What's in this Issue.

Review: Bubble Heroes from Crystal Interactive Software.
Report: SEALORAMA Show Report.
Editorial "Half of Amiga Owners are tight fisted misers"
Features: From our correspondant: Global news and views on the Amiga scene from around the world.
Ross Vumbaca. (Australian Correspondant) Talks about the forthcoming ACE 2k Show in Australia
Robb Perrone (USA Correspondant) Sadly there's No Robb. this month- Sob!!
Talkback Let off Steam about the anything Amiga. We want your views! Win £20 for it too!
Issue 1  Previous Issues.

Review.

The game has three characters a Knight (Yorumaru), a Frog (Gupochi) and a Weird cat girl (Nekochan)each of the characters have there own special moves for use in deathmatch mode.

The Plot

The game has an interesting plot involving floating islands, fairies and an evil villain who happens to looks remeniscent of Dr.Doom all of which seem pointless and the story it's self is very badly written and almost nonsensical, overall the plot seems to be nothing more than padding to try and make the game stand out from the crowd and is best worth ignoring.

Visuals

The games graphics are excellent and it seem apparent that a great deal of care was made in their creation. Right from the start, the in game background graphics are all exceedingly well drawn. The only place where the graphics could do with, improvment would be the character graphics, which appear blocky.

Game Play

The game itself plays exceedingly well and is challenging enough to keep you entertained for hours, it has a nice learning curve so the first time you play the game you'll find it quite hard though the more you play it the easier it becomes.
The game is structured in four sections each containing 10 levels at the end of each section you have to free a fairy after which you have to battle a level boss, this makes the game varied enough to keep you interested.


Score: 9/10

Mike Woods,
Rubber Chicken Network.

Game Spec: Bubble Heroes,it says on the cover, will quite happily run on an Amiga with:

• 68030 CPU or Above.
• AGA Chipset or RTG Card
• 4mb Ram
• CD Rom Drive with Audio output (not essential to play the game)
• Hard Drive
  Features
• Multiple Language Support

SEALORAMA Show Report

The SEALORAMA 2000 took place in Basildon a town some 32 miles east of London.
The venue itself is typical out of town community centre (English spelling) that you find dotted around the UK. This one however, is set in beautiful grounds with acres of gentle grass slopes inlaid with a large lake in the middle complete with ducks and geese which were bobbing lazily on the water, basking in the late summer sunshine.

Which is really quite a surreal setting for an Amiga show.
Pulling into the free car park, We arrived shortly before opening time (midday) I say we, because my other hat has Amiga North Thames Chairman written on it and A.N.T. had a table (albeit a very small table) at the SEAL show.

Entering the centre, which had just recently been re-painted throughout, the reception area having been painted sky blue with fluffy cloud patterns, we paid our entrance fee, a miserly £1.00 pound and we went in.

To the left as you came in was the games arena, inside were various assorted Amiga's running a bewildering array of Amiga Games including Heretic II, Wipout 2097, the obligatory Sensible Soccer and various other games. Heretic II in head to head mode. My god this game is mind bogginly good, the graphics are excellent, the sound is fantastic the gameplay looks sublime.

Also at hand were a few machines dedicated to running Wipeout 2097. One of them was running it on a monster of a monitor, 21 inches at least and it belonged to a bloke called Geoff (Jeff?) who paid a paltry amount (lucky for it. Let me tell you here and now ladies and gentlemen, size matters!

Wipout on a 21 inch screen is breath taking, especially at a 640 by 480 resolution! My mind boggled, I had to have a go (well two actually). As I mentioned, the obligatory Sensible Soccer was running on a large projected screen. I tell you, I'll be 70 and some git somewhere will still be playing this antique of a game at some computer show or other. Please, it's time to bury this game, it has seen better days.

Immediately next door to the gaming arena was the centre's kitchen which had been converted to a makeshift refreshments stall. This was very amiably manned by Sharon Sutton, the wife of the SEAL chairman and Mandyleigh. Boy did my sympathies lie with them on Sunday. A hot day, small room, little ventilation and tea urns running at full whack!
The Chocolate Brownies were excellent though, I had two!

Exiting the refreshment area, to the left and directly in front of the entrance, was one of the exhibitors area with the usergroups area immediately behind. Amiga North Thames were in there along with ASA, Kickstart and various other odds and sods, amongst them being Gasteiner and Crystal Interactive Software, who were showing off their first debut Amiga game, Bubble Heroes.

