Is the demo scene dead or does it just smell that way?
category: general [glöplog]
Interesting discussion.
However, I think a large majority of the posters are not actual members of the Amiga scene. Am I getting this wrong? I see Amiga sceners jazzcat and grip replying after about a page worth of posts. Anyone else?
It would be helpful to disclose when discussing the state of the Amiga scene, at least your current level of involvement or what have you looked at/attended/tried to do.
Aside from childhood programming, I got involved in 2024 and I have seen the Amiga OCS scene grow very quickly since then, with some of the best known folks coming back after dormancy (Hannibal/Lemon, Amigo/Binary, Jobbo/Cosmic Orbs, Hyde/Andromeda, Leonard/Oxygene, Bishop/Existenz) and some super exciting newcomers (Gigabates/Desire, Van Damme, Ash Checksum/Hackers, h0ffman/TTE, Spreadpoint). I feel bad listing only these folks, because I know there is more that I forgot. Not to mention folks that have been active throughout like bifat/TEK, Dan/Lemon, Facet/Lemon, FFP, Ghostown, britlite/DKD, bonefish/Reality and many many more that I unintentionally omitted.
I am not trying to be elitist, but it should matter whether the opinion of Amiga scene and where it's going and how it's going comes from participants or mostly uninvolved folks (but maybe very involved in posting and voting and commenting on everything in Pouet).
@porocyon and anyone else interested in tooling:
https://github.com/BartmanAbyss/vscode-amiga-debug
https://github.com/alpine9000/engine9000-public
https://howprice.itch.io/aira-force
^ These tools should be on your shortlist if you are interested in actual development on Amiga. They are very modern with tons of functionality and a breakneck development pace.
However, I think a large majority of the posters are not actual members of the Amiga scene. Am I getting this wrong? I see Amiga sceners jazzcat and grip replying after about a page worth of posts. Anyone else?
It would be helpful to disclose when discussing the state of the Amiga scene, at least your current level of involvement or what have you looked at/attended/tried to do.
Aside from childhood programming, I got involved in 2024 and I have seen the Amiga OCS scene grow very quickly since then, with some of the best known folks coming back after dormancy (Hannibal/Lemon, Amigo/Binary, Jobbo/Cosmic Orbs, Hyde/Andromeda, Leonard/Oxygene, Bishop/Existenz) and some super exciting newcomers (Gigabates/Desire, Van Damme, Ash Checksum/Hackers, h0ffman/TTE, Spreadpoint). I feel bad listing only these folks, because I know there is more that I forgot. Not to mention folks that have been active throughout like bifat/TEK, Dan/Lemon, Facet/Lemon, FFP, Ghostown, britlite/DKD, bonefish/Reality and many many more that I unintentionally omitted.
I am not trying to be elitist, but it should matter whether the opinion of Amiga scene and where it's going and how it's going comes from participants or mostly uninvolved folks (but maybe very involved in posting and voting and commenting on everything in Pouet).
@porocyon and anyone else interested in tooling:
https://github.com/BartmanAbyss/vscode-amiga-debug
https://github.com/alpine9000/engine9000-public
https://howprice.itch.io/aira-force
^ These tools should be on your shortlist if you are interested in actual development on Amiga. They are very modern with tons of functionality and a breakneck development pace.
Before someone else beats me to it: Spreadpoint was meant to go under recovering from dormancy. Forgot also Alcatraz. Also Virgill. As I sead, too many to list, but prefer backing up what I say with some real info.
Platon42/Desire, Nah Kolor, TRSi and other Italian groups, etc. etc. New Generation Crew, etc. etc. etc.
Fuck forgot all the awesomeness with No-CPU, a whole new Amiga-only category emerging which is for people who write awesome demos with absolutely nothing else running. This is blueberry/Loonies, mop2/AA, Zymosis, Attentionwhore, Amigals (newcomers, girls FWIW). Also forgot Spaceballs which has been a permanent fixture, innovative as always.
Just seems to me most of the audience and a majority of posters here does not know much about the Amiga scene, which is understandable because it's smaller and maybe not super active on this particular forum/website/social network
Just seems to me most of the audience and a majority of posters here does not know much about the Amiga scene, which is understandable because it's smaller and maybe not super active on this particular forum/website/social network
Having A.D.A. (or some other Amiga scene website/database) updated and buzzing with activity (like CSDB for C64) would additionally help improve the image. Or perhaps this exists unbeknownst to me?
