Domination 08 Media Judgement
From C64 Diskmag Wiki
---------------------------------------
* Media Judgement *
---------------------------------------
Another new edition to the Domination magazine.
As portrayed in other magazines, this chapter gives
our opinion on magazines from the past and present.
We will concentrate mainly on the magazine text; this is
a factor i regard as most important, if you want to
watch a demo do so, magazines are for reading!!
Hopefully all informations in this chapter are correct,
please understand, that due to the age of some
magazines, this gives a greater chance of incorrect
information.
The POWER ratings i shall give are just the opinion of
the Domination magazine, taken into consideration is
firstly the grammar/english input of the magazine,
it's consistancy and lastly the style/user friendliness
of the outfit itself.
Regards;
Jazzcat/Onslaught
POWER rating:
******** = Excellent Quality
******* = High Quality
****** = Above Average Quality
***** = Average Quality
**** = Below Average Quality
*** = Poor Quality
** = Very Poor Quality
* = Formatting time
SHOCK by CENSOR DESIGN/LEGEND.
Regarded by many as the greatest board related mag
ever, Shock sure did set the standards for many
magazines to come.
Appearing on paper first, a disk version was later
created by Mirage and edited by Mirage and Skater.
The magazine concentrated on elite news from the
board scene and was supported widely by most of the
scene in it's time.
The outfit changed twice only, and of these, were
modified slightly with each progressive edition.
The english, style and originality factor were excellent
to say the least.
Shock perhaps pioneered the proportional font style
we see in a lot of magazines today, and was certainly
copied later by The Pulse magazine.
The outfit was pure class and nice to look upon,
especially towards the later of it's 13 editions.
With the text at a high level along with the outfit, Shock
sure did rock the charts for quite a time.
Power Rating: ********
NITRO by EXCESS/ACRISE+EXCESS.
This mail based magazine started it's life in a note
maker in 1992.
Starting off rather small, it soon gained popularity
and moved into a much larger text amount.
Edited by Sentinel, Sgt.Pepper and others, it competed
with Skyhigh, Network and Script for the top position
at a time when mail based magazines were at a strong
point.
The magazine has an average english text content,
with some nice chapters, but like most mail based
magazines, the news was sometimes old.
As it became more popular, the Nitro staff managed
to produce some two sided editions. I believe they
peaked at around edition #16 to #19 and then the delay
was too heavy, caused by problems within their group
and a change of outfit.
The magazine is still alive and is at edition #21, again
solely produced by Excess after the Acrise+Excess
cooperation split.
Still a nice magazine, hope they get active once again.
Power Rating: ******
PROPAGANDA by GENESIS PROJECT/Independant.
Edited by Antichrist (aka Omg/Amok) and at a later and
current stage, Newscopy, this magazine focused on
board related issues.
The magazine has changed outfit on a couple of
occassions, but probably their best one was the
original coded by SES/GP.
The english was often very good, with some interesting
chapters, a good news section and some original ideas
such as an awards chapter and smiley characters
depicting their opinion on a group's current status.
The first editions however were very unobjective to
say the least, with their own group,members,magazine
etc allowed in the charts and a very unobjective
editorial and news section.
Things got better as Newscopy took over where
Antichrist left off, the journalism was of very high
quality from between issues #15 to #18 but then things
mixed up a bit, where the staff often got facts mixed
up with jokes and/or opinions.
Nowadays the Propaganda magazine boasts a great
read, but still one gets the feeling that they create
scandals and then highlight them for the public
appearance. They are currently at edition #21.
Power Rating: *******
THE PULSE by GRIDPOINT/PANDORA/REGINA/SHAPE.
When this magazine hit the boards on it's debut issue,
many sceners accused it of being a cheap rip off of
the Shock magazine.
They were soon proven slightly wrong, when things
picked up and The Pulse became one of the legendary
magazines in C64 history.
Edited by Duke and Crossfire, the magazine covered
board,mail and the internet related aspects of the
scene.
