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https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5934
Hah, I might not be the best to explain Amiga history, but I’ll do my best :) Fish disks were the main way to distribute public domain, open source, shareware etc. before the internet was wide-spread. People would send Fred Fish software, and he’d compile them into individual disks that people would copy. Magazines would have lots of companies that would allow you to order copies of these disks etc. He ended up creating over a 1000 disks this way. When cd-roms became a thing, you could order the whole collection on those. Those were strange times :)
Aminet was the most famous ftp-archive for amiga software. It was run by the same guy that made Brainfuck, Urban Müller. Rather than chronologically like fish disks, it was organized by topic, with readme’s for every file. You could upload to a staging area, and he’d put them in place. Much like fish disks, companies would print cd-roms with the latest from aminet for those not hooked up to the internets (or on 56k modems, which was most people).
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9073
Subject:
'Re: VIC-II colors'
From: Robert 'Bob' Yannes
To: Philip
'Pepto' Timmermann
Date: 27.09.1999
I was involved with the development of the VIC-II, however the actual implementation of the design, including the Color
Palette, was done by someone else. I have forwarded your message to him, but it is up to him if he wants to respond.
I can tell you that the design was based on the principle that adding a sine wave of a particular frequency and amplitude
to an inverted version of the same sine wave at a different amplitude produces a phase-shifted sine wave of the same
frequency. The amount of phase shift is directly proportional to the amplitudes of the two sine waves.
The VIC-II used the 14.31818 MHz master clock input (4 times the NTSC color burst frequency of 3.579545 MHz) to produce
quadrature square-wave clocks. These clock signals were then integrated into triangle waves sing analog integrators. The
triangle waves were then integrated again into sine waves (actually rounded triangle waves, but good enough for this
application). This produced a 3.579545 MHz sine wave,
inverse sine wave, cosine wave and inverse cosine wave.
An analog summer was used to create the phase-shifts in the Chroma signal by adding together the appropiate two waveforms
at the appropiate amplitudes. The Color Palette data went to a look-up table that specified the amplitude of the waves by
selecting different resistors in the gain path of the summer. The end result was that we could create any hue we wanted by
looking at the NTSC color wheel to determine the phase-shift and then picking the appropiate resistor values to produce
that phase-shift.
Color Saturation was controlled by scaling the gain of the summer. When we picked the resistor values to determine the
output phase-shift, we also scaled them to produce the desired output amplitude. Luminance was controlled using a simple
voltage divider which switched different pull-down resistors into the open-drain output. We could create any Luminance we
wanted by choosing the desired resistor value.
I'm afraid that not nearly as much effort went into the color selection as you think. Since we had total control over hue,
saturation and luminance, we picked colors that we liked. In order to save space on the chip, though, many of the colors
were simply the opposite side of the color wheel from ones that we picked. This allowed us to reuse the existing resistor
values,
rather than having a completely unique set for each color
I believe that Commodore actually got a patent on this technique. It was certainly superior to the Apple or Atari approach
at the time, as they ended up with whatever colors that came out--ours allowed the designer to freely select Hue,
Saturation and Luminance.
Since all of this was based on selecting different resistor values and resistance varied from chip lot to chip lot, there
was variation from one Commodore 64 to another. It wasn't as bad as it could have been though, since all of the Chrominance
selection was based on resistor ratios, which could be kept constant even if the actual resistor values varied. Luminance
was more of a problem. A trimmer resistor should really have been used to pull up the output. This would have allowed the
Luminance to be adjusted for consistency from unit to unit, however Commodore didn't care enough about consistency to
bother with adjusting each unit
Robert
'Bob'
Yannes
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=4280
where it successfully established itself primarily in the United Kingdom, France, Spain, and the German-speaking parts of Europe.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5721
Till today. What is the right amount of buttons?
It started with 3 Buttons and than 1 for the macintosh, 2 For Amiga, 2 for MS-DOS (ContextMenu).
Often behind the discussion: "Profesionality" vs too simple.
Interesting questions: Were the 16-bit-Homecomputergames differeent on Atari ST/Amiga and on Mac? An how? 
(First Impression: No second button used in 16-Bit-Games.)
 
