Conference hydra::amiga_v1

    Hi
    
    	I got SCOOPEX last night and I was not impressed.  All it is was
    some scrolling stars and music.  I used the newest version of LHWarp. 
    Is it a cheap demo or am I missing something!
    
    
    						   	Denis

    I've uploaded a couple of European demos to CRISTA""::AMIGA: (I didn't
    copy them to TAPE:: but I didn't want to start a new note; hope you don't
    mind). Bill Leimberger got them at System Eyes from their CBM rep.
    I've Lhwarp'ed them because they both have non-standard boot blocks and
    non-DOS formats (you'll get the usual validation/checksum error requestor
    and VirusX will complain about a non-standard boot block), but you can
    copy them with DISKCOPY. However, DISKCOPY will guru when finished.

                         REBELS-MEGADEMO.LHW    1701

    This demo, the second from the Swedish Rebels group, is awesome. There's
    something like seven different parts with great music and some incredible
    scrolling effects. My favorite is the BOBVECTORDEMO. Each one is fairly
    lengthy and will loop continually. The main screen has a nice "tracks
    left" display as it loads (rather quickly, I might add) and pressing the
    HELP key reveals some additional info. Certain parts allow interaction,
    for example SMILEY allows you to display different rotating objects via
    F1-F10 and pressing the ESC key enables mouse movements to control the
    object chosen. The first part has a neat effect; four "Maxine Headroom's"
    ([stolen?] from the NewTek DemoReel3) bob their heads to the music (one
    for each of the four channels?). It appears to be slated for PAL machines
    as you lose a tad of the display at the bottom on an NTSC machine, but
    you don't miss much. There's a good mix of sampled and genrated sounds.
    The amazing part is that this sucker runs on a 512K machine! Stay Cool...


                         MK-MUSICDISK2.LHW      1646

    This one is labeled as the second music disk from Mahoney and Kaktus. It
    contains a total of 46 tunes from the latter and others. The music is
    great and there's a lot of screen activity (turn up the intensity to
    catch them all), scrolling text and screen gadgets for play style, tune
    selection, volume and disk loading speed control. That last one scares
    me because the instructions mention it's use to prevent damage to the
    drive, but don't indicate whether faster or slower is safer. It starts
    out at about the 3/4 mark, but the drive gronks away at what seems any
    setting, although there is a definite sound/speed difference. There's
    also a nice four-line "waveform" display that reflects the music (how
    accurate it is I couldn't tell you), but it looks neat. One thing that's
    hard to get used to is the behavior of the mouse pointer. Every movement
    of the mouse causes it to travel along "frictionlessly" (is that a word?)
    and bounce off the "walls". Accurate control takes some getting used to
    for us heavy-handed mouse rollers, but it's a neat effect. There's some
    not so obvious functions according to the instructions, but I've only
    found one so far; pressing the ENTER key causes the list of songs to
    "wave", although it also does this on it's own periodically. Bill found
    if you press the left mouse button in the scrolling objects area when
    there's no song currently loaded, the "stars" will follow the pointer.
    This one also runs on a 512K machine.

    Enjoy,

    Pete

    And now for something completely different. It's...

    A playable demo version of Virgin Mastertronic's arcade style game
    "MONTY PYTHONS FLYING CIRCUS", as presented by Science 451, is available
    on CRISTA""::AMIGA: as:

                               MONTS451.ZAP    368

    You'll need the disk archiver ZAP to unpack it and that's also available
    on CRISTA and in TAPE's upload area (Thanks Steve). The demo requires
    that external drives and extra memory be turned off. The boot block
    contains a boot block-resident Virus Killer/Boot Utility that enables
    you to enable/disable external drives/extra memory. When you boot the
    disk, a screen comes up that displays the current status and the function
    key definitions for the utility. You toggle the settings for the external
    drives (F1 - OFF / F3 - ON) and memory (F2 OFF / F4 - ON) to OFF and then
    it "reboots" to confirm the settings. Don't hesitate too long, however, for
    it will fall through to AmigaDOS. F5 will invoke a "HARD RESET" and F6
    enables you to install the boot utility. The left mouse button exits the
    utility screen and the right mouse button has the label "FILTER" asociated
    with it (whatever that does).

