War Heli is a state of the art shoot em up game with big sprites on a computer with no hardware-scrolling! 

Atari was first a company for arcades and than splitted to Arcade and Consoles/Computers. 

Die Verbindung digitaler Audio- und Computertechnik ermöglicht eine Vielzahl von Anwendungen im Multimedia- und Musikbereich. Die akustischen Aspekte solcher Computerprogramme basieren auf Verfahren der digitalen Klanganalyse, -synthese, -bearbeitung und Tonaufzeichnung. Selbst komplexe Musikapplikationen sind aufgrund graphischer Benutzeroberflächen moderner Arbeitsstationen komfortabel zu verwenden. Das Buch bietet einen Überblick über Musik-Hardware und -Software, zeigt prozedurale und objektorientierte Beispielroutinen zu Klangbearbeitung und MIDI-Programmierung für Apple Macintosh und NeXT-Workstationen, erläutert die Funktionsweise digitaler Musikinstrumente, Klangsyntheseverfahren, MIDI und moderner Tonstudiotechnik. Eine Übersicht über die Möglichkeiten von Unterrichtsprogrammen und Multimedia-Anwendungen zum Thema Musik runden die Darstellung ab.

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?

this computers came with an operating system, gui-based and mouse. basic was a prg to use (not anymore line based). there were some new styles of basics coming up like gfa-basic, omikron-basic (atari st). 

and the most games were coded in assembler (68000 was a god processor for assembler). so you had to buy assembler, which was not included. 

Computerclub STAB, gegr. 1986, ca. 260 Mitlieder. Keine Mitgliedsbeiträge und Aufnahmegebühren. Leistungen: gelegentliche Kurse, Disketten zum Selbstkostenpreis, PD-Software. Kontaktadresse: STAB, J. Giroud, Solothurnstr. 69, CH-3322 Urtenen

 

Atari Computer Club Zürich, gegr. 1987. Mitgl.-Beitrag Azubis und Studenten 100 Franken jährlich, sonstige 150 Franken. Leistungen: Clubmagazin, PD-Software, Kurse. Kontaktadresse: ACC, Hansjürg Bürgler, Schüsselwies 13, CH-8636 Wald

 

DIAL-Computer-Club, gegr. 1984, 300 Mitglieder. Mitgl.-Beitrag Jugendliche 8 Franken monatlich, Erwachsene 11 Franken. Leistungen: Kurse. Kontaktadresse: DIAL-Computer-Club, Iwan Martin, Postfach 231, CH-4003 Basel

 

Aargauischer Computer Club, gegr. 1985, 400 Mitglieder. Mitgl.-Beitrag 80 Franken jährlich, Ermässigungen möglich. Leistungen: PD-Software, Kurse, Clubzeitschrift. Kontaktadresse: ACCB, Aargauischer Computer Club, CH-5200 Brugg

 

Verein Compix, gegr. 1988, 40 Mitglieder. Mitgl.-Beitrag 60 Franken jährlich. Leistungen: PD-Software, eigene Mail box. Kontaktadresse: Verein Compix, Roland Koller, Zähringerstr. 21, CH-6003 Luzern

The Tandy Color Computer was the runner up. The Apple II was the winner in the category of home computer over $500, which was the category the Commodore 64 was in when it was first released at the price of $595.

n the United States, the greatest competitors were the Atari 8-bit 400, the Atari 800, and the Apple II. The Atari 400 and 800 had been designed to accommodate previously stringent FCC emissions requirements and so were expensive to manufacture. Though similar in specifications, the C64 and Apple II represented differing design philosophies; as an open architecture system, upgrade capability for the Apple II was granted by internal expansion slots, whereas the C64's comparatively closed architecture had only a single external ROM cartridge port for bus expansion.

Aggressive pricing of the C64 is considered to have been a major catalyst in the video game crash of 1983.

The price war with Texas Instruments was seen as a personal battle for Commodore president Jack Tramiel.[25] Commodore dropped the C64's list price by $200 within two months of its release.[6] I

Meanwhile, TI lost money by selling the TI-99/4A for $99.[26] TI's subsequent demise in the home computer industry in October 1983 was seen as revenge for TI's tactics in the electronic calculator market in the mid-1970s, when Commodore was almost bankrupted by TI.[27]

Although many early C64 games were inferior Atari 8-bit ports, by late 1983, the growing installed base caused developers to create new software with better graphics and sound.[34]

 

Listing

First developing on Atari ST (Assembler) but never published something except a demo for a bbs 1993 (First founded by two brothers). First not released ‘product’. A listing game for Happy Computer. 
Than switched to Macintosh (1995 ). Games in C . And than published over the net (website) or in Maganzines Disc-Magazines as Shareware. Paid first with checkes (almost impossible to get the money for 15$ games), so switched to real money and than to KAGI.com a first worldwide payment service.

