History Main / Demoscene

The Demoscene is heavily influenced by its pirate and hacker roots, and demos often carry a strongly anarchic thread, eschewing traditional graphical conventions in favor of bold and ostentatious experimentation in art and typography. Lavish [[{{UsefulNotes/Graffiti}} graffiti]]-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" -- ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability. It should also be noted that the Demoscene is unregulated, uncensored, and has no compunction to adhere to content ratings - be aware that demos aren't always family-friendly in their language or imagery.

While computing power has long since surpassed the meager limits of those early systems, the Demoscene still continues to this day, with Demosceners commonly accepting voluntary constraints in order to test their skills, such as extreme restrictions on demo filesizes. Writing demos for obsolete systems is still popular, with new techniques continuing to be found, and some also enjoy the challenge of creating demos for more esoteric systems such as embedded hardware. In more recent years, the rise of fantasy consoles (modern software that seeks to [[{{Retraux}} imitate the retro aesthetics and harsh limitations of older hardware]]) has also given rise to a whole new facet of the Demoscene, centered on platforms like the UsefulNotes/PICO8 and TIC-80.

Demos originally started in the 1980s as "cracktros" -- custom [[LoadingScreen Loading Screens]] created by pirate groups that managed to remove the CopyProtection from software and added their own intro to promote themselves. Over time, these intros became increasingly elaborate as crackers were keen to show off what they could do even with the extreme limitations imposed by the hardware.

Eventually, the intro aspect was dropped completely, and evolved into full demos that were released without being attached to existing software, and the Demoscene was born.

Being rooted in pirate and hacker culture, the Demoscene has a strong anarchic thread, which often influences the artistic style of demos. Unconstrained by graphical convention, Demosceners often experiment with bold and ostentatious art styles and typography. Lavish [[{{UsefulNotes/Graffiti}} graffiti]]-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" -- ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability.

(It should also be noted that the Demoscene is unregulated, uncensored, and has no requirement to adhere to content ratings - be aware that demos aren't always family-friendly in their language or imagery).

While computing power has long since surpassed the meager limits of those early systems, the Demoscene still continues to this day, with Demosceners often accepting voluntary constraints in order to test their skills, such as extreme restrictions on demo filesizes. Writing demos for obsolete systems is still popular, with new techniques continuing to be found, and some also enjoy the challenge of creating demos for more esoteric systems such as embedded hardware. In more recent years, the rise of fantasy consoles (modern software that seeks to [[{{Retraux}} imitate the retro aesthetics and harsh limitations of older hardware]]) has also given rise to a whole new facet of the Demoscene, centered on platforms like the UsefulNotes/PICO8 and TIC-80.

Demos are often categorized into different groups based on their size and platform. While demos certainly exist for just about any platform, the most popular are PC (meaning MS-DOS until around 1999 and mostly Windows thereafter), UsefulNotes/{{Amiga}}, UsefulNotes/{{Commodore 64}}, UsefulNotes/ZXSpectrum and Atari home computers (both 16/32-bit (UsefulNotes/AtariST-compatible) and [[UsefulNotes/Atari8BitComputers 8-bit]] (400/800-compatible)).

While computing power has long since surpassed the meager limits of those early systems, the Demoscene still continues to this day, with Demosceners often accepting voluntary constraints in order to test their skills, such as extreme restrictions on demo filesizes. Writing demos for obsolete systems is still popular, with new techniques continuing to be found, and some also enjoy the challenge of creating demos for very esoteric systems such as embedded hardware. In more recent years, the rise of fantasy consoles (modern software that seeks to [[{{Retraux}} imitate the retro aesthetics and harsh limitations of older hardware]]) has also given rise to a whole new facet of the Demoscene, centered on platforms like the UsefulNotes/PICO8 and TIC-80.

Being rooted in pirate and hacker culture, the Demoscene has a strong anarchic thread, which often influences the artistic style of demos. Unconstrained by graphical convention, Demosceners often experiment with ostentatious art styles and typography. Lavish [[{{UsefulNotes/Graffiti}} graffiti]]-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" -- ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability.

Technical capabilities of older demos and cracktros were limited by graphic and sound chips and available memory... but due to the ersatz programming that demoscene authors invented, often to nowhere near the same degree as actual games software on those systems.

Demos are often categorized into different groups based on their size and platform. While demos certainly exist for just about any platform, the most popular are PC (meaning MS-DOS until around 1999 and mostly Windows thereafter), UsefulNotes/{{Amiga}}, UsefulNotes/{{Commodore 64}}, UsefulNotes/ZXSpectrum and Atari home computers (both 16/32-bit (UsefulNotes/AtariST-compatible) and [[UsefulNotes/Atari8BitComputers 8-bit]] (400/800-compatible)). In more recent years, the rise of fantasy consoles -- modern software that seek to [[{{Retraux}} imitate the retro aesthetics and harsh limitations of older hardware]] -- has also given rise to a whole new facet of the demoscene, centered on platforms like the UsefulNotes/PICO8 and TIC-80.