.
2022-05-21 14:24:19
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3040
Game description
Starbirds is a shoot'em up game in the style of old AMIGA shooters like R-Type, Apidya, Wings of Death and many others. The game play is simple: the player controls a space ship (called the Starbird) and tries to keep alive, which is best ensured by shooting as many enemies as possible.
Starbirds features four horizontally scrolling levels, each packed with a huge amount of enemies and guarded by an extra-large boss enemy with big shields and power. The levels are constructed in a way that there are a lot of turn-off's which allow the player to take another path each time.
A special feature of Starbirds is the weapon system, which was inspired by action games like Wings of Deathand Lethal Xcess. There are two categories of weapons, primary and secondary weapons. Each category consists of 8 different types of weapons, four of each category are selected by the player before entering the first level. The player can decide at every time if the approaching enemies should be attacked using the primary or secondary weapon. By repeated pressing of the fire button the primary weapon is fired, by holding down the button the secondary weapon is fired.
The currently active weapon can be changed by collecting weapon symbols, which are left behind from exploding enemies quite often. Blue symbols represent primary weapons, red symbols secondary weapons. Every weapon has five different powers. If a symbol is collected, which represents one of the currently active weapons, then its power increases by one. Therefore it is advantageous to collect the same symbol several times in order to get a weapon with high power. On the other hand, changing a weapon reduces the power by one, therefore too many changes without intermediate power-up quickly lead to a poorly armed space ship with little chance of survival.
The Starbird space ship does not survive hits with enemies, their shots or with the background. Fortunately the player has six space ships available and he can restart the game three times in the last visited level. The game supports four levels of difficulty, which can be selected in the main screen, before entering the first level. Finally the game can even be played by two players simultaneously.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5112
All in one. Democollection - show all possible things in one demo. also often wirh story telling aspects - visual narrative or a classic story.
What is possible on one disc. More longterm motivation, more content needed.
Own type/textsorte.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9255
OLIVER It all started for me at a Christmas party at Starbyte Software. It was a remarkable event. I never met so many talented people at one place before. The developers showed the games they were developing including the Amiga version of Rolling Ronny. We got the offer for converting the game and if I remember correctly, we agreed almost instantly. Previous projects of Bones Park were economic simulations, which was… how to describe… rather static stuff. I usually call those games Excel-pushers. A jump-and-run is way more interesting and it is action we wanted to create.
MARIO Back then, in the C64 era, most games took only a few weeks or a couple of months to develop. So we had to keep a constant flow of new contacts and projects. One project we did in late 1991, Trans World, for German publisher Starbyte, went pretty smooth and even became our first #1 in German sales charts, so we were invited and offered to work on other titles. One concrete offering was the C64 conversion of Rolling Ronny. Even though most of the first games I programmed were simulations, I still had spent a lot of time on developing action and real-time oriented games. So it was a perfect moment to put all the learnings into a concrete game – and that would have been Rolling Ronny.
Giger H.R. (Swiss)
2023-03-28 11:38:31
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=905
Giger was an educated as an industrial designer. Afterwards he made art and after working with jodorowski on dune, he joined the aliens-team. He created the slick fast monster in ALIEN. he influenced with his style (developped before in paintings and sculptures) the whole scifi. And so he became also one of the most influencing artist for games like r-type and and and and and …
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3161
The difference between Homecomputer and Businessmaschines was clear for the homecomputer users. Homecomputers were cheap, colorful, had sound, modern (GUI) and you could play with them. So they were designed for ‘fun’. And they came all in one - as one consumer product. So it was ‘identity’. Clear that the Amiga was first designed as an Console. On the hardware side the homecomputers didn't use the ugly intels like almost no Arcade-Console-Maschine did. The question here why? Perhaps because the most of the Software had to be coded in Assembler? 
One of the big question was: Is the Macintosh a Homecomputer? One answer it was to expensive for beeing a homecomputer. Perhaps the homecomputers were the cheap versions of the macintoshs. 
Fresh (1989 - 1990)
2023-09-15 12:08:56
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9173
Fresh was founded April 22, 1989 on the Crazy & RCS Party 1989 by Iceman/ISI Soft, Graphics-Boy, Project B, Shake (subgroup) and Welfare Software Boys (subgroup). 2 months later Krush joined in as main cracker. The first Fresh Intro gained a lot of attaention in the Swiss scene: it was coded Mat and the music was exclusively composed by Tim of Modern Arts, one of the most progressive demo groups back then.

After the Crazy Stardom Copy-Party 1989 (August) in Le Locle the 2 Swiss demogroups Future Vision Switzerland and Trap joined Fresh. 