Inbetween the author worked produced Flash-Games for advertising and ported a lot of games for Java (Applets) 1996 . 

Afterwards switched to Objective-C on MacOSX with a new name: la1n.ch. 

Computerclubs were a very important institution. 

0. Is a place and a community in the same and also a public in the same
1. Networking people in a non internet time.
2. Bringing KnowhHow to people (Courses)
3. Showing, Selling Hardware (Internally)
4. Own public magazines
5. Part of Creating Groups/interested people
6. Only available in bigger towns 

The swiss gamedesign was influenced and even founded by the cracker scene coming from the C64 to Amiga and the other tree was the Atari ST. Around 25 own Games and Ports were created and published from 1985-1997. There was even an own publisher Linel. 

Base for a lot of computers (GUI, Mac, Atari, Amiga, Next  etc) arcades and Arcades! Expensive but with a fantastic assembler-language. 

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). 

Playboy: You never lost sight of the reason for the job: to earn money so you could travel. 

Jobs: Atari had shipped a bunch of games to Europe and they had some engineering defects in them, and I figured out how to fix them, but it was necessary for somebody to go over there and actually do the fixing. I volunteered to go and asked to take a leave of absence when I was there. They let me do it. I ended up in Switzerland and moved from Zurich to New Delhi. I spent some time in India. 

Playboy: Where you shaved your head. 

Jobs: That's not quite the way it happened. I was walking around in the Himalayas and I stumbled onto this thing that turned out to be a religious festival. There was a baba, a holy man, who was the holy man of this particular festival, with his large group of followers. I could smell good food. I hadn't been fortunate enough to smell good food for a long time, so I wandered up to pay my respects and eat some lunch. For some reason, this baba, upon seeing me sitting there eating, immediately walked over to me and sat down and burst out laughing. He didn't speak much English and I

one day in the computerclub. they could decide it! 
atari st played against amiga the same chess prg .-)

Thesis: the atari st guy were much more into business afterwards because of the software (calamus etc)

 

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. 

not suisse, but people worked with their muscian jochen hippel. 

Several demos are behind the mechanic of the ‘puzzler’

Wir sind ein Musiker-/DJ-Kollektiv aus Basel in der Schweiz und produzieren Electro, dies zu einem großen Teil mit Lo-Fi-Instrumenten und -Computern. Seit einigen Jahren veröffentlichen wir die erstellten Songs auf unserer Website [1], Micromusic.net/Domizil Records und einigen weiteren Websites.

Unsere Crew besteht aus: Stu (Atari ST, Synths, Effekte), Remo (Laptop, Synths & Samplers) und Dj Rewind (Turntables). Auf unseren Live-Auftritten sorgt unser Laser-Techniker "Dr. Argon" zusätzlich für visuelle Effekte.

die motivationsmechanik ist ja auch interessant. man wählte zuerst aus. was könnte man gebrauchen. dann setzte man sich dran und musst zuerst einmal die sachen eintippen. die textsorte listing war ja oft, ein bisschen theorie, die erklärung des programmes/architektur. dann praxis

wie die textsorte rezept beim kochen. dann ging das aptippen los. bei den einen der versuch zu verstehen, bei den anderen nur aptippen. dann war man fertig. testete. 1. belohnung es läuft. 2. belohnung man hat vielleicht was gelernt 3. belohnung: es hilft oder macht spass.

4. man denkt, das könnte ich auch. und versucht selbst etwas. (die alte telekoleg idee .-) gingen die listings in den heften schon zurück über die jahre oder?

(ich meinte jedenfalls) wurden mehr so helpers. das ganze bediente ja auch einen noch nicht vollständig

entwickelten software markt. nicht zu vergessen, die keyboards wurden auch besser. gerade beim atari st und amiga.

Die ST-Tastatur kam mir (als gelerntem Maschinenschreiber) immer zu "schwammig" vor. So gut wie auf der Atari-8-Bit-Tastatur konnte ich darauf nicht schreiben/programmieren (was mich aber nicht davon abgehalten hat).

 

Invention oft an Icon Based desktop

simulated original Amiga Game. 

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.

The listing culture is a hybrid between gutenberg galaxis and software. Software was often distributed in the mainframe time as source code ( c ). each system had a different set of hardware, processor. c and co were the platform. You could compile it for your system. 

The listing culture brought source code to the magazines and could be published. first with basic and co for homecomputers, later with checksums, than basic with assembler inlines, than only shortcodes. 

of course by typing in you could learn how to code and solve problems.

