8-bit vor 12 Party

From 22 to 24 February 2002, Foundation Two celebrated the beginning of the new Atari party season

Because RIK of Foundation Two will marry this year, it was his last party as a free man, so you can say it is 5 minutes till 12 o’clock for him. From this circumstance we adapted the name of the party: 8-bit before 12. There are also some people who think the name came from 8 cans of Bitburger beer before 12 o'clock...

As we did for the After Eight Party in 2001, we booked the sports club house in Kellenbach, Germany. Last year at the AEP there were 12 people, so we expected the same number of people this year. Some days before the event it became clear this time there would be more people. At last, about 20 people found their way to Kellenbach, even when Mad Butscher did some fine tricks to disguise the location (like not mentioning the exact location on the home page).

The first attendant was Floppy Doc. He sent e-mail messages saying he doesn't know the way, didn't give people a chance to answer, and wondered why he was alone in the village. After he crossed the only road ten times within two minutes, he had the good idea to take a coffee break in the unique village pub (he was lucky it was open). There he was told that RIK, the main organiser, lives in the neighbouring house. So Floppy Doc and RIK met after a while.

Then they went to the location at the sports field. While waiting for the other guy, RIK saw a car coming, but it disappeared, and because it had a local number plate, he did not think more of it (or maybe because he was drinking). Later the car returned, and some people asked for an Atari event. RIK was very surprised, because he thought he was the only surviving Atari user in his area. Surprise, surprise! Two guys from the neighbouring town are also collecting Atari stuff.

The next ones to appear were Mr XY and Mad Butscher of Foundation Two, who travelled through the near forests (very dark) to the location. When they opened the door, they only saw the football team, but some groupies screamed, "Are you looking for the Atari party?" So they went inside.

The Dutch visitors did some strange travel planning, so we thought we had to pick them up at the train station. We discussed at length whether we should go to the train station 30 km to the west or to the train station 25 km to the east. After a while Mr XY mentioned he had the mobile phone number of one of them saved in his handy. We thought Mr XY should have mentioned this before, and told him to give them a call. So we found out they were already on the way - by car, not by train.

So we were able to relax, and start talking about what has been happening in the Atari world.

Some time later the infamous MNX guys appeared. They looked a little bit messy, because their car got stuck in mud. Fox-1 was lucky, because he was the driver, but TXG and The White Warrior (TWW) did not look very happy in their dirty clothes!

To enhance the party feeling, RIK built up the first computer. We played Decathlon on a XE. Like always the 400 and 1,500 m runs were great fun (for all except the players). We found out our new Atari freaks are excellent Decathlon specialists, and even Mr XY said that there are finally some competitors for him.

During the Decathlon contest, Charon of SDT appeared. He had to take a test at university, so he stayed not very long. The Atari freaks from nearby also left in the evening.

After the Decathlon contest, we built up more computers, then we had some sleep. We had to sleep hungry, because there was no pizza service in the area that would deliver after 23:45!

The next morning the RAF appeared. Artax, Harry Reminder and CAS also built up some computers. CAS and Mad Butscher went to buy a cassette for the video camera, and when they returned, most of the people were still sleeping (and snoring). Some people tried to revolt and asked for lunch. But Mad Butscher wasn't irritated and gave everybody an order to build up another computer first. After the people did their work, Mad Butscher allowed them to get some food in the village.

When Floppy Doc asked for the way the day before, the people in the pub told him they open at 11:30, but when we arrived at about 12:00, it was still locked. We were in luck, after a while they opened the door (maybe our loud talking disturbed them). After the cook was told to get up (he did not look very happy) and went cooking, we had a fine meal. When we returned, the rest were still sleeping.

Charlie Chaplin and The Gambler of SWAT appeared, and we woke up the snoring guys. Now we were ready to do our throwing in the field contest. This time, Harry had the idea to throw the hard disk into a beer box. So we tried. After the first round all of the 12 people threw three times, but nobody hit inside the box. We decided the three people hitting the box on the outside could try another time. We put the box closer and TXG, finally, was the only one who hit the goal.

Grisu, an Atari user from the Wiesbaden area arrived. He and Harry took most of the pictures on the home page.

Now we started the Atari Gaming Decathlon. Therefore we set up all the computers. We played ten games on ten different Atari systems! Here is the list:

Jaguar: Raiden
To find a game on the Jaguar is not that easy. The game should be easy, so everybody understands it fast, and it should not take hours. We made the mistake to allow five credits, so the game took very, very long. We could have finished the contest in about two hours, but because of Raiden it took much longer.

STE: Obsession
This game is still really cool. It really lets the STE look like a Falcon.

XL: Ms. Pac Man
It's RIK's favourite. And it's a lot of fun.

ST: Kid Gloves
A cool jump and run (or platformer - Ed). Every level has some tricks. Nice graphics and nice sound. A good game.

7800: Pole Position II
Pole position still rocks. The 7800 version has better graphics than the XL/XE version.

5200: This machine did not work
Half of the stuff in the car was for the 5200 console, the heavy power supply and the big, big NTSC TV, and this *$&#"^! machine did not work.

2600: Stampede (Cowboy beim Rodeo (German pirate copy))
A nice game, and a special sort.

Falcon: Skyfall
This Tetris-like game also took very long, but it gained some new friends.

XE Game System: David’s Midnight Magic
A nice pinball game.

XE: Zybex
The mother of battles. The No. 1 shoot 'em up on the 8-bit.

Lynx: Quix
Because this game provided such fun at the Unconventional (XL/XE version) we played it this time on the Lynx. The Lynx version is a little bit different, even the controls.

We were 13 people who competed in the contest. Ten of us played, and the three infamous judges (Mr XY, RIK, Mad Butscher) drank beer.

The predictable winner of the contest was Mr XY. In second place was The Gambler, while RIK took third place.

After the contest we ordered pizza from the village pub. While we were eating Alexander Feige arrived. Alexander did a great Atari survey, and wanted to choose the winners by random. So Mad Butscher had to code one line of Omikron BASIC to print a random number.

Another strange coding session was done by CAS and Floppy Doc. CAS gave a lesson on Forth programming. He is probably the only person who codes Forth on the 8-bit, but maybe Floppy Doc will join him.

Finally we held a team contest. Because we were running out of time, and Double Bobble was having some trouble with the joysticks, we only played Schreckenstein on the 8-bit. Mad Butscher and TWW won, in second place were Artax and Harry.

After this event everybody played his favourite game or talked with other freaks, except Mr XY, who fell into his sleeping bag. Gaming is very tiring.

Then the RAF went home, and we played the rest of the next night with a lot of talk.

On Sunday at about 2 o'clock we cleaned up and went home.

Atari is fun.
 

[ Top of page ]

MyAtari magazine - Feature #6, April 2002