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I am not trying to be elitist,
Obviously not trying very hard :)
Hello, @maalinstrippari. Thanks for your reply. Here are my comments.
> I would recommending opening your eyes and not basing your conclusions on a handful of highly anecdotal outsider observations.
Well, if I had touted this as a highly scientific study based on 2 (!) persons, this would have had been very valid critique. But I'm not. I like remembering the times of the old and mainly observing yhe scene. Am I an outsider? I don't know. Maybe. But I am at least in the scene. Went to DataStorm 2017, Revision 2026, Edison 2021,23,25 and Påga Data 2024. So, yeah, I have seen the scene. I have also been active in the olden days of 1994-96 as an orga/sysop in an obscure group called Eternal (ETA). It turned out to be anything but ... ehhhmmm... Eternal. Still, I will say that I have been around enough to make that observastion. It's a least good enough for me.
> this is frankly insulting to anyone in the scene (or any of the hobbies you mentioned) who isn't male.
When you say that one should not base reasoning on anecdotal data, I hope you understand that also includes you. I certainly hope others don't see it that way. I have definately not meant to be rude or condescending. I merely state that there are not enough women in the demo scene. I stand by that notion! I want more women in the scene. I hope people of all genders, sexual identities, vocations and ages comes around to join our community. This is the demo scene of today. Not the old one, but I certainly do not miss the elitist days of the 90s. "Lamer" was the term for anyone who did not fit in. I really don't want that back.
And as to the "demo scene dying", remmeber thar I (the OP) did not exactly say that (should probably had added "Amiga" in the subject, though). I talked about the Amiga-scene and noted, dying or not, it is not going to exist forever. And it's probably doing just fine today, so I don't worry. But will it be around in 20 years? I don't know. I does not matter. Newer people will come along and redefine the scene. So that's always that.
I close my argument by paraphrasing legendary cartonist Walt Kelly, "Don't Take the Amiga demo scene So Serious … It Ain't Nohow Permanent"
> I would recommending opening your eyes and not basing your conclusions on a handful of highly anecdotal outsider observations.
Well, if I had touted this as a highly scientific study based on 2 (!) persons, this would have had been very valid critique. But I'm not. I like remembering the times of the old and mainly observing yhe scene. Am I an outsider? I don't know. Maybe. But I am at least in the scene. Went to DataStorm 2017, Revision 2026, Edison 2021,23,25 and Påga Data 2024. So, yeah, I have seen the scene. I have also been active in the olden days of 1994-96 as an orga/sysop in an obscure group called Eternal (ETA). It turned out to be anything but ... ehhhmmm... Eternal. Still, I will say that I have been around enough to make that observastion. It's a least good enough for me.
> this is frankly insulting to anyone in the scene (or any of the hobbies you mentioned) who isn't male.
When you say that one should not base reasoning on anecdotal data, I hope you understand that also includes you. I certainly hope others don't see it that way. I have definately not meant to be rude or condescending. I merely state that there are not enough women in the demo scene. I stand by that notion! I want more women in the scene. I hope people of all genders, sexual identities, vocations and ages comes around to join our community. This is the demo scene of today. Not the old one, but I certainly do not miss the elitist days of the 90s. "Lamer" was the term for anyone who did not fit in. I really don't want that back.
And as to the "demo scene dying", remmeber thar I (the OP) did not exactly say that (should probably had added "Amiga" in the subject, though). I talked about the Amiga-scene and noted, dying or not, it is not going to exist forever. And it's probably doing just fine today, so I don't worry. But will it be around in 20 years? I don't know. I does not matter. Newer people will come along and redefine the scene. So that's always that.
I close my argument by paraphrasing legendary cartonist Walt Kelly, "Don't Take the Amiga demo scene So Serious … It Ain't Nohow Permanent"
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"Lamer" was the term for anyone who did not fit in.
