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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

[3] https://csdb.dk/group/?id=81



Answering my own question by disabling [1] "CRT emulation" in Vice. My demos were using "CRT bleed".

[1] https://twitter.com/hackteck/status/1634813587846844418


Top 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


Yeah VSP. Although you could scroll the entire screen with $d016 by splitting up the fullscreen byte shift in the 7 frames before the shift :)


Doesn't it support scrolling officially?


It 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.


Cool, 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.


Those 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 :)


Indeed, that’s me! Were you active in the demo scene too?


Yes, 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.


ESCOS blew my mind back then.

1001 Crew sparked the whole C64 demoscene, IMO.

I stand in awe.


Same 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


Indeed the most insane effects were always created by the dutch :)




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