Mainly in 1990, a war with Computer Freaks Association was ongoing. Both groups were competing for being Switzerland's #1. Computer Freaks Association released a small anti-demo called Fresh on Top. The war was officially ended at the Swiss Pirates Reunion 2002 (nowadays there are many friendship boundaries between the former 2 opponents).

Was in co-op with Century for short while in February/March 90. The co-op was stopped due to a lack of Century cracks.

After the Fresh Party 1990 (April) Krush, Ogygene and Mirage left to built up a new Swiss group together with The Sexton/G*P called Abstract, which later then joined forces with the ashes from the Swiss demogroup Future Concepts and renamed into Crusade.

Also in April 1990 a small but neat Austrian section was built by Awesome & Beast. They have produced some one file demos and due to the good connections to Lotus, Awesome has supplied a couple of hot originals. 

In May 1990 some Fresh members have been working on a project to join forces with The Ancient Temple. Both group got to know eachother at the Fresh Party 1990. Project names were SAPPHIRE or LIFE IS A BEACH. There was no agreement on the name, so the project never was realised. 

In June/July 1990 a German section in Cologne was built around Spy, Trax & Scoundrel. After their lame release Lost in Time , they have been kicked out.

Was in co-op with Holocaust from August 1990 to October 1990. The coop started with Fresh's first release of Back to the Future II 5. The co-op later was stopped due to a lack of Fresh cracks in that period (main cracker Graphics Boy had left the group to join Crazy).

Fresh died in late 1990 when Freestyle and Dave joined Talent.
TENNISFORTWO
2022-04-29 14:48:08
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=2343
Tennis For Two was the first Videogame ever! It was developed in 1958. The gameplay features were more complex and more fun than in the later very popular Pong or Breakout. GameLab ZHdK has made a new version to bring the amazing game mechanics to attention. You hit the ball with the A-button of your controller while you use the left analogue stick to indicate the direction (or angle) of the tennis ball. And since it is tennis, you can hit the ball anywhere in your own half of the court! It is surprisingly fun to play the "TennisForTwo Fantasy 1958" version. Made in 2015 by GameLab ZHdK.
Fantasy Consoles
2022-05-25 23:45:26
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=650
Consoles inspired by old consoles but 100% new. They are somehow like the dream of this days. All dev. thing in one tool (graphics, sound, tiles, coding, levelediting)
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3852
Interesting piece, because. you have to move around with an avatar to get to the demos. so their is a gamemechanic (puzzle) to open the subdemos!
Question: When this demo was created?
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=7387
one day in the computerclub. they could decide it! 
atari st played against amiga the same chess prg .-)
Coding Basic
2022-06-11 14:48:47
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=489
Basic was one of the first coding possibilities in the 8bit and also the ‘OS’. the interface to the computer. The shells were ‘basic’.
LOAD “”",8,1
With the second generation of homecomputers. The linenumberless basic came up like GFA-Basic etc. This was a new step and brought basic on the level of Pascal and co. 
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=792
With modems1987  and zterm you could enter to a bbs and download software. You needed the number and of course a computer on the other side. So this bullet boards system where dial in systems. from time to time the mother of a guy took the phone .-) 
You only used this in the ‘phone cheap time’ - >21.00. A game for Amiga or Atari ST was 900kb - the modem was about 3600-12200 bauds. you waited very long from time to time.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=855
Games made for old hardware or emulators for hardware. Restrictions of yesterday.
la1n.ch
2022-06-24 22:55:17
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1150
la1n was the direct next step from imp89. New maschines and a new platform macosx. “Therefore i learned objective-c and coded real object orientated” and switched now to 3d games with opengl. The games were now more an more like gameengines and were object-orientated. But still hardcore coded. This change with the upcoming game engine like torque or unity. 
Therefore the last games from la1n.ch till now were again hardcore coded games like axe (atari 2600 vcs), vecZ (vectrex 2016). 
l1neum - freeware
2022-04-13 10:52:39
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1186
a qix/volfied variant of the game in 3d open gl. done in 3 months for a mac contest 2003 in us. there was even a radio event at 3 o clock than. won the 3rd price and a membership for one year in igda. the problem there was only one chapter in switzerland in berne with 3 members and never a meeting.
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2022-06-06 11:39:02
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3743
“4-Which composing programs have you been using? Which one in particular?”
I discovered Linel's SoundFX about a year before I saw Soundtracker (which I 
hated). The important difference between the two is that SoundFX let you use 
CIA timing so you could match breakbeats perfectly, where as Soundtracker had 
no concept of "BPM". I was trying to make house/dance tracks so I found SoundFX 
was better for that purpose. I later used Noisetracker for making more typical
demoscene tracks (Noisetracker's pattern FX were far far superior to SoundFX's).
Of course, when it came to implementing the playroutine into code - SoundFX 
sucked! (See Magnetic Fields Spaced Out 1 music disk to hear how my music 
DOESN'T work with the playroutine hack.) By the time ProTracker was released, 
you could choose CIA timing, so I started using that.
The king of trackers, as far as I'm concerned, was OctaMED for its synth sound 
editor. I spent so many happy hours making C64-sounding tunes using that (some 
are still available at Exotica's Special section.)
 