An identity question. 

operativ
der Leiter der Bezirksverwaltungen
Berlin
Dresden, Erfurt,
Frankfurt/
Oder
Rostock West und Nord
Leipzig, Magdeburg, Potedam,
BStU
000005
Nach vorliegenden Informationen werden von dem Schweizer Klein-
vorlag
"Fata Morgana Spiele
das strategische Brettspiel
"Kreml"
und vom Hersteller
"Spiole Na Kro Soft
11
dessen Umsetzung als
Computerspiel
"Kreml"
für den Computer
"Atari ST" (mit Monochrom-
monitor)hergestellt.
Der Inhalt dieser Spiele widerspricht auf Grund der
antisowjeti-
schen Aussagen den Interessen der
DDR (vgl. Anlage
• Spielbe-
schreibung in der Zeitschrift
"Happy Computer"
7/88).
Die Einfuhr dieser• Spiele ist
im grenzüberschreitenden Reiseverkehr nach den Entscheidungs-
grundsätzen der DA 11/87 und
im Geschenkpaket-
und
-päckchenverkehr auf den Postwege nach
den Entscheidungsgrundsätzen der

Cartridges were used in Consoles (Fairlight, Saba).
Cartridges were also used by Computers like MSX, Atari 400 etc.

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.)

 

Hardware
- C64 consolen basis, erinnert mehr an eine Console als an einen Computer (Sprite, Hardwarescrolling, Music).
- SID wirklich witzig

VisualDisplay
Unmöglich viele Modis: High res. Multicolor > Programmierung schwierig. Positiv: Kombinierbar
- Beschränkte 16 Farben > Schwierig etwa eigenes zu machen. 
- Strahlende Farben fehlen.

Music
- Music Coding
- SID wirklich interessante Stücke. 

Tools
- Damals Paintingprogramme? > Öfter bessere Computer genutzt wie Amiga/PC (Compiling)

Coding
- Schwierig reinzukommen, sogar schwieriger als Atari2600
- Entwicklung über Jahre
- Basic embedded .-(
- Woher kam das Wissen? Die Software? (Magazine?)
- Öfter bessere Computer genutzt wie Amiga/PC (Compiling)
Gamecoding
- Ohne Tricks (Sprite Multplexer 8 Sprites viele Spiele nicht denkbar) ähnlich wie beim Atari 2600. Tricks

Beschränkung
- Beschränkung bei Shootemups am Schwierigsten bei allen anderen Genres eher möglich mit 8 Sprite durchzukommen.

Community
- Identitätsstiftend aber warum? Einfach übers gemeinsame Spielen?
- Bis heute ungebrochen. Aber mehrheitlich Spieler? Demoszener? 

Heute

Gesamte Entwicklung auf einmal da, keine allmähliche Steigerung/Entwicklung über 10 Jahre
Selbst heute, einige Tutorials aber kein Gametemplate. Viel bis heute unterschiedliche Nutzung: Vorallem game und demoscene. 
> Anwendersoftware fast nicht dokumentiert. 
> Neue Games, demos > Anwendersoftware?

Paraphrase: The decision is made - the same program on both computer. Atari ST vs Amiga with the same chess-programm.

 

 

Tracker were software - used especially on the Amiga. The most of the music was created in this type of music software. And the people behind the swiss games of the 80ies/90ies even created a tracker and the possibility to use the same framework also in games. 

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.

Den Crackern ging es selbstverständlich auch darum, bekannt zu werden. Sie versuchten symbolisches Kapital anzuhäufen. Man kann ihre Motivation und ihre Aneignungsweise durchaus mit derjenigen der Graffiti-Sprayer jener Jahre vergleichen, die mittels “taggen” ihres Künstler- und Gruppen Namens auf leeren Flächen der Stadt versuchten, Aufmerksamkeit zu erreichen – zum Beispiel GEN im Zürich der 80er Jahre. Getting Fame oder Getting Up war die Losung.

Aus den anfänglichen kurzen Bemerkungen als Text wurden immer komplexere eigenständige Vorspänne – die sogenannten Intros. Hier zeigten die Crackers mit der Message ihres Namens, die nicht zuletzt als Botschaften an die Adresse anderer Cracker Gruppen dienten, ihr Ganzes Können. Dabei versuchten sie alles aus diesen Computern herauszuholen. Diese Intros waren eine Art Graffiti auf den blanken Oberflächen der Games jener Zeit. Die Intros unterstanden nicht den Gesetzmäßigkeiten des Game Designs. Die Spielmechaniken spielten keine Rolle und mussten nicht verändert werden. Es ging lediglich um die Titel- und Credit Sequenzen der Spiele. Es ging um einen visuellen Auftritt, der auffallen sollte. Die Intros mussten gut aussehen und einen Wow-Effekt haben. Mit dem Einbezug von Musik und Animation wurde es aber bald auch wichtig, spezielleres Wissen zu erarbeiten. Die Cracker Gruppen begannen Arbeitsteilung einzuführen mit Programmierern, Grafikern und Musikern.

