[comp.sys.atari.st] Info about WHATTAHE demo?

saj@chinet.chi.il.us (Stephen Jacobs) (03/20/91)

I just got the WHATTAHE demo, and suspect that I don't know how to see all of
it.  There's the 'sorcerer Mickey' opening screen, the helix of spheres
animation, a block wall non-menu and a long text streamer with moving letters.
I get to all of those by hitting the space bar.  Any more parts?  If so, how
do I get to them?                       Steve      saj@chinet.chi.il.us

davidli@simvax.labmed.umn.edu (03/21/91)

In article <1991Mar20.143318.26598@chinet.chi.il.us>, saj@chinet.chi.il.us (Stephen Jacobs) writes:
> I just got the WHATTAHE demo, and suspect that I don't know how to see all of
> it.  There's the 'sorcerer Mickey' opening screen, the helix of spheres
> animation, a block wall non-menu and a long text streamer with moving letters.
> I get to all of those by hitting the space bar.  Any more parts?  If so, how
> do I get to them?                       Steve      saj@chinet.chi.il.us

Ummm, yes.  It is a bit cryptic.  The different demos are accessible using the
arrow keys and following the cursor.  Since I'm typing at a VAX and not at my
ST, I can only tell you the following from memory.

Left and right arrows should move the small cursor (at the helix of spheres
animation ... the one with all of those incomprehensible numbers at the top of
the screen) between various parameters.  The rightmost parameter (and the one
the cursor is at when the demos START...) changes the demo program number.  You
should then use the up/down arrows to select the NUMBER of a demo, and then hit
the space bar to get to that demo.

You'll first get a block wall with characters being written upon it.  Hit the
space bar after the characters are done and the demo starts.  Hit the space bar
again and you get to the block wall saying 'going to menu', hit the space bar
again and you're back at the helix of spheres animation (which IS the menu...)

Take it from there.  Oh yes ... it is possible that I've mixed left/right and
up/down arrows, but a little experimentation should take you where you want to
go.  There are (from memory) 13 demos...

-- 

David Paschall-Zimbel		davidli@simvax.labmed.umn.edu

ekrimen@ecst.csuchico.edu (Ed Krimen) (03/22/91)

saj@chinet.chi.il.us (Stephen Jacobs) writes:

- I just got the WHATTAHE demo, and suspect that I don't know how to 
- see all of it.  There's the 'sorcerer Mickey' opening screen, the
- helix of spheres animation, a block wall non-menu and a long text
- streamer with moving letters.  I get to all of those by hitting the
- space bar.  Any more parts?  If so, how do I get to them?

There are actually 13 more demos on the Whattaheck disk that can be
accessed from the main menu, which is where the blue spheres are
moving around.  The 'block wall non-menu' that you mentioned is an
intro to another demo.  From your description, the 'long text streamer
with moving letters' sounds like demo number 0.  To get to the other
demos, in the upper right hand corner of the main menu (where the blue
spheres are) there's a counter which indicates which demo you will
load if you press the space bar.  To change this number, use the
cursor keys (I think up and down) to move over there.  To change the
number, use the right and left cursor keys.  Now, you can use the 
cursor keys to change the other values on the screen to control the 
movements of the spheres as well.  Just play with it.  After you've
selected the number of the demo you want to view, press the space bar
(I think it's the space bar, it's been a while since I've viewed the
demo).  It will bring up the block wall with the cursor drawing the
text.  At this point, the demo is loading the next demo and
decompressing it.  It will take some time and will be finished before
all the text is drawn, so you can hit the space bar before it's
finished to see if it's decompressed yet.  Give it about 10 seconds 
though once the demo starts loading before you start pressing the
space bar. Demo #10 is one of my favorites.

-- 
         Ed Krimen  ...............................................
   |||   Video Production Major, California State University, Chico
   |||   INTERNET: ekrimen@ecst.csuchico.edu  FREENET: al661 
  / | \  SysOp, Fuji BBS: 916-894-1261        FIDONET: 1:119/4.0

boyd@nu.cs.fsu.edu (Mickey Boyd) (03/23/91)

In article <1991Mar20.143318.26598@chinet.chi.il.us>, saj@chinet.chi.il.us (Stephen Jacobs) writes:
>I just got the WHATTAHE demo, and suspect that I don't know how to see all of
>it.  There's the 'sorcerer Mickey' opening screen, the helix of spheres
>animation, a block wall non-menu and a long text streamer with moving letters.
>I get to all of those by hitting the space bar.  Any more parts?  If so, how
>do I get to them?                       Steve      saj@chinet.chi.il.us

In the Whattheheck demo, there is the screen where you can control the 
blue spheres.  On the top of the screen, there are editable fields controling
x-axis speed, y-axis speed, etc.  In the upper right hand corner, there is a 
field called DEMO __.  Guess what!!  You use the arrow keys to get to that 
field, and change it to see the other demos (there are 13, I think).  