HIstory
2022-08-03 12:18:08
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5064

Alcatraz was formed in 1988 from the ashes of the more strangely named "Motley Crue Team", by Metalwar (Code, Music), Helix (Gfx) and PGCS (Gfx).

Metalwar was the mastermind behind most of the first productions of the group, until the time of Mega Demo 2, when new creative members like Hornet of Avengers joined Alcatraz.

After Mega Demo 3, Metalwar started to work on his dream Amiga game, codenamed "Ilyad". This shoot 'em up was eventually released in 1989 by UbiSoft. One year later, Metalwar and Helix decided to leave both the group and the scene, leaving PGCS heading the group.

https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5100
'I had created maybe around 30 demos and I wanted to create a game on the Amiga because I always like shoot'e 'up. It was a new challenge for me: I gathered a team of a few people, some of them ended up not staying very long: Marc Albinet, the graphic designer, who would work on other games later on, such as Agony, Frédéric Hahn (musician with Ackerlight), Pierre Adane (who worked on the copy-protection system and the endgame animation), and myself Olivier Régis (Metalwar), doing the cosing in terms of programming, there was nothing fancy. I just had to create some specific tools to piece up graphics piece-by-piece and to manage the dynamics of enemy motion. We then called Ubisoft to show them our Ilyad project. Marc Albinet and myself met one of the Guillermot briothers in Paris - they are the founders of Ubisoft. At that time, the firm was very small compared to what it is now, and the licensic fees we received, were really symbolic. They barely covered our travel expenses, but we did not do it for the money."
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5522
  • don't write specs. Users should consider themselves lucky to get any programs at all and take what they get.
  • don't comment their code. If it was hard to write, it should be hard to read.
  • don't write application programs, they pro- gram right down on the bare metal. Application programming is for feebs who can't do systems programming.
  • don't eat quiche. Real programmers don't even know how to spell quiche. They eat Twinkies, Coke and palate-scorching Szechwan food.
  • don't draw flowcharts. Flowcharts are, after all, the illiterate's form of documentation. Cavemen drew flowcharts; look how much it did for them.
  • don't read manuals. Reliance on a reference is a hallmark of the novice and the coward.
  • programs never work right the first time. But if you throw them on the machine they can be patched into working in only a few 30-hours debugging sessions.
  • don't use Fortran. Fortran is for wimpy engineers who wear white socks, pipe stress freaks, and crystallography weenies. They get excited over finite state analysis and nuclear reactor simulation.
  • don't use COBOL. COBOL is for wimpy application programmers.
  • never work 9 to 5. If any real programmers are around at 9 am, it's because they were up all night.
  • don't write in BASIC. Actually, no programmers write in BASIC, after the age of 12.
  • don't document. Documentation is for simps who can't read the listings or the object deck.
  • don't write in Pascal, or Bliss, or Ada, or any of those pinko computer science languages. Strong typing is for people with weak memories.
  • know better than the users what they need.
  • think structured programming is a communist plot.
  • don't use schedules. Schedules are for manager's toadies. Real programmers like to keep their manager in suspense.
  • think better when playing adventure.
  • don't use PL/I. PL/I is for insecure momma's boys who can't choose between COBOL and Fortran.
  • don't use APL, unless the whole program can be written on one line.
  • don't use LISP. Only effeminate programmers use more parentheses than actual code.
  • disdain structured programming. Structured programming is for compulsive, prematurely toilet-trained neurotics who wear neckties and carefully line up sharpened pencils on an otherwise uncluttered desk.
  • don't like the team programming concept. Unless, of course, they are the Chief Programmer.
  • have no use for managers. Managers are a necessary evil. Managers are for dealing with personnel bozos, bean counters, senior planners and other mental defectives.
  • scorn floating point arithmetic. The decimal point was invented for pansy bedwetters who are unable to 'think big.'
  • don't drive clapped-out Mavericks. They prefer BMWs, Lincolns or pick-up trucks with floor shifts. Fast motorcycles are highly regarded.
  • don't believe in schedules. Planners make up schedules. Managers 'firm up' schedules. Frightened coders strive to meet schedules. Real programmers ignore schedules.
  • like vending machine popcorn. Coders pop it in the microwave oven. Real programmers use the heat given off by the cpu. They can tell what job is running just by listening to the rate of popping.
  • know every nuance of every instruction and use them all in every real program. Puppy architects won't allow execute instructions to address another execute as the target instruction. Real programmers despise such petty restrictions.
  • don't bring brown bag lunches to work. If the vending machine sells it, they eat it. If the vending machine doesn't sell it, they don't eat it. Vending machines don't sell quiche.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=5812
Amicom of Spreadpoint has been interviewed by Com and Orlando of Brainstorm at the Escpape and Spreadpoint copy party on Oktober 7th. 

