home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
The Equalizer BBS
/
equalizer-bbs-collection_2004.zip
/
equalizer-bbs-collection
/
DEMOSCENE-STUFF
/
ASM-94_2.ZIP
/
FCINFO16.TXT
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1994-07-03
|
39KB
|
740 lines
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ │
│ <<< THE FUTURE CREW INFORMATION PACKAGE >>> │
│ │
│ Version 1.6 │
│ │
│ 03-JUL-1994 │
│ │
│ │
│ This file contains general information about the Future │
│ Crew and our demos. It also includes frequently asked │
│ questions we often receive by mail and instructions on │
│ how to contact us best. │
│ │
│ We will update this file as things change, and if the │
│ above date is rather old, you can get the most recent │
│ version of this file either by E-Mail from Internet or │
│ from our distribution sites. │
│ │
│ │
│ │
│ │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ CONTENTS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
1: Opening words
2: Demos for Commercial Purposes
3: The Distribution and Use of Our Demos
4: The Current Memberstatus
5: List of all Future Crew releases
6: International Demo Competitions
7: How to Contact Future Crew
8: Frequently Asked Questions
9: The Brief History of The Future Crew
10: Sonic Dreams is NOT a Future Crew demo
11: Final Words
The following info is in FCSITE16.TXT:
1: Official Distribution Site BBS List
2: How to Become a Distribution Site
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 1: OPENING WORDS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Welcome to the FCINFO file version 1.6 !
This textfile is a new revision of FCINFO15.TXT (version 1.50),
which was originally spread with the Scream Tracker 3.01 Beta.
This textfile was written to tell you about Future Crew, to
give you answers to most of the things you would probably like
to ask us, and to tell you how to get more demos.
If you are interested in us making a demo for you, please,
start reading from the next paragraph in this file.
The things discussed in this textfile are mainly aimed to
those people who have not seen much demos before, but are very
interested in learning more about them and about the whole
demo scene (=demo world) in general and to people who are
interested in the Future Crew. In the future versions
there will be changes and additions taking into account what
has happened since the last information package.
Following parts has been changed since FCINFO15.TXT:
- Releases List
- FAQ section
- How to contact Future Crew
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 2: DEMOS FOR COMMERCIAL PURPOSES │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
If you find our demos interesting and would like us to make
you one for commercial purposes, do not hesitate to contact us.
When contacting us, please, include a short explanation of
what kind of a demo you are interested in. That would greatly
help us in evaluating the size of the project.
Kindly include, for example, the following information:
- What kinds of demo effects would you be interested in
- Should there be any colorful still-pictures (logos, etc.)
- If the demo should have sound, which sound cards would you like
to be supported, what type of music should be played, etc.
- How big the demo could be in kilobytes and for how long
should the demo run in minutes approximately.
- Where would the demo be used and how soon would you like the
demo to be finished.
- Approximately how much would you be willing to pay for the demo
We would like you to understand that our demos are not animations.
This means that nearly everything you see on the screen is being
real-time calculated. The speed of the movement is usually
dependant to the speed of the VGA card and the speed of the
processor.
When contacting us, you should realise that we are all rather
young and thus still studying in various schools. This is why
our time is usually quite limited. And it is very likely that
we might already be involved in another project(s).
You should also know that we do not make demos for Microsoft
Windows due to its limitations from an assembly language
programming point of view.
Since normal mail is quite a slow way to communicate, we would
prefer the communication be made through e-mail (or if e-mail
is not a possible way of communication for you, you can always
try to send a fax).
You can find our contact information from this file.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 3: THE DISTRIBUTION AND USE OF OUR DEMOS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
All our demos, except the ones which we have created for different
companies, are freeware.
This means that you can copy and distribute them freely as long
as you make no modifications to them. Also, no money can be
charged for copying/spreading them.
If you are a PD/shareware/freeware distributor, please contact us
before including our products in your collection. If you do not
hear from us in two weeks after sending us a fax or a letter,
it will automatically mean that you can include our freeware
demos in your collection.