Aus diesen Intros, die in bestehende Spiele eingefügt wurden, entstand später eine ganz eigene Szene, die Demoszene. Und so kommt es, dass sich im Umfeld der meisten Schweizer Cracker und frühen Game Devs auch immer Demos finden. Diese Szene ist noch immer aktiv und dokumentiert sich bis heute selbst. Man findet fast alles aus den letzten 40 Jahren auf der Website POUET (2000) sowie in spezialisierten Datenbanken. Einige der Entwickler updaten ihre virtuellen Echtzeit Welten bis heute aber auch direkt selbst.

Abbildung 14: Cracks und Demos aus den Jahren 1983 – 1988 werden archiviert und öffentlich zugänglich gemacht über die Website der Swiss Cracking Association SCA (2018).Abbildung 15: Aus dem Repertoire des Crackers Hcc: Solomon’s Key Cracktro, Atari ST (1987).
 

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

Demake is a ‘downsized’ game - a game developed for a ‘better platform’ (techincal) and was than recoded for an older vintage system. 

The after mainframe-area (based on c and co) was driven by coding near the hardware to get more speed. espacially in games. So Assembler was important. 

New software created for old obsolete hardware like in the demoscene or games on atari 2600 and so on.

at the end the vectors won. everything is now vector based in games (as an opengl or directx scene .-) more about this in the simple demo sinZ on pouet last year. therefore step back, step into the beginning 80ies with assembler and the vector console vectrex. and of course vecZ is a shootemup the most complicated (timing, a lot of action etc.) thing in those times.

the game is a clone of klax (arcade atari games) - an action puzzler also called the ‘tetris of the 90ies’. again all in 3d. webhighscore. specials: a mode for children and a mode for color blinds. 

Made by crackers and a lot of anti-protection-mechanics. So a long time this game was not cracked.
Example: all tracks are not starting at the same place like normally - every track starts somewhere else. therfore they 

Who was TDA?

archimedes with its risc-processor was still an exception. you could code in basic games like ! virus. 

Die Wellen der Wiederaneignung - von der Demoscene/Homebrew zu Retro und zu den Indiespielen Betrachtet man die weitere Entwicklung der Games und ihre Aktualisierung wird klar: Mit der Plattform Atari ST/Amiga starb auch die Unterstützung der Games. Denn nichts ist bekanntlich älter, als das Game von gestern und noch auf einer Hardware, die nicht mehr kaufbar ist. Die Vertriebskanäle wie BBSen kamen auch aus der Mode beziehungsweise wurden vom Internet verdrängt (FTP und WW) So wundert es auch nicht, dass die Spiele nicht in dieser Zeit dokumentiert wurden. Die meisten Spielkonzepte überlebten auch nicht die aufsteigenden 3D-Welten und wurden entsprechend auch nicht portiert. Erst später - mit mehr Rechenpower - entstanden die Emulatoren zu diesen Homecomputers und durch das WWW wurde Dokumentation auch möglich. [Recherche der ersten Emulatoren]

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!)
 

(Werner 2005)

Challenge:  Solve the puzzle

Reward: Get a new Demo!

CHEAT: Use F1-F10

What happens with them afterwards

Very big club with 600 (?) members. There are all paying money.  A lot of people found here other persons with the same ideas and interests.

It seems that the name ist also Statement. In german spoken as KAK means shit.

Reparatur abend
IBM-Treff
'C'-Abend
64 er Treff
IBM-Treff/'C'-Abend

CAC-Meeting
CAC-Meeting
ATARI-Treff
IBM-Treff
 

How people connect each other. Which places were important and why? Which media was important and why? Most of this places (Clubs, Supermarkets,  Arcades/Spielsalon, Computershops).
What happened with people from the country side? 

Tiling was a design pattern often used in the beginning of the gamedesign.
Reason:

Console or Computer? 
Could be both:
- Consoles with Keyboards
- Computers with Cartdriges

very important also for the developers of games. it was knowhow. the ground language. 

GameDevs are gamedeveloppers. The name tells also a lot about the idea behind. The most important thing was the technical difficulties. 

Basic for creating games. 

check: was this really every online?

atronic.ch

The shareware modell was the only that worked in those days. Because to get a publisher for mac was almost impossible.