You remember that wrong. Lamer was the term for someone without merits. Would apply to any newcomer. It wasn't even demeaning. Demoscene has always been inclusive to the point that even the lamest lamer could hang around with the others and turn into a hero with proper achievements. (It's just that you could usually tell from the amount of blathering if someone had what it takes :)
Lamers was just something people were throwing around to point at others, period. Because the attackers thought the others were not deserving, not trying hard enough or just different (had different goals). People were younger and thought they were cooler and they were mean. Merit is just another excuse, a way to draw a line.
But people were younger and absolute assholes because of that (some did not change)
On the matter of disrupting convos, when was hoffman a newcomer exactly? Wasnt he releasing on mono211 as a musician back then? And what is a newcomer, betcha a lot of the so called newcomers have been lurking for 20+ years until having the balls to release something (with enough merits). Which is also fucking lame :)
But people were younger and absolute assholes because of that (some did not change)
On the matter of disrupting convos, when was hoffman a newcomer exactly? Wasnt he releasing on mono211 as a musician back then? And what is a newcomer, betcha a lot of the so called newcomers have been lurking for 20+ years until having the balls to release something (with enough merits). Which is also fucking lame :)
4gentE said:
May I invite you to take a look at the English Amiga Board
It is absolutely buzzing with activity and extremely welcoming from just people casually getting to know Amiga to veteran democoders and even folks still working on new versions of AmigaOS or writing professional-grade reference material.
Just look at the numbers, record numbers of online users was:
in December 2025, 304 users at the same time!!!.
Given that the board has been around for more than a decade, it's a sign of growing scene!
Everyone is there, musicians, designers, game creators, crackers, democoders, software engineers, hardware engineers, emulator authors, hobbyists, beginners.
There's something for everyone and hundreds of thousands of organized posts and even private file archives. People are running their Kickstarters, itch.io, patreons from there. I heartily recommend it.
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Having A.D.A. (or some other Amiga scene website/database) updated and buzzing with activity (like CSDB for C64) would additionally help improve the image. Or perhaps this exists unbeknownst to me?
May I invite you to take a look at the English Amiga Board
It is absolutely buzzing with activity and extremely welcoming from just people casually getting to know Amiga to veteran democoders and even folks still working on new versions of AmigaOS or writing professional-grade reference material.
Just look at the numbers, record numbers of online users was:
in December 2025, 304 users at the same time!!!.
Given that the board has been around for more than a decade, it's a sign of growing scene!
Everyone is there, musicians, designers, game creators, crackers, democoders, software engineers, hardware engineers, emulator authors, hobbyists, beginners.
There's something for everyone and hundreds of thousands of organized posts and even private file archives. People are running their Kickstarters, itch.io, patreons from there. I heartily recommend it.
Isnt this an effect of concentration that occur when scenes die? Surely someone somewhere has written about that
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when was hoffman a newcomer exactly?
H0ffmans (r)evolution from a (great!) musician to reverse engineer/cracker/porter/demo coder is one of the most documented around. He has been around forever, but in the last couple of years you could literally tune in to his channel on twitch or take a look at his youtube to see how he gets progressively better and better at coding at all these retro platforms.
He has made some epic ports of aracade games, but then, together with folks on twitch who have followed his adventures in reverse engineering, cracking and what not.. ended up making a demo for Amiga OCS in 2024 that won Revision, that's super amusing to watch and super fresh.
I admire that level of transparency, infectious enthusiasm and inclusivity that makes other folks tune in and feel, hey, maybe I can do this too. Opposite of elitism, but also hard work and passion at the same time.
Virgill, Van Damme have followed the same path, musicians that only recently beginning to release any kind of Amiga prods where they are coders, and ended up doing amazing work, and I believe back in the day Vesuri/Da Jormas did something like that too.
Take a look at Steffest, who I think became "properly" active in 2023 and he did his own graphics, code and music on Ordo, winning a Meteoriks award for new talent.
Not exactly dying scene, I would say...
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Isnt this an effect of concentration that occur when scenes die? Surely someone somewhere has written about that
For a while the PC scene felt like it was concentrated online around Trixter's Hornet, cca 1992-1996. I don't think it's a signal that it was about to die. Like many natural phenomena, this is just an occurence of power law.