In general, all commercial utilization of our demos without our
permission is strictly forbidden. This includes selling disks
(or any other electronic media) containing our demos.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 4: THE CURRENT MEMBERSTATUS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Alias: Real name: Born: Main responsibility:
--------------------------------------------------------------
GORE Samuli Syvahuoko 1973 Organizer/PR/E-mail
Psi Sami Tammilehto 1973 Coder
Trug Mika Tuomi 1972 Coder
Wildfire Arto Vuori 1975 Coder
Purple Motion Jonne Valtonen 1976 Musician
Skaven Peter Hajba 1975 Musician
Marvel Aki Maatta 1975 Graphics Artist
Pixel Mikko Iho 1975 Graphics Artist
Abyss Jussi Laakkonen 1975 BBS Coordinator
FC Internet Division:
Henchman Markus Maki 1974 E-mail/PR/betatesting
Jake Jarkko Heinonen 1973 E-mail/PR/betatesting
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 5: LIST OF ALL FUTURE CREW RELEASES │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Filename Size Released A Short Description
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
YO!.ZIP 32 kb 2-24-89 YO! intro, VGA textmode/PC-speaker
GR8.ZIP 31 kb 7-12-89 GR8 intro, EGA/No sound
FC-SLIDE.ZIP 350 kb 7-23-90 Slideshow I, a graphics collection, SB
ST224.ZIP 130 kb 2-22-91 Scream Tracker 2.24 shareware version, SB
MENTAL.ZIP 90 kb 7-02-91 Mental Surgery demo, SB/Covox/PC-speaker
STMIK020.ZIP 170 kb 8-10-91 Scream Tracker Music Interface Kit 0.20
FISHTRO.ZIP 230 kb 4-08-92 Assembly'92 invitation intro, SB
STMIKFIX.ZIP 10 kb 7-14-92 A Bugfix to STMIK
UNREAL.ZIP 1350 kb 8-06-92 Unreal megademo, SB/SBp
STARPRT2.EXE 6 kb 9-13-92 StarPort BBS intro, VGA/AdLib
THEPARTY.ZIP 165 kb 10-02-92 The Party II invitation intro, SB/SBp
PANIC.ZIP 950 kb 2-04-93 Panic trackdemo, SB/SBp
ASM-93.ZIP 400 kb 6-15-93 Assembly'93 invitation intro, SB/SBp/GUS
WCHARTS.ZIP 680 kb 6-26-93 Worldcharts magazine issue #1, SB/SBp/GUS
SOULOMAT.ZIP 100 kb 7-10-93 A song by Purple Motion (.MOD)
ICEKNGDM.LBM 65 kb 8-01-93 Winner of PC graphics compo at Asm'93
ICEFRONT.ZIP 180 kb 8-01-93 The winner of PC multichnl compo at Asm'93
CAN'T.ZIP 125 kb 8-01-93 The second in PC multichnl compo at Asm'93
STRSHINE.ZIP 225 kb 8-01-93 The third in PC multichnl compo at Asm'93
TROLL.LBM 85 kb 8-01-93 The fourth in PC graphics compo at Asm'93
SUNDANCE.ZIP 235 kb 8-10-93 The winner of PC 4chnl compo at Asm'93
2NDREAL1.ZIP 1250 kb 10-07-93 Second Reality, Asm'93 winner, SB/SBp/GUS
2NDREAL2.ZIP 790 kb 10-07-93 Second part of the Second Reality demo
2NDR_MS.ZIP 280 kb 11-01-93 Skaven's songs from Second Reality
SYMPHONY.ZIP 260 kb 11-01-93 Symphony by Skaven (.S3M file)
PMFRACT.ZIP 210 kb 11-05-93 The winner of Megaleif ST/PC music compo
BUSMATKA.ZIP 75 kb 11-09-93 Finnish invitation to Party3 bussymatka
STARPORT.ZIP 5 kb 11-21-93 StarPort BBS intro II, VGA/Adlib
SP2SRC.ZIP 30 kb 12-02-93 StarPort BBS intro II sources
UNREAL11.ZIP 1335 kb 12-28-93 Unreal version 1.1 for Gravis UltraSound
JOURNEY1.ZIP 867 kb 12-28-93 First Musicdisk by Purple Motion
JOURNEY2.ZIP 1015 kb 12-28-93 Second Musicdisk by Purple Motion
CHMIND.ZIP 1420 kb 02-20-94 Chaotic Mind - Music collection by Skaven
2NDPATCH.ZIP 36 kb 02-20-94 Slowdown bugfix patch for 2nd Reality
ASM-94.ZIP 221 kb 04-08-94 Assembly'94 Pre-Invitation Intro
SCRMT301.ZIP 291 kb 04-18-94 Scream Tracker 3.01 BETA
ASM-94_2.ZIP 567 kb 07-03-94 The Assembly '94 Invitation Dentro
You SHOULD be able to find all of the above from our Distribution Sites.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 6: INTERNATIONAL DEMO COMPETITIONS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
For those who have no idea what the above are, I will explain.