I must add that Kickstart were selling various bits of shareware, amongst which was Moovid for PPC and 68k flavours. They sold over a staggering 30 copies in one day (Shareware authors take note). I myself was one of the people who had his arm twisted to buy an upgrade! - Don't worry guys, doctor says it will heal in six weeks and that I should get full use of the arm back with intensive therapy. :(

Exiting out back to the reception area and once more to the left (on the right of the entrance) was the main exhibitors hall. Here you could purchase from the likes of Fore-Matt home computing, EyeTech/Eyeplay, Blittersoft, The mighty Amigactive Magazine and finally, Analogic, the main sponsors of the show,

The main room was large enough to accommodate enough people without ever-feeling clausterphobic.

Fore-matt Home Computing
were there selling a mixture of old and New Software, from A500 days to Heretic II, Hellsquad and Easysys. I was impressed with Fore-Matt's wide range of Software. You really couldn't say they had travelled light.

Eyetech/Eyeplay
Were selling Hardware and Software. It's refreshing to see an Amiga Vendor like Eyetech making an Effort, not only were they the ones who had to travel the furthest to get to the show, but their prices were really reasonable and dare I say it, cheaper in most cases than everyone else. On top of that, most of the stuff they had for sale was mainly Amiga specific stuff. Something that some of the other vendors should do well in taking note. Overall I was also impressed with Eyetech/Eyeplay's effort, because they did just that, make an effort and sold most of the items at show prices including the SDK and Heretic II.

Blittersoft.
Their stand was really a bit of a dogs breakfast and I didn't see anything on there that grabbed my attention, it looked like a mini car boot sale (Garage sale) with everything strewn about. I passed over their table quickly as there didn't seem to be much that caught the eye. Admittedly, and to be fair, I am told by others that they did have a demo version of Fubar at some stage and also the PCI card was there on display and it was running. I didn't see any of it - sadly. They were also selling stuff from Arteffects to Fusion 3.2 but there didn't appear to be giving out much in the way of Show discounts apparently.

Amiga Active Magazine.
Andrew Korn (come in Mr Korn) didn't show on the day but Mark Hinton (himself) and some of the other staff did. They didn't get too many people round their table on the day taking subscriptions, although, I understand they sold a number of back issues. I hope that those people reading this will remember to subscribe to the last great commercial English Amiga magazine left on the planet. If you haven't subscribed already, please do, it's a fine magazine - worth every penny.

Anologic.
Oh Dear, what an uninspired bunch. Their table had a mixture of Amiga specific hardware as well as general computing hardware such as Simms and Hard Drives. Unfortunately their table looked like a jumble sale which had been set up by a four year old. Listen guys, here's a tip, presentation, presentation, presentation. I must admit I couldn't find anything in terms of Amiga specific stuff at show prices either.

Elsewhere.....

Gasteiner.
Were selling general computing stuff plus some of those used, buy at your own risk 2.5inch hard drives for a fiver apiece. They had the TV amazing running, but to be quite honest, their table was probably the worst of the lot on the day! Resembling more a junk yard. I was expecting Steptoe and Son to be manning it.

Best commercial effort for the day must undoubtedly go to.. (cue drum roll please)

Crystal Interactive Software.
Now this was more like it! If everyone made the same sort of effort that was done by this developer, Amiga Shows (even small ones) would look more professional and Glitzy.

For starters they had a large Crystal Interactive Banner at the back of their tables, two Amigas running their latest release, the excellently addictive Bubble Heroes, which you could play before deciding to buy or not. Coupled with an attractive display case holding the specially pressed, limited edition, SEALORAMA show Bubble Heroes CD's.

Not content with that, for an encore they showed off, first time publicly in the world, Gilbert Goodmate their soon to be released Blockbuster PC game that if not surpassing Lucas art's efforts, will quite happily rub shoulders with them. Amiga Owners needn't worry as there will be an Amiga version if Bubble Heroes sells well enough and it isn't pirated. Up to us really, Gilbert will be a landmark game for the Amiga and indeed any platform.

All in all it was definitely well worth the trip and the miserly one pound admittance charge.

In the end, half of those that attended the show came away with a load of goodies, the other half are tight fisted misers and I will rant about them in a separate arictle elsewhere.

Overall it was an excellent show, Attendance was around the 190 mark, the only criticsm I would make is that at five hours it is a tad too long. By the time the prize draws came round at four, most people had left. Their loss, as they really were nice prizes too - Never mind, those who remained, reaped the rewards by claiming the booty on the re-drawn numbers.

Most dealers were delighted too, as a few I spoke to afterwards reported making quite a nice bit of business. They will be back next year, mark my words.