Demos originally started in the 1980s as "cracktros" - custom [[LoadingScreen Loading Screens]] created by pirate groups that managed to remove the CopyProtection from software and added their own intro to promote themselves. Over time, these intros became increasingly elaborate as crackers were keen to show off what they could do even with the extreme limitations imposed by the hardware.

Being rooted in pirate and hacker culture, the Demoscene has a strong anarchic thread, which often influences the artistic style of demos. Unconstrained by graphical convention, Demosceners often experiment with ostentatious art styles and typography. Lavish [[{{UsefulNotes/Graffiti}} graffiti]]-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" - ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability.

Being rooted in pirate and hacker culture, the Demoscene has a strong anarchic thread, which often influences the artistic style of demos. Unconstrained by graphical convention, Demosceners often experiment with ostentatious art styles and typography. Lavish UsefulNotes/{{Graffiti}}-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" - ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability.

Being rooted in pirate and hacker culture, the Demoscene has a strong anarchic thread, which often influences the artistic style of demos. Unconstrained by graphical convention, Demosceners often experiment with ostentatious art styles and typography. Lavish UsefulNotes/{{Grafitti}}-styled logos are a common sight, as are "scrollers" - ScrollingText which is often designed more for showcasing graphical effects than for readability.

The Demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes in producing ''demos'' -- audiovisual presentations that are run in real-time on a computer (or sometimes more esoteric platforms such as embedded hardware).

Demos are typically written completely from scratch using custom code, and are designed to produce visually interesting and/or technically impressive experiences. Many demos are designed to showcase newly-developed techniques that [[SerialEscalation push the limits of the hardware]].

Originally started as cracktros, which were made by groups who managed to remove CopyProtection from software and added their own LoadingScreen to brag about it. Simple cracktros were gradually replaced by more impressive ones. Finally, demos started appearing without being attached to games or other applications.

The demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes in producing demos, which are audiovisual presentations that are run in real-time on a computer or other platform. Artists try to [[SerialEscalation push systems' capabilities to the max]] trying to make their demos look technically and/or artistically [[SceneryPorn as impressive as possible]] while usually trying to have catchy and memorable music in the background.

Demos are often categorized into different groups based on their size and platform. The most common platforms of demos are PC (meaning MS-DOS until around 1999 and mostly Windows thereafter), UsefulNotes/{{Amiga}}, UsefulNotes/{{Commodore 64}}, UsefulNotes/ZXSpectrum and Atari home computers (both 16/32-bit (UsefulNotes/AtariST-compatible) and [[UsefulNotes/Atari8BitComputers 8-bit]] (400/800-compatible)). There are demos for almost any platform, though.

Demos are often categorized into different groups based on their size and platform. The most common platforms of demos are PC (meaning MS-DOS until around 1999 and mostly Windows thereafter), UsefulNotes/{{Amiga}}, UsefulNotes/{{Commodore 64}}, UsefulNotes/ZXSpectrum and Atari home computers (both 16/32-bit (UsefulNotes/AtariST-compatible) and [[UsefulNotes/Atari8BitComputers 8-bit]] (400/800-compatible)). There are demos for almost any platform though.

PC and Amiga demos are usually divided by size. There are demos which have very loose size restrictions and where the demo is only limited by the creator's imagination, then there are demos restricted by size. Size-restricted demos are usually called intros. The most common categories for size-restricted demos are 64 kilobytes and 4 kilobytes, although there are even smaller quality demos and competitions like 1-kilobyte, 256-byte and even demos which take 32 bytes and less space (by which point they are typically DOS comfiles so as to dispense of executable headers). [[note]]There is even a [[Music/JohnCage zero-byte demo, which displays a "invalid executable" message]].[[/note]] Smaller demos usually rely heavily on procedural generation where assets such as 3D objects and textures are generated using simple algorithms.

When used as a genuine examination of how well a new system is expected to perform (for attracting interest at trade-shows and the like), such processes are typically referred to as a technology demo. Technology demos are usually made by the hardware companies themselves, however; not the demoscene.

Technical capabilities of older demos and cracktros were limited by graphic and sound chips and available memory... but due to the ersatz programming demoscene authors invented, often to nowhere near the same degree as actual games software on those systems.

Demos are often categorized into different groups based on their size and platform. The most common platforms of demos are PC (meaning MS-DOS until around 1999 and mostly Windows thereafter), UsefulNotes/{{Amiga}}, UsefulNotes/{{Commodore 64}}, ZX Spectrum and Atari home computers (both 16/32-bit (ST-compatible) and 8-bit (400/800-compatible)). There are demos for almost any platform though.

The demoscene is a computer art subculture that specializes in producing demos, which are audiovisual presentations that are run in real-time on a computer or other platform. Artists try to [[SerialEscalation push systems' capabilities to the max]] trying to make their demos look technically and/or artistically [[SceneryPorn as impressive as possible]] while usually trying to have [[{{Earworm}} catchy]] and [[SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic memorable]] music in the background.

As a side-note, size-limited demoscene productions typically use obscure executable compression which, outside the demoscene, is only ever used to cloak malware. It is therefore not unusual for antivirus or antimalware software to report clean demoscene files as infected. Likewise, it can be difficult to determine if something actually ''is'' infected.