Sure I've done something similar elsewhere in the forum but just wanted to elaborate a little on everyone's history. This was also inspired by a similar vein thread I took part in over at the bl0g forums run by Dick (ex-Freak/NFA). Guests feel free to input your guffage.

My scene history

I basically took notice of the Amiga scene around the early 90's which was technically late compared to some. I straight swapped my Sega MD for a fully loaded Miggy A500 bundle, a decent deal at the time.

After stumbling onto a few PD libraries I then found the 'scene' and was overwhelmed by what gfx/audio delights this piece of kit was capable of.

I was never really a member of any big scene groups although I did swap with a few of the better known sceners and I was more of a follower of the scene than an active member due to working all over the country on various contracting jobs. I always kept my finger on the pulse when back at home and the good wages funded MANY new parts, so I well and truly did my bit for the CBM hardware scene! Usually kept in letter contact with a good few of my swapping contacts during the periods of travelling. BBS'ed like a maniac on my wkends off too - remember those fookin' phone bills! :o

After the A500 had various upgrades, I moved to an A1200 which proceeded to have the shit modded out of it and ended up as a PPC + BVision unit bundled in a full Eyetech case. Then sold on and migrated to PC.

Ex Handles: Darkhorse, Mr.Q

Ex Groups: D.K Productions, Psykosonik (I think that was the name?)

I designed a front end for a m8 who founded the group Aneurysm but the prod was never released, their other prods included a few gfx front ends with ripped & protracked chart hits with usual greetz scroller.

I also released Mr.Q's Classic Arcade vols 1 & 2 and sent to a few PD libraries.. got a mention in CU Amiga in one of the PD ads as being one of the better selling titles.. yay! Also contributed some articles to The Word diskmag under the nick DarkHorse.

The Psykosonik group thing was basically an alias for a few ascii's and txts that I did which were uploaded to various local BBSes. Think the group name was inspired by a techno band?

Last thoughts: OldSkoOL will never die!

I got myself an Amiga around the time Blue boxing died so i missed out on all the FREE calls to bbs's :(

I never done much in the scene other than d/l demos and read disk mags.

Eventually i run a bbs.. DooM Castle bbs...... I had some good fun with this and chatted to a few kewl people.... I was 2nd person in UK to get Theme park for A500 and A1200 so did quite well :)...


EX Groups: (in order i joined)
X-Rayz - 976 Ev!l -Tesko

EX Handles:
Phantom


Started to learn C and done a few bbs doors (programs that run inside of the bbs program) but cant remember what they were....

Last thoughts:

"Bring back the old scene days"

... and whats wrong with AMOS?

used properly it can make some great demo's and decent games. Known AMOS made games include Valhalla, Base Jumpers and Jet Strike.

I have a pretty large collection of AMOS games and make Amiga software via AMOS. It's a great language, especially at this stage in the Amiga's life - no point learning assembler or ML for the 68K's!


Regards,
Lonewolf10

Welcome to oS-uK Andy (Lonewolf)!

After noticing that you'd posted in here, I was hoping to see a long article regarding your Amiga scene history - but alas you were just defending good ole AMOS. ;)

Love it or hate it, AMOS was a dominant part of our PD gaming lives at some point or another.

* Just to explain who Lonewolf is (for the benefit of everyone here), he was a reader/fan of my ascii newsletter and wanted to place an ad in the next issue, which sadly, will probably never happen?

He is currently collecting old AMOS stuff (Scorched Tanks anyone?) and is on the look out for links and/or general help in using this particular spin off language.

Jump in here with any additional comments Andy!

wow... errr where the hell to begin... now... let me try somewhere near the begining.

Zetr0 - part 1

back in 1983 - ish I built my first computer. (with a soldering iron) my dad was supervising, wich ment scratching his head when reading the instructions, I spent 2 or 3 days building that ZX80 kit built white monster... ahhh.. when it worked FIRST TIME that was a good feeling... by the time i was 10 I KNEW Zx80 basic, and had begun reading Z80 ASM magazine tutorials by the time i was 11-12.

