colors: 251 - black ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- F A C E T O F A C E W I T H U N F A M O U S S C E N E R S ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ::: ::::::: ::::::: :::::: ::::::: ::: ::: ::: :::::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: :::::::: ::::::: ::: ::: ::: :::::::: ::: : ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: ::: :::: :::: ::: ::: ::: ::: :::::: ::: ::: :::::: ::: :::::: ::: ::: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- H O S P E S / (ex) T H E V O T I O N (ST demo crew from Poland) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- short overview: the votion was the 1st serious Atari group i've been in. we lost contact a few years ago due to the internal conflicts. oneday i'd been surfing the net and i found messages posted by Hospes. he replied and discovered hismelf as the Hamtech from my ex-demo team! so i've got the idea to lead this interview which could be a good pretext to re-fresh our contact ;) grey: hiya, pal! hospes: Heh. Welcome after a long silence on my side! grey: I am sure that 99% of our readers living outside never heard about you so please introduce yourself as precisly as possible. How old are you, what are you doing these days etc? hospes: ...hmmm. let's start with the easiest things.... 27 years old, so i'm getting on a bit. Currently I am a professional graphician in a publicity agency. I live in the capital of polish beer (did you ever drink 'EB' in Poland? add note: grey). grey: When did you buy your first Atari ? And did you ever regret this choice? Who persuaded you with such purchase? hospes: My first Atari was second hand 65Xe with a XC12 tape drive without any turbo extension. What does it mean? Every user of such config should know what I mean. When I got bored playing games I started to create something. Of course I began with BASIC and due to the fact I was also interested in graphics then I started to experiment with mixing up the graphic modes etc.. In that time I managed to create "StarKwak" game. Heh, what a lame name, but being 14 years old I liked it. What was later... oh yes, what was? I've seen something like disc-drive at my cousin's home and everything started again... Another game came up - "No Exit" in mono mode, graphic drawn in Turbo Basic plus various sound experiments... And later STe era came up. In Elblag most of the computer sellers offered C-64 as the best computer or AT trash with Herkules and mono.. . When I asked about Atari they shrugged their shoulders. Then I decided to go to Gdansk to search for an ST. I remember it was August when I put myself on the train the train with hopes of finding this computer. I have to admit that at the beginning I persuaded myself to buy an Atari XL/XE 'coz I was "uder impression" even if I missed a good music in comparison to the C-64. But later everything changed.. grey: When at the first time you licked the so called 'demo scene'? What was your first ST demo you have seen? Which one really impressed you? hospes: I've seen such a demo in Elblag at my friend's house. He had 1040STFM (hello to CZAREK.... you have a quite nice sister...) and he showed me demo made by Union group. I don't remember and name, it has gone from my memory. Anyway during loading I was able to listen to the great "PLEASE WAIT" ripped from "Wings of Death". Eh, this music, overscan and something like a horse controlled by myself on the screen. Heh, that was probably my first demo I've seen. But one which I like the most was "OMEGA DEMO" but I am still not sure about the name of it.. It was working only on the STe and featured mixed samples and dancing figures. There was also other demo which really surprised me, but this time for the Falcon. It was a german "Veltmerschfsdhfsl" - I don't remember exactly. But anyway the hard music and digitalised screens with death of various ppl, scenes from Terminator etc.. Quite cool, even if technical not so complicated. grey: When The Votion has been founded ? And do you remember the members names? hospes: .....hmm. sometime in 93 the group became a reality. At the beginning The Votion had only two graphicians so we were searching for a coder now. In (probably) 2nd issue of QuaST magazine we've found the address to Uras who lived.... on the same street ;) So being armed with beers we decided to visit him. But before that we came to the park to drink another beer for being so brave.. we were going to a coder! ;) When we finally arrived at Uras house, we explained the reason for our visit and we then decided to work together. That's how The Votion became the fact. It turned out that we stole this coder from Van Eijk who was co- operating with Uras to develop QuaST magazine. A short while later, other members joined us, it was Costek, the lonely coder and Michal known also as Grey. Heh, he had another nickname before... but I won't say anything about it, hehe. So