    As for the demo itself, it's pretty good and will be a treat for any Python
    fans out there. You control a "twit" in a Terry Gilliam world (you know all
    those neat animations he does) dodging 16-ton weights, pestered by a
    shrubbery. Then your heads removed, placed on a fish's body, and you
    traverse the sewers while blasting and/or avoiding a multitude of objects
    while searching for cans of "Spam" for strength. Of course, in the true
    tradition, you're constantly interrupted with lessons on how to "recognise
    different types of trees from quite a long way away; number one: the larch".
    Good fun and worth the download.

    ETH NED,

    Pete

We tried to get the demo working. It ran but only cycled between the title
screen and the "extremely silly scores" screen. We couldn't figure out how to
play it (or even how to get the game to start). BTW, we had to disconnect the 
external floppy and the hard disk (which has my extra 2M of ram).

Any ideas? 

Dave (and WJG)

> We tried to get the demo working. It ran but only cycled between the title
> screen and the "extremely silly scores" screen. We couldn't figure out how to

    I'm not sure if there's another way but on my A2000HD+2Mb at home and
    A1000 with external floppy and HD at work, a press of the joystick fire
    button (plugged into port 2) gets things rolling. You then get a screen
    which by using the joystick up/down (or left/right? I forget...) toggle
    the cartoon portions on/off and the music on/off (the choices are
    sound/music but I guess sounds are always on) and you then proceed by
    pressing the fire button again.

> play it (or even how to get the game to start). BTW, we had to disconnect the 
> external floppy and the hard disk (which has my extra 2M of ram).

    You shouldn't have to physically disconnect anything! Make sure you
    retain the non-standard boot block after un-ZAPing. When you boot the
    floppy, you should see a black screen with a large white text menu with
    the title "VIRUS KILLER/BOOT UTILITY V6.1" or something to that effect.
    Below that is a status line with something like "EXTERNAL DRIVES ON/OFF"
    and "EXTERNAL MEMORY ON/OFF" with the on/off depending on your
    configuration and below that, it lists a bunch of function key (F1-F6)
    and left/right mouse button descriptions. Press the appropriate key(s)
    to turn off external drives (F1) and/or memory (F2). It seems to behave
    differently on different machines and/or Kickstart versions and/or
    autoboot/non-autoboot hardware, etc. For example, on my A2000HD if I
    pressed F2 to disable FASTMEM (I've only got one floppy), it would do a
    warm reboot and the status line would reflect the change. Also, if I
    didn't type anything in within n number of seconds, it would fall
    through automatically to the game. On the A1000 (0 FASTMEM, 1 external
    flop) however, It wouldn't proceed until I pressed the left mouse
    button (exit).

    I originally had trouble because I assumed the "VIRUS KILLER" was just
    a pattern/checksum (or CRC) written to the boot block to guard against
    a boot block virus, and I overwrote it (via VirusX) with the standard
    DOS stuff. But the utility portion of the boot block allows you to
    configure what the game will see for hardware. Pretty slick utility; it
    even has the ability to regenerate itself via F6. Unfortunately, this
    is no excuse for brain-dead programs that won't run with extra RAM or
    require to disconnect external drives, but the utility does help ease
    the pain.

    Hope his helps,

    Pete

Yup, it was the Joy Stick! being avid game players, we were blind to this 
possiblity :^;

It took Tom Moore's 13(?) year old daughter to figure that one out for us!

john

To whoever put this one up - THANX

As a person who grew up with monty python, and someone who has assisted in
demolishing the best part of barrels of beer listening to the records I thank
you deeply from the bottom of my heart!!

Does anyone know when the real game is going to come out (or is it out).


I MUST HAVE IT!

Regards

Stan Gifford.

(my favorite was the Assie wine sketch)

'notice the destingtive shape of the bottle, very useful in hand to hand combat'

    Hmmmm.  Does the Monty Python demo work on machines with the 1 Meg
    Agnus?  I can't get it to run on my 2000, but it works on my old 1000.
    