When did you join Spreadpoint ? 
-A month ago. 

Your task in Spreadpoint ? 
-Coder, but in Spreadpoint everybody can do what he wants to. 

For how long have you been programming on the Amiga ? 
-For 2 years. 
What computers did you work on before? 
-Spectrum, Sinclair QL. I did some graphic programming with BASIC. 

What did you program on the Amiga? 
-A 3D-Demo (Summer of 88 for TLB), various intros and copiers for cracked games, Powerutility (sold it), a level editor for a shoot'em up, AMICOM-Kickstart (Antivirus, Copier etc.) 

What are you doing at the time ? 
-I'm working on Demo, called ATOM-demo. 
What's this about ? 
-Colored, shaded, permeating(!) 3D-Objects. 

Your future projects ? 
-3D vectorgrafics, 3D editor (ev. sell it), copier with multitasking capility, various utilities. 

What hardware do you have ? 
-An Amiga 1000  (1.5Mb, Harddisk 20 Mega SCSI), And an Amiga 2000 (A2620 Unix card, 68020 processor, 68881 math. coprocessor, 68851 Memory Management Unit, harddisk 80 MB SCSI, Modem 2400 Baud) 
Tell us something about your Master Seka. 
-It's based on the Seka V3.0 by Kefrens/Promax. It has been reassembled  and revised by my collegue Buddha. 
The main advantages are: 
Better editor commands, a finally working optimize function, auto runback, the workspace can be changed without exitting the Seka. 

Is there anything you want to advise to Amiga coders ? 
-Unfortunetly, there are more and more good programs, recently, which run only on one special Amiga. So I advise to try out the programs on different Amigas and to avoid unproper coding (absolute addresses, selfmodifing code, DBF-waiting-loops running to fast on the 68020.) 
And I hate programs, which you only can exit by a reset! 

Thank you for your answers. 

     Translated by The Acc{sed/BRS
.
2022-12-19 15:00:31
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=6156
'dropfiles', small binary or text files dropped into known locations in the BBS'
A major use of doors is for door games: computer games played on the BBS.[3] These games included strategy games such as TradeWars 2002, Food Fight!, [4] Solar Realms Elite,[5] Space Dynasty, Usurper,[6] and Barren Realms Elite.[7] There were also role-playing games (RPG), often derived from earlier email-based games. One such game was Seth Robinson's Legend of the Red Dragon,[8] and another popular dystopian RPG: Operation: Overkill,[4] another was Mutants!. BBSes often published high scores, encouraging players to beat others.[9]
InterBBS leagues allowed users of different BBSes to compete against each other in the same game. A modern version of this known as BBSlink exists allowing sysops to offer door games on their BBS which are hosted on a remote server, thereby increasing the user base of the game.
FILE_ID.DIZ
2023-02-07 10:00:37
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=6685
  1. Program/file name: Ideally, all uppercase and followed by one space. Carriage returns are ignored in this file.
  2. Version number: In the format "v1.123", followed by a space.
  3. ASP number: Only if an actual ASP member, otherwise ignored.
  4. Description separator: A single short hyphen "-".
  5. Description: The description of the file. The first two lines should be the short summary, as older boards cut off the rest. Anything beyond that should be extended description, for up to eight lines, the official cut-off size. Additional text could be included beyond that but might not be included by the board.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=7638
With support for multicolor sprites and a custom chip for waveform generation, the C64 could create superior visuals and audio compared to systems without such custom hardware.
The C64 dominated the low-end computer market (except in the UK and Japan, lasting only about six months in Japan[7]) for most of the later years of the 1980s.[8] For a substantial period (1983–1986), the C64 had between 30% and 40% share of the US market and two million units sold per year,
In the UK market, the C64 faced competition from the BBC Micro, the ZX Spectrum, and later the Amstrad CPC 464.[11] but the C64 was still the second most popular computer in the UK after the ZX Spectrum.[12] The Commodore 64 failed to make any impact in Japan. The Japanese market was dominated by Japanese computers, such as the NEC PC-8801, Sharp X1, Fujitsu FM-7, and MSX.[13]
Part of the Commodore 64's success was its sale in regular retail stores instead of only electronics or computer hobbyist specialty stores.
One computer gaming executive stated that the Nintendo Entertainment System's enormous popularity – seven million sold in 1988, almost as many as the number of C64s sold in its first five years – had stopped the C64's growth. Trip Hawkins reinforced that sentiment, stating that Nintendo was "the last hurrah of the 8-bit world".[57]
 