computers really came easy for me in all truth, i remeber mrs redman cautioning 3 times in two weeks because the computer lab (6 BBC B's) for taking down the network, installing game files and removing administrator passwords, but since they had no proof it was me its all good..... (chuckles evily)

so from the age of 13 by this time its 1986-7 and I have a speky 48k+ with Interface 1 + Half modded Microdrive + Curra-speach unit and the obligatory Kempston interface... now that was a SERIOUS computer... big.. clacky and mean looking.. I used to abuse the beebs at skool on the BBS lol, it would take a day to load the software.. to be undone so quickly when your first Beeb ASM program pokes the keyboard buffer planting an ESC command ... if some one had checked the loader they would of seen it LOL. its would load up and say press space to continue... ... i am sure you can figure out the rest LOL

We got a CMB 64 that year... and by the end of the year we had every game i think ever published LOL... are home built datacassette duplicators... such fun.. I learned so much... Azimuth / parallel head reading / and fine tuning with a terminal screwy! ahh.... just remembering the noises.... wholesome...

end of part 1.

Amos was great and don't let any l337 coder tell you otherwise even i used it for a map convertor Very basic but beyond what i'd ever achieve in basic!

Amos indeed had a few great games for one Operation Lemmings i've played it recently (in the last year or so) and it's still one fine game! As for Scorched Tanks if we are talking about the same guy he is still going and doing Pocket Tanks for PC and Apple mac with shitloads of expansions and new weapons and i am a registerd user. Also one of my all time Amiga PD faves CA$H BA$H a great slot machine game!

Myself and sleepwalk played about with Amos/Easy Amos/Amos Pro plus the compiler etc great times was had by all :)

@Zetro we are gonna have to have a vote but i'd say you are the biggest computer geek we have here ;)

I didn't get my own computer (speccy 16k was ripped off) till i was 17, At school we had 2 beebs one with mono / green screen and the other with colour screen used to love playing defender / scramble etc the best conversions around at the time.

guys at school had computers ranging from the texas instruments Ti/49a to speccys and of course Atari consoles + plus an intellivision, 1 guy had a zx80 and another a zx81 we'd all do a few lines of typing in games etc out of the mags at the time only to find they didn't work and we'd have to wait till next month to get the errors fixed ;)

Also @ Zetro i can't believe you built a zx80 i've seen kits today on Ebay for zx81
with all the bits u need etc!

I had to wait a further 5 years before i got a c64 that was the Amiga of the day and when i got my c64 (the old Bull shape one!) it had a sound fault but i wasnt taking it back (2 dixons lol:)) and i figured out the modulator was out on the back and was happy as larry when i fixed it ;) and the game i tuned it into was Panther (mastertronic i think ;))

As for the Azumith tape alignment etc i also had those probs but i swapped a c2n tape deck for a Load-It tape deck i've only ever seen 1 on ebay but wasn't prepaird to buy a whole system just for a load it tape deck! way back at the time i didn't know you could get an interface to link 2 c2n tapedecks together and a few years ago i threw one of those away not knowing what it was :( We tweaked out alignment the old fashioned way with 1 qtr turns and then when near everything worked borrowed the girl friends nail varnish (or wife if you was old enough ;))

(@Zetro could you still make one of those i'd love one???) of course i have a c64 a c2n and a disk drive but i'd love to make up for that piece of hardware i threw away not knowing what it was!)

Can't believe my m8 posted 2 c128's out plus disk drives etc for next to fuck all tho he did get insurance back on the 2 c128's as some mug dirty theiving bastard postie worker nicked the box which had amstrad double deck vhs recorder on it (at the time very expensive) i bet he was shocked when he got home with 2 cbm 128's ;) They where yellowed to fuck too as the guy was a heavy smoker no minters here lol:)

Back in those days cause myself and sleepwalk couldnt afford Disk drives for our c64's we just had tapes but we saw in zzap64 about the demo scene the nearest we got was a game called TRAP with a cool hidden demo with a guy beating drums to a jm jarre assisted soundtrack Awesome at the time!

wow impressive days no wonder we all get that as dazzaboy would put it retro vibe ;)

@Sarek

biggest computer geek eh???

thats some kinds words my friend... i would be proud to wear that title.

Indeedy, a Zx80 White Kit built computer from Sinclair :D they shipped these before the zx81 and £30-£40 cheaper too, wich in the day was a loot of money in 1983 LOL.

Yepo, I can easly make, just let me download a couple of schemaitcs and gimmie a couple of days for my copper clad boards to come through from ebay ;) (i need a good etching project)

btw, you can buy datacasset port adapter that read MMC media cards :D seriously for arround £30 a CF carded C64... that will certainly be a projet down the line.