from party to party
(cafe'03 and forever 5 party reports and comparision by ellvis/zeroteam)

cafe'03

in the summer'03 mikezt and ellvis did a little mad thing - a travelling little over 2000km to visit speccy party in russia-cafe'03. trip was not prepared very well, we were not taking care much about accomondations or travellings. but party was the main point and it was most important.

we came to the party with a lot of other people. we were little like in another world - all those people who we knew about only because of demos, were in the same train with us. it was a nice feeling to see that they all really exist: )

we missed the official begining of party because we were eating in close restaurant. well, food was good, just the woman working there was not really fast. :)

first day of party was about speccy. classic competitions as gfx, music, intro (512bytes) and demo. the first new thing for us was the fact, that noone there had own computer, party was strictly only for watching the production presented on bigscreen. technical background looked very good sound was great (and really not silent: ), big screen was really big.

cafe'03 was biggest speccy event in russia in 2003 year and it really looked like that - i think that most of all active people around speccy were there. we spent a lot of time in talks, but we also wanted to enjoy the party (well, sorry to all who did not understood our jokes and also sorry for our not joinings of people outside as we really wanted to watch the production). nice was the fact, that mikezt took part in intro competition and even if he was not the winner, he not ended on last place.

little surprise was the fact, that after all the competitions the party place was closed and everybody had to leave. we were little confused, because we had no place to sleep (and even it's not problem to sleep on the street for us, but we simply wanted some great comfort and not street! :-), but organisers finaly let us to sleep on party place. thanks to them!

second day was about pc and amiga competitions. well, it's ok, just little boring after some time for me. very nice was one amiga demo pretty against usa - there were 2 guys from usa presented on the party so i think they were having fun. :)

well, it was another world - so much people around speccy scene, guys taking interviews for magazines, lot of new productions, words as "lamer" in the air: ) and so and so and so. the scene in russia is really big and it's possible to take a lot of energy from such events. cafe was different party then we used to know from here, but it have a lot of advantages which we can't se here.

forever 5

i came to party very late - it was about 2am in saturday morning. there was just very few people-i t's little sad that people are unable to free themselves for one full wekend and friday. i met few speccy people - shrek, dizzy, logout and so. atari people were sleeping or away in pub, c64 the same. forever is the biggest pure 8bit multiplatform party in middle europe, but this friday was there just about 30 people.

saturday was very good in the way that there was official program. so people were not just sitting and working on their computers, but hey had also fun with other people. it was throwing with 5, 25" diskette and playing a football match in microprose soccer on c64 (well, zx scene loosed: ).

during saturday came the usuall amount of people, so party was on every year standart. afternoon there were some presentations of new games (c64), digisid - sid emulation (speccy) and later started very long and boring music competitions. this time was a little problem with sound aparature, but for next years it will be better for sure.

demo competition was little surprise for atari and c64 scene was demo attrapa by mb maniax. both scenes prommised revenge, so i am unpatient to see what they will show us on next forever.

sunday is just about prizes giving, this time we made prizes little more better - not only t-shirts but also calculator and other stuff.

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well, and what's diferent between cafe and forever?

computers. cafe was party for watching and talking, meeting and so. forever is also the same, but you can also bring your own computer. well, saying truth, people here even can't imagine that they will be unable to bring computers to the party. and it's not like they all the time sit in front of computer.

the scene. well, saying truth, russian scene looked to me little like "professional". like it's very strictly divided between "elite" and "lamers". here people take it as pure hobby.

on both parties is lot of alcohol: ) people here visit more pubs, on cafe they were drinking before party place.

cafe is much bigger party.

i wanna thank here to some people who helped us a lot. at first it's to dizzy - he took care about us for all the 2 weeks which we spent in russia. next is unbeliever - we were his guests for few days and as he look like "professional elite ": ), he is really a great person. next big thanks goes to organizers of cafe - well, it was ugly from you to let us sleep on the street :) but thanks for letting us on the party place and also thanks for the party itself!

greets to all who we met there i'll not write any names because it was a lot of people and i don't wanna forget for anyone.

ellvis/zeroteam