like MORBID, CUBEHEAD, SPHERE, BRIZZ and WIZARD as they should be much higher than they are now. Music composers just missing the top ten this time are SHOGOON, DAF and WIZARD. TOP TEN MAIL TRADERS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Violator/AFL/Lepsi 912 02. (/) Dr. Soft/Albion 614 03. (/) Racoon/Hitmen 510 04. (/) Derby'Ram/F4CG 423 05. (/) Acidchild/Triad 376 06. (/) Walker/F4CG 311 07. (/) Funxilla/SCS & TRC 296 08. (/) El Banditos/TRC & SCS 212 09. (/) Spermbird/Chromance 117 10. (/) Sebaloz/Lepsi Dev. 113 There is nothing to comment since the it will change a alot until next time. Well, I guess this is the hardest cathegory to vote for since there are a lot of good swappers around. Mail traders just missing the top ten are RAZOR RA- MON, NEOTEC, CALYPSO and STARLIGHT. TOP TEN MAGAZINES ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Magazine Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (/) Domination 876 02. (/) Vandalism News 851 03. (/) Driven 696 04. (/) Propaganda 503 05. (/) The Tribune 467 06. (/) Empathic 372 07. (/) Contrast 276 08. (/) Vitality 253 09. (/) Nitro 212 10. (/) Palladium 169 DOMINATION has taken the honor to be on top this time but will they be able to defend their position now as VANDALISM NEWS is back in business? Magazines just missing the top ten qualification are INTERNAL,DESIGN and ROCK'N ROLE. Please keep in mind that the presented entries are NOT manipulated by the Relax Magazine staff, do NOT reflect our opinions and do NOT present our but VOTERS' personal favourites. Best regards, Violator/Alpha Flight 1970 ---------------------
[edit] Mega Charts
* MEGA CHARTS * ------------------------------------------------------------ Welcome to one of the most POPULAR chapters in scene magazines, the charts section. RELAX MAGAZINE has changed the charts section starting this issue, presenting "true" mail charts and still the approved mega charts conception in order to present a quite precise information about the charts situation in the CBM 64 scene. ------- |RULES| Please make sure to read the RULES very ------- carefully before submitting your votes. SELF-VOTING is NOT allowed and strictly forbidden! This one and only rule is known since the very be- beginning of public scene charts and has been used by almost all magazines over the years. Nevertheless there are still some persons left think- ing they are clever enough to OUTWIT the system for personal and/or group interests to MANIPULATE the charts suiting their needs. Enclosed please find a self-explaining list with GUIDING LINES to AVOID the public notification for SELF-VOTING! DON'T VOTE FOR: -------------- * YOUR GROUP (avoid to vote for ALL group(s) con- firming your membership) * GROUP COMRADES (avoid to vote for fellow group members including members of ALL crews confir- ming your membership) * GROUP PRODUCTIONS (avoid to vote for any pro- duction of your group, including ALL crews confir- ming your membership) * OTHER PRODUCTIONS (avoid to vote for produc- tions you are REGULARY involved in as a STEADY factor, such as magazine (co-) editors) In order to keep the charts actual please avoid to vote for people having LEFT the scene many years ago as we are NOT presenting ALLTIME charts yet. Furthermore the charts are supposed to present a representative overview about the BEST in their very own subjects and should NOT be influenced by sympathy/friendship votes as we are NOT promoting a MOST LIKED charts system. ---------------------- |HOW TO SUBMIT VOTES?| Relax Magazine actually ---------------------- offers a lot of different ways to submit your votes. Mail traders have the chance the fill in the paper votesheet. Please contact the official votesheet spreaders if you have not received a votesheet yet. Regular board callers have the chance to use the VOTING BOOTH installed at THE ESCAPADE, Relax Ma- gazine EHQ, a quite comfortable and easy way to vote for your favourites. Furthermore it is possible to leave mail containing your votes at Marc's account on our headquarters EDGE OF MIDNIGHT and THE ESCA- PADE or any other elite board worldwide. The DIGITAL VOTESHEET, an idea already adapted by lots of competitors, has been created to allow board and mail scene related voters submitted their votes via e-mail. In case there is actually no copy of the di- gital votesheet available you can submit your votes in a plain e-mail, too. Last but not least the is the ONLINE VOTER at RELAX ONLINE, our quite popular homepage project, another comfortable method to submit your votes, once again suiting the needs of mail and board scene, too. -------------------- |RELAX POINT SYSTEM| Relax Magazine is using the -------------------- TRADITIONAL and APPROVED system awarding the #1 entry with 10 points, #2 with 9 points down to #9 with 2 points and finally #10 with 1 point to keep a transparent and well working charts section. -------------- |STATISTICS: | The following top ten lists have been -------------- created compiling 07 magazines. The Crest #2/Independant AUGUST 1997 Palladium #3/Ascraeus AUGUST 1997 Vandalism News #28/Onslaught Design AUGUST 1997 The Crest #3/Independant SEPTEMBER 1997 Propaganda #24/Independant SEPTEMBER 1997 The Crest #4/Independant OCTOBER 1997 Empathic #6/Nitros OCTOBER 1997 Relax Magazine #22/Phuture OCTOBER 1997 And here we go... TOP TEN DEMO GROUPS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Oxyron 75 02. (2) Byterapers 68 03. (4) Reflex 66 04. (3) Crest 63 05. (5) Smash Designs 40 06. (5) Profik 28 07. (8) Agony Designs 18 08. (10) Lepsi Developments 16 08. (9) Wrath Designs 16 10. (/) Taboo 12 The top 2 remains the same while REFLEX and CREST changed places. Most of the other groups gained or lost one or two places. New to the charts this time is TABOO who gained a lot of votes since their latest demo ALTERED STATES. Demo groups that just missed the top 10 are ALBION, CAMELOT and GRAFFITY. TOP TEN SINGLE CODER ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Mr.Sex/Byterapers 80 02. (2) Graham/Oxyron 68 03. (3) Crossbow/Crest 67 04. (6) AEG/Smash Designs 47 05. (5) Fuben/Oxyron 37 06. (9) Zorc/Reflex 33 07. (4) Quiss/Reflex 27 08. (7) Druid/Agony Designs 22 09. (8) MMS/Taboo 15 10. (/) Clarence/Graffity 9 The top three remained the same as last time. AEG keeps on climbing and this time he jumped two places to end up on the fourth spot. Also ZORC managed to climb three places to end up on sixth spot. The big tumbler this issue is Quiss who lost three places to end up on position seven. New to the charts this time is CLARENCE. Coders just missing the top 10 this time are ED, KM and PROFI 1. TOP TEN CRACKING GROUPS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Group Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Success & TRC 70 02. (2) Alpha Flight 1970 62 03. (4) Hitmen 56 04. (3) Chromance 47 05. (5) F4CG 42 06. (6) Laxity 37 07. (7) Onslaught 22 08. (9) Motiv 8 16 09. (8) Triad 13 10. (/) Excess 6 Not much at all happend this time. HITMEN manages to climb one spot to the number three spot thereby re- moving CHROMANCE from a top three place. MOTIV 8 managed to climb on place to drop TRIAD to a ninth place. The other groups defended their places. Only the unactive FAIRLIGHT lost their grip on the tenth spot to EXCESS. Cracking groups just missing the top 10 this time are ACTIVE, AMNESIA and NONAME. TOP TEN SINGLE CRACKER ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (2) Moonchild/Hitmen 63 02. (1) Jack Alien/Hitmen 60 03. (3) Burglar/SCS & TRC 59 04. (4) Ignorance/AFL 55 05. (5) Didi/Laxity 39 06. (/) Skinhead/F4cg 26 07. (6) CBA/TRC+SCS 19 08. (7) Hain/F4cg 15 09. (/) Sting/Onslaught 14 10. (8) Derby Ram/Remember 10 10. (/) Jaydee/Chromance 10 For the first time in ages JACK ALIEN wasn't able to defend his top spot which he lost to MOONCHILD. BURGLAR,IGNORANCE and DIDI defended their places. DERBYSHIRE RAM lost two places,while unactive guys like CBA and HAIN keeps on slipping in the charts. The big mover this time is SKINHEAD who jumps from out of nowhere to a sixth spot. Also STING and JAY- DEE managed to enter the top 10. Crackers just missing the top 10 this time are CHRY- SAGON, CROSSFIRE and MR.WAX. TOP TEN GRAPHIC ARTISTS ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (4) Deekay/Crest/(OD) 75 02. (1) Joe/Wrath Design 66 03. (1) Cruise/Taboo 55 04. (6) Electric/Extend 52 05. (3) RRR/Oxyron 49 06. (5) Creeper/Antic/DCS 36 07. (7) Astaroth/Agony Des. 28 07. (10) Valsary/Lepsi/Samar 28 09. (8) Mike/Byterapers 16 10. (/) Stone/Agony Des. 7 The big news this time is that DEEKAY climbed three places to take over the nummber one spot from JOE and CRUISE who have to settle for the second and third spot this time. The other big climbers this time are ELECTRIC and VALSARY while RRR lost two pla- ces. STONE managed to enter the top ten. Graphic artists just missing the top ten this time are CUPID, DANE, FAZEE and RAYDEN. TOP TEN MUSIC COMPOSER ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (3) Mitch & Dane/Crest 70 02. (1) PRI/TIA/Oxyron 64 03. (3) Drax/VIB/Crest 54 04. (5) Jeff/Hype/Camelot 39 05. (9) Praiser/Reflex 36 06. (2) PVCF/Reflex 33 07. (7) Shogoon/Agony Des. 32 08. (8) Fanta/Bass/Oxyron 31 09. (6) Syndrom/TIA/Crest 25 10. (10) Compod/Charged/... 20 MITCH & DANE climbed two places to take over the number one spot from PRI who has to settle for a second spot this time. PRAISER made a big jump from nine to position five. SYNDROM lost three places while PVCF lost four places. No new entries this time. Composers just missing the top 10 this time are: JE- ROEN TEL, DAF, MOOG and TRIDENT. TOP TEN MAIL TRADER ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Alias Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (1) Violator/AFL/Lepsi 50 02. (2) Funxilla/SCS & TRC 36 03. (6) Acidchild/Triad 27 04. (3) El Banditos/TRC&SCS 25 04. (9) Racoon/Hitmen/Lepsi 25 06. (4) Dr. Soft/Albion 24 07. (/) Walker/F4cg/N0 18 08. (/) Sebaloz/Lepsi 15 09. (5) Spermbird/Chromance 13 10. (6) Derby Ram/Remember 10 10. (/) Caledonian/AFL 10 Both VIOLATOR and FUNXILLA managed to hold on to their places. ACIDCHILD climbed three places just to enter the top three. Another big climber was RACOON who climed from a ninth to a fifth spot. The biggest tummbler this time was SPERMBIRD who lost four places. The new entries this time are WALKER, SE- BALOZ and CALEDONIAN. Mail traders just missing the top 10 this time are GOAT, STARLIGHT, SPLATTERHEAD and UNLOCK. TOP TEN MAGAZINES ------------------------------------------------------------ Rank Last Magazine Points ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. (6) Domination 41 02. (1) Relax Magazine 39 03. (2) Vandalism News 33 04. (4) Nitro 30 04. (3) The Tribune 30 06. (5) Driven 27 07. (8) Contrast 25 08. (7) Propaganda 20 09. (10) Vitiality 18 10. (9) Empathic 7 As I predicted last time DOMINATION took a big leap from sixth spot to the number one spot, thereby putting the RELAX MAGAZINE on the second spot while VANDALISM NEWS had to settle for a third spot. Most of the other magazines either lost or gained a place this time. Something strange is that PROPA- GANDA keeps on falling. But I guess that will change until next time. Magazines just missing the top ten this time are ARACHNOPHOBIA, INSIDER and PALLADIUM. Please keep in mind that the presented entries are NOT manipulated by the Relax Magazine staff, do NOT NOT reflect our opinions and do NOT present our but voters' personal favourites. Best regards, Violator/Alpha Flight 1970 ---------------------
[edit] Netguide
* NETGUIDE * ------------------------------------------------------------ The Internet is getting a more and more important aspect in scene culture with more and more actual and former scene related persons finding the ascent to the information highway. WWW, IRC, FTP and E-MAIL services are frequently used by members of the scene, may it be in the seek for information, online chats, file transfers or com- munication in form of electronic mail. Homepages have been explored by both groups and magazines as a media to present information, public relations, photos and software just to name a few possibilites. Using the elementary functions of Java or Active-X it is possible to present intro conversa- tions and even complex (demo) routines totally inde- pendent from platforms as long as the prefered plat- form supports the specified system. PC and Mac com- puters already support both Java (Netscape Naviga- tor) and Active-X (Microsoft Internet Explorer), on Amiga a full compatible as complete operating system conceptioned Java-package (project name: Merapi) is under construction. [Homepages] ---------- Homepages are a first step into direction multimedia in the Internet, the variety and different purposes are not even close to the limits yet, combining the elements text, graphic, animation and sound to partly stunning masterpieces. Using the advantages of Java, Active-X or dynamic HTML in form of style sheets homepages are getting closer and closer to an im- pressing interactivity level. Games, demo parts, boards, home banking, home shopping, there are NO limitations left to stop you realising whatever you'd like to create. In order to present a personal or group homepage no real account or regular Internet access is neces- sary. There are various companies and organisations offering to host private homepage projects for free, financed through sponsors in form of online adverti- sements. Scenewise one of the most popular URLs is [http://www.geocities.com]. Normally the size for the projects is limited between 1 MB to 2 MB, nevertheless there are further institutions offering 100 MB up to unlimited web space, too, ofcourse for free if you know where to register. * Fusion (Man & Machine) * http://freespace.virgin.net/ian.bean Fusion has finally set up a homepage, like many other ancient groups and personalities. This homepage located in United Kingdom (provider: Virgin) provides the history of CCS (Cleveland Cracking Service) and Fusion, their history before the CBM 64 came into their lifes, their relationship to the concurence, imand export of warez, photographs of members and friends, information about cracks and suppliers and everything else what might be inte- resting around and about this legendary group. Even if some parts are still under heavy construction the homepage is already worth a visit, if not a MUST of CBM 64 related surfers worldwide, atleast for those who still remember the good old times or who are in- terested in the decade. * Relax Online [Phuture (Software & Marketing)] * http://home.sol.no/&zapotek Starting from early October Relax Online has got a new, slightly changed URL for the ambitious homepage project. The project located in Norway (provider: Scandinavia Online) has become a quite popular URL in the CBM 64 related Internet scene. The documents contain infor- mation about the project Relax Online, the history of Relax Magazine, online issues (currently 09 - 21), on- line voter to submit votes on a quite comfortable way, the SID-corner holding most Relax soundtracks in PlaySID/SIDplay format, a download corner contai- ning links to THE DIGITAL DUNGEON, an expanded ma- gazine overview about the magazines released the past two years, THE CBM 64 scene e-mail directory (about 680 entries) and last but not least a guest- book to sign in your comments, ideas, bug reports or whatever else might be useful for the project. The server has been updated in late September, so please note the TILDE (&), the new character to be found in the known URL. * Second To None [Legend WHQ] * http://b2.welcome.ch/secondtonone [frames] * http://b2.welcome.ch/secondtonone/qcbbs.cgi [frame-free] Second To None, located in Switzerland, can be con- sidered to be the forerunner for scene boards on all platforms and a worthy replacement for the noto- rious US boards. Various subs prepared for various discussion topics, up- and download facilities are already online in or- der to entertain the interested users of the system. Considering that the system QCBBS is still under construction the actual presentation is already im- pressive and innovative. Please find further informa- tion about the system following in this chapter. People who are interested in visiting this interesting place have to keep in mind it's "emulating" a complete bbs, so an user-account and a password are prefe- rences to enter this place. * Success & The Ruling Company * http://www.scs-trc.net Next to their effort with The Digital Dungeon by main- taining the absolute top warez site connected to the CBM 64 scene the ruling cooperation begun to work on a new homepage project. After the demise of their in Austria located homepage the new project moved to the Netherlands (provider: XS4ALL) and is still under construction. It's still quite empty, next to the group history, a current memberstatus including further information about its members, a private section and a typical document holding links to other homepages only Frontpage is present with an online-voter and some kind of charts which are supposed to get calculated out of the sub- mitted votes. Last but not least links to Action Jackson's Wonderworld and The Digital Dungeon close the current online documentary. Please remember this homepage is still under heavy construction so an overview in the current develop- ment phase can't reflect an impression of the final version. Nevertheless there are some neat GIF ani- mations online. * Spankerz Heaven [Success & The Ruling Company] * http://www.scs-trc.net/sh * http://www.scs-trc.net/apply.htm [applications] As Success & The Ruling Company have enlarged their activity in the WWW area Burglar is on the way to realise his own planned web-bbs system using the project name Burg-BBS. Spankerz Heaven is the name of Burglar's vision how to create a web-based board, realised in PERL, due to the incompatibility of QCBBS with provider's ser- ver (XS4ALL). At the moment of the test phase five subs have been online, mainly to check out the secu- rity system being responsible for access restric- tion. These subs are "Spanking In", "Warez my Span- ker", "Spank me silly", "Eleet Spankerz" and "Span- kerz Delight". The current version 0.0 is already containing the notorious oneliners but it is still in a very early