Heehee, don't be embarassed.  I had this demo, saw the two you describe, then 
threw it in my disk box and forgot about it.  I then got another copy with a 
small doc file, and sheepishly dug my old one out and saw the rest of them.  

I have about 6 more of these full-disk type demos (the demo wars are on in 
Europe, boy are we lucky!).  Some of them are absolutely mind blowing.  I 
will MSA these guys and put them on atari.archive.
--
    ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------
             Mickey R. Boyd          |  "It's amazing how much growing up 
          FSU Computer Science       |      resembles being too tired."
        Technical Support Group      |
      email:  boyd@fsucs.cs.fsu.edu  |                  - Heinlein 
    ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------

jamie@defoe.enet.dec.com (03/25/91)

I'd MSA some demos myself (I've got maybe 30 disks worth of demos) but
the MSA program
seems to require TWO disk drives. Me with just one drive is left cold!

If anyone has a version of Magic Shadow that works with a single drive
then please let me have a copy and I'll start uploading these demos
myself.

Some of the best are : European Demo, Mindbomb, Skidz Row, Decade, Dark
Side Of the Spoon (by far the best ST demo EVER written and ever likely
to be written!).

I'm in Reading, England so I tend to get the demos pretty regularly
(almost weekly).


				Jamie.

boyd@nu.cs.fsu.edu (Mickey Boyd) (03/26/91)

In article <2806@shodha.enet.dec.com>, jamie@defoe.enet.dec.com () writes:
>I'd MSA some demos myself (I've got maybe 30 disks worth of demos) but
>the MSA program
>seems to require TWO disk drives. Me with just one drive is left cold!
>
>If anyone has a version of Magic Shadow that works with a single drive
>then please let me have a copy and I'll start uploading these demos
>myself.
>
>Some of the best are : European Demo, Mindbomb, Skidz Row, Decade, Dark

I believe the latest version of MSA is 1.03, and I have MSA'ed many disks
with only one drive by using a large ramdisk (to write the .msa file to).
If this does not work for you, perhaps your version is dated?  I could 
probably email you my version, or you could get it from atari.archive.

See ya!


--
    ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------
             Mickey R. Boyd          |  "Kirk to Enterprise.  All clear 
          FSU Computer Science       |      down here.  Beam down    
        Technical Support Group      |      yeoman Rand and a six-pack . ."
      email:  boyd@fsucs.cs.fsu.edu  |               
    ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------

Roger.Sheppard@bbs.actrix.gen.nz (03/28/91)

Distribution:world 

In article <1991Mar25.184418.3705@mailer.cc.fsu.edu> boyd@nu.cs.fsu.edu writes:
> In article <2806@shodha.enet.dec.com>, jamie@defoe.enet.dec.com () writes:
> >I'd MSA some demos myself (I've got maybe 30 disks worth of demos) but
> >the MSA program
> >seems to require TWO disk drives. Me with just one drive is left cold!
> >
> >If anyone has a version of Magic Shadow that works with a single drive
> >then please let me have a copy and I'll start uploading these demos
> >myself.
> >
> >Some of the best are : European Demo, Mindbomb, Skidz Row, Decade, Dark
> 
> I believe the latest version of MSA is 1.03, and I have MSA'ed many disks
> with only one drive by using a large ramdisk (to write the .msa file to).
> If this does not work for you, perhaps your version is dated?  I could 
> probably email you my version, or you could get it from atari.archive.
> 
> See ya!
> 
> 
> --
>     ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------
>              Mickey R. Boyd          |  "Kirk to Enterprise.  All clear 
>           FSU Computer Science       |      down here.  Beam down    
>         Technical Support Group      |      yeoman Rand and a six-pack . ."
>       email:  boyd@fsucs.cs.fsu.edu  |               
>     ---------------------------------+-------------------------------------

Try ULTRA, this lets you set the Config, for the disks that you are using
but works the same as Magic Shadow..
-- 
Roger W. Sheppard   85 Donovan Rd, Kapiti New Zealand...