Demo competitions (= parties) are international events where
the demo scene people go to meet each other and to compete in
the many competitions that are being held. These competitions
(= compos) are the demo, intro (= a demo sized under 64kb),
music and graphics. There are often different compos for different
machines (PC, Amiga, Atari ST and C-64). There are also prizes in
each compo (cash or computer hardware & software). The cash prizes
are usually the money people pay as the entrance fee (usually
about $20 US/person) and the possible computer hardware & software
has usually been sponsored by various computer companies. All
contributions are being experienced on a big screen (many meters
wide) and with the aid of a powerful audio system. After this all
the people or a selected jury vote and decide which contributions
are the best. After this the prizes are being given out and the
party is over. In the process people of course get to know each
other better and exchange a lot of new ideas.
All contributions are usually being released at the party itself,
but sometimes the PC demos are not. This is very unfortunate,
and will probably change in the future. The reason why this is
allowed to happen is because most demos haven't been beta-tested
well enough before the party and might not work on most machines.
So, the groups are being allowed to finish their demos after the
party and then release them when they so see fit. But if they do
not release their demos after a certain period of time (like
1-2 months), the party organizers will release the version which
was contributed to the competition.
Parties usually last for three days (a weekend) and are usually
organized by bigger demo groups.
There are a few big demo parties being held annually in Europe.
These include the following: The Party in Denmark at Christmas-
time, The Gathering in Norway around Easter, The Computer
Crossroad in Sweden before the summer and Assembly in Finland
in the end of Summer.
The Computer Crossroads'94, though, has been cancelled.
A few months before the party, the organizing demo groups usually
release special invitation intros to advertise their parties.
At Assembly'93 there were a total of 1500 attenders from which
550 were PC people. About half of them had come from outside
Finland (Germany, Belgium, Holland, Sweden, Norway, USA, Israel,
Canada, Denmark, Switzerland, Spain, etc...). Only PC people were
allowed to vote on PC compos.
The overall quality of the contributions exceeded all expectations.
It was very cool to see how much the PC scene had developed since
last year. The party itself went quite smoothly, except for a
few bumps, but what would a demo party be without them... :-)
Also the prizes were very good in all PC compos. The total value
of all the prizes on the PC was about $7800 US.
At The Party 3 there were around 2800 people. Most PC groups
were able to come and meet one another, and we even had
a cool snowball fight! But somehow the co-operation between
the Amiga and PC organizing groups wasn't successful and thus
there were some problems in the PC competitions. Read more about
this in the FC History section in this file.
And to all you people out there:
Don't forget to attend Assembly '94 !!!
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 7: HOW TO CONTACT THE FUTURE CREW │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Our snail-mail address is: Our home BBS is:
Abyss / Future Crew StarPort - FC WHQ BBS
c/o Jussi Laakkonen +358-0-455 4801
Sepetlahdentie 2 E 36 455 4805
02230 Espoo 455 4807
FINLAND 455 4810
455 4812
GORE's cellular phone (GSM): 455 4827
+358-40-502 3025 455 4829
StarPort is also available thru telnet/rlogin. Telnet MPOLI.FI
user-id: PCBOARD. There is also an anonymous FTP-service,
MPOLI.FI. These services are accessible only within Finland.
We are working on international access.
You can also e-mail us or send a fax:
Please direct general questions, requests for information etc.
ONLY to FC@MPOLI.FI. Other addresses are only for contacting
purposes.
Alias Address
----- -------
Abyss abyss@mpoli.fi
GORE gore@mpoli.fi
or jtheinon@cc.helsinki.fi
Marvel marvel@mpoli.fi
Pixel pixel@mpoli.fi
Purple Motion purple.motion@mpoli.fi
Skaven skaven@mkoski.otol.fi
skaven@mpoli.fi
Wildfire wildfire@mpoli.fi
Jake jtheinon@cc.helsinki.fi
Henchman mmaki@cc.helsinki.fi
"Finger" jtheinon@cc.helsinki.fi for the latest FC-news!!!
