Speaking about their latest demo, the party Roma.exe and the italian scene. Pictures and replies by Mod3m of Darkage, text by Ghandy of Nukleus.
The Italian scene has apparently been on a break for many years, of course with a few exceptions. However, with Roma.exe we saw the return of demo parties in the capital city this past summer, raising hopes for a revival of the demo Scene in Italy. We spoke with Mod3m, the main coder and organiser of Darkage, who won the Amiga competition recently. Apparently, the title of his demo seems to have something in common with a ‘one-night stand’. But it can also have a completely different meaning. However, as we are not Italian, we don’t quite get the joke.
Roma.exe – the first demo party in Italy since 24 years?
Ghandy: If I’m correct, Roma.exe was the first demoparty in Italy since 28 years. Wasn’t your “Spoletium” party in March 1998 the last one in your country? Time is moving forward so damn quickly.
Mod3m/Darkage: Well, the last Amiga only demo party in Italy has been Spoletium 4 in 2002. I left the demo scene after so I have no memories if there was some PC demo party in Italy later. But anyway, for long time in Italy we had no demo parties at all.
Ghandy: Oh, I missed some other events such as Horde 2007 or the Codex Alpe Adria, which was more an Amiga meeting instead a demo party. My fault, sorry! But if you’re having a look at Demoparty.net you will quickly notice that not much happened in that country during the past years.
What would you say: What’s happening in the Italian demoscene right now? How many people can be considered as being active in your country?
Mod3m/Darkage: I would say that after 2020 the demo scene in Italy is a bit restarting and right now there are something like thirty-forty active demo sceners, which is enough to restart this scene in Italy.
Ghandy: What changes, if any, do you expect as a result of Roma.exe?
Mod3m/Darkage: Maybe the fact that there was a demo party in Italy again after so many years will motivate other old demo sceners to do something again! Let’s hope so!
No local scene meetings in Italy
Ghandy: In Germany in some towns we have local scene meetings like the Meetup at the C-Base in Berlin, the “Berlin Pub Meeting” (bpm) or the “Düsseldorf Pub Meeting” (dpm), which again takes place each three months. Do you have similar events?
Mod3m/Darkage: Sadly in Italy we don’t have any demoscene meetings in towns because we are not so many. However, I know of some small meetings like Passione Amiga Day Spring Edition where Amiga users, not only demo sceners, meet in some Italian wineries and spend time drinking and talking about Amiga.
Ghandy: Were you satisfied with the quantity and quality of the competitions at the Roma.exe?
Mod3m/Darkage: I was very satisfied with the quantity and especially the quality of the competitions. And I think the Amiga democompo was better than the PC democompo for the quality of releases. In particular, I really really enjoyed the third place by TAD. His demo was really emotional to me.
Ghandy: How did you find it? Do you think it’s a good idea for the party to only be held once every two years?
Mod3m/Darkage: The party was amazing, was incredibly higher my expectations. I did expect to find something like 40, maybe 50 people, not more than 200 and everything was organized incredibly well.
The only negative thing in my opinion is that the next edition will be not next year but in two years. It’s a bit of a pity, but I do understand the reasons of the organizers.
Ghandy: By the way, what’s going on with your group’s website, scene.darkage.it? Do you plan to reactivate it at any point?
Mod3m/Darkage: I know that our website is offline since decades, but we have really only a little bit of time for the scene and I do prefer personally to invest it in using Asmone then installing WordPress. Anyway, maybe we will see if some other members of the arcane will contribute to make a new website. 🙂
The second collaboration with Steffest
Ghandy: I saw that Steffest, the graphic designer from Desire, has contributed his work again after participating in “The Deep Meet” in March 2024 for Revision. How did you start working together?
Mod3m/Darkage: Me and Steffest know each other since long time and we already collaborated in 2024 for the demo “The Deep Meet” that won Revision 2024. And we are not only demo sceners, we love the Amiga computer and we both do extra things related to Amiga. So when I asked him if he wanted to collaborate on a new demo, he said yes and we (Darkage) were also happy because Steffest is such an incredible artist and such a gentleman.
Ghandy: To be honest, I really love your demo, ‘Book in Air‘. Do you agree that it’s a step back to the old Darkage style you used several years ago?
Mod3m/Darkage: Thank you very much. We made this new demo quite in a short time, I would say couple of months. Of course, we had some effects ready, but the whole design and mounting the effects together took a short time. We wanted to do something joyful, happy and really party-party-party style.