phase of development. However, Spankerz Heaven and Burg-BBS can be already seen as a pro- mising alternative to Second To None and QCBBS. Still no definitive judgement can be done but with se- veral web-bbs-systems runned by a variety of groups the activity of the board scene will sooner or later only concentrate on the Internet, a statement which can be ported over to all other scene platforms aswell. [QCBBS, THE NEXT GENERATION OF CBM 64 BOARDS] ------------------------------------------------------------ Along with the comeback of the group Legend the CBM 64 scene made a new recruiment, the return of SECOND TO NONE, an Internet based CBM 64 board, runned using the QCBBS system. But what is QCBBS? QCBBS, developed by Uncle D/Legend, is practically a from the CBM 64 ported upgrade of the original CBM 64 bbs software called UCBBS. The Internet version of this system itself is based on a CGI-script, a war- ranty for a high compatibility level on all possible platforms used to approach the system. CGI-BIN scripts (Common Gateway Interface) are a (Unix) standart for client-server communication accessing the server resources only, contrary to HTML [(HyperText Markup Language), originated from SGML (Structured Generalized Markup Language) with the special adjustment to hypertext functions] depending on client's internal browser resources, what can become a serious problem when an outdated version gets into trouble with "unknown" HTML tags of a document. These "unknown" tags are normally getting ignored, leading to the fact that the entire document can't be displayed according to the au- thor's intention. QCBBS' CGI-script has been developed completely in C (it is possible to create CGI-scripts in C/C++, Fort- ran, Perl, TCL, Visual Basic and AppleScript just to name a few examples), interpreting all necessary .qhtml files and administrates the important .ini files, responsible for user administration, access groups, subs and permissions next to further elements which can be configurated by the system administrator ac- cording to his personal needs. The first server for Second To None and the QCBBS software was a Silicon Graphics Indigo 1, its configu- ration was 33 MHz, 32 MB Ram and a 256 KB line. Af- ter moving to Switzerland the system is currently running on a Silicon Graphics O2, configurated with 96 MB Ram (10 ns), 180 MHz (R5000) and 100 MBits (eth0), having already brought for the visitor a de- tectable speed improvement while accessing the sys- tem. QCBBS is supposed to cooperate with all types of Unix derivat with a Netscape Enterprise Server 2.0+ and even on Microsoft's Windows NT. Uncle D explai- ned the challenge to develope a package like this has created to show that CBM 64 scene and its users can not only surprise the world with stunning abilities shown on the ancient breadcase, working with cut- tingedge-technology shouldn't be the problem for the mother of all scenes, too. QCBBS is the perfect combination of nostalgia and high-end technology, offering all the functions people used to know from the notorious (US) boards all over the years, what is nothing else but file transfer and message exchange in form of subs. The complete version offers next to an excellent file transfer fa- cility statistics like last 10 callers, a graffity wall, on- line chat, private messages to other users (in form of e-mail exchange, mailto: link) and other useful im- plants becoming a warranty that Internet boards are as exciting as real boards, too. Contrary to the rather boring FTP up- and download facilities QCBBS will support a more advance system, displaying the data in form of length, file, description and uploader, offering a form-based file processing a la RFC 1869, FAST and STABLE working, allowing the administration of credits for up- and downloading. Unfortunately not all browsers are supporting this standart, but PC browsers like Netscape Navigator v2.x+ and Internet Explorer v3.x+, in other words 90% of all Internet surfers, are capable to work with it. Popular Amiga browsers like IBrowse, AWeb and Voyager might offer it in future revisions. The stan- dart Unix text browser Lynx doesn't support it yet, too. The complete version of QCBBS will be given away for free to a few handpicked groups and persons only. Actually there is no commercial version planned with the intention not to rip off former comrades who show interest in working with the system. [Mailinglists] ---------- E-Mail is considered to be one of the most important correspondance methods these days, comfortable in handling and speed, a service which can be used by persons without an own Internet account, too, due to the fact that it is possible to access the net in Inter- net cafes or from a friend's place this service can be used by everyone. Various companies are already offering web-based e-mail accounts for free. Hotmail (www.hotmail.com), Netaccess (www.usa.net) and Rok- ketmail (www.rocketmail.com) are only a few but per- haps the most used providers offering this service, a steady e-mail address you can use for the rest of your life (or as long as the company doesn't go bank- rupt). In case you subscribe to mailinglists you can come into the position to participate in the informa- tion exchange and to receive lots of interesting in- formation about the scene, happenings, parties, re- leases and whatever else might affect the scene life. PADUA has decided to administrate a mailinglist, too. People who are interested in subscribing may send a mail to [mj^padua.org] by adding the message [subscribe c64] in the BODY of the e-mail. 75 e-mail addresses are alreasy registered. Furthermore it is possible to subscribe to a mailing- list providing information about a project adapting the once popular demo-of-the-year conception en- titled "We Are Family [WAF]" introduced by Magic Man of Crazy)Hitmen. Just send a mail to [mj^padua.org] and add the message [subscribe waf] in the BODY of the e-mail. Meanwhile the MOTIV 8 mailinglist administrates about 200 subscribers. In order to get the system more comfortable for the maintainers the system became more automatically. Any future subscribers only need to send a blank e-mail to [c64list-subscribe^sunsite.auc.dk] and are getting immidiately validated. A confirmation will be send out by e-mail as usual, too. Motiv 8's mailinglist is the most frequent CBM 64 scene mailinglist used by the public. Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Society
* SOCIETY * ------------------------------------------------------------ In the last episode the cracking scene has been co- vered positively, ofcourse the illegal sector is provi- ding many negative aspects, too. First releases and release charts are steady initiators for hot tempe- red discussions on the boards. Having a closer look inside some interesting and astonishing facts can be explored. In the beginning of the release charts hype all va- rious types of possible releases have been cleary defined. It was no problem for the masses all over the globe to check out what is a fullprice game from an established and well reputated company and what is just a budget or low budget. Public domain or free- ware games have not been taken into consideration. A FULLPRICE game was a game being sold for GBP 9.99 (and more) by companies like Ocean, Psygnosis, System 3, Rainbow Arts, Electronic Arts and all other well reputated software houses who have left the CBM 64 market behind to earn a fortune on Amiga, PC and consoles. BUDGET games have been produc- tions sold for GBP 2.99 up to GBP 6.99, the Golden Disk releases from CP Verlag, responsible for Magic Disk and Game On can be named as reference here. LOW BUDGET games have been productions to be found on disk magazines, just as Magic Disk and Game On. In that period the borders between the different game types still have been visible with commercial computer magazines reviewing games and offering lots of prize lists from commercial distributors. Today the situation is quite different. Commercial distributors offering fullprice and budget games can not be found anymore, the competitors in the struggle for first releases have found various sub- stitutions to hunt for points. Polish or Hungarian fullprice games let the eyes of cracking group mem- bers lighten these days. On the first view the term fullprice game sounds quite good, but on the second view it's nothing else but hypocrism to see those productions as genuine fullprice releases in the ori- ginal sense. Having had a good relationship to the Polish software house TIMSOFT Phuture got informed about the prize for a fullprice game on tape, since the Polish market mainly demanded tape versions only, GBP 2.99. GBP 2.99 was originally classified as as BUDGET only, but a fullprize release is receiving by far more points than a plain budget game only. Furthermore it is interesting to see releases intro- duced as a fullprice production by cracking groups which have been presented later on a programm disk of a certain disk magazine as LOW BUDGET. Random? What about FULLPRICE productions which have never sold a single copy only or when the original could not be purchased in any way? Just a curiousity or the standart these days? Since the market moved from regular stores into di- rection mail order, a service offered in most cases by in any form scene related persons, there is NO transparency offering an secure overview to realise a definitive classification for fullprice and even bud- get games anymore. What is left from the fullprize spirit? What does the term fullprice express? Today people think a fullprize game is an upperclass game with excellent coding, graphics, soundtrack and gameplay. This explaination sounds quite fine and fitting in some cases, but it is WRONG. Fullprice does nothing else mean that the game is sold for a predefined "high" price, a price around GBP 9.99 and more. There have been lots of low quality games sold as fullprize games to make a good profit and not to deliver outstanding quality. Nevertheless most of the time those games were worth it's money that time even if there were lots of budget and low budget games which were by far better than so-called fullpricers, but quality doesn't automatically form fullprize games. The only stable factors these days are LOW BUDGET games and PREVIEW copies. Sources for low budget games are quite rare, too, so verification is absolu- tely no problem here. Known distributors for low budget games, still to be found on programm disks supporting commercial (disk) magazines, are CSW VERLAG (Go64), J & F PUBLISHING, INC. (Loadstar) and Magna Media (64'er). Preview copies can be heated, too, that is NO secret anymore. People are creating previews out of old games and even demo parts, it seems even 0.x points awarded in release charts are attractive enough to spoil the competition. It is no secret that the existance of about 55% of all preview releases is based on the fact that the group was interested in releasing something, 20% have been stopped from the authors for what reason however and 25% show atleast an almost complete version some time later. After getting "cracked" PUBLIC DOMAIN and FREE- WARE productions use to morph into fullprice, budget and low budget games, what is for sure quite inte- resting to notice, too. Editors of r elease charts HAVE to accept the releasing group's classification unless the opposite could be proven, and in most cases too much time passed before the information could have been confirmed or disproven so that no one does really care about it anymore, except for publications covering a larger period, and since most magazines just cover one or two months around their release dates so those failures won't be covered up at all, in case there should be some interest shown by the responsible editors. Release charts are said to be different from maga- zine to magazine, but sometimes they can be similar when one editor creates release charts for multiple prouductions, and here the danger or atleast the suspect of manipulation can come up. In two concurence publications definitions for the classification have been found NOT being based on the original release charts rules originated from SH0CK and THE PULSE MAGAZINE, upgrading public domain and freeware to LOW BUDGET, productions from programm disks of commercial magazines to BUDGET (please note Softdisk Publishing has left the CBM 64 behind, since almost 1.5 years Loadstar is getting released by J & F Publishing, Inc., responsible for contracts and licensing the submitted software) and productions from Everlasting Style (Australia) and Cherry Software (Sweden) are named as FULL- PRICE examples for western countries. We have requested the issue at Cherry Software's spokeman PER JACOBSSON, scenewise known as Newscopy/F4CG. He admitted that "Ice Guys" has been cancelled to be released under the label Cherry Software and and it's quite clear, perhaps even for regular board callers, that any "Ice Guys" version copyrighted by Cherry Software is NO fullprice game but public domain only, as only the regular sales ver- sion can archieve a classification for release charts. The status of an every release can only be defined AFTER it got SOLD to any company/distribu- tor and experienced, regular board sceners hunting for points must admit that. PRE-VERSIONS without any distributor, what means that NO classification is possible, can only be classi- fied as PUBLIC DOMAIN, but that is ofcourse hard to admit. Release charts have been and must be created with regular sales versions, otherwise the original sense of release charts is for sure missing when the contributors can pre-define the classification, what exactly means the number of points, themselves. Sur- prisingly even sceners who are NOT regular calling the boards are capable to purchase software from distributors and get in the position to remark diffe- rences between a sales version and a pre-version WITHOUT calling the US boards regulary, and that is the clue of the story. Unfortunately EVERLASTING STYLE, to say it in a kind way a with more than just friendly terms towards Onslaught related company, is not connected to the Internet (yet?) but it would be for sure quite inte- resting to know, if there really was any kind of sale, how much copies of the from Onslaught release FULLPRICE game "Misfortune" have been purchased by non-fictious customers. It is nice to see that both companies intend to support the CBM 64 software market and to release new, ma- jor titles for this computer system, nevertheless people start wondering why those productions are getting advertised as FULLPRICE productions, titles which are nothing else but PRESTIGE objects for cracking groups while counting their points for the next release charts. Are those titles, which might be able to sell a maximum of 100 - 200 copies in case people will purchase them, comparable with former major titles having sold ten thousands of copies? Regarding the situation of "Ice Guyz" (Cherry Software version) judged in the different release charts of various magazines one could start wonder- ing about the current system. In Relax Magazine the game received fullprice points, in Domination, Vanda- lism News and The Crest it received budget points. Propaganda must be excluded in this case due to a different rating system, not working with the cathe- ories fullprice, budget and low budget anymore. DODGER, responsible for The Crest's release charts, explained the issue by refering to the TRUE sales version distributed by CLASSICAL GAMES for DM 25,-- (around GBP 8,--), what is for sure under the limit of GBP 9,99 for fullprice games, even if a game sold for GBP 8,-- must be considered to be a CBM 64 fullprice games these days, too, so Dodger's jud- gement must be rated fair and logical according to the rules. Asking JAZZCAT for a classification the following statement was given "I GUESS IF IT IS THE CS VER- SION THEY WOULD SELL IT FULLPRICE, BUT I DON'T KNOW THIS FOR SURE. YOU WILL HAVE TO E-MAIL NEWSCOPY." what is indeed a quite impressive state- ment for a person having judged the release in the release charts for Domination and Vandalism News, first F4CG's and later on SCS & TRC's version, to be a budget release. Just a few days later, after recog- izing the dimension of the clever statement made be- fore, try number two followed "THE CHERRY SOFT- WARE VERSION RECEIVED BUDGET POINTS DUE TO THE GAME NOT BEING SOLD/MARKETED. I BELIEVE IT TO BE OF FULL PRICE QUALITY, AT LEAST BY TO- DAY'S STANDARD." what is even more impressive but definately WRONG defined. Normally two choices exist, either to accept the preference given by the releasing group, in this case fullprice, as long as the opposite could be proven or to judge an UNSOLD game as public domain! An unsold fullprice game is NO budget game, atleast it was not known before Jazz- Jazzcat created once again one of his interesting new rules. 