Fax: +358-0-420 8620 (at GORE's place)
We receive a lot of mail and simply can't answer all of it.
Comments and opinions are always appreciated, but if you
also have questions, consider first if you might find the
answers elsewhere, for example from the Frequently Asked
Questions section inside this file. However, if you include
questions in your mail, please enclose a return envelope ready
with your address and an international mail coupon. We simply
can NOT afford to pay hundreds of dollars a year just to answer
mail. This means: no mailing coupon = NO reply.
The best and the fastest way to contact us is through e-mail.
So, if you really want to chat with us alot, you should find
a way to use e-mail. From internet you can also find lots of
demos and be able to e-mail other demo groups as well.
We get a LOT of e-mail so you may have to wait for our reply
for a while. We TRY to answer every e-mail we get and please,
write your e-mail address into your message.
And PLEASE, be very brief and only ask FC-related questions!
We are NOT some all-around info forum or internet users help center!
The reason for this is that we receive around 30-40 long email
messages per day and simply don't always have enough time to
answer them.
Good Internet Demo Sites:
A few very good anonymous ftp sites where you can find lots of
demos are ftp.uwp.edu and ftp.eng.ufl.edu. Our demos can be found
in the directory: /pub/msdos/demos/groups/future.crew.
There are also mirrors for these sites in Europe, for example
ftp.luth.se.
And since many people don't know how to login to an anonymous
ftp site, here's some info: as the login name put "anonymous"
and as the password, put your own internet e-mail address.
You can also call our many BBSes around the world. You can
find the list of these BBSes in the FCSITE textfile.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 8: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE CREW │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Here we have compiled a list of questions along with the
answers (in random order) which are being asked in about
95% of all the letters we receive. Hopefully you will find
the answers to your questions from here and save us and
yourself from some unnecessary paperwork.
Q: Where can I get your and other groups' demos?
A: There are several ways to get demos.
The best way (if you have a modem) is to call an FC distribution site
near you. They have all of our productions online and you can download
them freely. Also many normal BBSes carry our productions and other
groups' demos. If you don't have a modem, then getting our demos is a
lot harder. We don't have a mailswapping system. So, if you have a friend
who has a modem, why not try to get him to call one of our distribution
sites. Another VERY good way to get demos is from the INTERNET. Good
anonymous ftp demo sites are for example ftp.uwp.edu and ftp.eng.ufl.edu.
Our demos can be located in the /pub/msdos/demos/groups/future.crew
directory.
Q: When is the musicdisk coming out?
A: We released Purple Motion's musicdisk called Journey at The Party 3.
Skaven's musicdisk - Chaotic Mind - has also been released.
Q: When will you release a MOD/S3M player?
A: It has already been released along with Skaven's and PM's musicdisks.
It's called the MusicDiskPlayer (MDP) and it plays 4-8 channel ProTracker
MOD files and all S3M files. It support SB, SBPro and GUS. The most recent
version (v1.1) was released with Skaven's Chaotic Mind musicdisk.
Q: When is Scream Tracker 3.0 going to be out?
A: It was released some time ago. You can find it from the releases list.
A new version is not planned.
Q: When is Worldcharts issue #2 coming out?
A: Since there are a lot of other groups publishing all kinds of magazines
today and our main directive is to make demos, and that Worldcharts #1
wasn't as good a success as we wanted it to be, we see no real sense in
continuing to publish it anymore. Also as you might have guessed our
time has become too limited for these kinds of projects. In a nutshell,
at this time there is no real reason for you to send in your votes or
articles. If we change our mind about this, you can be sure that we'll
let you know. Thanks to everyone who supported us by sending us votes
and articles.
Q: What programming books would you recommend to learn assembler and VGA?
A: This is a hard question, and a general answer is, that any book will do.