    
    Works fine on my Fat Agnus equipped 2500/20.
    
    I had to toggle F4, F5, and F6 to get the graphics to appear correctly. 
    After that, the boot block appears to get modified to reflect these
    settings, and it boots correctly from the start.
    
    Ed.

    Curious.  I tried just about every combination of the startup options,
    and the result was *always* the same.  I can hear the sounds, and I
    can see bits and pieces of the graphics, but the display is very dim
    and rolling wildly (like it has no sync).  [I don't think it's the
    monitor's fault, it has been rock steady under all other conditions,
    including PAL displays.]
    
    I hope these morons learn how to produce programs without stupid
    configuration requirements before releasing this game...

    Re; -1
    
    My story is EXACTLY the same. Not much of a demo when all you hear
    is a sound sample.

    Re: -.1, -.2

    This is the exact same problem I originally had until *you* (Bruce) gave 
    me a tip about the scrambled video symptom and FAST RAM. I agree, the
    program is brain-dead when it comes to these requirements, but the
    utility should "fix" things without having to rearrange the hardware.

    1.) Make sure the utility boot section of the floppy disk stays intact.
        If not, you may possibly be able to recover it by pressing F6 at
        the utility screen (rewrites the boot block). I originally created
        an LHWARP archive version of the demo to upload , once I got it to
        work, because I thought more people might have it instead of ZAP.
        But when I unpacked it, the boot area was not right, and I couldn't
        get it work properly. I pressed F6 (with the disk write enabled)
        and on reboot it worked with no problems. Unfortunately, the ZAP
        file was smaller, so I stuck with it. The point is, even if the
        utility is not complete, it can apparently regenerate itself.

    2.) You must type the apropriate keys while at the utility screen to
        disable extra memory and drives. Also, the utility seems to have a
        dead-man's timer, so if you don't type quickly enough, it will
        drop through and complete the boot. Check the status lines below
        the title on the utility screen to see what it "sees" as your
        configuration (ie/ MEMORY OFF   EXTERNAL DRIVES ON) so you can
        press the correct function key(s).

    FWIW, it has worked on systems with/without FASTRAM, fatter Agnus,
    external floppy drives, hardrives, etc. I've haven't tried installing
    it on a hard drive because of the custom boot stuff. I had tried running
    NOFASTMEM first and then running the demo from the CLI, but no go.

    Don't give up yet!

    Pete

    re: last few
    
    To get the Monty Python demo running on my fat Agnus 2000 with external
    drives and 3 Meg RAM, I do the following...
    
    {boot} hit F1 {program reboots} hit F2 {program reboots} 
    click left mouse button {demo begins}
    
    Refreshing the boot block seems to make no difference - the sequence
    above is needed every time.
    
    The demo itself is quite amusing if you like the Pythons, and has
    several subtle touches, such as theme music played on the same
    instrument you'd find at an amusement park carousel (a calliope?).  The
    demo is for PAL machines, but only a status line is cut off on my NTSC
    screen.
    
    I agree with recent replies that the boot scheme and configuration
    requirements are brain-dead.  For the last few days I've also been
    wrestling with Euro-demos, and the loader on the Python demo is not
    really all that different in kind from the funny loader on the M & K
    music disk or even the dreaded Red Sector Megademo loader.  
    
    For the Python disk,  the demo animation, at least, doesn't require
    great speed.  So it doesn't make any sense to trash the operating
    system.
    
    Wes

    re: -.1 problems with Euro-demos
    
    No downloading problems, except for having to split up one or two big
    ones to fit on peecee diskettes.  No, the problem is screwy custom
    loaders that make these disks act differently from regular Amiga disks. 
    The Red Sector Megademo disk is especially flaky, as you must nurse
    along the loading process between demos.
    
    Wes

    But I'm NOT as dumb as I look...  Honest!
    
    I tried it again last night just to be sure.  I carefully poked "F"
    keys until the status line said: "DRIVES OFF, MEMORY OFF"; clicked
    the left mouse button and the result was the same.  In fact, it seems
    to make no difference whether I set the drives and memory OFF or ON,
    it *always* looks the same.
    
    I don't really care, it's just mysterious.