 
.
2023-05-01 12:01:44
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=8656
Derrick Steel sums up the game succinctly in his entry on MobyGames: "In what has to be considered one of the most "original" games of all time, you are a flying beer in space. And the evil corporations are coming after you, so you must use your "beer power" to fight off wave after wave of corporate beer." To be more precise, your goal is to defend the Eichhof Brewery from the imperium of invading "big beers," with bottle caps and other imaginative weapons that only beer lovers can appreciate ;)
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=8893
digitalization was after the end of the idea of the replica of man as a robot and thinking being. something that the analog first read largely unchallenged. it was a colonization of a new space, a space that created itself - cyberspace. with this, this space did not come into conflict in a first moment - in the sense of earlier struggles over existing mostly analog territory. this is probably also one of the reasons why digitalization proceeded creepingly and was not perceived or actively fought by parts of the broad population (the nerds etc.). and many waves of digitalization then also emerged in the field of music (synthies) or games, for example, and took hold in everyday life at home. the normal things, however, continued to run until they then also arrived in the working environment.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9147
The CFA was founded in 1987 in Basel, Switzerland, when 3-letter names were still in fashion. CFA stood for “Computer Freaks Association”. In the first months the CFA was a group of C64 fans and gaming tournaments were held in regular intervals. They organised a gaming room at a local School-Party of the RG in Basel.

The CFA started with pure Demo-Making and Software-Swapping. The first international contact was the Norwegian group The Sinister Realm 2013 Stavanger. One of the early meeting places was the Dial-Club, a local Computer-Center in Basel.
At this time a regular Exchange-Ring of Software between the members was built up.
The first Copy-Party visited by CFA members was Crazy & ZSS Party 1988 in Pratteln/Switzerland. In 1989 Members of the group was busted by police on a German Copy-Party, but thanks to slow Swiss legislation, no CFA member had any troubles at all after returning to Switzerland.
The CFA took part in Demo-Contests of other Swiss copy parties: Crazy & RCS Party 1989, Crazy Stardom Copy-Party 1989 and Fresh Party 1990. 

In the early days, our strategy was: focus on Switzerland. This changed with the first member expansion outside of Basel: 
German members: Snief and The Cure.
Liechtenstein members: Sandman.

War against another Swiss group Fresh, which led to a funny anti demo Fresh on Top. The war was officially ended at the Swiss Pirates Reunion 2002. (nowadays there are many friendship boundaries between the former 2 opponents).

The CFA has in the meantime started importing and cracking games: access to the major US BBS, latest wares and cards agogo. 

1990-1991 Cooperation with Italian Cracking Service from Italy.

11/1989-07/1993 reknown Disk Mag “Immortal Flash” an e-zine that become quite popular in the scene (later released by Atlantis).

