There were many really nice demos on Revision this year. Hacker News favorite (and mine, too!) LFT put out another microcontroller demo, Sum Ergo Demonstro:<p><a href="https://youtube.com/watch?v=v8zKDotYh9A&is=xAbW7VZVGLn0986B" rel="nofollow">https://youtube.com/watch?v=v8zKDotYh9A&is=xAbW7VZVGLn0986B</a><p>But I think my favorite so far from the ones I've seen has to be Second Nature, an OCS Amiga demo by Desire & The Twitch Elite, and music by Hoffman.
i second that. "Second Nature" is also my party favorite!
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFVxntafsXM&t=1764s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFVxntafsXM&t=1764s</a>
Classic first comment on the Youtube video: <i>Hey lft, I designed the RISC-V core you're using, and I had a ton of fun watching and re-watching this video and trying to guess some of the tricks you used. Awesome work and I'm looking forward to a write-up!</i>
Ah wow.<p>I really enjoyed the demoscene back in the 90s. Was never a part of it but I was always fascinated by the effects and music and ascii art that these guys created.<p>A BBS in my city always had the latest e-zines like Reality Check Network and Affinity, and others I forget. Reading up on the scene and about groups like Razor1911 was something I spent a lot of time on when I was younger.<p>Amazing demo and homage to the era.
> I really enjoyed the demoscene back in the 90s. Was never a part of it but I was always fascinated by the effects and music and ascii art that these guys created.<p>It was quite something... I take it there are quite a few hotshots on HN who used to be in the top groups. I was in a group and we were writing small intros for BBSes with a couple of friends and then we'd get infinite leech/upload ratio on those BBSes. Best memory was driving through Belgium / the Netherlands / Denmark / putting the car on the boat / Sweden (Uppsala) with our computers (Amiga, Atari ST and PCs) to participate at a demo compo. Forgot its name but in the PC category we tied first place with Future Crew (we would have been first had I not screwed the sound playback routine which crashed half-way the demo), before they had their big breakthrough on the PC demoscene. I think that was in 1991.<p>Cops/customs stopped us as the boat arrived in Sweden and thought we were dealing drugs: they tore the car apart and had no idea what we were talking about when we were explaining them in broken english that we were going to participate in a demo compo :-/<p>I still have a few effects as executables but I don't have the code anymore for these.<p>Thankfully I still have the entire source code of a game I made in assembly (for PC / 386+) in 1991 (never published but it's how my career started, long story) and lately I've been having a huge lot of fun trying to compile it again with Claude Code CLI / Sonnet. I'm using UASM, which is compatible with MASM which I used to use. I managed to have all the utilities I wrote back then (picture converters / sprites extractor / etc.) compiling and running (in DOSBox) but haven't managed to compile the main game yet. A few more hours with Claude Code CLI and I should get it running.<p>FWIW it's hilarious to go back to code from 1991 and see comments in my code talking about this and that bug and asking the LLM: <i>"Find where that bug could be"</i> and the LLM manages to find it. It's also insane the lack of version control: version control was copying entire directories. Copy/pasta code everywhere. And then 10 000 lines of code per source code file.<p>What an era. Diving in that old code of mine brings me back: the decades they've been flying.<p>P.S: funnily enough by lack of luck a macro I had used back then happen to become a reserved keyword/macro in assemblers later on. I had named back then a macro "incbin" and that was preventing my code from compiling in UASM: Claude Code / Sonnet 4.6 found that issue instantly.<p>P.P.S: 0x777 in hex gives 1911. RZR, legendary: probably the most legendary of them all. Probably still have a few 5"1/4 floppies (both C64 and Amiga for I had an Amiga with a little software mod to read 5"1/4 floppies as if they were 3"1/2 for the 5"1/4 were way cheaper) with Razor 1911 "cracktros" (even if they weren't called that yet) still working (back in 2020 quite a few of my floppies were still reading: maybe half to 2/3rd of them). I know it won't last, nothing will.
What are using as a linker? Also, do you use protected mode and if yes, what do you use for that, PMODE or CWSDPMI or something else?