Written in excellent english, they had some quite nice
ideas, including an extraordinary staff which
specialized in individual areas.
The Pulse magazine died after quite a few issues and
then returned 9 months later to find competition to
tough, and it never regained it's crown. At edition #23
Duke decided to quit once again. The Pulse had
probably the best legal editors and varied staff in
general.
Power Rating: ********
REVEALED by CAMELOT/IMN.
When this magazine first hit the scene, it was one
based highly on an original concept.
This concept was one focusing on the commericial
game industry as well as the legal demo scene.
Edited by Kring, it boasted a good english content
with quite a few chapters to choose from, ALWAYS
interesting interviews and news sections.
The magazine only made it out once and a while, and to
date, only has four editions, with a fifth and final on
the way.
Edition four showed a different editing style by Kring,
with more cyberpunk scene text, which the public in
majority disliked.
The outfit was quite nice, especially with the original
outfit improved upon. Quality graphics and musics
gave the magazine a professional look.
If this magazine had been released in say, 1989, it
would have been VERY big (due to the game industry
boom on C64), still a very nice read.
Power Rating: *******
SKYHIGH by OXYRON/CAMELOT.
This mail based magazine originally started as a mail
based magazine created and edited by Bizkid.
As issues progressed, the magazine gained more
support, thus making it larger in content.
Skyhigh had some good text, although the news
section was a little old.
Other editors at a later date were introduced to the
magazine, giving it more interest and variation.
It was the first magazine to push the three disk side
marker, but this may have lead to it's death, as one
issue later, edition 21, it died.
Very popular throughout the mail scene it managed to
hold the number one position for quite a large amount
of time. The charts,addresses and other mail
orientated chapters were all quite impressive. The mag
also offered seperate add-ons within the mag such
as pictures, small games etc..
Only if Bizkid had continued.
Power Rating: *******
VANDALISM NEWS by MYSTIC/SUNRISE/THE FORCE/BCT/
REBELS/SHAZAM/SCS+TRC and
ONSLAUGHT DESIGN.
This Australian based magazine has been around for
quite sometime now, as one could estimate by the
amount of groups which have helped to produce it.
Edited by Vengeance it was written in good english and
started as a mail based magazine before changing to
an mail/board magazine at edition 14.
The editing staff started it's slow expansion with
Jazzcat joining as co-editor at edition 8. By edition 15
the staff was quite nice with more illegal board content
giving the magazine greater recognition on the boards.
Things improved even more with some added original
chapters and the inclusion of Bizarre as new co-edito
(former main editor of A-head by Trance).
Onslaught took over the mag, and a regular release
rate was seen, pushing the mag to number one in the
charts.
There has been many changes in outfit, but probably
the best one was seen recently in edition #27 which
was coded by Jolz/Onslaught Design.
The magazine continues to improve with each issue,
and will probably go to the highest rating i can give
here, but for now.
Power Rating: *******
SCRIPT by BRONX/CLIQUE.
This famous magazine originally was called 'Cemetary
News' and was produced by the Turkish based group
called Bronx.
Due to another magazine being called Cemetary News
they changed name to SCRIPT at edition number #5 and
it also changed to Clique magazine.
The main editor Remix, was a very friendly scener who
just happened to be a megaswapper. As with most mags
whose main editor is a megaswapper (i.e. Ahead,Brutal
Recall,Skyhigh) it was bound to become successful
throughout the mail scene.
Remix had an excellent way of writing english, it was
always easy to read and understand, although a little
too much emotion sometimes!
Script reminds one of Skyhigh.
It started off quite small, as it became more and more
popular, it became larger in size.
In the later editions it pushed to 2000 blocks of text,
which may have been it's downfall, as it was delayed
more and more as the editor had more work to do.
The outfit in the beginning was quite nice for it's time,
at a later stage they changed to a much better outfit
which always had well suited graphics and musics that
were good to look at and read to.
Eventually, Remix decided to leave for the Amiga scene
and the magazine died, boasting 14 editions.