In 02/1991 the CFA died and the remaining members built up Atlantis. More info in Joker Note.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9257
OLIVER Being a pixel guy – the tools were remarkable. We did not have devkit like the Katakis tools or something specified for creating game graphics. I used the editor that came with the Shoot ‘Em Up Construction Kit for sprites, which turned out extremely practical. The Ronny-sprite was created with an C64 editor called Mob-Profi, which provided overlayed hires and multicolour-sprites. The pictures in the intro and end sequence were pixeled in Koala Painter with a joystick, but everything else was more like hacking. I edited the charset with a font editor. The level backgrounds were tile-based maps, so a friend of mine coded one tool for combining 2×2 chars to tiles including the colour – and a second tool for assembling the levelmap like a puzzle game. As setup I had a C128 and Amiga 500 side by side. By the way – there was a TV and a monitor connected to the C128 at the same time, because of the the different video quality and I wanted to be sure that the graphics  looked right on both display types. With our modern mouse or stylus driven tools and those workflow-trimmed programs it is hard to believe that we got things done at all back in the day when we were even lacking fundamentals such as UNDO functionality. However, I have to say that you had full control over the technical specs of the graphics and as a graphic designer you started to think like a coder.
Otherwise, I hardly remember details of the project. At least for the first month, Mario and I were working alongside each other. The intro and the end sequence were finished first. Then it was very intense and determined by crunchtime, the process was sort of first-in-first-out. The progress in code was tied to incoming graphics. Markus composed the new tunes at home far away and we had some issues with the delivery. Nevertheless the whole soundtrack reached us in time and its implementation went smoothly. Still there was no free time at all. In the final weeks weeks it became a kind of competition – like, who needs the least sleep! I also remember that the editing of the levels was pretty chaotic. Three of us worked in shifts and it took much longer than planned.
Oh I almost forgot about the  communication with Virgin. That was the horror for me because I hardly spoke any English back then. David Bishop and I talked English and German mixed, which worked surprisingly well.
DA DOO RON RON RON
2024-01-19 17:02:32
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9259
Rolling Ronny was looking decent, too. Commodore Format had featured a well-received demo in the Autumn on Power Pack 13, and it gave a fairly typical taste for the game. You’re cast as the hero of the title, a delivery boy in the fictitious town of Fieldington who secretly works for Scotland Yard on the side. When the town’s crown jewels are stolen and scattered across town by the careless robbers, Ron’s the obvious one to call. It’s at this point you’re plummeted into the first level. At first glance, it’s straightforward left-to-right stuff. Sure, you’re wandering the levels in search of the treasure but you also need to earn enough money for your bus fare to get to the next stage. This is where the errand boy stuff comes in: as you dodge cars and the mutated animals of Fieldington (in a surreal plot twist, the local magic circle turned everything fluffy a bit demented), you’ll meet some of the town’s inhabitants. By doing them a favour – for example delivering a package – you’ll get coins. Pocket enough, and you can level up. Here’s the whole game:
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=221

Musée Bolo owns one of the most extensive collection of machines and objects related to information technology and its brief history.

Historical Culture
2022-04-10 20:58:18
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=297
Culture towards technology changed massively in the last 50 years. 
Fantasy-Computers
2022-04-17 22:36:48
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=638
Fantasy computers are computer that are ‘inspired’ by real computers. Means their name sound like ZX81 > Tic80 but of course they are fast, programmable with lua and in the most of the cases have all integrated: spriteeditor, tile/background-editor, soundeffects editor and music editor. So they are really the dream of an 8bit-coder* with assembler, low memory, low graphics, no tools. 
Cracker-kiosk
2022-05-26 09:25:37
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1089
come in with your original. come back in one hour. you get the original and  the cracked game back on floppy disc.
War Heli (Atari ST)
2022-07-08 11:36:10
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1258
War Heli is a state of the art shoot em up game with big sprites on a computer with no hardware-scrolling! 
.
2022-04-14 14:10:31
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1463
1972: Demo Unix
> Science Fiction: When Harlie Was One  - "Computervirus" 

1975 Schockwellenreiter (Roman)
1979 AI im Netz (The Adolescence of P-1 Roman)
1980 Vergleich Bio - Computerprogramme
1983 AppleII Programm verbreitet sich > Elk Koner

Elk Cloner: The program with a personality
It will get on all your disks
It will infiltrate your chips
Yes, it's Cloner!
It will stick to you like glue
It will modify RAM too
Send in the Cloner!
1984
1984 Theorie und Praxis > erster Demovirus
1986 erste Infektionen
1986 MS-DOS: Indien (free copy) >  Raubkopien > Virus dazu > Bindung an die eigene Software ... > effekt: umbenennung
1987 erster Mac Virus.,
1987 erste Amiga  Virus - SCA
The story behind
2022-04-14 14:55:17
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1481
r and c discussed if a bootsector virus is possible (in 512 bytes). than c went home and coded in2 days one, gave a infected disc to r with software. legend: from this disc all sca viruses shall come from.
story was told in a discussion around 2013 by c.
.
2022-04-28 11:39:51
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=2266
**The Cheshire Catalyst** (Richard Cheshire) (@Cheshire2600) was the last editor of the notorious TAP Newsletter of the 1970s and 1980s. (TAP was a predecessor of 2600 Magazine.) In his “share the knowledge” spirit, he has volunteered at every HOPE conference since the first one in 1994. His PHonePHriendly.Com sets up web pages meant to be read on mobile phone web browsers, and allows him to delude himself that he’s still into phones as a phreak.
Tennis for two - radical
2022-05-21 14:44:35
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3072
Tennis for two is one of the most radiacal games ever. It has no ! avatar. At the moment the ball is on your field, you have the power to kick it in the direction, you want. So the game is more territorial based than avatar/npc-linked.
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3463
What is next? 16/32-Bit but which one?
(- Macintosh)
- Atari ST? (like C64)
- Amiga (Multimedimaschine) expensive - Amiga 500
- Sinclair 68000
- Archimedes?
(- NEXT very expensive!)
 