    Re: -.1

    Bruce, I'd like you to meet Bruce; he's in charge of the sheep dip...

    Sorry, I don't have an answer for you. Did you try an F6 with the disk
    write enabled? Have you tried banging your head on the wall several
    times? I believe the person who wrote the program did just that before
    writing it ;^)

    Pete

    re: .16
    
    If you try the sequence I put in .13, the indicators will NOT say
    "drives off, memory off," but the demo does work.  I found this out
    through something like an hour of trial and error.
    
    Wes

    
    one more step is needed - power off for a minute or so, then
    power up and try the steps in .13  (although I use F2 then F1,
    since F1 will switch to OFF if pressed after F2)
    
    I get the impression that this thing was designed, debugged, etc.
    on a single drive 512K PAL Amiga.
    
    Dave

    OK, having caught the bug, here are two more demos.  I got these from
    the Internet archive at 'abcdf20' and have tried them out.  Both are in
    the usual place:
    	TAPE::USER2:[UPLOAD]
    The files are...
    
    VECTORBALL.LZH  Swirling, swooping balls flying in formation, with a
    Eurostyle soundtrack.  Clearly an ancestor of the Vectorballs segment
    on the Red Sector Megademo disk.  PAL, also does not run on my A2000
    after loading Workbench.  The following produces a bootable disk:
       1.  INSTALL AmigaDos on a fresh diskette.
       2.  De-archive VECTORBALL.LZH and put the four files on the
           diskette.
       3.  Add a file s/startup-sequence to the diskette containing just:
    			VectorBallDemo
    
    If you have a Fat(ter,test) Agnus, you may wish to modify the disk for
    a PAL display using PALboot.
    
    PSYGNOSIS-DEMO.LHW  Slide show from Psygnosis and Psyclapse games, with
    Eurostyle soundtrack.  NTSC compatible!  High testosterone level in the
    images.  Unwarp this to make a bootable diskette.  Note: attempts to do
    a DIR on the resulting diskette crash the Amiga.
    
    Enjoy!
    
    Wes

>
>                         MK-MUSICDISK2.LHW      1646
>
>    This one is labeled as the second music disk from Mahoney and Kaktus. It
>    contains a total of 46 tunes from the latter and others. The music is
>    great and there's a lot of screen activity (turn up the intensity to
...

How do you get the music to play?  I get boot the disk and get the selection
screen, click LMB on a title, and the title appears in the lower part of the
screen, but nothing else happens.  The only sound I get is a "Boing" when
I click on the SILENCE button.

Thanks!

>    I can't remember offhand but I think it should start as soon as you
>    make a selection (well, after it finishes loading the tune). If you

Maybe this is my problem.  When I select the first tune, the disk drive
becomes active and sounds like it is loading, but the drive LED never
goes out after that...

> Maybe this is my problem.  When I select the first tune, the disk drive
> becomes active and sounds like it is loading, but the drive LED never
> goes out after that...

    Actually, I think the drive LED stays on from the word go, however you
    can tell when a tune is loading; the name of the selected tune is
    brightly highlighted in the list and it appears at the top of the lower
    scrolling region. Also, the title scrolling gadgets will "freeze" and
    when you move the mouse pointer to the lower scrolling area, the "stars"
    will follow the pointer. After the load completes, the four horizontal
    lines will display waveforms as the music plays. Some of the tunes take
    quite a long time to load, but you can hear the difference between the
    load and idle sounds of the disk. When it's loading, the gronking is
    quite evident; this part scares me, especially when the speed control
    just seems to change the pitch of the nasty, horrible scraping sounds
    of the stepper motor shaking itself to pieces and the spindle motor
    burning up from reversing rotation at high frequency...;^)
    If you still have problems (and you feel daring), try playing around
    with the diskspeed control; perhaps you have a fussy drive (gad knows
    what they're using to torture the load device). Although I don't think
    it's a major factor, what version of LHWARP did you use?

    Pete

>    what they're using to torture the load device). Although I don't think
>    it's a major factor, what version of LHWARP did you use?

I think I used 1.31 or 1.30.  I will try it again.  Thanks.