mekka-symposium 2002 report

this year i have reached the partyplace with a huge delay because my train from berlin to hannover was delayed more than 30 minutes and so i missed the connecting train to fallingbostel and had to wait 2 hours for the next one. the location was again the 'heidmarkhalle' and for my surprise i found quickly a nice place near to the big screen for me. there was also no real big problem with to less space for all the people because there was more space for additional tables available and also the tables were bigger so that more people could sit at one table.

on the later afternoon and in the evening several musicians mostly from farbrausch and black maiden made dj sets on the stage. then it was time for the opening ceremony and steeler was made to a knight and declared as a defender of the scene against evil gamers. with a delay of more than two hours the live act by noisedrift began, followed by my demoshow. there were some problems with showing the info screens but the demos and intros were running without any problems and it seemed that the visitors were quite lucky with the selection :). negative 'highlight' of this day: the laptop from mithris got stolen by actually unknown person.

the second day was starting with a short game by steeler where the people on the stage had to mimic a demo or game. the c64 4k-compo began with about 30 minutes delay and there were some very nice entries. all pc compos were live this year - a good decision because only live you will have the real feeling and there was also nearly no trouble. in the pc 4k-compo we could see a stunning intro by t$ with hardcore techno and raving tomatoes, but also the releases by cubic & klf (another nice raytracing intro) and fuzzion were very nice. in the following tracked music compo some polish sceners waved always with their flag. in the amiga 4k-compo there were only 4 entries, but mostly very nice ones. after this i was going outside for a while eating something and drinking a beer. the freestyle graphics compo has begun shortly before i returned to the hall. after this the amiga 64k-compo begun and we all were witnesses of a compo with stunning entries by loonies and potion. the potion intro is something that you can call 'the product' for amiga. the wild compo brought many boring stuff but also some quite nice stuff. farbrausch made a funny entry to the music 'catch that goblin!' by skaven/fc while dbki made a very good animation which based on the popular simpsons series. haujobb made a (to long) western movie. crim$on jihad's wild entry with many pictures and videos from the terrorist attack on the wtc was the reason for a controverse discussion in the party irc because the organizers decided to disqualify the entry after playing it first. in the c64 democompo the demos by warrios of the wasteland and breeze (with another adaption of 'la linea') will probably have the best chances, the rest was more or less average.

the third day began with the fastintro compo and the 15sec music-compo, followed by a quite good liveact from digitalverein. the beginning of the pc 64k-compo was quite boring, but the quality raised clearly with the entries by spinning kids, cryonics, aardbei and farbrausch. farbrausch competed with 2 entries and their 'poem to a horse' looked like a winner, but the entries by aardbei and cryonics will also have a good chance for the top 3. some more bad news: one bicycle and another laptop got stolen by unknown person - this points really a bad light at mekka this year. the console compo this year couldn't compete with last years smashing dreamcast demo by haujobb. i missed the music compos on early evening because i was outside for some longer time with the wildmag crew enjoying the nice weather. the bad side is that the grass is really full with bottles, paper and other waste especially from drunken polish and finnish sceners. back in the hall it was time for the 32k-game compo and there were at least two very nice games (both for windows). and it seems that there is a massive problem with thieves, now a wallet and a mobile phone got stolen :(. after this steeler and a bunch of sceners made live music with e-guitars on the stage while the rest of the people were dancing to it, one polish scener made even a complete strip for a short moment. what we could see in the amiga democompo will probably make history. from the 6th entry by tbl (already a very good one) the compo quality raised even more with every demo. other excellent demos were coming from scarab, madcats vs. erazorwizards and scenic+encore.

the last day began with the last compo, the pc democompo. and there were never so much demos in a compo. the organizers announced 50 (!) demo entries and at least nearly 40 were played with an one hour break after the best 25 demos. the compo quality was overall very high, but it was hard to chose a clear winner of the compo. according to shamada 2 more laptops got stolen and the thieves are still unknown :(. after some hours sleep it was time for the pricegiving, moderated by steeler. the pc 4k-compo was won by frenetic/cubic & r0k/klf, followed by the intros from t$ and fuzzion. the 32k game-compo was won by calodox, followed by the john trapolka memorial krew. the amiga 64k-compo was won by potion, followed by loonies. the pc 64k-compo was won by farbrausch with the 1st (poem to a horse) and 2nd place (ein.schlag), followed by cryonics. the wild compo was won by dbki, followed by noice (the ti-83 demo). the atari democompo was won by ephidrena, followed by spiceboys. the c64 democompo was won by breeze, followed by warriors of the wasteland. the amiga democompo was won by tbl, followed by scarab and creative minds. the pc democompo was von by smash designs, followed by orion (easter egg fun-demo) and farbrausch. once again mekka-symposium was a success, just some bigger delays and of course the theft sucked. also the air quality could be better, but the doors of the emergency exit were closed all the time.