Event planning is still in progress, and this page will be updated as events are scheduled.
This year, chiptune musician Swerdmurd (Dan Bisciglia) will be performing live at Demosplash 2019. Swerdmurd has been tracking for over 20 years, beginning on Jeffrey Lim's Impulse Tracker in 1998. Swerdmurd hails from Austin, TX and is a lifelong RPG and game music nerd. Swerdmurd's music is a rather manic fusion of late-gen Konami videogame soundtracks and trancey mid-2000s electronic music. His sound is primarily centered around the 2A03 soundchip, popularized by the Nintendo Entertainment System. Dan also co-manages the multi-man videogame remix group Relay Bros, alongside Toni Leys, Dya, and Senn. His first LP effort, Astral Acrobat, is available via Cheapbeats on Bandcamp.
Come to hear engaging discussions on topics across the demoscene.
Painter and ANSI expert Kevin Bouton-Scott tells the story of the ANSI art scene in this 30-minute documentary directed by multi-disciplinarian artist and filmmaker Oliver Payne. The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the rise of a movement of computer users communicating with their peers on Bulletin Board Systems. These BBSes were the perfect proverbial "letterboxes" for illegally distributing cracked software, or "warez", and the avant garde graphical artwork which accompanied these downloads soon became their own underground art movement. The documentary will be followed by a brief discussion of BBS memories.
Presenter: Vince Weaver
The Apple II, when paired with a Mockingboard card, can play AY-3-8910 music, much like other vintage machines. However most of the other machines have Z80 processors (the Apple II has a 6502) so there were no players for most of the common tracker formats. With the only documentation being Z80 assembly and Russian-commented Pascal code, I managed to put together a player that can play arbitrary Vortex-Tracker PT3 files while using about 20% of the CPU.
Presenter: Ashlae Blūm(e)
ukiyobang is a livecode musical project in the vein of downtempo emotronica. Blūm(e) tangles improvised performance content using Python, Haskell, Supercollider, Ableton, and Musical Instruments to evoke fantasy-inspired journeys to otherworldly places.
Our yearly retro gaming room returns! Play from hundreds of the games you fondly remember on authentic hardware, including:
We'll be running a tournament in our gaming room. Do you have what it takes to be the best?
Come celebrate the spirit of the Demoscene with live screenings and competitions.
Throughout the weekend, we'll be offering live showings of demos running on real machines, old and new, from the CMU Computer Club's large collection -- Amiga, Atari, Commodore, PC, you name it! We'll be showing both eternal classics and recent releases. Check the schedule for more details and times!
No demo party is complete without the chance to write your own demos and submit them to be screened and voted on by the audience! We have several categories - check the compos page for more info.
Loud, flashy, and generally seizure-inducing, rave demos are the demoscene's link to the techno/rave culture it grew up within. These might not be for everyone, but they definitely have devoted fans. We'll be giving these their own room for your enjoyment!