100% versions seem to get discredited by Onslaught and its own media publications, still missing out one important fact, the fact that 100% versions are not only benefitting the points account of cracking groups but the scene itself, especially the game fans and collectors all over the globe, what should be most important aspect to r egard. What is the benefit of a bugging first release as this production can't satisfy the scene but only the group disqualifying itself with non-regular working releases expecting to get the points for? Since Onslaught has lost many points caused by bugging and incomplete releases in its early stage of existance it does not surprise the masses that it is Onslaught to be one of the forerun- ners against 100% versions. Unlike some so-called cracking groups, being born a long time after the last protections tried to avoid crackers presenting pira- ted copies and after originals have been sold in re- gular (software) stores, might think the intention of cracking is NOT to earn a few points for the release charts, the original intention was to support the sce- ne, and in brackets the overall CBM 64 community, with software for FREE. The history of successful scene platforms told over and over again it is always a bright and attractive software palette and espe- cially the games sector being responsible for the ac- ceptance and the popularity level. Curiously Onslaught is continously hunting for bugs in Alpha Flight 1970 releases, releasing them under URINE. With MYSTERY they have failed in all objective magazines, in both Onslaught publications (respon- sible editor: Jazzcat) Urine's version got the score. SAMBER is another interesting example to see how certain people are trying to outwit the system for their interests. Playing Samber with activated trainer options is affecting the gameplay in a definately ne- gative way so that you can't continue playing after level 1. This is NORMALLY punished, according to the rules, with a minus point. References can be found elsewhere in the magazine, to be more exactly in "Games People Play", but we will repeat it here once again. A similar "bug" has been the reason for the deduction of one point for the games "Roll Over" (re- leased by Alpha Flight 1970) and "Nodule" (released by F4CG). Why is e.g. Jazzcat, who is acting in the role of a release charts editor for Domination and Vandalism News, demanding the deduction of all points and to count the release for Urine once again? Ran- dom? Refering to Jazzcat's version is story is really looking BIASED once again. Why are certain Onslaught members hiding themselves cowardly behind a fake label? Why are the responsi- ble persons playing CHILDISH games and upload the game using a fake account which was said to belong to RAYDEN/Alpha Flight 1970? Yes, indeed, that's how real successors behave towards an already defea- ted group like they continously claim.... definately NOT! Groups and persons standing behind their 100% releases using their genuine group names and handles are showing CLASS and deserve RESPECT, proving that they are willing to take the fame or blame and show a responsibility for their deeds, how- ever the release turns out to be rated in any form. What happens to a group releasing an authentic 100% version? Yes, correctly. It is receiving points for its effort. What happens to a group releasing a proven to be unnecessary 100% version? Yes, correctly. It is receiving minus points for a re-release. What hap- pens to a fake label like Urine? Except of causing trouble nothing really can happen, since Urine can't be awarded nor blamed for their "noble efforts", a quite comfortable and pleasant situation for people continously trying to seed disorder and disruption within the scene according to their very own inte- rests. A normal group would have been punished with re-release minus points for both releases, perhaps one of the reasons not to use the name Onslaught? It just looks like this. OFFICIAL SALES VERSIONS published and sold by AU- THORIZED DISTRIBUTORS should be the foundation and taken into consideration while creating release charts, definately NOT suspicious pre-releases claimed to be the final versions. For sure Alpha Flight 1970 has released a lot of sales versions supporting the game industry and clearly proving the opposite to Vandalism News', some might prefer Onslaught's, im- preachment of programmers updating the produc- tions for internal release strategies only. People purchasing the originals from those distributors will be able to identify authentic versions without pro- blems, and in case certain regular board callers are claiming to be best informed would invest some money into originals they might be able to find out that it is NOT necessary to call the US boards on a regular basis to define a TRUE sales version since distribu- tors are happy to sell originals to EVERYONE as companies and distributors are NOT focusing and regarding board sceners as the only potentional software customers only. 100% VERSIONS, containing repaired or fixed elements which worked wrong, spoiled and affected the game- play on either Pal or NTSC, can be rather annoying for the groups releasing the incomplete versions as those releases cover up failures and nobody likes to be blamed for it in the public. On the other hand the scene, especially the above mentioned game fans and collectors united on both Pal and NTSC systems, are rather happy about the FEW productions presented in FULL working or proper fixed released, what should be a preference for a release these days. Some examples have been MAGICAL FORMULA, 100% Pal/NTSC version released by Alpha Flight 1970, getting especially recommended by Ultimate Hacker, Domination release charts reference when it seems to suit Onslaught's interests only, or ICE GUYS, 100% PAL released by Success & The Ruling Company, al- lowing the player to enjoy bug-free software titles. In these days when just a few titles are getting made available for the CBM 64 community the user should be able to rely on 100% working versions only since there is no stress to release a huge amount of soft- ware in a row anymore, those days are unfortunately long gone for good and just a rememberance to a glorious past this machine, a rememberance stopping a lot of oldtimers leaving the CBM 64 and its scene finally behind. Peacemaker/Hitmen, still considered to be the number one NTSC fixer, explained on The Dungeon "BTW. NICE TO SEE PEOPLE RELEASING 100% WORKING VERSIONS. I MEAN, PLAYING A GAME WITH BUGS SUCKS!". That should be always kept in mind. What is the definition for point hunting? A rather of- ten asked and most discussed question of the past few months! Is it the release of 100% working soft- ware, the release of sales versions or the release of software with a cheated classification? The ans- wer is quite simple! An every release made to contri- bute in the first release competition will be awarded with points, the groups are releasing those produc- tions with the intention to receive points, so an every so-called first release made by cracking groups on the American boards can be rated as simple "point hunting". We don't really like the expression and we haven't introduced it to the stunning scene. When other so-called editors think they have to play games like this the chapter "games people play" will be their favourite location in this issue. Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Games People Play
* GAMES PEOPLE PLAY * ------------------------------------------------------------ A quite interesting phenomenon in the scene these days is that most groups love the define their current status in the scene THEMSELVES, so it is in fact no real surprise that average and even extremely weak groups copied this conception and are proudly presenting themselves to be the best ever happening to a meanwhile almost dead scene, too, comparing the current situation with the scenary in 1993, in a time when the decreasing activity within the scene could be first detected. Negative critism is NOT allowed at all, critical coverage in magazines is forbidden, it's the reputation, the attitude or the show or the illusion of a well working group what seems to count in the scene these days, not knowledge, skills, truth or credibility. Propaganda and F4CG are permanently sharing a persecution mania that Relax Magazine is only produced to bash them down, what is for sure nothing else but a pathetic and imprudent point of view. Without any doubts the responsible staff members don't share this opinion, since REPORTING about the scene, covering activity and happenings is not exactly what impartial parties would dare to define as bashing or ragging. Out of the experience Relax Magazine did with certain F4CG profiles one could believe in the fact that Relax's coverage about F4CG must have been always totally wrong, after comparing the FACTS the opposite can be easily proven. Propaganda 24 suggested that Relax Magazine and the responsible staff members are just like a concrete-wall when it comes up to communication. It's infact quite interesting since WE raised our hands infront of the release of Relax Magazine 21 in order to clear up the misunderstandings and problems F4CG and Propaganda seem to have with our publication, a sign which simply can't have been ignored, as we especially pointed out in an e-mail to renounce taking out statements out of a reaction Newscopy sent us which can now be found in this article. We think, regarding Propaganda presenting some so-called facts in the public, that it's amazingly impertinent to see that the magazine tried to implant that Relax Magazine is not interested in communication and not accepting other people's opinion by publishing the following quote made by RRR, responsible Relax main editor, "IF A WRONG VERSION OF THE STORY HAS BEEN PREPARED FOR THE SCENE I AM NOT WILLING TO SEE THE FILE BEING CLOSED, EVEN IF IT MIGHT NOT REFLECT YOUR INTERESTS.". Propaganda is continously explaining that there are always two versions of a story, nevertheless after releasing their version of the story the topic is always passed through and of no public interest anymore, what does not mean anything else but ONLY Propaganda is allowed to comment scene-related affairs, regardless from the fact that it only reflects THEIR very own interests in the way they would love to see it, but other magazines or people are NOT allowed to present well researched articles filled with facts and reasonable arguments. Those "aggressive Germans", as some Relax Magazine editors or to get more concrete some Alpha Flight 1970 members, have been named in Propaganda, are proud to live in a democracy supporting the freedom of speech for citizens and freedom of the press for the media and definately not in a dictatorship that only allows one version satisfying a few persons only, a situation Propaganda seems to regret deeply in their hearts and does NOT want to cooperate with. Maybe the Propaganda staff feels uncomfortable when especially Relax Magazine has no problems to uncover hidden facts they would love to hide from the scene, maybe the staff dislikes to see that some publications do not mirror the actual scene happenings according to F4CG's and Propaganda's interests, or perhaps they are disappointed to see that other productions have in fact an advanced team of reporters delivering the latest information bringing Relax Magazine into the position to present the latest information to readers not being interested in from the public relations department prepared propaganda information. It must badly hurt to see external organisations receiving internal group information BEFORE the group's most suiting version has been officially spread. F4CG and Propaganda have blamed Relax Magazine's release charts for a missing credibility because F4CG's release "NODULE" has received a minus point for a trainer preventing that the player is able to finish the game, what seems to be the main goal while playing a game. Exactly for the same mistake Alpha Flight 1970, the group of the responsible editor Marc, got deducted a minus point for the game "Roll Over". The issue got explained in Relax Magazine #20, chapter "Not Worthy", still we have NOT received a sign of confirmation or acceptance of the presented facts which have clearly proven that F4CG was NOT unfairly punished. Indeed, Propaganda and F4CG are always right, a fact which unfortunately can't be confirmed yet. The evilish Relax Magazine dared reported about the during a period of about six months daily announced warez rush which did not take place but got continously announced by Sixx in IRC channel #c-64, the reaction towards Relax Magazine mentioning it was ofcourse that the topic was passed through. The "warez rush" was not only requested by Relax Magazine back in time but aswell by the majority of regular #c-64 attenders who felt a bit bored from reading this promise over and over again, still when either Alpha Flight 1970 or Relax Magazine requested the topic the intention of both was, according to F4CG and Propaganda, only to ATTACK the fantastics. Ever heard about a syndrome called persecution mania? We have generously renounced to publish a reaction to Relax Magazine 20 we have received from Newscopy, a document that has clearly shown that the organisation in F4CG seems not to be as perfect as presented to the stunning audience day in day out. That reaction contained the following statements: "DERBYSHIRE RAM NEVER LEFT THE GROUP. I SUPPOSE YOU HEARD THE RUMOUR FROM JAZZCAT AND NEVER CONFIRMED IT. WHY DON'T YOU CALL BARRY (LIKE I DO EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE) AND CHECK FOR THE RIGHT STORY?" while in Propaganda 23, released AFTER Relax Magazine #20, the following news could be found "DERBYSHIRE RAM DID LEAVE THE GROUP SHORTLY, BEFORE THE GROUP RETURNED TO THE AMERICAN BOARDS" as well as "ARISTO AND WORM NEVER LEFT F4CG - WHERE DID YOU HEAR THAT FROM? THEY HAVE BEEN PUT ON THE INACTIVE LISTS AND ARE GOOD FRIENDS WE WANT IN THE FAMILY." and the official Propaganda version "CHASH AND ARISTO LEFT THE ENTIRE F4CG-ORGANISATION BEHIND". Two different dates, two different places, two different stories from virtually the same source, the F4CG spokesman and Propaganda main editor. Meanwhile most magazines have already reported about Aristo, Chash and Worm leaving the fantastics, too. As if Relax Magazine is to blame for presenting a proper news coverage when the F4CG organisatation does NOT know what's going on in their own rows. Next to the Onslaught media publications Propaganda did take clearly position AGAINST 100% (sales) versions and particular against Alpha Flight 1970, a group providing quite a lot 100% working releases in form of sales versions directly purchased from the distributors in the year 1997. Having lost after 'Ice Guys' with 'Plasm' the second internal release in a row F4CG seemed to have changed their very own release philosophy, especially pointed out in Propaganda 23 ("A GAME IS PLAYABLE WHEN IT IS PLAYABLE, AND AS AN EDITOR I CAN HONESTLY SAY I DON'T GIVE A SHINING FUCK ABOUT SMALL, SMALL, SMALL BUGS"), it seems that formerly made statements seem to mean nothing when the interests have changed over-night. In Propaganda 24 F4CG stated "IT WAS CLEAR THAT THE HITMEN-VERSIONS HI-SCORE SAVER WAS A CRASH AND THE MUSIC WAS NOT FIXED. NORMALLY, THIS IS NOT ENOUGH TO REQUEST A 100%-VERSION BUT THEY DECIDED TO RELEASE IT ANYWAY, EVEN THOUGH THEY KNEW IT WOULD BE GIVING THEM MINUSPOINTS.", implanting in a pathetic way the fact that F4CG is interested in releasing quality versions presenting themselves as martyrs by accepting to be blamed for a re-release. "Plasm" has been the second loss for F4CG in a row after failing completely with the so-called fullprice game "Ice Guys", a game claimed to be copyrighted by Cherry Software in order to receive fullprice points. Actually it is so secret anymore that the production is NOT copyright nor licenced by Cherry Software, and meanwhile even Newscopy had been forced to confirm it "ORIGINALLY WE PLANNED TO BE RELEASING MAGICAL FORMULA, DAVE SPEED AND ICE GUYS UNDER OUR LABEL BUT THE COMPANY WAS FACING DIFFICULTIES. MANY OF THE PEOPLE INVOLVED LEFT NOT ONLY THE COMPANY, BUT THE ENTIRE SCENE, OF THEM MY PARTNER MATHIAS HEDBLOM. I DECIDED TO LET THE COMPANY REST UNTIL SOME MATTERS WERE SOLVED... ICE GUYS, TOO, WAS CANCELLED.". F4CG was aware of the fact that 'Ice Guys' was no fullprice game by Cherry Software, nevertheless they released the in the current status UNSOLD production as fullprice game, on the other hand they dared to blame Hitmen being backstabbers while releasing with 'Plasm' an unsold production. When two parties are performing the same action it seems not to lead the same result, just curious but still interesting to be kept in mind. To receive points for a fullprice game is indeed more attractive in the release charts of board magazines publishing a regular release charts chapter or looks even more impressive on information sheets, a fact quite interesting to be noticed here, too. On SECOND TO NONE, in the sub "Smalltalk", post #411, people can find Newscopy publishing the following statement, contrary to the version found in Propaganda: "ALSO GREAT FACT THAT WE RELEASED PLASM 100% TODAY SO IT SEEMS HITMEN DIDN'T GET THE RELEASE ANYWAY. AND GO AHEAD WITH THE REST OF THE TITLES. IT IS A PITY YOU WILL PUT ALL THE TIME INTO FIXING GAME WHEN WE WILL SHOW UP WITH THE RIGHT, COMPLETE SALESVERSION A FEW DAYS LATER.". This is NOT exactly a statement to be expected by a group trying to create the impression of a situation being aware of the fact getting punished with a minus points for their release. This is NOT exactly a statement people expect from a group having explained to be STRICT against so-called 100% versions. Fungus, F4CG's American NTSC fixer, commented the issue aswell on Second To None in the sub "Techtalk", post #146: "HOHO C0 ALERTED ME TO THIS PARTICULAR BUG! HEHEH, NOW WE HAVE TWO THINGS, MUSIC NOT FIXED, HI SAVER BUGGING WITH TRAINERS ON. HMM SEEMS WE GET THE POINTS :) HAHA I LOVE IT.". The show continued with Fungus in the sub "Bigmouthin", post #155: "OH EXCUSE ME FOR ACTUALLY BOTHERING TO FIX THE MUSIC IN THE GAME AS MOST GOOD FIXERS DO, BUT OBVIOUSLY SOMETHING JACK ALIEN CAN'T HANDLE HAHAHA FACT IS DEFF DOES NOT HAVE THE 100% VERSIONS OF MANY OF THE TITLES HE STOLE, AND GO AHEAD AND RELEASE WHAT YOU WANT CUASE WE'LL JUST COME BACK WITH THE TRUE SALES VERSION.". Peacemaker replied in the following post: "... AS MOST GOOD FIXERS DO? HELL, I NEVER FIXED THE MUSIC IN ANY GAME. AND TELL ME NOW, AM I A BAD FIXER? OR DID OTHER "GREAT" FIXER SLOWED DOWN THE MUSIC? NOPE! I DONT CARE ABOUT THE MUSIC. NOBODY COMPLAINED ABOUT THE NOT FIXED MUSIC IN THE PAST.". The discussion has met the interest of non-involved groups, too, so Burglar explained in the next post: "I NEVER FIXED MUSIC IN ANY OF MY FIXES... FIXING MUSIC STARTED DURING THE AVANTGARDE TIME, AS PUDWERX DID IT A COUPLE OF TIMES, BUT MOST OTHER DECENT FIXERS NEVER BOTHERED... HELL, PLENTY OF NTSC PEOPLE TOLD ME THEY LIKE THE SPEEDY MUSIC, AND THAT THEY ARE USED TO IT... BUT WELL....". And finally Count Zero, Propaganda editor responsible for The List, Propaganda's release charts, added in 'Bigmouthin' (post #161) and 'TechTalk' (post #150) "A 100% VERSION OF A RELEASE IS: A REAL SALES VERSION ... NOT JUST THAT LABEL STAMPED ON ... THERE SHOULD BE MAJOR DIFFERENCES ... OR ATLEAST ADD-ONS ... A 100% VERSION IS NEEDED WHENEVER THE CRACKER AFFECTED THE GAME-PLAY OR LOOK BY STUPID MISTAKES." "PRETTY LAME TO RELEASE A 100% SALES VERSION IF YOU KINDA OWN THE COMPANY ANYWAYS ..." It seems to be a hobby of Newscopy looking out for posts and to publish them in many different ways, unfortunately only presenting a few hand picked ones being predefined to be used for propaganda affairs, without presenting the further background to cover the whole story, but curiously he seems to be the person demanding other sources to cover both sides of the story if he is feeling to be unfair treatened. Interesting is that this kind of coverage couldn't have been found in Propaganda yet. We wonder why the above presented posts did not make it into Propaganda. Relax Magazine has had no problem to locate a very interesting statement written by Walker, a post which can't be excused nor accepted after all, even by re- garding the entire background story. The idea to present this particular post was NOT to cover the problems the alliance F4CG and Propaganda seem to have with Alpha Flight 1970 and Relax Magazine, like like Propaganda loved to suggest. This very unique example might a perfect example how things can drift out of control, nevertheless alone the idea or dream to see a person dying because of scene related affairs, especially caused by the topic 'ragging on the boards' when some people might try to repeat a missed out childhood or trying to receive in real life missing respect and recognition if one dares to have a closer look on the dump, brainless and hilarious comments and arguments to be found there, can't be defined as simple irony anymore. The basic idea behind making it available to the public was not to attack F4CG, as Propaganda is trying to suggest, it merely was ment to be a warning NOT to mix up scene and real life, a warning for many hot tempered scene related persons NOT to cross the borders of morality and especially humanity. Up to the current knowledge of mankind death is the very last station of any living (human) creature, the end of life, the end of any known form of existance and just alone for real life rather unimportant discussions should definately NOT starting that kind of yearning in a scener's brain , not even if that person belongs to F4CG, ESPECIALLY by keeping the background story in mind that F4CG's group member Scope died in a tragical traffic accident a while ago. If some people dare to define this as a simple rag or irony to target on Ned, how to define Ned's rag towards Newscopy? Blaming NED to be the origin is definately NOT the solution for the affair. Keeping the actual constitution of Newscopy's mother in mind, defined in Propaganda 24, it really sounds terrible and inhuman on a level like Walker's post was. The question comes up if it was a preference that Ned was informed about the situation. Nobody will be really surprised to read that he was NOT informed and feels now very sorry as things look like this, nevertheless creating the scenario that Ned abused the situation is definately another try to incite the masses and to discredit Alpha Flight 1970 once more in the public. Perhaps one should request why certain magazines always need to create moods and opinions for their readers according to their interests? Furthermore it should NOT be forgetten WHO continously came up with with posts or single sentences taken out of 7 KB+ long e-mails only reflecting the interests of a single side of the story in order to define an opinion for the reader, an opinion suiting the interests of the responsible editor, an opinion the editor is expecting to be adapted and accepted by the few persons considered to be the remaining rest of the CBM 64 scene, but ofcourse Propaganda is the least institution to judge about happenings, incidents and persons as claimed in certain articles or chapters. Propaganda is definately not judging but prejudicing what is in total nothing else but judging. The bitterness, Propaganda claims it to be the engine for Relax Magazine actity, seems to be a problem for Propaganda and F4CG. LOST FILES, our satirical chapter commenting actual and not so actual scene happenings on a sarcastical and humorous way, must have hurt them badly, like some others felt. Lost Files is NOT ment to be an objective news chapter, Lost Files is merely ment to be an entertaining chapter using sartirical and sarcastic elements which can be very often found in late night shows worldwide, too. Ofcourse it is quite impressing from those "victims" covered in the chapter to explain that the chapter was written to sort out problems or to offend, nevertheless the conception is not that new and could be found in other publications like Shock! aswell. And if some scene related persons have problems with the content there is one secure method to avoid them: do NOT enter the entertaining area. Easy, isn't it? Person complaining about the entire magazine caused by disliking the satirical chapter can't be taken serious from our side, these persons must feel real bitterness, NOT the authors nor the editors. On the other hand Relax Magazine is NOT dedicating memory for childish and pathetic slogans in a lot of different chapters, Relax Magazine is NOT adding ambiguous comments in chapters which are supposed to be objective for the purpose of so-called hidden attacks like some others do. However, it is always quite interesting, not to say entertaining, to see F4CG/Propaganda always reporting about an anti-campaign started by Alpha Flight 1970. Requesting an about half a year continously announced warez rush is not exactly what people can define as an anti-campaign. Curiously neither F4CG nor Propaganda reported about the way F4CG behaved in Holland at the X-97, sitting in a circle infront of the entrance and acting like children in a kindergarden whenever an Alpha Flight 1970 or Relax Magazine staff member passed them. It's normally not exactly the behaviour to expect from a so-called "professional" and business orientated cracking group. It is NO surprise that it is NOT Alpha Flight 1970 who is continously releasing information sheets containing statements done by F4CG members, another important point the objective reader could start thinking about. The publication Relax Magazine is NOT produced to degrade certain groups or some of its members, perhaps other editors and producers see their main goal in offending or attacking people by releasing a scene magazine. Keeping their very own motivation as the engine of their activity in this sector it is absolutely no surprise to see them thinking this is the petrol getting other engines working, too. Ofcourse the echo to this article will be, as always, that the story is passed through since Propaganda has already handled it so nobody else is allowed to put a spotlight on it and the topics were just mixed up to present something against F4CG and Propaganda, but we have heard this verse of the song by far too often already, we have collected facts, true facts, we have informed ourselves by contacting involved persons, so that we are bored of the shown arrogance and ignorance. Please continue reading in "Games People Play II". Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Games People Play II
* GAMES PEOPLE PLAY II * ------------------------------------------------------------ VANDALISM NEWS #29 contained some interesting statements worth to be discussed further, too. Relax Magazine's article "Who are the real point hunters" seems to have brought some movement into the board scene, so Vandalism News decided to comment it, and we decided to comment mainly Jazzcat's TWSITED comments. When the research for the article "Who are the real point hunters" started Relax Magazine, namely RRR, has received the following answer from Jazzcat: WELL CONCERNING MYSTERY, IT BUGS ON SO PAL C64'S.. NEWSCOPY^ALGONET.SE (ed. Newscopy/F4CG) MRWAX^INF.BME.HU (ed. Mr. Wax/Chromance) ALSO NOTICING THE BUG, BUT I DON'T HAVE THEIR EMAIL ADDIES ARE.. SPECTATOR/SCS & TRC, DONAR/ONSLAUGHT, STING/ONSLAUGHT, SKINHEAD/F4CG AND THERE MAYBE IS SOME MORE. I AM GLAD YOU HAVE NOTICED THIS AS PEOPLE ON THE BOARDS ARE REACTING NEGATIVE TOWARDS MARC/AFL FROM ALL GROUPS (EXCEPT SOME MEMBERS OF SUCCESS AND DODGER) AND THEY ARE SAYING THINGS LIKE HOW MARC WILL MAKE THE LIST OF RELAX CORRUPT CONCERNING THIS RELEASE AND THE RELEASE OF MAGICAL FORMULA, THIS MAGIC FORMULA GAME. The interested reader might have noticed that there was NO reaction starting that RRR isn't allowed start his research here as he is NOT supposed to be a regular board caller so the experience is missing. The reaction was merely positive that RRR intends to start investigating in that field. Ofcourse the qualification to take care about scene related problems can be simply proven by the fact that RRR has been in the scene since 1988 (since 1989 known as RRR), meaning 5 years scene affiliation BEFORE Jazzcat entered the scene, containing groups like Duplex (= illegal Crypt together with Johnny Walker and Max), Alpha Flight 1970, Paramount and Depredators having been known as cracking groups back in time. Quite interesting for the statistics might be aswell that RRR is actually longer a member of Oxyron than Jazzcat belongs in the scene, but that is no surprise at all. CHOTAIRE, a regular board caller, brought it straight to the point on Second To None, Legend's HQ: "... AND THEN WHEN THEY FAIL TO IMPRESS REAL C64 ACTIVISTS WHO HAVE SKILLS (SEE #C-64 LOG) THEY DO IT THE OTHER WAY AROUND, TALKING ABOUT ELITE BOARDS ETC... WHILE THERE IS NO KNOWLEDGE NECESSARY AT ALL TO GAIN ACCESS TO BOARDS AND TO ABUSE CALLING CARDS OR CCITT5 SYSTEMS... ... BUT ABUSING OTHER PEOPLE'S CODES AND FREQS OR BUYING CALLING CARDS IS NOT A SKILL, IT IS AS USELESS FOR EVERYONE IN THE WORLD LIKE A FART ON THE WOMEN TOILET.... ... RAGGING CAN BE FUN FOR SURE, AND HAVING BEEN A PART OF THE GOOD OLD DAYS ON THE BOARDS MEANS SOMETHING SPECIAL. FOR YOURSELF, BUT NOT FOR ANYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD. IT'S NO PRODUCTIVITY, NO REAL SENSE, NO NOTHING..." A quite interesting view on today's wanna-be elite behaviour of certain board callers and their stunning "experience". After the research leading to facts not suiting Jazzcat's very own needs and interests it is for sure quite easy to say that the responsible person is not calling out regulary instead of taking position to the listed arguments. What a great and impressive response. "THE QUESTION MAY BE ASKED, WHY WOULD HE TRY AND DEFEND ALPHA FLIGHT ANYWAY, HE IS IN THE LEGAL SCENE AND A DEMO GROUP MEMBER?" The question may be answered as the article was NOT written to defend either Alpha Flight 1970 or any other group releasing 100% versions, it was a general article about 100% versions and sales versions proving that the public prosecutors are releasing 100% versions themselves, too (very latest example: Plasm/F4CG). MAJA, who suggested that RRR must have been a Russian propaganda journalist, claimed in the SAME post that Relax claimed Onslaught, F4CG and SCS & TRC to be lame. Why did Onslaught cut the post here? SCS & TRC was definately NOT defined as lame by Relax Magazine and the Dutch cooperation will NEVER be defined as lame. Relax Magazine even CONGRATULATED SCS & TRC's responsible cracker Burglar for his excellent 100% version of Ice Guyz and Relax Magazine appreciates the 100% work SCS & TRC did this year (Xiom and Ice Guys). Curiously NO SCS & TRC member felt attacked by the article "Who are the real point hunters" and nobody officially complained about it so far, quite interesting to notice. 100% versions and sales versions are NOT only a topic interesting for board sceners but for the ENTIRE scene, even if the first release lists are based on board uploads. Perhaps, due to the short time of scene afflication, it is not known to sceners like Jazzcat and Maja that it's NOT the cracking group but the DISTRIBUTOR who finally defines the classification of a potentional release by selling it in a specified prize cathegory. It was NOT the cracking group who defined the classification in the way and it won't be the cracking group defining the classification in the future, too. Calling CBM 64 US boards is definately NOT a preference to have a look on the prizelist of distributors and a corrupt copy of a release doesn't automatically work if you belong to the persons abusing AT&T, ofcourse vice versa working copies don't get corrupt for board callers, do they? If yes the board scene really seems have a kind of unbelievable magic. The fact should be already known in the CBM 64 scene, even to Onslaught members in Australia, that RRR is responsible in the sense of pressright for Relax Magazine, so it is a clear answer to the question what RRR has to do with the topic, since any judgement made for Relax Magazine release charts is affecting the entire production Relax Magazine, too. RRR wouldn't be a main editors of a (leading) scene magazine if he would NOT show interest in the ENTIRE content of the magazine he is managing. Following Jazzcat's policy Relax Magazine started the research, only involving crackers/fixers to comment the situation of either MYSTERY and MAGICAL FORMULA. Due to the fact that 90% of all board sceners are connected to the Internet it is no problem to communicate with them WITHOUT calling US boards, just ment as a short reminder for those who might start wondering how a person not calling boards regulary can receive first hand information. The research started with MYSTERY. Jazzcat named Newscopy, Mr. Wax, Spectator, Donar, Sting and Skinhead as references for his claims that the game bugs on PAL (please note: PAL). According to any possible competence only Mr. Wax, Sting, Donar and Skinhead can be taken into consideration since they are known to be crackers or fixers in the CBM 64 scene. SKINHEAD admitted in a private telephone call to Marc that he just said Alpha Flight's version is not running correctly as it was a good chance to jump on the train and to rag against the flight. At MR. WAX's address we have requested the issue TWICE, just to make sure that NO misunderstandings appear: "BUGS IN THE AFL VERSION OF MYSTERY ARE AS FOLLOWS: SOMETIMES WHEN YOU ENTER THE HI-SCORE ON NTSC THE MUSIC SLOWS DOWN AND SHIT START TO FLICKER. PROLLY COZ THE NTSC FIX PART IS BEING OVERWRITTEN IN THE MAIN MENU IF YOU HIT CERTAIN KEYS AT ONCE THE RASTERS START TO FLICKER." As Mr. Wax especially pointed out that the bugs appear on NTSC (the interested reader will remember Jazzcat claimed it bugs on PAL) we have requested on WHAT system, PAL or NTSC, those "mysterious" bugs appear: "HEY! SO FAR THINGS ONLY HAPPENED ON NTSC. SO THE BUG MUST BE BASICALLY COZ THE FIX ROUTINE IS BEING OVERWRITTEN LIKE THOMAS HAS SUSPECTED." Thomas is nobody else but STING/Onslaught, who does NOT own a NTSC CBM 64 yet in case he did NOT steal one out of Marc's appartement like he did with Marc's 14k4 modem three years ago, so according to Jazzcat's logic he is definately NOT in the position to give a qualified comment here. How can a person without a NTSC computer judge about bugs which are said to appear on NTSC machines, as Mr. Wax has refered to Sting while describing the bugs? It's a big disappointment to see now Mr. Wax continously claiming that Relax Magazine has twisted his words. It really doesn't prove a respectable character but we are not resentful since computer activities are after all just a hobby, an exiciting hobby, for the Relax Magazine staff. However, Jazzcat has promised that either STING and DONAR will send precise bug reports to Relax Magazine in order to prove their claims, for sure it is no surprise and there is no need to explain that these promised bug reports never made it to Relax Magazine. After hinting that Relax Magazine would prefer to see OBJECTIVE people testing it, people who don't belong to Jazzcat's clique or alliance and who are NOT involved in the discussion, we have received the following answer: "OK REGARDING THE GAME MYSTERY, WELL I DON'T SEE WHY YOU SHOULD KEEP ASKING OTHERS." One could say that a person providing FACTS does NOT need to fear research and supervision. It's very interesting to notice that the game just seemed to bug on machines of the inofficial alliance against Alpha Flight 1970. The from Onslaught as defeated group defined Alpha Flight 1970 has received for their version of MYSTERY points in the release charts of THE CREST MAGAZINE and PROPAGANDA, a magazine which is currently NOT in what people would dare to define as being in friendly terms with either Alpha Flight 1970 and Relax Magazine, judged in form of DODGER and COUNT ZERO, both well known and accepted authories in their subjects, unlike an Australian mail and modem trader who thinks to be in the position to create release charts. Furthermore BURGLAR, in MOST single charts the number one cracker and known to be a skilled coder and fixer, could NOT define an explainable, correctable and concrete bug in AFL's version. What does it mean? Normally people releasing a 100% version name all improvements in either the intro scrolltext or the trainer menu screen. In case of MYSTERY NO improvements or errors caused by the cracker in Alpha Flight 1970's version could be named! That could make objective readers stun. Indeed a real mystery. Regarding MAGICAL FORMULA nothing must be added for sure. Domination's reference for NTSC productions, Ultimate Hacker, has clearly put the spotlight on AFL's version but it seems his humble opinion is only demanded when it suits Jazzcat's interests. Instead of taking position to the present content the attention is continously reflect to other, for this case unimportant, minor events. "ADDED ALSO TO THE FACT THAT HE HAS HAD PROBLEMS WITH ONSLAUGHT BEFORE AND MAY BE USING THIS OPPORTUNITY TO ATTACK THE GROUP." Unlike Onslaught members who are permanently practising this kind of scene journalism definately NOT a single Relax Magazine staff member has used the magazine to solve personal or group related problems. As almost an every person involved in the scene has or has had problems with Onslaught it does not really surprise the masses that certain Relax Magazine editors, including main editor RRR, have already made bad experiences with the behaviour and attitude of Onslaught and its members. Nevertheless in Relax Magazine these matters have never been discussed, since it's Relax Magazine's policy to keep PERSONAL discussions out of the content, and