our member-list was the following: Uras (CODE) CoSTek (CODE) Marcin (GRAPHICIAN) Hospes alias HamTech (GRAPHICIAN AND MUSICIAN) Grey (SWAP) grey: What prods did you release on the ST? Could you tell us the titles? hospes: Hmm, we managed to release something, however we had more music and graphics than coders willing to put it somewhere ;) We did a couple intros to the QuaST magazine, I took a part in several graphic compos at parties. Besides we did a multi-part demo which fitted on two DD disk, however only the beginning "survived"... There was a big digitalized animation when I murder the doll in my cellar... There was a big scroll on the overscan and module playing. The main part of the demo was DELETED (!) by... Costek, 3 hours before the competitions started (!!!). Being "gratful" for that in the greetings part we put a photo of big pennis instead of his face. So finally this demo became a real SHIT. I still have a lot of graphics which weren't used anywhere because of the coders laziness. I almost forgot about another The Votion release called "Really shit". It was a..... porno demo in 4096col for the STe, overscan, mixed resolutions, module... These pictures were REALLY the worst pictures which seen the light of the day. If you have this demo then press F10 - hidden part! Later I co-operated with Wachu (coder from Luzak Team - grey's note) in time of my study in Poznan. We were working together on the demo called Insomnia which featured: mapped pictures, gourauds, fractals... Unfortunately time didn't let us to work on details... grey: If I good remember you were working on the game? Apocalypse clone for the ST? Is there a preview available? hospes: Yes, it's true, it was "RED KILLER" with one playable screen shown at the QuaST party. But where is it now? I don't know, I was moving from "place to place" and I probably lost it. Maybe I'll ask Costek then we will spread the preview version. If I have to compare this version to the original from Amiga then I have to say it looked the same, maybe a bit better even. I was working on it pretty hard. "RED KILLER" was running only on the STe so we put sampled sound and modules wherever it was only possible. The final version was planned to fit on three disks, the beginning the end, all "beetwen game" parts were ready... Unfortunately I had trouble with my studies, Costek found a girlfriend and everything failed. That was our last project which I really regret skipping... grey: Did you ever think about posibility of creating a Falcon section of The Votion? hospes: ...well, people with who I was working aren't on the scene anymore, And I am also not the same anymore, job, home, wife, children.. Ooops, wife and children - lack ;)) So it's rather unlikely that you will see The Votion on the Falcon scene. grey: What's happening with The Votion members? Is there any chance to see you back on the scene? Do you plan to release anything for the ST? Are you still drawing graphics? hospes: A little bit...... Uras is busy with his studies, I see him sometimes huddling together with a women during weekend evenings. He is THAT busy that he even doesn't recognize mates. Costek lives with his girlfriend Iza..... I meet him quite often, he has a lot of ideas for the work to earn money but always doesn't finish it. The only thing we finished lately was a couple bottles of beer... Marcin is twice as fat as he used to be... If I get in touch with any ST coder than I would be pleased to co-operate. I am really willing to do something for the ST one day. grey: Have you seen the latest ST prods? What do you think about their technical-level? hospes: ...lately rather don't... I don't have too much time... But I rather often check the Atari www pages and I am almost up-to-date what's happening in that world. Ah, I've seen a small intro for the ST downloaded from Atari Area. Quite nice... grey: If someone would ask you to choose between Jennifer Lopez and your ST, what or who it would be? =)) Detailed answer please... hospes: ....hmm if we talk about women then I am still alone.... so if someone gives me that posibility of choice..... I would ask for the Lopez, but wait a second. I am playing with my Atari since almost 10 years and I am still so nostalgic to this machine... And women after only 3 months becomes pretty boring... So I think I'll take Lopez, do something with her and later I say "I was wrong" and exchange her for an ST. grey: ..okay, thanx for all your answers. keep taking your paintbrush and see ya soon drinking beer somewhere! old times rule 4eva! hospes: ...heh I am leaning on the beer bottle, which helped me to answer all these questions. See you soon when I back from Turkey! - -- -- ----- ---- ------------------------------------------------------------ CHOSNECK team contact us: we're listenin' 2 da voice of da scene! atarimsb@wp.pl ------------------------------------------------------- ---- --- --- --- -- ---