breakpoint 2003 report

after nearly 8 hours of train travelling we (rob and me) arrived at the trainstation bingen. the shuttle bus to the partyplace (and some other locations in the city) arrived in time and so we reached the party at around 14:35 at the former military depot in which the uc 6.22 was held last year. breakpoint is the successor to mekka-symposium and so we could expect quite much visitors. and indeed, the party hall was already pretty crowded, but with enough space for a few 100 more people. the quality of the big screen was really good, but the screen itself imo not big enough for the hall. the organizers couldn't get a bigger one, the next available size was to big for the hall. I took again mindcandy dvd's with me and I could sell them quite fast. the same with my 'planet scene' cd. at some places of the hall it was quite cold even at sunny afternoon and now at evening some heating would be nice.

outside there was a huge camp fire where you could warm yourself. and breakpoint is very international even with several u.s. visitors (dan wright, sir garbagetruck at his first party after more than 15 scene years and others) and also visitors from australia (shock). the opening ceremony at around 21:00 was mainly some minutes of music, followed by a short speech by scamp. on the later evening the cold air in the hall was the main theme. one of the heaters wasn't working like it should and so the temperature dropped with every hour a bit more. anyway, the general party atmosphere was relaxed. the live act with doj at the guitar and kb singing was starting with a bit delay. quite strange stuff ;-). after this the last event of the first day started: my demoshow, and everything was running without any problem. this time also with 4 amiga demos from rob's a1200. later in the night many people gathered around the camp fire.

the freezing in the hall continues also after some hours sleeping under the table (sleeping hall to cold), but the organizers promised to fix the problem during the day. my mindcandy dvd's are sold out now and i will take a shower break. due to the shower break i have missed parts of the c64 4k-compo, but what i could see was quite good. the short amiga 4k-compo was dominated by two entries from spaceballs+ephidrena (timur lenk) and scarab with 'fact'. the hall starts also to be warmer now after the problems were fixed. frenetic & r0k rocked the pc 4k-compo massive with their stunning intro, you must see it to believe it! but also fuzzion, freestyle and hazard design were showing nice stuff. on the afternoon steeler announced the rules for the fast compo: overcrowded bus, camp fire, big and fat heating tube, 'ms is dead'. the 96k game compo at the early evening wasn't that spectacular, but the games by ainc and calodox were quite good.

the pricegiving for the scene.org awards was a 'plugin' of this years breakpoint party and started around 19:00. 'variform' by kewlers was the big winner of the awards by winning in the categories best soundtrack, best effects and best demo. 'squash' by and won in the category breakthrough performance while potion's 'planet potion' won the category best intro. the next pricegiving will be held at assembly. a norwegian guy showed us at the camp fire place how the consume of to much alcohol affects your control, but also several finnish guys were boozing all the time. my table neighbors were told by the organizing to stop playing their porn shit all the time - we have also female visitors. the c64 democompo had only 4 entries and the overall quality wasn't that high. the wild compo had 23 entries, but luckily quite much of them were really enjoyable, some animations excellent (rollercoaster simulation by deichshaf for example). a funny entry was the 'emulation' of a c64 demo just with paper (pappe light 120%). the compo ended with an an entry from nosfe against the u.s. led war on iraq - not all sceners stay silent.

the first competion on sunday, the amiga 64k-compo, was cancelled due to lack of entries. so i had the time to take the bus to the sports hall where the showers are located. immediatly after return the pc 64k-compo began and the best stuff was shown at the end of the compo. conspiracy rocked the house with their 'project genesis', but also farbrausch's 'candytron' and the coop intro 'subversive' by bypass+black maiden were very nice. also the weather was really nice now and so quite many people stayed outside (where the real party is ;-)). on the afternoon a fun-compo was announced: build your own balloon. also on afternoon a big mystery was revealed: the identity of the legendary ohase (#szene.ger flooder and probably most kickbanned person on the channel). he wasn't acting clever enough during the party and finally he has his 'coming out'. but he is still alive ;-). the fast-compo on late afternoon had some quite funny entries. the entry 'scamp, warm my feet' by benjam in the streaming music compo (to the music of ben e. king's 'stand by me') was imo one of the best. all amiga demos will win a price just because there were only 3 entries, but all were really nice and the demo 'magia' by tbl really excellent. madwizards contributed with a ppc demo and iris with their demo 'light 2'. after this it was time for ballooning. the balloons from the fun-compo should now rise in the sky and the biggest and most complex construction was for the longest time in the air. the console compo surprised us with a kickass gba demo by unique called 'phloam'.

nearly the first half of the pc democompo was quite annoying, but then the quality raised. farbrausch rocked the compo one more time with a killer disco demo (fr025), but also the demos by kolor (relais), federation against nature (still sucking nature) and squoquo (squoquo's mansion) were really nice to watch. but all these demos will need probably more or less high end hardware. the compos are over and the rest of the party will go on around the camp fire. for the results check scene.org or the breakpoint page. breakpoint was a really nice and funny party with an unique scene atmosphere. for me it was like 2/3 of mekka-sysmposium and 1/3 of the underground conference. besides the problems with the several times unusable toilets and the heating on friday and saturday there were also really good positive details like showing all steps in the graphics compo (even in the c64 graphics compo) and zooming into the graphics to show details. this will set new standards for demoparties. the food support wasn't especially cheap, but the quality way better than at mekka. in opposition to last years mekka there was also no problem with theft. kudos to the organizers for making a very good job. this party will definitly have a future!