opportunities to attack the group have been more than grains of sand in a desert like Sahara since Onslaught is continously dropping a brick just to step into the next one later on. It's just curious that everyone who is actually NOT sharing Onslaught's opinions is AGAINST the group or is using the situation as an opportunity to attack the group. The question might be asked what to expect from a person getting caught for self-voting in several occassions coming up with the mislead story that he has become the victim of an unjustified attack or an unfair treatment? It was an information, not an attack, but ofcourse it is very uncomfortable when the scene recognizes continously LAME actions like this one. Still a quite excellent example on the way Jazzcat uses to handle things. "THE ANSWER SIMPLY WOULD BE 'IF YOU LIVE IN GELSENKIRCHEN/GERMANY YOU'D DO THE SAME. MARC/AFL WOULD RUN OVER HIM IN HIS CAR FOR ANY INDECENT COMMENT'." It is already proven by scientists that the permanent usage of drugs influences the activity of brains. This really seems to be a fitting example, a statement which must be made by a person on a (bad) trip into extacy land. In case this statement was not made by a person high on drugs this person must be sick, really sick, mixing up scene and real life in case there still exists a border between both realities for Jazzcat. Unlike in Jazzcat's empire called Onslaught any staff member of Relax Magazine is allowed to bring in and discuss his very own opinion, his facts and arguments to ENRICH a discussion while in Onslaught those persons usually get removed for causing disruption and disorder within the group. A slight but important difference! Nothing can replace the feeling of living and working in a DEMOCRACY and supporting the FREEDOM OF SPEECH, a preference which must be given especially in groups or magazine staffs to guarantee a harmonic and reliable co-existance often misinterpreted as friendship in the scene. "HE DOES GRAPHICS FOR THE GROUP..." Or RRR is a former member of that group is indeed on the first view a quite interesting aspect, nevertheless people should concentrate their attention on the word "FORMER". Former does not mean actual, former does mean there must have been a reason for this step, reasons which are NOT meant for the public. In order one might use this to discredit Alpha Flight 1970 further, a membership in any cracking group on the CBM 64 is no more a desireable aim since 1994. Presenting facts or the results a research brought along has actually nothing to do with the relationship towards or against a group, facts and results of an intense research are supposed to be impartial in our definition. Just for the record, RRR has created artwork for Shout! (unreleased), Vandalism News, Domination, Vitality (unreleased), X-97, Success & The Ruling Company and Hitmen done in 1996/97 among other graphics done in 1994/95 and used in productions of Alpha Flight 1970, Oxyron and Lepsi Developments in the past two years, too, so what does a statement like the one from Jazzcat really express? Nothing? Or absolutely nothing? The question may be asked what does it all have in common with 100% (sales) versions? Giving an answer to this question really doesn't seems to be necessary. Jazzcat named it "TRY TO CONCENTRATE ON CURRENT SUBJECTS AND RELEASES INSTEAD OF TRYING TO CHANGE THE SUBJECT AND HIDE FROM THE TRUTH!". That's our opinion, that's our motivation and that are the principles RELAX MAGAZINE is following. We couldn't have compiled it more precise. 100% and sales versions is actually one of the most discussed subjects in the cracking scene. Reading through the latest issue of Vandalism News (#29) one could start believing in the fact that MIDFIT/Legend (aka. Galland/ex-Onslaught) intended to start an anti-campaign against Onslaught and its members in Relax Magazine, suggesting that Relax Magazine refused to publish it. This impression can't be confirmed when the chronological order is going to be taken into consideration. On Domination's homepage the following sentence could have been found: "GALLAND LEFT ONSLAUGHT, HE WAS TOO BE KICKED AT SOMETIME DUE TO CAUSING ARGUMENTS AND DISRUPTION WITH MEMBERS OF THE GROUP. HE IS PROBABLY GOING TO DO AN ANTI CAMPAIGN AGAINST US IN THE RELAX MAGAZINE." As a reaction to a notice found on the Domination homepage, which irritated the Relax Magazine staff, an e-mail to either JAZZCAT and MIDFIT have been sent out in order to clear up any (upcoming) misunderstandings. RRR, responsible Relax Magazine main editor caring about the ENTIRE content of the magazine, replied to this impreachment like found in Vandalism News, reactions chapter. "I HAVE ALREADY SENT AN E-MAIL TO VOLKER EXPLAINING HE SHOULD NOT INVOLVE THE NAME 'RELAX MAGAZINE' INTO HIS PERSONAL DISCUSSIONS. VOLKER IS AND FOR SURE NEVER WILL BE A PART OF THE RELAX MAGAZINE STAFF." The result of the requests was ofcourse NOT very surprising since Midfit did NOT send in any ANTI-CAMPAIGN or any offensive remarks against Onslaught to be published in Relax Magazine. How the name 'Relax Magazine' got involved is a mystery for him, too, as he is only known to be a supporter of the magazine "The Crest", a magazine started by some Dynamic Techologies and Megastyle members. Quite interesting is ofcourse the presentation on the homepage. Domination is said to be an independent release, so the usage of "US" (= Onslaught) is quite wrong in this case, or is it just a clear sign for the interested reader regarding the continously missing aspect of independence? More paranormal activity is coming up. Relax Magazine has been reviewed in Vandalism News #29. For those who might expect a reaction, it is rather pointless to complain or refer to judgements made in reviews while considering that always personal taste, preferences and exceptations influence the overall result, still correcting so-called facts, confirmable data, is a secure method to avoid misunderstandings caused by an unqualified review. In the review Relax Magazine #21 has mutated up to 19 chapters while the responsible reviewer only listed the real existing 18 chapters by name. People who might start wondering two equal packets in width and height with 9 chapters each can't provide an unequal number of chapters. Furthermore the review claims that Relax Magazine's comeback has been 2 years ago, still Relax Magazine has made its comeback in 1994 and is the ONLY CBM 64 scene magazine released on a regular basis since 1995. Just for a complete record in 1995 Relax Magazine has been released all six weeks, in 1996 all two months and in 1997 all three months. Keeping in mind that the responsible editor has not been very active the past 12 months and has been moved into the inactive status of his group it does not really surprise that he seems to have missed a full scene year. Last but not least we would like to comment another interesting offence, "... RRR/OXYRON IS ONCE AGAIN AT HIS BIASED BEST WITH HIS CONTINUING DEFENSIVE TEXTS IN HIS MAGAZINE RELAX.", one of countless inobjective and unsteady attacks to be found in Vandalism News #29, or on Second To None "I GUESS RRR EMAILED IT TO MIDFIT AS ALL THE LEADING BOARD MAGAZINES ARE BASHING HIS PUBLICATION. WORD! I GUESS HE HAS TO DO TRY SOMETHING IN HIS DEFENSE.". Please continue reading in "Games People Play III". Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Games People Play III
* GAMES PEOPLE PLAY III * ------------------------------------------------------------ Getting into the defensive position is just a natural reaction to aggressive offenses, an impressive and self-explaining example can be found once again in Vandalism News 29. Not only after the latest edition of this Australian based magazine it is quite clear that those so-called scene journalistists are permanently using both group related magazines, one is claimed to be independent, to sort out personal and group problems in order to manipulate the masses and to present the verse of the song which seems to be in the interest of the authors, namely Onslaught members. One could ask why the group Onslaught needs to release two magazines containing virtually the same content and Vandalism News being infact nothing else but a plain mirror of the content to be found in the previous released issue of Domination, what is no surprise since Jazzcat is responsible for the content of both magazines. One could ask why other Onslaught members have infiltrated other magazine staffs, too, what is ofcourse more than only suspicious. Support or control, the border is quite thin. Presenting a story twice or even more often in various magazines does not turn manipulations into unplugged, raw and true information, especially NOT if it is twice the same person being responsible for the articles. Having a look at the overall charts chapters of scene magazines in the past few six months one could find in about 70% of all publications Relax Magazine on the top spot, that is infact a quite clear indicator to prove what publication is the LEADING board magazine, nevertheless this should not be judged by the involved parties. In the opinion of Jazzcat the leading board magazines in his definition seem to be Domination, Vandalism News and Propaganda, the only magazines continously attacking the publication Relax Magazine. To have a closer look at those publications and their interesting relationships is quite effective and self-explaining. At first there are the Onslaught publications Domination and Vandalism News. Vandalism News' comeback issue has been a cheap copy of contents to be found in Domination, the following issue still has been major influenced by Jazzcat, too, so it is no surprise that both publications' content is mirroring Jazzcat's phantasmagorias, and the argumentation that ALL major magazines are bashing Relax Magazine has been relativated. The role Propaganda is playing is even more interesting. A few issues ago Onslaught and F4CG have abused their partly independent magazines as one of all the various methods to express their hostility against eachother. When two parties not even grudging eachother the dirt under the finger nails all over the years have allied even a blind man is able to see the corruption, an arranged manipulation in order to present the own interests in as much publications as possible. However, power is nothing without control. An every magazine editor has the power to edit and release texts in the publications he is contributing to, but control is the most important element, Relax Magazine editors have the ultimate control about the content, Relax Magazine editors can stand behind the texts they are publishing in the magazine, a content based on rules and true facts instead of cheap tries to manipulate the masses. No Relax Magazine needs to counter with experience as the only reaction to reply on articles, still it could be ofcourse possible to refer to the real existing experience of Relax Magazine editors like Marc, Max or RRR who have been a part of the scene 5, 6 and 7 years before Jazzcat realised that something like a CBM 64 scene does really exist. The pathetic screams from Jazzcat that only his enemies won't confirm his point of view because of an aversion against his person is in fact interesting to notice, therefore Count Zero in Propaganda and Dodger in The Crest did not confirm his judgements. Experience and objectivity would be more fitting here since both Count Zero and Dodger have built up a fine reputation for their skills in the cracking business as CRACKERS, unlike Jazzcat who is not exactly what one would dare to define as a leading cracker in the scene. Fact is that Alpha Flight 1970 was facing problems with both profiles, too, that is a fact which can't be denied. Who does not remember the discussions around the game "Lemmings" between Alpha Flight 1970 and Dytec, who doesn't remember the way Count Zero has been talking about Alpha Flight 1970 all over the years? Releases don't work or go corrupt because of personal differences, an indepedent magazine editor should be aware of the fact. Independence expresses a desired objectivity which should not be infected by personal or general problems with a group, its members or its releases. The problem is the different way people are willing to read and accept the contents, the "critism" on the boards especially concerning this publication is already written before the magazine has been released and "the critic" has read just a single letter. It is no problem to name the complaining persons in advance as it are always the same persons who would love to see their group on the top spot and the best ever happening to the scene, a wish or better a dream which can be realised in their very own (independent) productions, a fairy tales not to be found in an active and reliable magazine. Critism can only be positive, regardless if the content is positive or negative, when it is objective and constructive presented to be a real support for the responsible staff. Unfortunately by far too often some persons loved to mix up critism and stupid rags or attacks as a method to reach a desired aim, to get closer to a goal which must be on a fair and honesty way IMPOSSIBLE to realise. Showing off and making a big deal out of normal activities is not our business. We prefer to work hard to present a solid result, a production we can be proud of, a production we can stand behind. Unlike some competitors do this production is not made to gain personal or group fame, it is not ment to highlighten the involved groups, ofcourse there might be some persons who want to see it this way they simply see it. In summary we can proclaim that we did not brought in "point hunting", we just highlighten it to prove that other groups are releasing 100% and sales versions, too, and presenting INFORMATION about people performing self-voting can't be seen as an attack as a "victim" loved to see it, it's an information about a negative process, NOT an attack caused by hostile feelings or motivation. None of our staff members did an anti-campaign against any group nor its members using Relax Magazine. It's not negative propaganda against a group when we report about certain people feeling uncomfortable in a group. It can be originated by a decreasing interest in the scene, personal problems with group members or other preferences which do not satisfy the unhappy member. It doesn't report anything about a group, it's organisation or reputation when a member is feeling uncomfortable and prefers to leave for another group. In case of former Avantgarde members we got informed about their plans to leave the group and to rebuild Avantgarde during the membership in F4CG. Cupid, Deff, Derbyshire Ram and Jack Alien have already left the group behind, to be found more or less active in Hitmen and Remember. The plans for a possible comeback of Avantgarde can be requested by asking almost all more or less active former Avantgarde members, starting with Cupid, Derbyshire Ram, Intruder, Jack Alien and Metal to name the main characters who are still considered to be active. Those information hinted and remarked in Relax Magazine are in fact definately not without any basis but the result of COMMUNICATION with the responsible persons, it is quite interested that some former fellow group members ignored it and intended to blame Relax Magazine for it! The next interesting example is what was made out of us reporting "THE LATEST GOSSIP REPORTS THAT FINAL GENOCIDE IS ONE OF THE POSSIBLE CANDIDATES TO BECOME THE NEW FANTASTIC 4 CRACKING GROUP HEADQUARTER.". In Propaganda and in other sources having been feeded with F4CG's version one could read that Relax Magazine suggested Final Genocide will be the new F4CG headquarter. Everyone who reads the original report in Relax Magazine or Relax Online can see that the statement made by F4CG is incorrect! Here we would like to quote Newscopy regarding the coverage in Propaganda "WHAT WAS WRITTEN WAS REFLECTIONS FROM THE BOARDS.". As one could read we wrote that in the actual gossip on the boards Final Genocide is one of the possible candidates, we did not suggest it is the new F4CG headquarter. Another fitting example how F4CG and Propaganda use to handle "facts" and manipulate the masses. Amazing! We are once again deeply impressed that credibility and honesty doesn't mean anything anymore, just the best possible presentation in the public is important, regardless if that is the true version or the most pleasant version for the author. No, we are really NOT amused about this kind of impertinence. No, we are NOT feeling bitter, WE don't need to spoil the truth. If necessary we are not the last ones willing to discuss and solve the problems in the public or private. However, we don't see one good reason to accept the permanently cheap trials to attack our publication, its staff members and their groups over and over again from different sources. We are not willing to accept taking the blame OTHERS deserve. Spoiled facts, making belief, manipulations and similar methods to draw an indeed bizarre version of the happenings can be found elsewhere, NOT in this publication. In case things will settle down now and others are stopping their weak impreachments now we will remain in silence, too, since peace and harmony are very important for our staff members. Nevertheless we won't tolerate aggressive behaviour against our publication in the public anymore. When people are willing to discuss things privately we agree to handle it hidden for the public, when people decide to choose the public as their playground we will ofcourse reply in the public, too, just in order to present original and unplugged material, facts and information, following the principles of journalism to present an informative and objective magazine, not a propaganda media to promote groups or personalities. Hopefully the topic is through now. Here we are now in the position to proclaim, like others did before, that if anyone reacts to "Games People Play" this person can let things rest, then we can put these persons into the bad, negatively seen position by re-starting over and over again. We won't be surprised if for some wanna-be number 1 candidates the topic isn't closed by now. Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Demo Reviews