Can’t talk for them but I would find it fishy if hoffman just had started coding few years ago. A lot of musicians have taken an interest in coding because of the scene while being musicians in the scene, I would even bet that most of tjem did coding jobs because hell it pays better than being a failing artist for sure.
Anyhoo, these are not young blood, you are tampering with the data to make it look different, hoffman and virgill are most likely older than me. Does not say they don’t rule but using them as newcomers is bad faith.
But sure, there has been a growing interest in amiga prods and it’s cool.
Anyhoo, these are not young blood, you are tampering with the data to make it look different, hoffman and virgill are most likely older than me. Does not say they don’t rule but using them as newcomers is bad faith.
But sure, there has been a growing interest in amiga prods and it’s cool.
> folks coming back after dormancy
Yes, the Amiga (or rather Amiga 500) scene is indeed in a strong position at present. I think the turning point was the release of Rink-a-Dink: Redux in 2012. Something similar happened on the C64 scene a couple of years earlier. It's great that people find their way back to the Amiga, and that people who haven't dared release stuff before decide to give it a shot.
Revival, however, isn't the same as rejuvenation. I'm doubtful that we'll see parties like Gerp or X in 30 years, where hundreds of people (mind you, these are small parties compared to the early 1990s) bring Amigas or C64s and compete in something we'd recognize as a demo compo. The kids just aren't that interested. For the record, I'm completely fine with that, and I'm going to be scenemaxxing as long as I have the energy for it.
Yes, the Amiga (or rather Amiga 500) scene is indeed in a strong position at present. I think the turning point was the release of Rink-a-Dink: Redux in 2012. Something similar happened on the C64 scene a couple of years earlier. It's great that people find their way back to the Amiga, and that people who haven't dared release stuff before decide to give it a shot.
Revival, however, isn't the same as rejuvenation. I'm doubtful that we'll see parties like Gerp or X in 30 years, where hundreds of people (mind you, these are small parties compared to the early 1990s) bring Amigas or C64s and compete in something we'd recognize as a demo compo. The kids just aren't that interested. For the record, I'm completely fine with that, and I'm going to be scenemaxxing as long as I have the energy for it.
> Isnt this an effect of concentration that occur when scenes die?
This sounds interesting, and plausible.
> Surely someone somewhere has written about that
You wouldn't happen to know the name of that someone?
This sounds interesting, and plausible.
> Surely someone somewhere has written about that
You wouldn't happen to know the name of that someone?
Nah I am just assuming.
Because been there and around for twenty years plus and just seeing a pattern about how scenes slowly die, local OR online.
Some people like me don’t want to get too attached.
Because been there and around for twenty years plus and just seeing a pattern about how scenes slowly die, local OR online.
Some people like me don’t want to get too attached.
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Lamers was just something people were throwing around to point at others, period.
Haha, cool rhetorical device! When I'm having my period, I'm also smarter than usual.
I recommend reading all the scrollers in the '89 RSI Megademo until you find the passge explaining why lamers are important :)
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I think the turning point was the release of Rink-a-Dink: Redux in 2012.
I'd say it happened a little earlier than in 2013. For me, Superoriginal by Supergroup (2010) marked a turning point. Britelite proved that A500 could do much more than glenzes, filled vectors or dot tunnels. Superoriginal was full of the fresh Copper chunky effects, and the demo looked almost like an AGA to me. Great stuff!
There had already been a few outstanding OCS demos before that, such as Hideous Mutant Freaks by Spaceballs (2001) and Major Release by Jormas (2004). They were early signs of a revival, but I think at the time the OCS scene wasn't ready to make a real comeback.
Hologon in 2020 distributed on floppy disks in a custom trackloading format, featuring texture mapping with lighting, environment mapping, infinite bobs (?), fast uvmapping effects, and other stuff I can't even describe because it really was not typically Amiga 500 effects at all. That stuff just blew my mind.
What really got me, was the super old school distributing of floppies by mail. It reminded me of the old days when you were just getting demos and intros through friends and friends of friends. The way you found out what was going on in the scene was by reading scrolltexts or getting ahold of a diskmag. That was just marvelous.
