Area 5150 Audience Reaction

The Big Blue Wrecking Crew is back. After 7 years from 8088 MPH, we competed at Evoke 2022 with our new production called Area 5150. This is the audience reaction during the Alternative Platforms compo. It later won first place after audience voting.

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[chotaire]

This is likely the biggest technical achievement ever seen on a PC without a 3d acceleration card, even crazier this is a machine from the very early 80s. If only 30% of this had been done in the late 80s, no one would be screaming Amiga today. To those knowing my name, I have seen a lot, but this is absolutely monumental. And to those watching who are not demosceners, you can not even imagine what an effort went into this to make this happen. Congratulations to everyone involved, you've become legends.

[johnbewty]

Sometimes I think I'm an okay programmer. Then I see a demo like this and realize I am a clown. THESE are programmers.

[Henk]

I know people are dying to send this demo back to the 80's and watch people's reactions.
But even for 2022 it feels like someone time traveled this back to us.

[RicardoBanffy]

Pushing a 5150 to do this is a supreme achievement of creative misuse of technology. Nobody in IBM at the time would have had any clue that the computer they built could eventually do this. They'd just say it'd be impossible.

[infinetic]

The parallax scrolling at what seemed to be 60fps would have knocked people's socks off on a 5150 in the early 80s, and then the water reflections? Wow thats not just talent, thats organized, integrated talent + effort.

[jhaluska]

I have been programming for about 25 years and Area 5150 has me questioning everything I know about computers.

[xinmyname]

I really hope they do a breakdown of how they pulled this off. My brain is WRECKED.

[zulupox]

Completely insane! I spent my entire childhood on a 10mhz CGA computer. Never seen more than 4 colors before 😂 and these smooth parallax scrolls... it is just insane

[infinetic]

This is almost impossible to believe, I thought it couldnt get any better than 8088mph. WOW. Coding talent galore!

[chrissingleton]

This is absolutely amazing! Considering the limitations of the CGA hardware, this is nothing short of MAGIC.

[PCFixer]

Modern PC Today: "Eh? An IBM 8088? What can that old thing do?"
IBM 8088: ***FLEX***

[cromulence]

This is what the demoscene is all about. What an amazing achievement. Congratulations on the very well deserved first place!

[infinetic]

The "music" starting at 7:24 was legendary for PIC controller-based sound...

[Aranimda]

We never needed faster computers, we just needed better programmers.

[orangeActiondotcom]

> It later won first place after audience voting.
of course it did holy shit man

[jaymzjulian]

Not only am I completely blown away by the tech of this (my first ever demos were actually made on CGA, but are lost to time.... boo), but I deeply love how loud this PC speaker is

[nicco]

Frankly, all I can say is congrats. You guys deserved that first place. This is truly an achievement, especially for hardware like this.

[red_msx]

This 1 channel track turns me on! Subwoofer output colorizing the sound unbelievably.

[StanAlam]

This is monumental. My 5150 would melt, it does beeps, using Q-basic and can draw to CGA, which takes about half an hour... but this is some serious human ingenuity. Thank you. tears

[VRnamek]

4 decades later, with hindsight, better tools and enough time, whiz kids reimagine the dawn of home PCs. Feels like steampunk reimagining the victorian age...