* DEMO REVIEWS * ------------------------------------------------------------ Parties are still places to find lots of demo releases, nevertheless the overall impression has turned out to become negative. There has NOT been any OUT- STANDING demo release made in 1997 nor has there been any party with more than three remarkable demo productions. Will it become better again? The summer started with the annual Assembly party in Finland. Unfortunately the quality of the contribu- tions was not that high compared with the previous years. "Speedway" from Panic, "O-Tech-People" from Active and "3D Highlight" from Lepsi Developments have been nice productions but no real smash hits like known from former events. The Rage 1997 demo competition did not really deser- ve the name, DENTRO competition would have been by far more fitting. "Zoom-8-Terror" from Breeze, "An- tiq 97" from Ideal and "Better Late Than Never" from Active have been all quite nice designed, but like al- ready stated earlier a real smash hit was missing. At the Gravity 1997 Samar has released "Bloody Do- mination", Exon released a production called "Exon- eration" and Albion "Excalibur". People expecting a real smash hit have been disappointed again. Some months after the North Party Samar finally re- leased the 100% version of "Opium". In summary of the year 1997 the most active groups releasewise have been Lepsi Developments, Samar, Active and Smash Designs, that won't change after The Party VII, too. Atleast the hope that the quality of the productions released there might let the demo scene looking for- ward to the annual christmas party. Things can only get better. WE ARE FAMILY ------------- Hello guys. Most of the older sceners will for sure remember projects like "DEMO OF THE YEAR (DOTY)" organised by TRIANGLE, which was a bigger demo where several different groups contributed with single demo parts. It was meant as some kind of competition. Recently the returned MAGIC MAN (Crazy)Hitmen) decided to start a project to bring back a bit of the old spirit of the CBM 64 scene. This is how the "We Are Family" project got started. We already got a few people together and decided to produce a demo together with all the groups that wanted to participate. The project just now is only in its very early stage, so that no standards have been set yet. We need all the support that we can get, so please get in touch with us. We want to produce a huge coop demo named "we are family". Since Magic Man seems to hardly have any time now to take care of the project, I decided to set up a mailinglist on the Internet to form an organisation team. Please join our list by following these instrutions: Write an e-mail to [waf-request^padua.org] stating [subscribe] in the BODY of the mail. Once you are on the list, you can send messages to us using the address [waf^padua.org]. If you encounter any problems, please write a mail to me [anonym^padua.org]. If you do not have any Internet-access, we do of course not want to exclude you from our project. To be updated whenever we finally get closer to coding the whole thing write a postcard to me: XXXXX XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX or call me on my cellular telephone at +XX-(X)XXX-XXXXXXX Also a webpage about the whole project will be put online soon. It will be reachable at: http://www.padua.org/waf/ Thank you for your support! SPEEDWAY (90% Version)/PANIC ------------------------------------------------------------ Panic is one of those demo groups who normally get active for party competition contributions only. Being located in Finland it does not really surprise the masses that the Finnish group concentrates on the legendary ASSEMBLY series where Panic has alrea- dy competed a couple of times. Fuben about the coding: -------------------- This demo is entirely coded by Jer/Panic and was presented at the Assembly'97 in Finland. The trackmo starts up with some text (nice propor- tional charset) and a picture. After the introduction the first routine is presented. It's a weird plasma-like effect in 8x8 interlace. It looks great in a way, but it is nothing special. Then a REALTIME MANDELBROT- ZOOMER is announced. And you get DISAPPOINTED by a simple boring zoom-routine. Dear Jer, a mandel- brot-zoomer is the realtime calculation of the man- delbrot set. You have precalculated the basic set and zoomed in with a zoomer-routine, but this is no man- delbrot-zoomer! The same routine follows with a tex- ture of the earth. This one looks nice! Evenso, I have already seen this routine in an old Byterapers demo. The speed of the routine is ok for 8x8 interlaced. The next routine is a boring COLORCYCLE-routine, which I won't describe further now as this routine just calculates a bitmap and cycles the colors. No- thing special at all. Later you can see some INTERFE- RENCE stuff in 4 colors (4x4 resolution). Nothing se- rious, too. After this, a very often coded effect co- mes up: a SWIRL ROTATOR (in 8x8 interlaced). I have seen a lot of versions of this effect yet, so I think it has be enough! The same goes for the next effect: a 8x8 interlaced fire-routine! This one looks nice, but I think you can speed it up a bit regarding the low resolution. The next routine is a 2-way plasma in 8x8 interlaced, also seen very often yet. Then following is a 2-way plasma again, but this time in 4x4 interlaced. I think the speed is acceptable. After so greetings and some other texts the next part appears. It's kind of a BLURING-effect, which you can see in every FIRE-ROUTINE. It is something new of its kind and it looks funny! Later, after some personal greetings, a ROTATING DUCK comes up, which is shaded at the outlines. This part looks great too and is quite fast (even the 8x8 interlaced resolution). But why is the- re a HOLE in the duck?! The next routine is a PHONG- LIKE shaded in 8x8 interlaced. The 3D-MAPPING-EN- GINE tries to project a light-source on the faces of the cube, but the light is just FAKED (there's some- thing with the geometry). The last part is a COMPLEX HIDDEN LINE VECTOR, which is quite ok. Nice work! Finally at the end, a picture is loaded again and again to the screen. Speedway shows some great effects and also a lot of crap. All in all, it lacks of design. Most pictures for example were loaded to the screen in realtime (instead of a fade in). And the existing fadings in the demo are rather weird. My rating is 52%. RRR about the artwork: -------------------- The credits for the graphics shown in Speedway are given to Jer and Throne. In the beginning there is a coverage page in multico- lour bitmap format, showing a creature looking a bit like Eddie, a "mascot" to be found on many Iron Mai- den record covers, holding a gun in his hand. Next to it there is graphic-based text displaying the demo and group name. The graphic is NOT very sharp and detailed, the suspect of converting/scanning seems to be justified here. The next fullscreen picture fits exactly into the same drawer, showing Pam's (Pamela Lee Anderson) lovely face and a small Panic logo. At- least while fixing the colour settings a little bit more effort could have been brought in. A Speedway logo is the next in the row, once again in 160 X 200 reso- lution. A higher resolution, e.g. MCI with 320 X 200, could have presented the plain standart logo a bit more impressive. Last but least (!!) there is a rather poor big the end logo and a smaller Panic 1997 logo. Once again, using a higher resolution could make it look atleast a little bit better. No further comment necessary. Well, normally one should believe in the fact that when graphics are in a production atleast a percentage of 20 has to be given, having a closer look at the con- tent of this production 20% are by far overrated. As this is the 90% version only one could still hope that the missing 10% are the graphics only. My rating for this performance is 19%. ECO about the soundtrack: ----------------------- AGEMIXER of Atlantis is responsible for the sound- track of this demo, which consists of four tunes. The first tune is a simple 120 bpm techno tune, start- ing with an octaved filtered bass and some harmo- nies in TWO voices. After this short "introduction" a simple drum and bass sets in. The bass line is varied in filter and notes from time to time but all in all no- thing special. Some UNSPECTACULAR chords play the accompaniment. After some time there is a kind of CHORD HANDLING which is simply transposed. In the also a SIMPLE melody appears but this tune LACKS of some more variation and effects, a basis to get C64 techno tunes more interesting. Track two can be taken into the drawer "older work" as it got arranged in 1993. The very beginning re- minded me of a bagpipe (?). Well, the music itself sounds somewhat oldschool (especially the bassline). The melody sounds quite squeezy but anyway as it fits to the rest. In the end there's some playing with with up- and downmoving notes - nothing really im- pressive but nice. At least I like this tune more than the 1st one. No. 3 is in my eyes the worst of this demo. The bass- line is quite simple. The melody just plays around the notes of the accompanying chord. After this the chord walks up the scale which sounds quite disso- nant. And now the whole thing only repeats and re- peats - melody - upwalking chord - melody... Only drum and bass line are variied from time to time. Let's come to the end tune - my favourite. It's a sad, melodic tune with a pleasent melody line. Indeed it's no complicated arrangement but this tune doesn't requi- re this. It's just nice to hear. I think it would perfectly fit in a mag but that's only my opinion. All in all I think the soundtrack was a bit weak. I know that Agemixer has enough talent to do far better mu- sics. All three main tracks are somewhat boring. Es- pecially the techno tunes should include MORE ef- FECTS. By the way, in this Panic-trackmo NO credits for the musicians were given. Hey, come on guys! If you use these tunes you could at least mention the composer(s) anywhere. My rating: 60%. 3D HIGHTLIGHT/LEPSI DEVELOPMENTS ------------------------------------------------------------ The Polish demo group Lepsi Developments has shown an intense activity level during 1996 to 1997 by re- leasing a quite impressive number of demos. It is not surprising that the single components, code, artwork and soundtrack, are supposed to increase with an every single production, and nobody can really deny to see a progress in the productions. Fuben about the coding: -------------------- Lepsi's new demo "3D Highlight" is coded by MADROM and linked up by SEBALOZ. It starts with a usual intro sequence: a few pictures, logos and some text. Nothing special, but all is timed to the music, which by the way fits good to the intro. Later, a VECTOR SPACESHIP with 14 faces comes up (in 4x4 mode), which rather looks like a FAKE of the spaceship in Radio Napalm/Reflex. Sorry, but I have seen far better 3d engines yet. The next real routine is a VERTICAL TEXTUREMAPPER, which shows a rota- ting city. Even I prefer Graham's vector city in "Parts", this effect doesn't look bad. Evenso I think you can increase the speed of the routine because of the chunky-like 4x4 mode. After a lot of pictures, greetings and credits the next real effect comes up. It's a GOURAUD-SHADING routine in 4x4 in a square (?) of 48 points. The first object is again a spaceship made of 36 faces (according to the note). The routi- ne performance is acceptable for 36 faces (evenso the colors should get changed). The second object is a torus with 16 faces. This object is far too slow (even it looks nice with the color-dithering). I used the same object in the PHONG-SHADER part of Re- Lightening which even was faster than this gouraud- routine. And that's it! All in all Lepsi's production was a quite DISAPPOINT- MENT for me. It is definately NOT a 3d highlight, what was announced in the title. All vectorparts have been released in other demos yet. Furthermore I am NOT sure if this production can be called a demo. A slide- show would fit much better. There have been far too many pictures instead of routines. Positively there haven't been many bugs (especially no linking bugs!). bugs!). Only the Lepsi logo in the intro and the first vector spaceship did NOT apear all the time I runned the demo (just one time). Also positively rated was the timed music in the whole demo (especially in the intro sequence), but a bit more design (e.g. in the fa- dings) wouldn't be wrong. My rating: 34%. RRR about the artwork: -------------------- The graphics for this production have been realised by ALG, Katon, Lego, Nazgul and Sebaloz. The show begins with a fullscreen picture in IFLI for- mat, showing some kind of muscular freak (from the author described as a cyborg) holding a gun in his right hand, a quite detailed and nice looking piece of art, followed by a small 3D Highlight logo in MCI for- and a bigger 3D Highlight logo in IFLI. Both logos are just average and not very interesting in form and style. Another logo is coming up, this time a Lepsi logo again in MCI, once again just another average piece of art. The next one is a quite nice hires picture pre- senting the right half of a male face, quite detailed with eye, nose, mouth, folds and an unspecified liquid substance flowing out of the mouth (blood? spittle?) giving the overall good impression the final touch. An animation in MCI is following, showing an unknown spe- cies (alien? monster?), to be more precise the head only with an unspecified liquid substance (blood? spittle? some MORE colours would be FINE), due to the fact of it dropping down viciously one could ima- gine it to be blood, but what is known about the con- stition of aliens or monsters yet? Anyway, the anima- tion makes the quite nice drawn part of the head even more interesting. Next in the row is a multico- lour bitmap but unfortunately average Lepsi logo, followed by a rather POOR upper part of a face with eyes, dead eyes, done in MCI. The in multicolour bitmap drawn side-view on the profile of a mutant drawn fullscreen picture is by far more promising, quite de- tailed realised. Again in (singlecolour) hires the next picture is providing a view on an imprisoned woman in a cold dark prison. The room itself has been drawn quite nice, the woman can not reflect the beauty of a lovely young lady. The following FLI picture shows 3 well done body-builders, two of them female and one male. The bomb in the right upper part of screen just seems to fill the empty space. Having a closer look on the picture the artist is VERY talented in drawing bodies, forms, details and proportions, on the other hand he FAILED completely when it comes around the colours, which can give the impression that the pictu- re was drawn on a b/w monitor/TV set as the set- tings of certain colours are in some cases a real pain. A short tip for the future. A FLI picture CAN hold 16 colours per char but it MUST NOT hold them! LESS colours can be MORE effective! Next one is a- nother FLI picture, in height half-screen, showing a worker infront a kind of public traffic system, it's not given for sure if it's a subway (underground) or magnetic system. Afterall it's NOT very impressive. A space taxi, it seems to be originated and adapted in form and style from eternal noble limousine bodies, in (singlecolour) hires is quite okay, but not that stun- ning either. Following are various singlecolour hires logos presenting the credits for the demo, all these logos are NOT anything special and far beyond ave- rage. The Lepsi logo, quite interesting in form and style, in multicolour bitmap looks like being cut off while watching the person's body holding a gun. Once again the colour settings partly spoil the overall im- pression. Last but not least there's a fullscreen logo in multicolour bitmap format. It's quite interesting in form and style but unlike in other productions in this format there are no new elements and aspects to see on a second and third view. By involved various graphic artists the quality level is supposed to vary, this production doesn't make an exception here. The variety in the quality level can NOT only be detected while comparing the work of different graphic artists only, it's merely like that the level of single artists varied a lot, too, from promising to rather poor, what is for sure a not normal in a single production, aswell as the same colour palette with exactly the same shadings in the majority of the artwork makes some losing their attractivity and turn them more into direction boring. Generally can be said that the level increased compared with for- mer Lepsi productions. Still this is just a 69% for me. ECO about the soundtrack: ---------------------- The entire soundtrack of this production consists of two tunes - both made by WACEK of Arise/Albion/ Coma and (last not least) Lepsi Developments. It all starts with a quite dark tune made in the typical C64-techno-style. In the very beginning the action on the screen is timed on the music. The bassline seems to stay the same during almost the whole play- ing time - only the filter frequence varies from time to time. The bass drum stomps away with around 150 bpm. Wacek tried to create something like a break beat with the snare but it could have been done bet- ter I think. After some time he added an accompani- ment with two chords, which in fact sounds (ehmm) NOT so good as the 2nd chord doesn't fit to the bass line. Later on he included a pulse-sync. But as it sim- ply plays the notes of the chords this doesn't sound very well, too. In the credits part the tempo suddenly changes. First I thought it's still the same tune - but no. This transition was really well made. The 2nd tune is, like said before, a bit slower, "only" (around 120 bpm). In the beginning you can hear some quite interesting sync-FX. But also in this tune the bass drum just stomps in its tact. The bass line is more simple but sounds more powerful than in the 1st tune and includes the snare which sounds quite STRANGE. Sometimes I get the feeling that those strange drums were only made to stand out from the mass - anyway. Later on there's some kind of chord- handling - nothing really impressive as it's a bit cha- otic. Beside this there are no special things. In summary I have to say that this soundtrack didn't impressed me a lot. Okay, I liked the dark atmoshere but the rest is only AVERAGE - just like the instru- ments. At least only the transition and the FX in the beginning of the 2nd tune impressed me a bit. I think Wacek has the potential to make better tunes. My rating: 55 % Best regards, Eco/Alpha Flight 1970^Excess ------------------------- Fuben/Oxyron ------------ RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Party Radar