You can get the basics from a book and books are a great reference,
but when it comes to creating something new, you can't just read it
from a book. We have all learnt to code the hard way (a lot of
miscellaneous books and a lot of experimenting). Anyway, here are
some of the books we often find handy (there are undoubtably newer
prints, so check them out):
Mastering Turbo Assembler, Tom Swan
Hayden Books 1989, ISBN 0-672-48435-8
PC System Programming, Michael Tischer
Abacus 1990, ISBN 1-55755-036-0
The Programmers PC Sourcebook, Thom Hogan
Microsoft Press 1988, ISBN 1-55615-118-7
Programming the 80386, John H. Crawford and Patrick P. Gelsinger
Sybex 1987, ISBN 0-89588-381-3
Programmers guide to EGA and VGA cards, Richard F. Ferraro
Addison Wesley 1989, ISBN 0-201-12692-3
Also, most up to date are many software 'books', such as interrupt
lists from bbs'es and such. We have also found a lot of valuable
information in articles and such. In short, there is no magic
way of learning to code, it really does take hard work.
Q: Are you going to make games in the future?
A: Why not. It all depends if we have the time. We have a few game
projects cooking, but they are far from being finished. But we will
let you all know when we have a game coming, don't you worry!
Q: What do the members of Future Crew do besides computers?
A: Most of us study in various schools; universities, high schools and
colleges. In real life most of us are quite normal(?) human beings.
Our hobbies are for example, sci-fi, movies, weight-lifting, techno,
hi-fi, etc, etc. And most of us have or has had a girlfriend.
Q: What soundcards will you support?
A: At the moment our productions support the following sound cards:
Gravis UltraSound - for it's programming advantages and for
being the new standard on the demo scene
Sound Blaster Pro - for being the old standard on the demo scene
Sound Blaster - for being the basic sound card
Support to other sound cards is always possible, but right now we
don't see enough demand to support any other sound cards.
The first precondition that needs to be fulfilled before we add support
to a new sound card is that we get at least 10 of these sound cards with
developer's kits for free. And even if we got 10 cards, it will not
certify that we will support the card, but it will make it more possible.
If you have some "supposed to be 100% SB compatible"-soundcard and still
can't get any sound, or the sound isn't working correctly, DO NOT bother
us about it!! It's not our fault, but the fault of the manufacturer of
the soundcard.
Q: Why aren't we supporting General MIDI?
A: Simply because our musicians don't like the idea of using a preselected
patch of samples over and over again in all their songs. They want there
to be the so called artistic freedom of using any kinds of sounds they
like. General MIDI and other such things are not a good thing from our
point of view - they are a limitation.
Q: Why do your demos require a 386 or higher to run?
A: There are several reasons for the requirement; For example, 386 has many
new assembler commands, 32bit registers, and of course more processing
power. There isn't simply enough processing power in 286 to run a full
ledged demo. And besides, 286-based machines are a rapidly dying breed.
Anyway, if you are going to purchase a new computer, we strongly suggest
you get a fast 486.
Q: How did you learn to code?
A: Learning to code demos is a long and very very difficult process. It takes
years to learn to code demos very well. A good way to start is some high
level language like Pascal or C and then started to experiment with
assembler. It takes a lot of time and experimenting to get better, and
there are no shortcuts (for book recommendations, see a question before
this). The main thing is trying to understand what you do, then trying
to change the program to see what you get, and gain wisdom in what's
the best way of doing things. Learning to code well requires a lot of
patience, a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of time. It is not easy.
Q: What programs do you use to do your demos?
A: We use the following programs to do our demos; For code we use
Borland C++, Microsoft C, Borland Pascal and of course TASM (Turbo
Assembler). For graphics we use Deluxe Paint 2 Enhanced (and 3D Studio
3.0). For making the music we use Scream Tracker 3.0 beta, and for
digitizing the samples for our songs we use Advanced DigiPlayer 3.5
beta. Scream Tracker 3.01 and Advanced DigiPlayer are our own programs
made by Psi. In addition to all these, we of course have a big
collection of utilities we have crafted to our need during the years.
Q: I'm a beginner programmer. I wonder if you could help me learn demo coding?
A: To help beginners learn the secrets of demo coding we have released the
full source of our Mental Surgery demo. This source code is spread along
with our STMIK (Scream Tracker Music Interface Kit), which is a 4 channel
music player, which you can link into your own programs. You can find these
from our distribution sites, under the name STMIK020.ZIP (be sure to grab
STMIKFIX.ZIP too, which fixes one nasty bug). Do not try to ask us to send
you some of our unreleased source code.