‘Book in Air’ is all about girls and other wonderful things 😉
Ghandy: I saw fish and flying smartphones, but no e-book readers. What’s the idea behind the title of the demo? Have I missed something, or is there simply no connection? 😉
Mod3m/Darkage: The name of the demo is something that only Italians understand, and they all laugh 🙂 Well, ‘Book in air’ in Italy is something wonderful that girls do with their mouth to men, and men enjoy very much. So, the meaning of the demo is very “philosophical” but not very book oriented.
Ghandy: After the last issue of Versus in December 2024, there won’t be an active Amiga charts magazine anymore. Is there any chance that Showtime will make a comeback? Or, to be more specific: Does the scene still really need a charts magazine because of the existence of the internet? It’s hard to say if they will come up with anything, but Nukleus gave all the rights back to the Void members.
Mod3m/Darkage: I don’t think that Showtime will ever come back. Not with the brand Darkage at least. Or if we would do, I think we would first have to ask again Ram Jam, but at the moment it’s not in our plans. I personally miss disk magazines VERY much! Big up to Magic for releasing Speed! (which has a small magazine part) and to you, of course!
Ghandy: I know this is a sensitive topic. You don’t have to answer the question. If not, that’s OK with me! How well did you handle the whole discussion about artificial intelligence?
Mod3m/Darkage: I think one solution to this problem would be to separate the compos at the parties, something like “classic, no-AI Amiga compo”, and something like “with the help of AI” Amiga demo compo. So if somebody uses AI and enjoys doing it, then there will be a specific compo for them.
“I love to feel like in the 90s”
Ghandy: Will there be any more AI-assisted demos in future? Or will you only submit them at parties where they’re allowed?
Mod3m/Darkage: Oh well, I personally use AsmOne one point forty-nine on my Amiga 1200. So, I’m very old style. My Amiga is also offline, and I love to use it because I love to feel like in the nineties. I love the sound of the mechanical keyboard, I love the limitations, and this makes me really enjoy coding on the Amiga in twenty twenty-six. If someone wants to use AI, I have no problem with it. I like the way I code because I enjoy it. It’s a hobby, afterall.
Ghandy: Have you been in touch with any former Ram Jam members in recent years? Or did you lose contact with them completely? What about their former leader, ACBS, or the other members, Podsnuos, Crazy Surfing, The Ripper and Vega? Those are the names that came to my mind.
Mod3m/Darkage: Oh, I just met Surfing from Ram Jam at Roma.exe. We haven’t seen each other for twenty years, and it was really cool to meet him again. I’m friend on Facebook with Vega and with ACBS, but we don’t write much to each other.
Ghandy: Speaking of memories… Do you still have any contact with your former group mate, Kaosmaster? What is he doing nowadays?
Mod3m/Darkage: No, sadly I have no contact anymore with Kaosmaster.
Ghandy: I see that your company, Lightage, is an IT service provider in your old hometown of Spoleto. Is that your main source of income? Or do you have any other projects?
Mod3m/Darkage: My company, Lightage, is still running well. We are now twelve people, and we mostly create websites, and I know I should make one for Darkage, and we provide web hosting all around Italian companies, and yeah, that’s my main source of income.
His passion for the Amiga brought him back
Ghandy: What has motivated you to become active again? Is it mostly the friendship with Dip, Soda7 and the other members? Golden memories from the past, or something else entirely?
Mod3m/Darkage: My passion for Amiga and especially for the Amiga demo scene came back in 2020 during COVID. I haven’t followed what was happening to the Amiga and to the demo scene for 20 years and I was so happily surprised that still there were demo parties, that the AmigaOS was still developed, there were new games, new programs, new tools! So, I slowly slowly restarted using Amiga and believe me, I didn’t remember how to assemble an AsmOne source. It took me many many months to remember and slowly get back on track!
Ghandy: What do you think: What will you be doing in five or ten years? Will you still be running the same business and coding for the Amiga in your spare time?
Mod3m/Darkage: I really have no idea what will happen in five or ten years, but I hope that the demo scene will be still alive with or without me! 🙂
His wife supports his activities in his spare time.
Ghandy: What does your wife think of your hobby? Do you have any children who you could introduce to the Amiga in order to infect them with the same virus? 😉
Mod3m/Darkage: My wife actually supports my hobby and she loves to enjoy going to the parties. Her first demo party was at Xenium last year in Poland, and this year she came to Roma.exe, and we will probably come back to Xenium this summer again.
Ghandy: Thank you very much for your detailed answers. I hope to see you in two years in Rome or at another event!
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Nice article.. (although topic was already written about in Speed #77 and also a little in Speed #78)
Hope to see Amiga version of the Diskmag someday still.. Keep em coming!