* PARTY RADAR * ------------------------------------------------------------ The party radar of Relax Magazine 22, September 1997 edition, will provide the RESULTS from the fol- lowing scene parties ------- + Assembly 1997 + Rage 1997 + Gravity v2.0 aswell as the INVITATION to --------- + The Party 1997 the traditional party to close the file of an every scene year, already hold since 1991. ASSEMBLY 1997 --------------- Helsinki/Finland August 08 - 10, 1997 + CBM 64 DEMO COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 2424 Speedway Panic Creations 02. 1648 O-Tech-People Active 03. 1304 3d Highlight Lepsi Developments + CBM 64 GRAPHIC COMPETITION + --------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 1272 Scissors Electric/Extend 02. 1216 Leon Tyrant/Therapy 03. 636 Astral Princess Debris/Panic + CBM 64 MUSIC COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 800 Fugue in D-Minor Trident/Active 02. 648 Old Skool Coma/Trauma)Pal 03. 592 Space Dreams The Alien/WOW ANTIQ 1997 ----------- Pecs/Hungary August 22 - 24, 1997 + CBM 64 DEMO COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 473 Zoom 8 Terror Breeze 02. 261 Antiq 97 Ideal 03. 213 Better late than... Active 04. 128 Csemegeuborka Pofik + CBM 64 GRAPHIC COMPETITION + ---------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 309 Cyberboard Poison/Singular 02. 255 Demon Of Hell Splash/Resource 03. 201 Manga Girl Flimbo/Resource 04. 163 Fraktal Girl AMN/Anarchy 05. 95 Skull And Drug Jonny/Ideal 06. 70 Cyberhead TGM/Singular 07. 69 First Mephisto/Ebola 08. 59 Devil TGM/Singular + CBM 64 MUSIC COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. 279 Hasted Flash/Leader 02. 222 Dark Side Wayne/Ideal 03. 136 Voodopeople Soci/Singular 04. 134 Half Lights Da Blondine/Wish/.. 05. 100 In the window of... Mephisto/Ebola 06. 92 The Other Side Tomace/Singular 07. 69 Magic Melody Perplex/Therapy 08. 56 Future come Jonny/Ideal GRAVITY v2.0 ------------- Opole/Poland August 30 - 31, 1997 + CBM 64 DEMO COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. ---- Bloody Domination Samar 02. ---- Exoneration Exon 03. ---- Excalibur Albion + CBM 64 GRAPHIC COMPETITION + ---------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. ---- Onslaught Sebaloz/Lepsi Dev. 02. ---- Compo Picture Valsary/Samar 03. ---- Escape Cyclone B/Exon + CBM 64 MUSIC COMPETITION + ------------------------- Pos. Points Production Author ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. ---- Psyhic Max/X-Vector 02. ---- Jerz2 Bax/Fatum/LD/NN 03. ---- Amphetamine Wacek/Albion/... In total 597 party guests visited this gathering in the southern part of Poland, 69 of them are or were re- lated with the CBM 64 scene: ACIDCHILD/Triad, ARCHANGEL/Alpha Flight 1970) Street Children, ARISTO/Samar, ASL/Nipson, AZGAR/ Vaudeville, BALD M./Estate, BIMBER/Arise, BISHOP/ Samar)Factory, BROWAR/Arise, BUTT-MAN/Samar, CARRION/Elysium, COMANCHE/Agony Design, CORWIN/ Tengu)Exon, DAF/Samar, DRUID/Agony Design, EARTHQUAKE/Cosmic Style, EVERLAST/Street Child- ren, FANGORN/Alliance)Tengu, FANTA/Oxyron, FLASH/Reflex)Street Children, GLUT/Agony Design, GOLD HAND/Samar, HABIB/Exon, HARDCORE/Samar, HAWK/Albion)Proxima, ICEMAN/WOW, INCO/Agony De- sign, JAKEC/Nipson, JURGEN/Fraction, KATON/Lep- si Developments, KERK/Albion)Color 7, KILLER/Ten- gu)Kreciki, Kmeg/Albion, KORDIAUKIS/Kreciki De- sign)Fraction, KSIN/Ascraeus)Tengu, LEMING/Fatum Nipson, LUKE/Arise)Nipson, MICRO/Street Children, MOOG/Agony Design, MORRIS/Agony Design, NEMO/ Lepsi Developments, NOISE/Exon)Street Children, PROVOCATOR/Tengu, QBILL/Vaudeville, RAMMY/Hit- men, RICO/Nipson, RODNEY/Arise, SEBALOZ/Lepsi Developments, SHAMAN/Taboo, STICE/Estate, STIL- GAR/Albion, SUNDANCE/Exon, TSL/Arise, VOLCANO/ Exon, WACEK/Arise)Fuse, WARP 8/Flash Inc)Cosmic Style and Zwark/Proxima THE PARTY 1997 INVITATION ----------------------- [Introduction] ----------- The Party scene is like a WILD animal - it won't just lay down to rest, and so we're back. This time we have put together the demo event of the year packed with many new features and all the best from past years. We have pretty much thought of everything for you to have a blast, only thing is... - Batteries not included! [Where & When] ------------- The Party 1997 will be held in Messecenter Aars, the place with the real party atmosphere. The Party 1997 will be held from Saturday 27 December at 08:00 CET to Monday 29 December at 15:00 CET. [Facilities] --------- * Room for max. 3500 people! * A seperate sleeping area. * Cafeteria and kiosk will be open 24h. * Extremely powerful PA equipment and a huge, high quality screen. * LaserDisc Room! * Free access to swimming bath & showers! * The Party 1997 T-Shirts will be sold. [Events] ------- * 55 hours non-stop activities. * 15 main compos with great prizes. * Traditional party-events like Body-Crashing and DiskOs. * Live concert on stage. * Several conferences. * Free Party-Bowling night! * Plus much more... [Competitions] ------------ Main competitions and prizes: Pos. Amiga Demo PC Demo WILD! Demo ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $2000 $2000 $2000 02. $1000 $1000 $1250 03. $500 $500 $750 04. $250 $250 $500 05. $100 $100 $250 Pos. Java Demo Win95 Demo Amiga Intro ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $ 1000 $ 500 $ 500 02. $ 750 $ 300 $ 300 03. $ 500 $ 150 $ 150 Pos. PC Intro 4 KB Intro Pixel Gfx ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $ 500 $ 200 $ 600 02. $ 300 $ 100 $ 400 03. $ 150 $ 50 $ 200 Pos. PC Intro 4 KB Intro Pixel Gfx ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $ 500 $ 200 $ 600 02. $ 300 $ 100 $ 400 03. $ 150 $ 50 $ 200 04. $ 100 Pos. Raytraced Gfx 4-Ch. Music Multi Ch. ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $ 400 $ 600 $ 600 02. $ 200 $ 400 $ 400 03. $ 100 $ 200 $ 200 04. $ 50 $ 100 $ 100 Pos. C64 Demo C64 Music C64 Gfx ------------------------------------------------------------ 01. $ 300 $ 200 $ 200 02. $ 200 $ 100 $ 100 03. $ 100 $ 50 $ 50 [Rules] ------ General Rules ----------- * If you want to take part in a competition you must be present at The Party during the presentation and prize ceremony. * If too many contributions are delivered for a com- petition a competent jury will make a selection. * All contributions can only participate in one compe- tition. * We will copy and spread all contributions. * All contributions must be final, no bug-fixes will be accepted before or after presentation. * Compo-disks will not be returned. * PC hardware configuration: Pentium 166 MHz, 16 MB Ram, SVGA by VESA 1.2 Support, Soundblaster AWE 32 or Gus Max. * Amiga hardware configuration: Amiga 1200-030 50 MHz/882 50 MHz, 8 MB FAST ram & 2 MB CHIP Ram. * All entries for Amiga can be compressed with either LZX or LHA. * All entries for PC can be compressed with either ZIP, ARJ or RAR. * No self-extracting archives will be allowed. * No other archive-types will be allowed. * All filenames must comply to ISO-9660 8+3 stan- dard. No funny charaters allowed. * All contributions must be able to run from HD and CDROM, except for WiLD! demos. * Contributions with racial content (incl. anti-racial) will not be accepted. [Please Note] ----------- * We will not accept anybody selling anything without our permission. * Alcohol and drugs are not allowed at the party place. If we find any it will be confiscated and not given back. * Intoxicated people will be thrown out or handed over to the police. * We will not accept weapons, spraycans or firework etc. * People who cause damages of any kind will of course have to pay for it. * We take no responsibility for illegal swapping, software, hardware, video etc. * The entrance price is dkk 300. [Addresses] ---------- Party Place: Messecenter Aars ---------- XXXXXXXX XX XX-XXXX XXXX XXXXXXX The Party-Phone: (+XX) XXXX XXXX -------------- World Wide Web: http://www.theparty.dk ------------ E-Mail: theparty^theparty.dk ----- Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Lost Files
ATTENTION! WARNING! ------------------------------------------------------------ After the initial release in Relax Magazine #21, July 1997 edition, a lot of ANGRY parents approached our editorial staff and reported about suicidial tenden- ces, general depressive behaviour, insomnia and to- tal aparthy in the rows of their after-growths named in here. In arrangement with our pool of lawyers we decided to install this WARNING message in front of the chapter, just to make sure that an every person will finally mention that the content is fullfilled with SATIRICAL, SARCASTICAL and HUMOROUS views on the current scene which MUST NOT, but can in some cases, reflect original but FICTIONAL happenings. The content of LOST FILES is NOT supposed to be serious journalism to cover the actual happenigs but an ENTERTAINING section only! Do NOT enter if you have NO sense for humor, infe- riority feelings/complexes, further psychical pro- blems or if you are NOT an adult person yet. Here the URGENT recommandation to leave this chapter im- midiately must be given. And a special note to newcombers and wanna-be elite persons: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME! --------------------- * THE LOST FILES * ------------------------------------------------------------ It is no secret that Relax Magazine has built up a secret police and a unique network of countless in- formers reporting about the latest trends, happen- ings, internal secrets and strategies. No doubt that all those secret agents have already infiltrated group/magazine headquarters and have installed monitors for telephones and backdoors for Internet and board accounts. There is no step a scene related person can do without surveillance of Relax Magazine agents. Some protocols and files of the "Relax Archive" have found the way out of the secret headquarter, provi- ding the scene with stunning and unbelievable infor- mation, facts which should not have been made public yet. Therefore countless agents are hunting for the stolen documents in order to prevent non-authorized usage. Always remember, the truth is out there! ------------------ "Well, Relax's secret service seems NOT to be active in Holland!" cheers BURGLAR in a small town called Zaandam near Amsterdam, "They did not report about me spanking my computer equipment day by day for an excellent orgasm. Furthermore other inte- resting facts about some missing levels in the last true fullpricer ever released on the CBM 64 never made it out of this room! No, our anti-spy defence system is working brilliant!" while CBA finally took a shower after his expanded Interrail tour and com- mented "Wow. It's just great to see it working 100%! Nevertheless flies don't like me anymore! Life is beautiful". In the southern part of Germany THE IGNORANCE has been last spotted joining a toilet three weeks after and still is rumoured not to have left the place any- more. Some Relax reporters carefully entered the room to find what is going on and found a totally debi- litated German cracker, restarting to puke all two mi- nutes. Requesting the issue Thomas reported "It just started when I called a board and saw Jazzcat re- porting about cracking, a person just knowing how to turn on the computer and to type 'load' and 'run'. My stomach started turning and I immidiately had to leave for the toilet. Whenever I want to get up I see the screen again, still showing the same content, and the show restarts again! I fear it will never end!" just to turn into a deep depression before restarting to puke again. Somewhere in an overcrowded flea market textiles tycoon MANIAC is celebrating his so successful scene career "After joining Legend I can continue starting to pretend that I am a living LEGEND! Still I wish I was in Ikari & Talent, a dream I dreamt for about 5 years already." DIGAHOLE, next to MANIAC the most well known elite scener ever in the history of the CBM 64 scene, continued his desperate attacks against the Relax Magazine and its editor RRR in this Internet, this time when RRR entered channel #c-64 on IRC. WESTBAM/Legend requested "I wonder who you are and what you are so proud of?" as he seemed to have no idea who this very-important-scener is. Some people in the channel tried to help Westbam in his quest and started to explain. MIDFIT, former Ons- laught member, has been the first one "On a great history in Accuracy!", COUNT ZERO continued "And he is now lead by the glorious Jazzcat of ex-Legend ..." while TRANZIIE requested "Glorious? What makes him glorious? I rather call him a good organizer.". Westbam has been satisfied with the answers and replied to Andreas "I know. That is propably the ONLY point you ever were right about... But for hea- ven's sake: who or what the fuck is Accuracy?". Digahole seemed not to be impressed, still feeling proud and immortal, "The only remarkable part of Re- lax 21 is the Polish news section.... coz it was done by Druid!". DRUID of Agony Design had to confirm "Yes, after my article in Relax 20 I started to code an intro for Relax, but I did NOT edit any part for edition 21!" just to prove Digahole's excellent research showing that he really knows what he is talking about. Then it was Mert's part again "Asshole, you would prolly think its a monster when you see a modem!". RRR started thinking "Modem? What's a modem? Com- puter: what is a modem?". The computer answered "Modem is the short form of modulator and demodula- demodulator. A modem is an old-fashioned communica- tion instrument to transport computer data via tele- phone lines, necessary to log into Internet and boards. There are different modes converting bits to accustic signals....". RRR stopped the processor unit "Oh, these poor people still need modems? Computer: tea! Earl Grey! Hot!" and felt sorry for people still in the need for old-fashioned computer equipment to approach the Internet or boards just to beam back into the holodeck to continue chatting in the channel. Here MIDFIT added "Nobody should tell me how glo- rious JAZZCAT is, since 'the best card supplier in the scene' buys his cards from Hybrid PC!" and Westbam requested "As I heard he doesn't get them anymore?!?!" just to get the reply "True fact, and if he likes to buy them, for 20$ at each one!". RRR felt a little bit bored and advised: "Digahole, like said before, tell your mummy about it. Perhaps you'll get a Doner Kebap from her to grow up a little bit faster!". Digahole, who seemed to dislike that he did not find the audience he was looking for, "Well, I gotta run... smack you up later Mr. ASSHOLE. Give it up! You can NEVER over power me in C64 media... I have much better arguments, asshole! Asshole! Asshole! Asshole!" left the channel crying mummy and repor- ting her that he still did not receive the desired posi- tion in the CBM 64 scene he was heading for. Later on he reported JAZZCAT about a new method to collect news and information for disk magazines. "It is quite simple," he started to explain, "you just need to offend everyone around, that's the way I did it." and that is a system I have developed on my own. "How does work? Is it effective?" requested Jazzcat. "I began the research concerning Legend news on IRC like this." he continued, "Misfit and Westdumm, are there any news you wanna submit from Legend? To- day is the last day I collect news." to report about his experience. Westbam replied "I think you morons published enough crap already, didn't you?". Digahole stroke back "Westdumm, where?". MIDFIT replied "He is talking about the Onslaught magazine. Domination issue #9 to be precise." and Westbam added "What- ever it is called!". Digahole explained "That's an inde- pendent publication.", so Westbam requested "And your and groupmates' LAME posts on certain boards are also independent or what?" just leading Digahole to express "Westdumm, so tell me now the CORRECT news about Legend and I will publish them as they are ... in a few days... Westdumm, I never posted anything against Legend or you... so cut that crap... We're the only ones talking here!". Westbam said "If anyone from you Onslaught members WOULD care you would have asked before publishing bullshit. And I told Jazzcat 10.000 times he shouldn't publish certain things..." while Midfit seemed to be a little bit confused "How about using Westbam's real nick while talking to him instead of offending him with a fake over and over again?", so Westbam confirmed "Are you trying to make fun of my handle or is it you never learnt to spell in your 3rd world country?". Digahole got a little bit nervous "If you are calling me and my group mates idiots dont expect me to kiss you hands!". That lead Westbam asking "I didn't call you an idiot, I called you a moron. Can't you read?". Digahole feared that the discussion wouldn't end too positive for him, so he finished "Westdam, you are very funny... Now if you got nothing else to add... I am leaving... but you still got a chance to get a publication to print correct news about your group". Westbam answered "Relax Magazine did a proper coverage. Yeah! Right! Run you lamer writing more bullshit... EVERYTHING had been told to Jazzcat, still noone cared... I will let Jazzcat know right now he shouldn't count on any form of as- sistance from Legend anymore...". "Hmh," said Jazzcat "it doesn't seen to be very ef- fective after all I heard until now.". "No, you are wrong!" commented Digahole the issue. "After using my new effective method I found out that Onslaught can't expect any assistance and cooperation with Legend! I am so proud of my efforts as my method lead Legend to that decision.". "Oh, yeah, I see. Well done, Mert!" praised Jazzcat the activity of his loyal member and both started to smile, feeling satisfied like successful people do after having made another million of US dollars. After