We have also released a new source code pack which includes the full,
documented ASM source code of our StarPort intro II.
There's always the possibility that we will release some other source code
in the future as well, but at this time there are no immediate plans for
such an event.
Q: Exactly where do FC members study and what?
A: Many of us study in high school or in university. Here is the complete list:
Psi - Turku university, major informatics
Trug - finished his studies
Wildfire - finished high school, starting at an institute
Purple Motion - second year in high school
Skaven - not studying at the moment
Pixel - not studying at the moment
Marvel - finished high school
Abyss - finished high school, starting at a university
GORE - studying in a business school/commercial college
Henchman - Institute of Technology, studying computer eng.
Jake - Helsinki university, computer science
Q: How long does it take to make a demo like Second Reality?
A: The complete time that it takes to make such demo can't really be counted.
Most of our knowledge is based on years of hard work and on our previous
works. All of us do little experiments on their freetime and when a
"critical mass" is achieved the making of a demo begins more seriously.
From this point to a final demo (in the case of a major production like
Second Reality) it takes around three to six months.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ 9: THE BRIEF HISTORY OF THE FUTURE CREW │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
- 1986-1987 -
Future Crew (FC) was founded in the year 1986 on the C-64. And only one
member has been in the group for the whole time - Psi. FC did two
demos on the C-64 before moving into the PC scene in the year 1988.
- 1988 -
FC's first PC demo was a EGA sinus -scroller called GR8. At that time
the members were HAL, JPM, SS (Psi) and SIDDER. And DARK POWER
was FC's BBS.
- 1989 -
Then there came YO! which was quite popular for a while. It used one of
the VGA's textmodes and included 'nice' PC-speaker music. It had
many scrollers, a sinusing YO!-logo, a little bouncing ball and
a 2D-starfield. At this time ICE joined and so FC
had another BBS - SILICON DRAGON.
- 1990 -
In the year 1990 there was only one demo release from us, the Slideshow I.
It was the first PC demo which included 4 voice SoundBlaster music.
It didn't include any other special code for it was a VGA picture
slideshow. And at this time there were a lot of members in FC:
Psi, ICE, HAL, JPM, SID, BIG, DAC, MAC and SEBU.
And only shortly after Slideshow I, Psi released his Scream Tracker 2.0
- a 4 voice music editing program inspired by the Amiga SoundTracker.
ST 2.0 was a real success. But of course, it didn't take much time
when a pirated version was on the move.
- 1991 -
In summer 1991, FC released a demo called Mental Surgery. It had
a big scroller on the top of the screen, 3D-starfield, a nice writer,
music scopes and of course 4 voice SoundBlaster music.
This was the last FC demo that worked on a 286 machine. At this
time the members were: Psi, ICE, Dr.Venkman and Purple
Motion. And only a while after this I (GORE) joined FC and ICE lost
the interest to demos and left FC along with his BBS.
- 1992 -
So, FC lived quietly for about half a year. But when the year
1992 came Trug, Pixel, Skaven and Abyss joined FC. And as Abyss
joined, FC had a BBS again, called StarPort. So, in the
beginning of the year 1992 FC had the following members:
Psi - Code
Trug - Code
GORE - Organizing
Pixel - GFX
Abyss - BBS Support
Skaven - Music & GFX
Purple Motion - Music
It was at this time that we had begun making UNREAL. Our first
plan was to release it at MEGA-Leif Convention - An Atari ST/PC party held
in Uppsala, Sweden. But about a month before MEGA-Leif, MeeGosh/Rebels
(Amiga) called me and told me about ASSEMBLY'92 and that it would be cool
to have also the PC scene there. So, he asked us to do an invitation intro
for the PC scene about this mega-event. We agreed and so, UNREAL was put to
rest as Psi got the idea of making something different - namely the Fishtro.
It took us about two weeks to create Fishtro from nothing, but when we went
to MEGA-Leif Convention, we still had a few little bugs in it and therefore
we couldn't release it until a week after MEGA-Leif.
After we came back from MEGA-Leif, we started on making Unreal again in
order to get it finished for Assembly'92.
In July'92 came Assembly'92, and we won the demo competition with Unreal.
Around 1000 people attended this party, which wasn't so bad as it was being
held for the first time. The total amount of PC people was 300.