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=3469
Mod and one of the first game design actions on the big platforms. 
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=7187
_ virus
_ transformation
_ smart monster
_ fit monsters 
_ nihilation
_ all also visuals rules
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=7501
and for the machine to not look like “a pregnant calculator”
.
2023-04-16 13:19:38
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=8258

Our President, Paul Schaerer

As Our President since 1993 he tries to keep the club running. He also tries to "fill" the club-MAGA 
He was born at 1st of April 1954 and is an educated radio-tv technician. 1978 he startet working for IBM and acts as a Hardware Level2 supporter since January 1997 in still the same company. 
Even if he works with "real PCs", he loves MSX. He is a hardwareman and You can see it because he developped a lot of Hardwarestuff. 
->Slotexpander, Modeltrain-controlling and some other hardware. 
His e-mail address: schaere@ibm.net

Our Vice-President, Peter Burkhard

This man is the driven force of SUNRISE SWISS and so also the driving force to developp all the excellent projects released by SUNRISE SWISS. In his professional live he is a salesman who sells courtains. 
During his small free time he likes to play games with MSX and Playstation. He is the guy who everytime finds new software like games, demos and sounds in all over the world. He also holds contact with all MSXers all over the world. To do this, a thing not from MSX is very helpfull to him; INTERNET. 
His e-mail address: pburkhard@msx.ch
picture of Vice-President
picture of Cashier

Our Cashier, Hans Juergen Rechsteiner

One of the most important jobs in a club is the cashiers job. This is not only his job for the club, but it is also a big part of his daily business. He is the branch manager in a large chain store with stores all over Switzerland.
As an MSX computer-hobbyist, he mostly tries to make titles for his own movies. He also likes it to developp own sounds with his music-module. Another thing he loves is to make bar-b-queues. How all the other things, he also does this nearly perfect. 
His e-mail address: hjrechi@swissonline.ch

Our Secretary, Hans Langenauer

His job in our club is, to write everything about our monthly meetings. This is not an easy, but a very intresting job. He also writes all the paperstuff for the club. In his professional live he is a government official in a village near St. Gall. If he don't have to write articles for the MAGA, he loves it to make movies. On every ocassion, he is there with his camcorder. All this stuff, he is editing and cutting with his MSX. That's why he is waiting yearning for the announced digitizer which should be released soon from SUNRISE SWISS. 
Sorry, but he don't have an e-mail. Phone: xx41 x71 385 85 72
picture of Aktuar
picture of Beisitzer

Our Assistant, Marcel Truetsch

As Our Assistant, he is mostly responsible for the editing of the club-MAGA. He is an educated postman and he loves not even MSX but also interneting and gameconsoles. He everytime knows the newest news about Internet helps, and games.
He also is a member of the legendary SUNRISE SWISS which developpes the finest stuff for MSX. He knows nearly everything about the news there and he acts as a kind of public relations manager. So, he seems to be the right hand of Peter Burkhard. 
His e-mail address: mtruetsch@msx.ch
Videotex
2023-07-21 16:43:23
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=9081
MTW Video des SRF aus dem Jahre 1989 zeigt die Nachteile von Videotex als Projekt der Post und die aufkommende Konkurrenz durch Mailboxen.
Cracking
2023-02-11 14:57:25
https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=768
Make games copyable. Some cracker groups where in the tradition of information freedom, others learned from cracking software creating software, others had fun, others were in a sport ‘who is first’ and of course also others gained money. 
Why switzerland? and not us? The rumor is: There was no law in switzerland against cracking. 
linkz: https://vintagecomputing.ch/?browseid=1
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