Overall, a show worth holding and one worth going to. Well done SEAL! I am looking forward to SEALORAMA 2001 already. Class.

For myself, I came away with a copy of Heretic II, Foundation add-on pack, Easysys, Moovid PPC and a rather lucky find in Defender of the Crown, boxed and with originals. (I'll get Hellsquad next month.)

P.S. Quick thank you to Phil Wagstaff and everyone else who came along and said hi!

Michael Carrillo.

This issue sees a lot more of my rant and raves, apparently, it will be good for me to get things off my chest!
Sadly Robb Perrone is unable to file a report for this issue.

Tight Fisted Misers

From WoA size shows to the smaller offerings you will see these tight fisted "w*****s" wondering from pillar to post trying as many freebies as they can get their hands on.

Take the recent SEAL show, which whilst making many retailers happy, I would estimate that just over half the people who attended, were buying the stuff, the remaining 40% of those there came in, paid their pound (I bet that hurt) and spent the whole day wondering about trying everything that was available for free but never reaching into their pocket. I asked a few of them and they admittted that they didn`t have any money. Why the F*** turn up???

Case in point.

Crystal Interactive Software.
I must come clean and declare an interest here, over the last year or so I have come to know Andrew Reed, Managing Director of Crystal Interactive Software. (Not to be confused with Crystal Software & Electronics in the UK and Crystal Software in Italy - totally different kettle of fish - OK?)
Crystal had pressed, especially for the day, fifty copies of Bubble Heroes to sell at the show. These were home burned efforts but with professional packaging, instructions (no read me file here folks) etc. All day long people were glued to the two machines which had Bubble Heroes running. In all, nearly 50 to 60 people played the game during the day. Most really loved it and quite a few came back for another go! Sadly as is now prevelant in the Amiga World, only nine copies were sold all day.
Myself along, with another nine people play tested this game to death (didn't find any bugs, solid). Quite a few reported staying up until 3am in the morning playing the sucker. Such is the addictiveness of the game.
As I said many came back to have another go. Yet as I have already stated only nine copies sold all day. Not withstanding the fact that it was selling for a measly twenty pounds! Of course it will be higher once the "proper" copies go on general sale at your local dealer.
Go figure..

Of course you can hear the old excuses of "I haven't got the spec machine to run it" sob story being heard . If that were the case then only those people with a stock 020 And only 2mb Chipmem can count themselves unlucky as Bubble Heroes will run on an 020 AGA or RTG and 4 mb fastram (oh yes, you also need a cd rom drive and a hard drive)

I know of someone who has successfully run the game on an CD32-SX1 with an 020 and 4mb fast ram and a titchy hard drive, so there!

Of the 60% of people who still buy Amiga stuff, they are roughly divided in half by those who like games and those who don't like/play games.

It wasn't just Bubble Heroes who suffered though...

Hellsquad
Sadly didn't fare much better either, having only sold three copies at one vendor, and not much more at the next. Great for a "just released" game.admittedly, people could have been waiting for the review to come out, but there have been demo's and of course this wasn't the case with Bubble Heroes as people could really "try before you buy".

Heretic II only sold about 10 copies tops the whole day (if that.) I hear that Hyperion required to sell 4000 copies of the game in order to just break even. ( apparently the license cost loads) To date they have only sold 400 copies. Good luck guys I hope you stay afloat.

Having seen the gutted look on Andrew Reed's face (A man who wears his heart on his sleeve and a big Amiga fan to boot) at the poor response of Bubble Heroes, I wouldn't be surprised if BH is his first and last foray into the miggy market. Bubble Heroes needs to sell a minimum of a thousand copies. If it does, it will be nothing short of a miracle.

Shame really because the game is class and I bet that it gets very good reviews on all the Amiga magazines.

The whole thing seems endemic to me as to how the Amiga Market lies. Amiga shows are normally the big cash cow for many Amiga companies. This isn`t a reflection on the SEAL show, or any other Amiga Show in the UK, they are excellent, rather we appear to be stuck with some sad piss heads that call themselves Amigans but would most probably rather spend all their money on fags (cigerrettes) and booze and sod buying stuff. These people are probably the ones doing the pirating. As I said, these people are Parasites!

Don't know why I am even bothering anyhow, most likely these type of people are too tight to surf the .net. and read this article, it might cost them too much in electricity!
Mind you they are probably using someone else's machine anyhow.