It's an old MS-DOS .EXE. Actually it compiles with the ".286" directive too. So I don't use protected mode.<p>It requires a VGA card and those were more common in 386 IIRC and, anyway, performance-wise to run at 60 Hz it needs a 386. I never tried to run it on a 286 with a VGA card: don't know if that was a thing.<p>It's funny looking at that old assembly code and see ax, bx, cx, dx registers and not the eax, etc. ones.<p>The utilities I've compiled to .EXE so far are self-contained in one file and I just use UASM to create directly the .EXE:<p><pre><code> uasm -mz myutil.asm
</code></pre>
UASM v2.57 does the job in my case (note that I compile from Linux: UASM exists for several platforms/OSes):<p><a href="https://www.terraspace.co.uk/uasm.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.terraspace.co.uk/uasm.html</a><p>I haven't tried yet to compile the entire game yet: that one is more involved as it implies many files.
The parts where it exits fullscreen and starts messing around with separate windows is really well done. In a way it's playing with the limits of what defines a demo (ie. the user's desktop is part of the performance), which is something I love to see. Same with the notepad animation part. I wonder if they implemented their own notepad-alike from scratch or it they used something like this: <a href="https://kylehalladay.com/blog/2020/05/20/Rendering-With-Notepad.html" rel="nofollow">https://kylehalladay.com/blog/2020/05/20/Rendering-With-Note...</a>
That was amazing, really great song & visuals too. Takes me back to the days when you couldn't close the keygen because the midi playing was such a banger.<p><a href="https://keygenmusic.tk/" rel="nofollow">https://keygenmusic.tk/</a>
MIDI songs? I checked, I couldn't find any from the link you posted. Most were different module formats, like XM, Protracker, S3M, Impulse Tracker. Those have nothing to do with midi other than they also produce music.
At one point in time, (I think maybe in connection with some mobile phone being able to play .midi files?) MIDI songs was (incorrectly) referring to a style/type of music rather than the transport/protocol we use for sending notes between instruments/devices, or the file format.<p>I'm still since then always assuming the above when someone says "MIDI music"; they really mean "really basic/simple music" or just straight up "chiptune" sometimes.<p>It has nothing to do with MIDI really, just a misnomer.
They've probably been converted over the years, just like you might convert an mp3 into flac or ogg or whatever.
Do you know if someone is hosting these in web radio format so I could stream in a car and such?
You might enjoy this: <a href="https://scenestream.net/demovibes/streams/" rel="nofollow">https://scenestream.net/demovibes/streams/</a>
qUAntUm RaDio<p><a href="https://radio.erb.pw/public/subspace" rel="nofollow">https://radio.erb.pw/public/subspace</a>
I don't. I'm sure you could find an archive of just midi files out there though.
Superb demos this year at Revision. Triplet by Otomata Labs for the Atari 2600 is exceptional<p>Original release video (probably running on Stella)<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEJ0A8Wvdxs" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEJ0A8Wvdxs</a><p>And a video of it running on Gopher2600.<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixFH22MxqEg" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixFH22MxqEg</a>
Legendary demo group Razor 1911 submitted this beautiful demo as the closer for the Revision 2026 demo competition.<p>It is an homage to 40 years of hacking from the group.<p>For context, they were pioneers in both the demoscene and in the warez scene in the 80s-00s.
Executable here: <a href="https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954" rel="nofollow">https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954</a>
This is so sick!<p>Revision faded out the credits part, which is still really cool on its own. The full version (10m 16s) can be viewed at <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AnbYNudAyM" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AnbYNudAyM</a>
Sadly, that full version isn't in 4K, unlike the submission.<p>But this is Hacker News, we can do much better! Here is the actual binary: <a href="https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954" rel="nofollow">https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954</a><p>Sadly I couldn't get it to work on Linux with Wine/Proton, like a lot of demos they seem to really be using less common paths, so of course it crashes.
Oh man, I watched "non-live" earlier today but hearing the live vers with the crowd audio is amazing. So damn good <3
Really cool retro-mix, and some slick transitions.<p>Most of that was before my time though, so 1995 by Kewlers[1] hit harder for me, since that was when I really got into the demo scene and with it my drive to learn programming.<p>Glad the demo scene is alive and kicking, though I get why a lot is oriented around old hardware, modern hardware makes things too easy almost.<p>[1]: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mtctbodNXY" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2mtctbodNXY</a> (20 years old this year, now I feel <i>really</i> old)
I upvote every post related to the demoscene due to my age, so I couldn't let this one, especially when it's coming from RZR.
