4 ms·
Great article, I love "digital archeology"! I created two demos in 1986 that also show additional colors to the basic palette of the C64. I don't recall whethe
by evaneykelen 4y ago
Great article, I love "digital archeology"!
I created two demos in 1986 that also show additional colors to the basic palette of the C64. I don't recall whether these demos used a pattern of pixels that caused "CRT bleed" [1] or whether colors were quickly alternated in the way described by the article.
I just ran the demos in Vice and took screenshots [2]. As an aside, notice that the sprites extend outside the regular border which was long considered impossible on the C64. A whole arms race started between demo groups to beat each other by taking border sprites to the next level. I contributed to a number of those demos too [3].
[1] Of course, I just ran the emulator on a non-CRT display on MBP but I don't know how well the C64 emulator also emulates the bad video quality of 80s TVs/monitors. I seem to notice some bleed artifacts in the screenshots.
[2] https://twitter.com/hackteck/status/1634807467056963585 https://twitter.com/hackteck/status/1634807467056963585
[3] https://csdb.dk/group/?id=81 https://csdb.dk/group/?id=81
- evaneykelen 4y agoAnswering my own question by disabling [1] "CRT emulation" in Vice. My demos were using "CRT bleed". [1] https://twitter.com/hackteck/status/1634813587846844418 https://twitter.com/hackteck/status/1634813587846844418
- _the_inflator 4y agoCool, Hacktec from legendary 1001. :) Sodan vs 1001 - of course veterans will remember. Also the story about how Cardcruncher got stolen and then released. ESCOS is still highly regarded today as it should be.
- ruk_booze 4y agoESCOS blew my mind back then. 1001 Crew sparked the whole C64 demoscene, IMO. I stand in awe.
- pwrrr 4y agoIndeed the most insane effects were always created by the dutch :)
- _the_inflator 4y agoSame here. I will never forget my "first contact" with it. I saw ESCOS at a friend's house (Brandis/Success). At first I thought he manipulated the monitor, which was able to zoom in so that it shows only the text/graphics area. :D
- evaneykelen 4y agoIndeed, that’s me! Were you active in the demo scene too?
- _the_inflator 4y agoYes, on C64 I've been with Beastie Boys, X-Rated and again with Remember later on. Now working on a contribution to the Amiga competition for Revision 2023.
- pwrrr 4y agoThose were the times :) I remember Sodan releasing his borderscroll back then. I guess 1001 released their demo first. 1001 was always held in the highest regard by us scandinavians :)
- OnlyMortal 4y agoTop and bottom border sprites were trivial. A single poke turned off those borders. Side border sprites were trickier as you had to catch the raster and, to prevent flickering, time your code with a few “nop” instructions. Then there’s the full screen scrolling trick. Not the 8 pixel shift. I mean full screen scrolling. It used a “bug” in the VIC. Mayhem In Monsterland been an actual real world use: https://youtu.be/ldo2ewLBt3Y https://youtu.be/ldo2ewLBt3Y
- pwrrr 4y agoYeah VSP. Although you could scroll the entire screen with $d016 by splitting up the fullscreen byte shift in the 7 frames before the shift :)
- prvc 4y agoDoesn't it support scrolling officially?
- tinus_hn 4y agoIt supports scrolling up to 7 pixels but after that you have to actually move the memory backing the screen, and the cpu is slow enough that it’s pretty hard to do.