Re: Twilight II Press Release...

[irsman@iastate.edu (Ian Schmidt)]

In article <1r7tg4INN3b2@gap.caltech.edu> nathan@cco.caltech.edu (Nathan Mates) writes:
>seen it. Basically, Unreal is as useful as a screen saver as Modulae is-- who

I'm not saying that Unreal is a screen saver, but rather that with cool
animation algorithms something much more impressive could be done (maybe if
Jim talked to the animation Gods...Bill, Nate, or Chris :)

>of ripping stuff from the FTA, which came first: the scroller on the FTA's
>Bulla disk, or your titles for ModZap? :)

The MODZap graphics were designed by an independant contractor...in this case
Matt Keller of DigiSoft (how coincidental).  In any case the font in question
is actually from the logo of Psygnosis Software on the Amiga (yup, FTA did 
their share of borrowing).

My big objection to the Impulse 3D module is that it feels uncomfortably like
grave-robbing.  I have a lot of respect for the FTA and their work, and I'm
kinda uncomfortable with a slower version of their best demo slogging along
under an environment it was never meant for.  

>   Why criticize something for being unoriginal? It works, it's cool, and I

This is the same war being waged in comp.sys.ibm.pc.demos right now.  Most of
the PC demos, like all the FTA and GSA demos, are rehashes of Amiga concepts,
and many people wish for demos which show off the unique attributes of the 
machine in question.  In the case of the PC that's raw power, in the case of
the GS we need 3200 and fillmode and other things idiomatic to the GS hardware.

>   "Unoriginal" Same thing applies here. Did you flame Brian Greenstone for
>ripping off the frogger concept? Did you flame the first person to do the

Brian G. made something fresh and original based on the Frogger concept.  SVI
was by no means a rehash.

>>   I quote from the addemdum: "Modules put stuff on the screen, and that

I know, I've seen Matt D's mail on the subject, and I do believe he's totally
right...

>   You think you'll get more support from the author by pissing him off, or
>by trying to help anything on the IIGS. Yeah, you seem to have won a flame
>war over MODZap/ST, but that was because you had a product that was seen by

Au contraire.  soniqTracker was seen by an overwhelming majority as being
far superior on the basis of its somewhat fancier user interface.  An
interesting phenomenon (any psych experts out there wanna munch on this?) 
developed where people were reporting bugs and glitches in MZ in droves and 
Tim got almost no feedback, since everyone was apparently convinced sT was 
superior.  In any case, with the advent of ShellPlay its all irrelevant and as
of 4 days ago all MODZap source was thouroughly destroyed.

Have at it, kiddies.


-- 
        Ian Schmidt - Two Meg Software: irsman@{iastate.edu | aol.com}
"I will choose a path that's     | Author of AudioZap, MODZap, and more.
 clear: I will choose free will" | Co-author of SoundConvert and DeskTracker.
 - N. Peart, 1980                | Coder and Musician for the GS<>IRC.