Imagine if we could get a new release from FC as well in 2026 (40 years since their founding)!!!<p>More about Razor 1911 and Future Crew for the young readers of HN: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razor_1911" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razor_1911</a>
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Crew" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Crew</a><p>P.S. Too many groups to mention, but these two hold a special place in my mind ;-)<p>P.S.2. Extra mention to the most famous Greek demo group - ASD (Andromeda Software Development) - <a href="https://www.pouet.net/groups.php?which=1317" rel="nofollow">https://www.pouet.net/groups.php?which=1317</a>
Razor 1911 and FC are different in that FC was one of those team/friend-groups that depended more on a constellation of people working together and producing until life took them away to other things.<p>Razor, Fairlight and some others became more of continious groups with evolving memberships (I was briefly a member of the demoteam back in 1999 and did one production in association with the people that moved over to Fairlight).
ASD - Spin lives rent free in my head. I remember a colleague explaining how the morphing between meshes was really just random noise but the proximity and speed made it look like a real transformation. So cool.<p>Should out to TheBlackLotus, Fairlight, Orange, CNCD also for those of you who want to look up epic demos.
I also liked Triton. They made great demos and also FastTracker 2!
CNCD and Orange are two of my most favorite groups! Inside, Secret Life of Mr Black, Megablast are some of my favorites of all time.
Future Crew's "Second Reality" was my introduction to demos, back in the 486 PC days.
Yes - Razor 1911 was a core memory unlocked.<p>Along with Skidrow and Paradox crews
Demos used to have sizes - I can't see one for this, is it just an 'open' category? This thing is far too insane to be size limited, surely?
In demoscene nomenclature, an "intro" is a demo with a sizelimit. This was entered in the demo compo, ergo "no size limit".<p>With file size, most democoders go all the way, both ways. By that I mean that if they choose a sizelimit category, they squeeze out every last byte, and if they don't, most don't care about filesize <i>at all</i>. There's demos these days that are many times bigger than an acceptable video recording would be because nobody bothered to eg compress the assets, it includes an entire game engine, etc. Like 800MB for a 3 minute audiovisual show. Kinda ridiculous but it's just.. well, call it either laziness or focused pragmatism :-) Gotta get that prod out before the deadline!<p>The Razor1911 zip[1] is 30MB, which actually is very much on the small side for a current-day demo.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954" rel="nofollow">https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=105954</a> has a download link
This came up in the Discord party chat, basically there isn't a size limit in the rules[1], but going beyond 2GB would be concerning that it's not a real-time demo but instead just playback of animation.<p>[1] <a href="https://2026.revision-party.net/competitions/pc/" rel="nofollow">https://2026.revision-party.net/competitions/pc/</a>
Edit: better answer below<p>Idk what Revision actually enforces but that used to be the rule at Assembly.<p>For the 1k, 4k, retro systems etc it’s specified!
I like that you linked the live show instead of the video of the demo alone, as the crowd noise adds to the experience.
The song can be gotten for free / pay what you want at: <a href="https://dubmood.bandcamp.com/track/fighting-words-feat-goto80-master-boot-record" rel="nofollow">https://dubmood.bandcamp.com/track/fighting-words-feat-goto8...</a>
In addition, here is the Bright White Lightning discography:<p><a href="https://dataairlines.bandcamp.com/album/bad-teeth-data024" rel="nofollow">https://dataairlines.bandcamp.com/album/bad-teeth-data024</a><p><a href="https://dataairlines.bandcamp.com/album/dirty-nails-data038" rel="nofollow">https://dataairlines.bandcamp.com/album/dirty-nails-data038</a><p>Having not seen anything from them since 2014, so I am very happy for another track.
or you can unpack the executable (it's packed with UPX) and extract the MP3 from that ;-) You can also get high-res PNGs of some of the scenes that way (e.g. the floppy disk pan, or the fake Windows desktops)
Beautiful. Masterfully done. I love all the BBS-era aesthetics and callouts. I hadn't seen FILE_ID.DIZ art in forever.
Absolutely amazing.<p>Nice to be reminded that Revision is still active, on my bucket list to visit at least once in my life.
Awesome, I remember some of these from back when, mostly from the 90's and early 2000's I believe.
incredible work!<p>such a nice way to remember their fallen teammates at the end there.
Wow, and this is their “mid career retrospective”. Wait for the end of caree retrospective…
Great music.<p>Bright White Lightning, but didn’t see a track name.<p>Overall, wow.
Anyone understand why multiple demos have voices singing now.. how do they do it ?