It dominated the charts for quite a while, but some say
it was due to how much ass-licking Remix was doing.
Whatever the case, it was a fine read, but not an
all-round magazine.
Power Rating: *******
SEX 'N' CRIME by AMOK.
This magazine was created and edited by Omg/Amok
aka Antichrist/Genesis Project.
It was a one file mag focusing on the boards and elite
scene.
It was much like Propaganda, in the sense that there
was always wars and arguments throughout the mag.
At one stage, there was even a federation against Omg.
But this did not make the magazine bad, it had quite a
lot of interesting text, especially the interview section.
What it also had was a good amount of Commercial
scene news and reviews on the big games, which at that
time, were still being released from the United Kingdom.
The english was okay, and got even better towards the
magazines last issue, edition 21.
Sex 'n' Crime was the only one file magazine to become
number one.
Power Rating: ******
RELAX by BAD BYTES/PHUTURE/Indepedant.
This still existant long living magazine was originally a
one file production.
It's original editors were Thomas Olschewski (Tom) and
Marc of Alphaflight, with support from several others
as issues progressed.
In early days the Relax showed the public that charts
in magazines can be compiled without being manipulated.
The news section always held interesting bbs/mail
orientated news and the magazine was released every
third Saturday at the famous Venlo meetings.
By edition six the magazine was expanding and changed
to a multi-file format. New graphics, menu system and
a whole lot more to offer improved the magazine even
more.
But then it never came out again. After quite sometime
it again came out, this time edited by Skinhead, Skidrow
Marc and Rrr.
Still independant, the outfit had changed, and iffl
routine had been included, proportional text and a big
improvement on the text quality, showing a more
professional touch.
The magazine seemed to be more involved with the bbs
scene. As editions passed it grew more and more,
going back to a multi-file format in the outfit and Rrr
of Oxyron and Marc of Alphaflight becoming more
prominent in the editing staff before taking over the
magazine entirely.
The magazine was controversially released under the
Australian based game lable 'Bad Bytes' after several
issues under this lable the main editor RRR changed to
his own lable 'Phuture productions'.
Today the magazine still maintains a high standard,
the new section is sometimes a little wrong, but they
always seem to get some rather good gossip from
either the internet or the boards where the magazine
is most strongly based.
Perhaps the most appealing chapters in the magazine
is the always good interview section and the 'Party
Radar', which is perhaps the most informative of
scene party chapters in any magazine of todays
market. I myself have had some problems with this mag
but being objective, I cannot let this change my
decision or fool my eyes of what i read elsewhere in
the magazine besides the Editorial and News section
which on occassion let their personal opinions take
control of their minds instead of remaining nuetral.
The magazine has a nice english standard, very user
friendly outfit with please musics and graphics and
scores a modest rating.
Power rating: *******
FRONTPAGE by TRC.
This magazine was born in 1990 and has always been
a one file magazine, even until it's death at edition #28
4 years later.
The magazine was original edited by Action Jackson of
The Ruling Company with support from Dj.
It contained several sections with were viewable in one
entire chapter which was a page changer from left to
right.
It had a standard editorial followed by a informative
news section which focused on the leading news only.
An amusing chart section with a good amount of
sarcasm was always amusing to read.
Action Jackson wrote in an understandable english,
he released the magazine when he wanted, putting in
what he wanted and was never pressured by any
deadlines that other magazines keep.
The magazine also had some non-scene related topics
such as a movie section, where it contained all the
latest movie news and updates from hollywood, which
i personally always enjoyed.
Action Jackson had once said he had ideas to expand
the magazine into a multi-file format, but this never
evenuated and the Frontpage ceased to exist after
edition 28.
A nice magazine, which was more fun than professional
which was also nice to see amongst all the serious
productions out there.
Power Rating: *****
Thats all we have time for in 'Media Judgement' this
edition, this chapter will continue in edition nine.
If you wish your group magazine observated and
evaluated, then simply contact the Domination staff.
Best Regards;
Jazzcat/Onslaught
--------------