having made experience with lots of frustrated sceners RRR decided to rename into DR. MOTTE and to work as IRC psychiatrist to guarantee mental sup- port for CBM 64 sceners, following the slogan 'let the sun shine in your heart'. RACOON of Hitmen was the first to enter the virtual consulting room "Doctor, doctor! I have been crak- king for around three days on a fine first release, and when I entered The Dungeon to u/l my excellent version I just saw that AFL has u/l it a few minutes ago. What should I do now?". Dr. Motte immidiately ad- vised "There is just one acceptable solution. Look for bugs! Looks for bugs and release the 100% ver- sion!". Anyway Racoon seemed to dislike the idea "But Doctor, if I find out something what AFL could dislike they will surely slag me down in Relax Magazine. And imagine what happens then. Nobody will like me any- more and people will start to ignore me.". Dr. Motte saw that he needed to encourage him and explained "No, I really don't think so. I have heard that Relax Magazine just complains about fantastic groups they have once-laugh-ed about.". And the first cured pa- tient left smiling, back in full effect to support the scene again. The release of "Ice Guys" and a in the scene highly appreciated release of the 100% version has caused some arguments. Playboy/F4CG finally commented the issue " OK... Skinheads's version is the worst version of a crack ever... NOT, even it bugs! It contains a VI- RUS, due to LACK of knowledge Skinnie doesn't even know how he created it, which creates new bugs everytime it is played...". Meanwhile in the Alpha Flight 1970 headquarter when MARC returned from his two weeks trip to Canada. "The reason for me leaving for Canada was for sure that we were out of cards, therefore only Ignorance, Chrysagon and Violator have called, instead of in- vesting my money into new cards, cards I am always getting for free, I prefered to go to Canada for two weeks." explained Marc to MAX, who just replied "Yes, I see the problem. I will now leave for Ibiza for two weeks so that people can't find out we have card problems! :)". Marc continued "I have heard that a certain CBM 64 cracking group is interested in buy- ing cards from Hybrid PC. And who out of the CBM 64 scene joined Hybrid as card supplier? Wasn't it Ned/Alpha Flight 1970?". Max confirmed "Yes, that's true. So that specific group tries to buy cards indi- rectly from Alpha Flight 1970 but attacks us for not having cards? Is it still what we once called a proud scene bringing lots of fun all over the years really went down to a not acceptable level, sad but true!". Both felt back on the chairs, remembering a decade when real fullprice games just as 'Chambers Of Shao- lin' and 'Lemmings' were high appreciated and not dis- credited by proud and glorious suppliers of those unbelievable expensive Polish or Hungarian fullprice games. In the Legend headquarter in Germany WESTBAM is poring about his comeback in the CBM 64 scene, holding a quite interested monologue "I have received an e-mail from Jazzcat this morning. He said while I was gone he has had big wars with Newscopy, Burg- lar, Jack Daniels and some more guys. He totally hum- miliated them all and I should be careful about being he next on his list.... Uhm, I feel scared now.... Really! I better quit again....". "Look if the music is slowed down on NTSC! Look if the highscore-saver has been disabled after choo- sing a trainer! We will release the 100% version any- way!" was heard in F4CG's headquarter "We will re- lease the 100% sales version, even if the product is not sold yet!". "Look for the bug! Look for the bug! Even if there is NO bug we will release the 100% version under Urine to hummiliate the scene over and over again. Unlike Onslaught Urine is known for quality versions!" was heard at Jazzcat's house lately. Satire?! Sarcasm?! Parody?! Even if it looks like a news chapter in concurence publications this is just a satirical chapter, offering sarcastically and humo- rous comments on more or less actual scene hap- penings. Or is more truth in here than some might ex- pect? Afterall it's just humor and if you can't have a good laugh here we can't help you anyway. Whoever feels offended may keep that mind. The lost files - the perfect view on the scene ------ Best regards, RRR/Oxyron ----------
[edit] Advertisements
* ADVERTISEMENTS * ------------------------------------------------------------ Welcome to the area of advertisements where you get the chance to offer the rest of the world the possibility to either contact you as a trader or just to place a request through us. To see your advertisement in this chapter you HAVE to fill one of our VOTESHEETS, to use our VOTING BOOTH or our ONLINE VOTER. Your advertisement can be found in the binary version and on RELAX ON- LINE, our quite popular homepage project. In case too much advertisements have approached us we feel free to cut the supporting text in order to present as much addresses as possible. * ACTIVE * ------------------------------------------------------------ RIDDLER: XXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX XX, XXXXX XXXXX, XXX- XXX SCARE: XXXXX XXXXXXX, XX XXXXXXXXX X, XXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX,XXXXXXX (->NOSTALGIA) * NEW ADDY * ALBION * ------------------------------------------------------------ DR. SOFT: XXXXXXXXX XXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX XXXX, XXXXXX /++XX/XX-XXXXXX /GOTHREK^VM.AMU.EDU.PL * reliable & quality swap, cover contacts wanted, * VITALITY and RELAX MAGAZINE, just TRY it HAWK: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX- XXXX, XXXXXX (->PROXIMA) UNLOCK: XXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX, XXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXX * ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 * ------------------------------------------------------------ ALG: TXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXX X/XXX, XX-XXX XXXXXX, XXXXXX (-> SAMAR) ARCHANGEL: Therapy? Fan Club, XXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX ARGOS: XXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXX XXX X, XX-XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX BALDHEAD: XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX X/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX (-> KRECIKI DESIGN) CALEDONIAN: XXXXXX XXXXXXXX, X/X XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX, XXXX XXX, XXXXXXXX CHASH: XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXXXX X, X.X. XXX XXX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX (-> FRACTION) MARC: MARC1970^AOL.COM VIOLATOR: XXXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX, XXX XX XXXX, XXXXXX (-> NOSTALGIA) * For RELAX MAGAZINE, THE BEST, .... * Also for serious old DEMOS + MAGAZINE swapping XENOX: XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX. XX, XXXXX XXX XXXX- XXXXXX, XXXXXXX ZAPOTEK: X.X. XXX XXX, XXXX XXX, XXXXXX /ZAPOTEK^ONLINE.NO * CBM 64, Covers, Sheets, 100% Reply * HTTP://WWW-STUDBO.HIT.NO/&U952487 * ASCRAEUS * ------------------------------------------------------------ MOLOCH: XXX XXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX. XXXXXXXX XXX., XX: XXX/X XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX/XXXXXX RAZOR RAMON: XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX XXXX X, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX * NEW ADDY * CHROMANCE * ------------------------------------------------------------ ROUGH: XXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX. XXX, XXXXX XXX- XXXX, XXXXXXX STASH: XXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXX XX, XXXXX XXX- X], XXXXXX SYCO: XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XX, XXXX XX XXXXXX- XXX, XXXXXXX * DARK CRYSTAL * ------------------------------------------------------------ ERNIE: XXXXXX XXXXXX, XX XXXXXXX XXX, XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXX, XXXX XXX, XXXXXXX FREEZE: XXXX XX XXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX, XXXX XX XX- XXX, XXXXXXX WUNPUNK: XXXXXX XXX, X XXXXXX XXXXX, XXXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXX * EXCESS * ------------------------------------------------------------ CREB: XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXXXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX FANTASTIC ZOOL: XXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX XXX. X, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX SUSH: XXXXXX XXXXX, XX XXXXXXXXXX X, XXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX (->ACSORE) * EXTEND * ------------------------------------------------------------ JUNKIE: XXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX X, XXXXX X-XXXXX, XXXXXXX (-> DOOM PATROL) * F4CG * ------------------------------------------------------------ MR.ALPHA: XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXX XX, XXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX (->NOSTALGIA) NEOTEC: XXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXX. XX, XXXXX X"XXXXX, XXXXXXX WALKER: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XX XXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX (->NOSTALGIA) * NEW ADDY * HITMEN * ------------------------------------------------------------ RACOON: XXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX * RELAX MAGAZINE STAN: XXXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXX£X XXX, XXXXX XXX- XXXXXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXX /STAN64^HOTMAIL.COM * LAXITY * ------------------------------------------------------------ ANIMALO: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXX- XXXXX, XXXXXXX DIDI: XXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX (->NOSTALGIA) GOAT: XXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX (->MOTIV 8) * LEPSI * ------------------------------------------------------------ SEBALOZ: XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX VALSARY: XXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX X/X, XX-XXX XXXXXX, XXXXXX (->SAMAR) * MEGAUNIT * ------------------------------------------------------------ RANZ: XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXX X, XXX XX, XXX- XXXXX,XXXXXX SILVERBULLET: XXXXX XXXXX, XX XXXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX, XX-XXXXXX XXX-XXX, XXXXXXX * NEW ADDY * MOTIV 8 * ------------------------------------------------------------ IBANEZ: XXXXX X. XXXXX, XXXXXXXX XX, XXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX NUKE: XXXXX XXXXXX, XX XXXXXX XX, XXXX XX XXXX- XXXX, XXXXXXX (-> SCORN) VISBY: XXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX XXX, XX-XXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX * NITROS * ------------------------------------------------------------ DARIO: XXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXX- XXXXX, XXXXXX (-> ASCRAEUS) HOOTIE: XXXXXXX XXX, XXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXX XX, XXXXXX XXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXX ZZR: XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXX XXXXX XX, XXXXXX XXX, XXXX XXXXXXXXX * NONAME * ------------------------------------------------------------ ALMIGHTY GOD: XXXXXXX XXXXXXX, X/. XXXXXXXX XXXXX. XXXXX X.XX, XXXXX XXXXXX - X/X XX, XXXXXXXX XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXX (-> WOW, ROLE) CELTIC: XXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXXX X, XXXX XX XXXX- XXX, XXXXXXX FLARE: XXXXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXX X, XXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXX , XXXXXXX HUNTER: XXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXXX XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX JB: XXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XXXXX, XXXX- XXXX, XXXXXXXXXX (-> LEPSI) * ONSLAUGHT * ------------------------------------------------------------ SHOCKER: XXXXXXX XXXXXX, XX XXXXXX XXXX XX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX * OXYRON * ------------------------------------------------------------ FANTA: XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX X, XXXXX XXXX- XXX, XXXXXXX FUBEN: XXXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX RRR: XXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX /xxxxxx * (game-) graphics * ROLE * ------------------------------------------------------------ BUGJAM: XXXXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXXXXXX X, XXXXXXX COMMANDER: XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XXXX XXXX, XXXXXXX DEE JAY: XXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXXX X/XX, XX-XXX, XXXXXX, XXXXXX (->ATH, KRC) GAXAR: XXXXXX XXXXXXXX, XX XXXXXXX XX, XXX XXX- XXXXX XXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXX * SAMAR * ------------------------------------------------------------ CENTRAX: XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX XXX/X, XX-XXX, XXXXXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXX MAVERICK: XXXXXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXX XX, XXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX RAMOS: XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXX X/XX XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX TTL: XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXX * SCORN * ------------------------------------------------------------ ARCHON: XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX X/X, XX-XXX XXXXXX XXXX., XXXXXX Naphalm: XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX/X, XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX ZINIA: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX X, XXXX XXX- XXXXXX, XXXXXX (-> NITROS) * SUCCESS & THE RULING COMPANY * ------------------------------------------------------------ FUNXILLA: XXXXX XX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXX X, XXXX XX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX SPLATTERHEAD: XXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX X, XXXX XX XXXXXXXXXX, XXX XXXXXXXXXXX * TENGU * ------------------------------------------------------------ CORWIN: XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX X/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXX- XXXX, XXXXXX (-> EXON) KILLER: XXXXXX XXXXX, XX. XXX. XXXXX XXXXXXX XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXX * TRIAD * ------------------------------------------------------------ ACIDCHILD: XXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXXXX XXX. XX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXX *NEW ADDY CA$H: XXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX TAPER: XXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXX XXX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX * NEW ADDY * UNREAL * ------------------------------------------------------------ ERZIKA: XXXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX XXX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX JUMBO: "UNREAL", XXXXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXX X, XXXXX XXXXXXXX TURBO: XXXXXX XXXXX, X. XXXXXX XXX, XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX * WILLOW * ------------------------------------------------------------ BLEZE: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXX XXXXXXXXX X, XXXXX XXX- XXXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX FLOYD: XXXX XXXXX, XX XXXXXXXX XX, XXXXXXXXXXXX- XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXX (->ASCRAEUS, PANIC) SCORPE: XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXXXX. XXX, XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXX (->ROLE) * OTHERS: * ------------------------------------------------------------ ALPHA/FRACTION: XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXXXXX, XXX/X, XXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX PSYCHIK/FATUM: XXXXXX XXXXXX, XX. XXXXXXXX XXXX- XXX X/XXX, XX-XXX XXXXXX, XXXXXX MANIK: XXXXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXX XX, XXXXXXX XXX, XXX- XXXXXXX X, XXXXX, XXXXXXXX ZWARK/PROXIMA: XXXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXX XX/XX, XX-XXX XXXX, XXXXXX ASTAROTH/ANUBIS: XXXXX XXXXX, XXXXXXX XXX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX MANEX/ANUBIS/STARDUST: XXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXXX XXX, XXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXX XXXXXXXX AZGAR/VDV/ASPECT/PSYCHIC: XXXXXX XXXXXX, XXXX- XXXX X/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXX-XXXXX, XXXXXX 2GE/REACT/UNREAL: XXXXX XXXXX, XXXX XXXXXX XX, XXXXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX MILLER/ALLIANCE/JAZER: XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XX-XXXXX- XXXXXXXXX XX/X, XX-XXX XXXX, XXXXXX OPHIS/CENSURE/FAITH: XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX NIGHTRIDER/RULES/VDV: XXXXXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXX X/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX XX. , XXXXXX DCV/DOOM: XXXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXXX, XX-XXX XXXXXX- XX, XXXXXX DROOPY/STS/AMORPHIS: XXXXXX XXXXX,XXXXXXXXXXXX, XX/X, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX ANTARES/M+B/ATTIC: XXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX, XX.XXXXX- XXXX X/XX, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX RAZOR/SYSTEM: XXXXX XXXXX-XXXXXX, XX XXX XXXX, XXXX XXXXXXX XXX XXXX, XXXXXXXXX SAHIR/FAITH: XXXX XXXXXX, XXXXXX XX/X, XX-XXX XXX- XXXXXXX XXXX, XXXXXX B.M/KRECIKI/VDV: XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXX- XXXXX XX/X, XX-XXX XXXXXXX, XXXXXX TIMON/LASSER: XXXXX XXXXXXXX, XX. XXXX XXXXXXX X/XX XX-XXX XXXXXXXX, XXXXXX DR.WHO/ATLANTIS: XXXXX XXXXXXXXX, XXXX XXX-XXXX, XXXXXX YOONIOV/DOOM: XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX,X.XXXXXX XXX/X, XX-XXX XXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXX If you have submitted an advertisement and you have NOT found it in this edition it might have been deli- vered after the deadline or the memory has been al- ready filled to the limits. As we do NOT intend to pre- sent multiple advertisement chapters in just one is- sue we will MAKE SURE that your advertisements will be included in the forthcoming edition. Best Regards Violator/ALPHA FLIGHT 1970 ------------------------