It has been a thing for some time. Even back in the 16-bit days:<p>- Movement <i>Mina Omistan</i> (1994): <a href="https://youtu.be/Ryq8fz_XAhI" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/Ryq8fz_XAhI</a><p>- TBL <i>Tint</i> (1996) second part: <a href="https://youtu.be/KcSV4qAG-xk?t=459" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/KcSV4qAG-xk?t=459</a>
Most full demo (no tech or sizelimit) soundtracks since the early 00s are just mp3 streams or alike, size-coded that have soft-synths or retro categories were singing is an issue due to datasize or hardware power often don't (sometimes they do as a technical demonstration).<p>But I did notice some 64k's and small synths-executables had singing this year, I've added small voice-samples (compressed) but that's just seconds whilst these entries had longer sequences so I'm a tad curious as well.
I wish there was more info about how they're made but I suppose part of the demo scene has always been secretive and reverse engineer it if you want to know.<p>The first one said made with Godot and blender so is it using premade assets? (Which I thought was not allowed)<p>Edit: #22 Heart of Glass says 144kB of WebGL + audio. I assume this means the audio is separate.
Literally just singing! It’s an mp3 :)
OMG. Thanks <i>so</i> much for posting this - completely awesome! Such a nostalgic roller coaster ride, from Qmodem to Xcopy and everything in between... brought back so many memories... - thanks again!
as a broke kid from the third world, the amount of coping Razor1911 enabled for me with gaming got me through high school during the 2000s (edit due to not finishing a sentence originally) cannot be understated.
Wow, a real throwback to my earlier years exploring the Warez scene as cash poor teenager, which meant you had to get creative to find what you wanted.<p>Looking back in my 30s, I think part of my brain has atrophied because I can now purchase and download games and content with a few clicks on Steam and £40, which will be ready to play after dinner.<p>Before you had to think and search forums (both public and private) for DDL links, CD keys, cracks, passwords to unzip files.<p>Then once you had downloaded these multiple RAR/Zip files you then had to check and verify them for corruption or viruses. After that it was reading the sacred README.nfo file included in the crack zip. Which if you didn't specify to open in Notepad or Notepad++, it would open the Windows System information window.<p>The last stage before firing up a game was the patching/cracking phase; that could involved things like editing hosts files, unplugging or disconnecting from the internet, or modifying your firewall to prevent network requests for anti-piracy software. Then you ran your crack or copied a patched .exe file over into the game directory. Aye presto, you're ready to fire up (hopefully it didn't have a virus or rootkit)<p>...but wait there is no loading videos or splash screen (panic). Well that's because the pirates were saving storage space and removed unnecessary game videos and music assets.<p><Play game> Bioshock<p>Ah, that was a nice nostalgia trip.<p>Also for any other nostalgia trippers, do you remember the first thing you always installed was a cracked version of WinRar (before 7zip became cool), running on a fresh install of Windows_7_SP3_BLACK_EDITION_XXX.iso
Excellent demo and good music to go with it. My favorite part was probably the X-Copy sector map transitioning into a 3D cube with a running sprite.
Same! Beautiful nod to this amazing demo : <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMFBAOjuMWw" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMFBAOjuMWw</a>
The tunnel going from ascii to RT gave me chills and made me teary. It was 40 years of progress in seconds.
not sure I've experienced goosebumps like this before
I think a modern equivalent might be WebGPU. Anybody doing cool stuff that? I'd like to see the code.
absolute banger :D
That Dynamic Duo disk at the beginning reminded me of my friend who got his house raided in 1987 for exchanging (not selling) cracked computer games for the C64 at the age of 18 in super rural Germany. He still managed to get into the army as an officer.
This is awesome!
My first time hearing the name RAZOR1911 was on the cracktro for GTA IV, which had this banger of a music <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy4-9PsZHqI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy4-9PsZHqI</a>
The game was notoriously hard to crack too. Rockstar had a lot of former demosceners, so they put all sorts of protection that would mess with the game.<p>I recall my friend describing Nico being randomly drunk, or vehicles suddenly accelerating. Razor eventually nailed it iirc
Nice!
Did they state if/how much AI agents they used in creating this demo?
How many inkjet printers did Da Vinci use for the Mona Lisa?
None. That would defeat the entire purpose
Of course they used none.
Direct link with the correct timecode: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw4W9V57SKs&t=5716s" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw4W9V57SKs&t=5716s</a>