After this we were contacted by the organizers of a big Amiga/C64/PC party,
called The Party 1992. They asked us to organize the PC demo compo there and
to make an Invitation Intro for it's PC side.
At that time we had the following members:
Psi - Code
Trug - Code
WildFire - Code
Pixel - GFX
Purple Motion - Music
Skaven - Music & GFX
GORE - Organizing
Abyss - BBS support
The Party 1992 Invitation Intro was mostly coded by Psi and WildFire.
WildFire was our new coder who joined us in autumn 1992. He had before been
active on the Atari ST scene.
Then it was the time for another big demo. The making of Panic began.
It was the normal process of making demos with blood and sweat and annoying
deadlines. Wildfire was the one to assemble the demo together, but lots of
code was also done by Psi and Trug.
Then it was the time for The Party 1992. As we thought that it would be
really nice to get as many people as possible to The Party as cheaply as
possible, we decided to organize a bustrip there with the Amiga people.
So we managed to load two buses full of computer freaks and start our trip
to The Party.
At that time The Party 1992 was the biggest demo party ever. There were
about 2500 computer freaks of which around 300 were PC dudes.
There we entered the demo compo with Panic, and to our surprise we came
second. Witan's Facts of Life had won the demo compo. We were quite
disappointed by this, because there was absolutely no voting. The voting
system on Amiga just didn't work. And then some Amiga organizer just asked
the last remaining PC organizer (A member of Danish Elite) "What do you
think were the best PC demos?" without telling him that these were going
to be the official results. And without thinking the PC organizer just
said "Witan's, FC's and Sonic's".
However, The Party 1992 was a nice party.
- 1993 -
After The Party 1992 we lived quietly for awhile. The only big change was
that Marvel (formerly in Sonic Amiga) joined us. So we now had two GFX
artists. Then we began thinking of making a diskmag (Worldcharts). At first
nobody really wanted to code it, so we thought that we would make it as a
co-operation with Stone (a finnish demogroup). But after some co-operation
trouble we began making it 100% by ourselves. Only the first issue was
released. Then we decided to stop making it, for we had other more important
projects to attend to.
Then it was the time for Assembly'93. Once again we were the PC organizers
and we made an invitation intro about it.
Assembly'93 was the biggest summer demo party ever. There were about 1500
people on the party place of which around 550 were PC demo freaks. Asm'93
was also a big advancement on the PC side. For the first time we also had
an intro, a music (4 channel and multichannel) and a graphics competition.
Next was The Party 1993 (also known as The Party 3), and all we can say is
that it wasn't such a good party as it could have been. This was NOT the
fault of the PC organizing group Access Denied, but instead it seemed that
the Amiga organizers had underestimated the PC side and thus treated the PC
side somewhat unfairly. Already there is some talk about organizing a
PC-only party for X-mas'94.
Anyway, we released the GUS version of our old Assembly'92 winner demo
Unreal, and Purple Motion's musicdisk called Journey (which also includes
the MDP - our MOD/S3M player for GUS/SB/SBPro).
- 1994 -
A new year has started and Future Crew is now almost 8 years old.
We have big plans for this year, both in the demo scene and in the commer-
cial market. We, along with Sonic PC, Accession, The Movement and
Virtual Dreams will organize Assembly '94 this year. According to what
we know by now, Asm '94 will be held from the 5th of August to the 7th of
August in the center of Helsinki (the capital city of Finland).
We have released the Assembly'94 Pre-Invitation Intro and the second
Assembly'94 Invitation Intro (which will include the final info).
We have also released the long-awaited Scream Tracker 3.01 BETA - A
project which has been in the making for over 2 years.
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│10: SONIC DREAMS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Two files which have claimed to be a demo from us under the
name of Sonic Dreams have been circulating boards around
Europe.
These files: FCSONIC1.ZIP and FCSONIC2.ZIP
A R E F A K E S !!!
We don't know the maker of these files nor the purpose of them.
Under our tests we have not found any viruses nor troijans in these
files. These files are composed of PCX pictures with some simple
C source code. Please delete the files when encountered. We
(the Future Crew) are not the makers of these files.
If you encounter these files on any commercial/shareware CD-ROM disk
or such, please, report to us immediately!
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│11: FINAL WORDS │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Thank you for reading this file.
Signed, GORE, Henchman & Abyss / FC