A-Head 01 Aars Party Report
From C64 Diskmag Wiki
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party report from'the party 1992
part ii,the final'
by diabolo
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welcome reader to the report from the
aars x-mas party which was arranged by
camelot on the c64 in cold denmark.
the party start was set on the 27th of
december 0800 cet. we (benno/trance,rrr/
oxyron and me) already arrived at 0730
at the conference centre after we had
driven in our car during the night.
we were astonished that there were
already quite many cars on the parkiing
place half an hour before the official
beginning. it was very cold outside
and we were lucky when we discovered
that one could already enter the warm(!)
hall. we went torwards the place where
you had to pay the entrence money. there
was a very long row of people waiting.
it took us 2+1/2 hours(!)to get to the
desk where we had to pay the entrence
fee. after having paid we got a white-
orange band round our wrist which
should make it easier for the organizers
to see if people had paid or not.
furthermore a 3.5 votedisc was handed
out which allowed us to vote for the
various competitions on an amiga.
unfortunately an error occured on these
discs but it was repared after giving
the discs back to an organizer.
a little sheet with a timetable of the
competitions and other things was
available at the information desc.
after having fetched our equipment out
of my car and installing it,we had a
look through the halls. in hall 1 was
the information where you also could
deposit your contribution for the compos
later on, a little computer shop with
discs etc, a cafeteria, a snackbar and
ofcourse the 600x550 cm large screen on
which mtv,compos,information and live-
pictures,which were shot in the halls,
were displayed. this carpeted hall was
resrved for amigas and pc's. on the
reserved tables were sheets on which
groupnames were written. the same had
been done in hall 2 which was planned
to be the c64 hall. but more than half
of the hall was occupied by amigas and
pc's later on. at the edge of hall 2 was
the main entrence. both,hall 1 and 2,
were divided into parts by moveable
partition walls. on the edges of some
tables were plastic bags which were used
as dustliners. later on the first day
both halls were filled and all space the
halls offered was needed to accommodate
all people. the third hall was t`e
sleeping hall where you could sleep on
the ground. one bad thing was that it
was strictly forbidden to sleep in the
other halls. it made no sense to me why
i should not sleep on my chair in front
of my equipment. two times some
organizers forced me to sleep in hall 3;
but without success. later,rrr told me,
they threatened to cancel the compos or
the party if people were going on with
sleeping in the halls.
the halls were always clean as the hired
personal did their job. only in the
three (!) toilets was a little mews
because the bin for the used papertowels
was too small so that there was soon a
hill of th3se. i only discovered two (!)
showers,one for men,one for women which
could luckily be used by everybody.
nevertheless there was always a row of
people in front of the showers and
people had to wait 1+1/2 hours to have a
shower.
we builed up our computer in the middle
of hall 2. at the same table was the
oxyron crew busily finishing their
demoparts. people and groups that i
personally saw at the party are:
oxyron (tts,graham,axis,slide,rrr,kirk,
pri,...)
trance (benno,asmodis,luka,...)
antic (incubus,zyron,...)
padua (syndrom,bulldog,...)
spirit (ans,bulldog,...)
smash design (tardox,ivan,...)
varsity
nitro/rebels
and some more.
around 1 o'clock in the morning was a
little techno concert which i
unfortunately missed just as the game
competition.
the amiga graphics compo was really
great. alltogether there were about 50
pics. some pictures they showed were
just brilliant and close to perfection.
in my opinion the picture with some
flying dragons as theme was the best.
but there were many more good pictures,
many of the good ones were showing two
fighting humans in former times. one
picture was supposed to be a joke and it
made everybody laugh. it was a flying
bird that could have been drawn by a
child of 5 years and it got loud
applause.
the music compo was not that good as
the musics sounded all the same. the
projectionists printed that about 250
musics were handed in for the sound
compo and only 34 were chosen to be
played. the amount of musics were
probably a joke because i don't think
that 250 musicians were present at the
party.
the fast-intro-compo was one of the most
amusing parts of all competitions.
some were really simple. just a logo and
a scroller looking like a standard intro
on the c64 but below the amiga standard.
one intro that looked quite good in the
beginning did selfdestruction as the
line routine which was supposed to look
quite well wrote the datas in the
bitmap of the logo. but i don't want to
slag on all intros as i'm not sure how
much time they groups had to finish
their intros,
the'normal'intro-compo was astonishing.
some intros looked like demoparts with
excellent coding. the'intro'from rebels
was one of the best. but also some
others whose names i can't remember
had the same quality. one featured
raytracing, another 3d-views out of a
vehicle driving through a city.
i can't say anyting about the amiga
demo-compo because we were alredy on our
way back to germany when it started.
the pc demo-compo was quite good if i
consider that the scene on pc is not
that large yet. most of the demos
contained standard effects like dycps,
multiplexing and techtech. only some
contained filled vector cubes which were
not as good as on amiga or c64 if i look
at coma light 8. but i liked most of the
demos.
the c64 graphics compo had some really
nice pictures,totally about 25. the best
ones were from ans/spirit, ivan/smash
design and some more. in my view the
winning pic was the picture from a
gfx-artist from vision,showing a vamp
carrying a lady in front of a castle
in the moonlight.
in the music competition 14 sounds took
part. the music from devilock/x-rated
had a good rythm but was not diversified
enough to have the number one spot.
personally i think that the tune from
steel/scs/origo was the best one.
at 5 o'clock in the morning the c64
demo-compo was held. totally about
11 groups took part like noice,varsity,
trance,oxyron,visual reality,smash
design,starion,dunex and some more.
the best demo was undoubted coma light 8
from oxyron. the demos from visual
reality and starion were good,too.
but both did not get spread. starion
did not spread it because it seems to
become fashion to keep one's demo after
the compo. visual reality did not link
their demo in time so that they showed
the parts seperately with a monitor.
perhaps people awaited more demos from
some elite groups but the demo-compo
and the graphics+music competition were
of a high standard.
finally i can say that the party was a
success. the organization was good,
the sound equipment and the big screen
made the compos a real enjoyment and
the quantity of wares that were released
was ok.