Stone Arts/Reviews
Gathering 93 Demo (1993, 07.04, ECS File)
Review by Glenn Lunder
This is the weaker of the two demos STA released at The Gathering '93. Though competent here and there, with nice smooth design, they're like an Andromeda without the focus; like a Lemon. without the Lem :) The music and graphics are just bland, and the only cool and unusual code I guess were the three ellipses with shadows - though the routine could certainly have been exposed better if for example the objects were larger. Promises but does not deliver.
I've seen this mentioned with the name Announce, but that name doesn't appear anywhere in the demo. The demo will require absolutely ALL memory if run on an A500 with ½mb fake fast - and probably won't work at all on 2.0+ machines based on my own experiences.
tested A2000/000-7 /1mb chip, 2mb fast/2.04. A1200/030-50/2mb chip, 4mb fast/3.0 -- Note: KillAGA.
Atmosphere (1993, 07.04, ECS Trackmo)
Review by Glenn Lunder
Quite an acceptable trackmo this, though it does not specifically excell in any area. There's certainly a lot of logos here! Unfortunately none are truly excellent.
tested A2000/000-7 /1mb chip, 2mb fast/2.04. A1200/030-50/2mb chip, 4mb fast/3.0.
Bjarne (1994, 03.04, AGA 40k Intro)
Review by Glenn Lunder
Niggerjack, Braintumor & Heywood's first production for Stone Arts would prove to be their most successful yet! It opens with a few dot routines, and ends with a HAM rotzoomer that is truly a thing of beauty, just as Niggerjack himself claims. Not much bang for your buck, except for the rotzoomer, but still a good enough production.
tested A1200/030-50/2mb chip, 4mb fast/3.0.
Rush (1994, 03.04, AGA 40k Intro)
Review by Glenn Lunder
STA's 3rd-placer at The Party '94 where they won with 'Bjarne' is just as good. There's a few OK effects here, of which I especially dug the double STA twister. However, that pseudo-plasma thing looks like the blocky stuff they do on the C64 to achieve the same effect. On a 1mhz machine, that's impressive - on an A1200 that's pathetic. The picture used in the rotzoomer is a small portion of BCR's title picture for "Headline #1" [08/93].
tested A1200/030-50/2mb chip, 4mb fast/3.0.
Vidar! (1994, 28.12, AGA 40k Intro)
Review by Glenn Lunder
It opens with the letters S T O N E A R T S flying at you in rapid succession timed to the music, before the intro gets going with the three letters STA on fire! Then we're shown some text before a rather awesome 3x3 rotzoomer appears, that's controllable in almost every and any way! Unfortunately, I don't get to see that on my machine, which you shows me some garbled graphics. Slummy/Spaceballs' theory about why this happens was the it was probably selfmodifying in some way and any accelerated Amiga was just too fast to cope with it. Therefore the dots did not appear where they should :) The picture that's rotzoomed is "Smokin'" by Absurd, which also participated in the graphics competition at the same party and came in at a split 20th.
The intro was originally supposed to compete in the 40k intro competition at The Party, but the disk it was delivered on was corrupt, and it was disqualified. It was therefore just released at the party.
tested A1200/030-50/2mb chip, 4mb fast/3.0 -- Note: See review!
