A.D.A. Amiga Demoscene Archive

Hi,

Ok, so it's now been 2 months since I finished this demo and am finally getting around to advertising it on here!
Those of you on EAB may have already seen this, but for those that only frequent on ADA here are the links:


Pouet page: http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=59047

Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWcnvkNjNgo


I recommend that you download the LHA'ed ADF, as the YouTube video is a little messed up - the sound is out of sync by 2 seconds or so, an annoying glitch with 1 pixel gaps being filled every few frames on certain screens and the rendered image (that looks like pixel-art) is kinda messed up :(
I'm not sure whether that's down to my lack of expertise with video formats or not (I converted a 400MB .avi file to 40MB .flv file and then added subtitles (which added an extra 5 MB to the .flv file)).


Edit: (added 12th April)

Just realised I forgot to mention that my demo should be run from boot-up on an Amiga 600. Preferably with workbench 2.05


Regards,
Lonewolf10

Ok, watched the intro on youtube so i'm going to give my honest feedback which i hope you will see as constructive.

First of all, i think you should try and get original tunes for a new intro. Maybe i'm alone on this, but it's kind of offputting to see a new intro with such a well-known tune in it. An original new tune helps to set it apart from the rest and create an own identity. As an example, the nice tune in Kaiser's second intro helped a lot in making it enjoyable.

Secondly, the graphics and color need to improve a bit. Personally, i'm not a fan of scanned graphics (unless integrated into a picture or backdrop or something). A bit more different (meaning not "true" blue, red, green, white, yellow, purple) colors could help a lot in improving the look of it. I understand it has that typical retro look (lot's of black, copper bars,...) so it might have been on purpose. I like a bit of retro with a modern twist though.

Thirdly, when watching the intro, i felt you should have condensed everything into a much shorter time and added a bit more flow. The running time is nearly 8 minutes, which is a lot. Ofcourse, it has some scrollers and the credits take a lot of running time. But even then. Each scene lasted a bit too long without much new happening.

I have the feeling that it would be useful to make a one (or two) screen intro first and try to intergrate some different effects into that one (or two) screens and make it look good design/color wise + original tune. After that, you could go for more and longer demos.

I am happy to receive honest opinions - good or bad - as long as they are worded in a polite and constructive manor :)


I wasn't aware that it was a well known tune when I made it. I have loads of Amiga CD's packed with music in various formats, and picked 2 of them that I really liked. After all, the vast majority of those tunes are long since forgotten by many and would have been missed my many people. However, I'll try to get someone to compose fresh tunes for my future projects, aswell as including old tunes.


Not sure if you are talking about the copper-based effects here or not... No images have been scanned in. It's all been created fresh by myself and, in the case of the intro logo, Greyfox. I forget his old demoscene name. I'll have to get that correct for my next assembler project.


A few people have said it does have a retro-style look. To be honest, until recently (the last 6 months or so) I have mainly seen old-style demos from the 80's and early 90's.
Plus, red, green and blue is easier to mask out for a newbie than it is to mask out more complicated colours.


I agree that the demo was quite long - the deconstruction of wireframe bit originally took 3 times longer to run and I speeded it up by doing more lines at a time . I will have to work on a better flow for my next demo, and leave out the scrollers until the end credits.


Alot of my time with it was spent learning how to play with the hardware. I think if you go back to the demo's that alot of groups/people make you do tend to see that early demo's are flawed in one way or another.
I now have a benchmark which I hope to improve apon in my next demo (which probably won't be out until next year). I will take some time out to play with the hardware some more and learn how to improve my coding.


Regards,
Lonewolf10

Hi Lonewolf !
That's nice you released your first demo !
There are plenty of oldschool effects (I'm more used to 1991 - 1993 demos than 1988 ones, though.), so the demo is rich, and the effects themselves are quite nice. Maybe screens could have been richer if you had mixed effects with gfxes (like, for instance, in the credits screen at the end). I'm actually working myself on the same design questions :-)
As you have several screens, I think transitions between screens and effects should be faster; the demo seems too long. Maybe the scrolltexts could scroll faster, so you could say the same things in less time :-)

You contribute to make the Amiga a living platform !! and that's important, too.

No demo until next year ? why not working on, for instance, a one-screen intro ? that can also be a good coding / design exercise !
I'll watch with interest your future releases :-)

Kaiser

Well done as a first attempt.There's a start for everything,and I'm quite sure you've learned a lot from making this demo.So,stay motivated and have fun coding the old lady.