Plus, like in the good old days, the effect wars, the infamous rotozoomer wars that really ramped up in 2023 with Blueberry's Water my gray beard responding to Photon's Grade my waterbear. And then Batman Group responds with Joker snacks on Blueberries, only to get beat by Hannibal/Lemon in his comeback 3D Demo 3... except did he?? Nooo, Rhino put a secret part in his intro and activating it breaks Hannibal's record WTFLOLOMGBBQ that is so unreal, this is the demoscene, this is what it's all about!!111
Not only did you have Eon in 2019 and De Profundis same year, but then you had Batman rises in 2022 that left people absolutely floored, Transhuman / Pachinkoland by TEK the same year (worth checking out the live recording) and it only got better and better... Hamazing, Desire.fm, etc.
And yeah, for a while it felt like Britelite/Dekadence was in a league of his own, winning, for example, Assembly in 2013 with Norwegian Pillow. And you had really really nice prods showing up pretty much every year (Ghostown, Lemon, Oxyron, etc.), but then yes around 2019,2020 just you had more and more prods really pushing the limits of the well known Amiga 500 platform even further.
To me it is awesome that on a 40+ year old platform you still ends up getting productions that completely surprise everyone. Like these guys Hackers just came out of nowhere and have this new killer texturemapping technique in catalog.exe. Or before that gigabates of Desire just in a streak of boundary pushing prods such as Inside the Machine, Bacon of Hope, Second Nature. And all the awesome musicians and graphicians joining to truly make all these prods shine. This is the essence of what the scene is about and the activity in the last 5-6 years is so much more intense than, say, in 2010s.. but the seeds of revival were already there..
What really got me, was the super old school distributing of floppies by mail. It reminded me of the old days when you were just getting demos and intros through friends and friends of friends. The way you found out what was going on in the scene was by reading scrolltexts or getting ahold of a diskmag. That was just marvelous.
Plus, like in the good old days, the effect wars, the infamous rotozoomer wars that really ramped up in 2023 with Blueberry's Water my gray beard responding to Photon's Grade my waterbear. And then Batman Group responds with Joker snacks on Blueberries, only to get beat by Hannibal/Lemon in his comeback 3D Demo 3... except did he?? Nooo, Rhino put a secret part in his intro and activating it breaks Hannibal's record WTFLOLOMGBBQ that is so unreal, this is the demoscene, this is what it's all about!!111
Not only did you have Eon in 2019 and De Profundis same year, but then you had Batman rises in 2022 that left people absolutely floored, Transhuman / Pachinkoland by TEK the same year (worth checking out the live recording) and it only got better and better... Hamazing, Desire.fm, etc.
And yeah, for a while it felt like Britelite/Dekadence was in a league of his own, winning, for example, Assembly in 2013 with Norwegian Pillow. And you had really really nice prods showing up pretty much every year (Ghostown, Lemon, Oxyron, etc.), but then yes around 2019,2020 just you had more and more prods really pushing the limits of the well known Amiga 500 platform even further.
To me it is awesome that on a 40+ year old platform you still ends up getting productions that completely surprise everyone. Like these guys Hackers just came out of nowhere and have this new killer texturemapping technique in catalog.exe. Or before that gigabates of Desire just in a streak of boundary pushing prods such as Inside the Machine, Bacon of Hope, Second Nature. And all the awesome musicians and graphicians joining to truly make all these prods shine. This is the essence of what the scene is about and the activity in the last 5-6 years is so much more intense than, say, in 2010s.. but the seeds of revival were already there..
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Can’t talk for them but I would find it fishy if hoffman just had started coding few years ago. A lot of musicians have taken an interest in coding because of the scene while being musicians in the scene, I would even bet that most of tjem did coding jobs because hell it pays better than being a failing artist for sure.
Anyhoo, these are not young blood, you are tampering with the data to make it look different, hoffman and virgill are most likely older than me. Does not say they don’t rule but using them as newcomers is bad faith.
But sure, there has been a growing interest in amiga prods and it’s cool.
49 last week :)
And yeah, day job is coding and I've been doing more Amiga focused coding since I made 8Bit Jungle back in 2011.
I'm old enough to have committed phone and postal crimes at the age of 15 :D :D :D
I have insight at 100
all that 'look at all those others doing cool stuff' is probably why it's dying though ;)
No no, I need more explaining!