Interviews

Published in Vandalism News #46
Performed by Jazzcat


Welcome to the second interview for this edition of Vandalism News. This time we introduce a Finnish scener who has been active for some years producing demos and leading his crew known as Dekadence.

A regular attendee of scene parties he is an all-rounder when C64 skills are concerned, performing the duties of coding, painting and composing.

Enjoy!

J)
Welcome to Vandalism News Peter, please introduce yourself to the readers (such as who you are and what
are your real life activities).

B)
My name is Peter, and I'm also known as Britelite / Dekadence. I'm currently studying computer science at a university and hopefully I'll graduate by the end of  this year. :)


J)
What interested you in the C64 and when did you get one?

B)
I probably got interested in the C64 sometimes in the 80's, as most of my friends had one and it seemed like all the best games were made for it. I bought my first own C64 pretty late, I think it was in 1994.

J)
Could you tell us a bit about your scene history? When did you start? What things in the scene have happened to you that are of importance until present day?

B)
My scene history probably began in 1990 when I saw demos on the Amiga for the first time. I then began doing crappy demo like thingies in Basic on my PC and started composing and watching PC-demos in the early 90's too. I started following the C64-scene in 1994 and founded Dekadence in 1997. And the most important thing that happened was probably the Reflex and Byterapers demos in the mid-90's, which really got me hooked to this little machine. :)

J)
Dekadence have been releasing some nice demos for quite a while now and have developed their own style. Have you fulfilled your expectations in Dekadence and are there things within the group you hope to still achieve?

B)
I've filled my expectations to a certain point, I'm really glad we've managed to win some compos at some bigger parties like Breakpoint and Assembly. But that really kickass Dekadence-demo is yet to be made. We still need to do a demo with some superb gfx, which we really haven't been able to do yet.


J)
What are the other guys in Dekadence up to these days?

B)
Most of them are studying or working, and being lazy in general. :)

J)
Do you think people limit themselves in demo creation by following existing designs, preset boundaries and basically copying one another?

B)
Well, it's the same as with music or any other kind of art form, there's very few people who actually come up with new things all the time. I don't see anything wrong in getting inspiration from other people's styles and effects, but the best thing to do would of course be to improve on what you've already seen if you're copying someone.


J)
The C64 scene keeps changing. In which direction do you see our scene heading at the moment?


B)
It's hard for me to say where the scene is heading at the moment. The lack of real quality demos with a lot of thought and passion put into them is obvious. I myself also tend to rush out all my demos just to get them shown at the party I submit them to.

J)
The internet is a central part of the C64 scene now, it is a great medium for communication and assists in prolonging the life of the our underground culture. In your view, what are some good and bad things about the internet, in relation to the C64?

B)
The great thing about the internet is the fact that you can get all the fresh releases really fast. I also like the IRC, as it gives me the opportunity to communicate with all my friends in the scene. Most of the internal communication in Dekadence is also done via IRC. The bad thing is of course that most people spend more time on #c-64 rather than doing something ;)


J)
CSDb has been a huge success and is one of the major websites for the scene and it's history. The forums there have been plagued by arguments recently with the central villain being a guy called Wanderer from Canada. What's your opinion on these events? Are the guys who administrate CSDB to weak in their moderation of the database? and is Wanderer really a lamer or just misinterpreted by most?

B)
I do think that the admins could be a bit more harsh in these matters, especially when someone keeps deleting stuff from the database. As I don't know this Wanderer guy personally, it's quite hard to comment on him being a lamer. But based on his comments on CSDB and the rude PM's and emails he has sent me he really seems like a self-centred 12-year old kid who can't handle any kind of critique at all.


J)
Are you a friend of the C64 hype that appeared when the (PC) C64-emulators started working properly or do you think that all those newbies spoil the good old c64? What is your opinion about emulation in general?

B)
I think emulators are a great tool when developing and checking out demos before transferring them to disks. I've used cross-compilers and vice since 2002 for my demos, and I must say it really makes the task easier, especially as I usually don't code hardware-effects.


J)
You are on the IRC very often (same also). Do you like it there or do you think that it is more or less wasted time because of the fact that there are many "newbies" or "wannabees"? (IRC-"sceners")?

B)
I'm online on IRC a lot anyway, so I don't think being on #c-64 or other scene-channels is a waste of time. And I don't think the newbies are that annoying, I actually find some narrow minded old-timers to be more a pain-in-the-ass than the new guys =)

J)
What do you think about cracker groups who are doing new versions of oldie-games, groups like REMEMBER or NOSTALGIA? Do you like it having brushed up and bug-fixed version of that games or don't you care about it?

B)
Can't really comment that much on the topic as I don't play that many games on c64. But I think it's a nice idea to do these "complete" cracks and trainers of various games, especially if the old ones were sloppy or incomplete.


J)
Do you own a C64-DTV? What's your impression on these new toys?

B)
I don't own one yet, even though I have ordered one, so I can't really say anything about it yet. But I think it will be a fun toy to play with.


J)
What is missing from the C64? How can we improve our scene?

B)
Tough question. The thing missing is more quality demos and new sceners. But those two kind of go hand in hand, if there's no new blood then the amount of releases will decrease and at the same time the amount of quality releases.

J)
What is the weirdest experience you've had on the C64?

B)
One of the weirdest experiences must've been at Zoo'97 when a drunk Mr.Sex/Byterapers thought I was a girl and tried to hit on me for quite some while...


J)
The little game you and Fairlight have been playing with these fake demos, any background on that?

B)
I don't recall myself making any fake demos, as I can send my fuckings under my real name, unlike our dear opponent who have to resort to fake groups. ;)


J)
Any greetings?
 
B)
Greetings to everyone I know and fuckings to Fairlight (and especially Reed) of course ;)


J)
Thanks for your time, any words to leave a final impression upon our audience?

B)
See you all at some party somewhere. :)