Don't get me wrong, There is money to be made at Amiga shows, substantial amounts, with all the dealers especially if you make an effort. The problem is that most of the money comes from the 60% spending money and if you are selling games software then, you are down to 30% of Amigans and the amount of times you can sell a particular piece of software to these people is normally limited to just one.

Which finally brings me to Gilbert Goodmate. The demo drew a large crowd with everyone straining vigorously to see the presentation on the tiny laptop running the completed PC version.

This game is total class and when it's released on the PC market it,they will zoom straight to the top of the charts. We Amigans may get our own version. However, if those tight fisted misers don't start digging into their own pockets and start supporting instead of pirating, we are more likely to see Elvis re-appear than see Gilber Goodmate coming an Amiga Screen near you.
* Gilbert Goodmate? It's Good mate, let's hope we see it on our machine of choice.

Think I'm wrong? If you want to argue with anything I have said, use the Talkback forum or express your thoughts in our voyager friendly Javascript Poll

Regards.

The golden days of the Amiga are long over, and for the NG Amiga - it's early days yet.

So what does an Australian Amiga user look forward to, in their day to day lives? What event can they scribble a note on their calendar about, to remind them not to miss it? Their wedding anniversary? A vacation? Paying the mortage off? Bah..!

For the true Amigan, these events are boring at best, unless they involve Amigas...

So what interesting thing can they look forward to?

Well, apart from a monthly usergroup meeting - if your actually a member of one - and perhaps a subscription to an Amiga magazine, the answer is
--- not much.

And even then, your "Amiga" usergroup might strangely not look like an Amiga newsgroup, as a recent post in aus.computers.amiga seemed to show:

               Subject: Demo of iMovie 2 tonight at AUGWA meeting + more..
               Date: 08/08/2000
               

               Tonight's AUGWA meeting 08-Aug @ 7.30
               Rod Lavington from Random Access will be showing off the latest
               product releases from Apple.  For the desktop video enthusiasts, there
               will be a demonstration of iMovie 2, the follow up to the
               highly successful original. There will also be a presentation on the
               latest product launches from Apple, which include a revamped  iMac
               range, dual processor G4 towers, and the PowerMac G4 Cube.
               

According to the poster of the above, this usergroup is doing an "alternative platform thing" and has been doing it for a "while". This was of course very obvious - I never for a moment thought that they had turned into an Apple users group. Did you?

So there doesn't seem to be much happening for the average user nowadays - the market is all but dead, the users are scattered, and your probably on the verge of despair.. But wait - dont despair! (yet).. Cancel those "FS: Amiga" adds, and give the new PC to your in-laws.. it turns out that there will be at least one thing to look out for this year, with an upcoming computer show in Melbourne, that will feature Amigas.

I figured I might as well take the opportunity to share some info. which was kindly provided to me by Michael Czajka, one of the people involved with the organisation, and a member of MAUG.. (Melbourne Amiga User Group)

The show is called "ACE 2000" and stands for "Amiga Computer Expo".. (well it also stands for "Australian Connectivity Expo" - but it sounds better if you say Amiga.. don't you just love those buzz words?)

It will be held on the 21st-22nd October (Sat-Sun) in The Pits, Aughtie drive, Albert Park. This is in the middle of the park, and a few minutes from the Melbourne CBD.

Apparently, the show is the largest Amiga Expo to occur in years, with almost 100% of Amiga dealers attending (they might get them all). Almost all Australian Amiga user groups are attending, and groups that the organisers have missed are welcome to attend (they will be offered free tables).

The show is in actual fact not exclusively Amiga, and will also feature Mac, Linux, OS/2 and other alternative OS'. Because of this, they are expecting 5,000 - 10,000 attendees, and the show should receive lots of coverage.

Of major interest, is that Amiga has confirmed that they will attend with Bill McEwen and Petro/Fleecy possibly attending. Power Computing and other companies are being worked on.

There will also be a dinner/quiz night - I went to the one held in Canberra (during ADU 99) last year, and it was an enjoyable evening, eventhough the MC would tend to disagree.

There will be special pricing for students, and concession holders. A mailing list is now available for people who want to keep informed, this and more information, can be accessed from the show's web page at: http://www.ace2k.net

At it's worst, the show seems like a great opportunity to meet other Amigans, hear the latest about the NG 'Amiga' from the horses mouth (Amiga), and to visit Melbourne* if your from interstate.. And at it's best.. well .. it could be a "pivotal point for the Amiga in Australia".. (or so I've been told)..

Sounds pretty good to me, so I'll see you there. ;-)

Ross..

* OK, this might be a bad thing..

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