I was at my Amiga 2000 the other night loading this and that scenedemo (demoscene productions) at random, many of which I’d not watched in years, when I ran across a little 40K intro featuring some nifty Halloween-themed elements. With Halloween just a few nights away, that seemed a rather appropriate use of pixellated vectors and it occurred to me to put together a collection of some of the Halloween-themed scenedemos out there for vintage systems, much as I’ve been doing for the past six years for Holiday / Christmas demos.
I’ve written a number of posts on this blog about computing memories around the ghoulish time of the year. For instance, there was the year that an Atari ST saved Halloween for me. I will certainly never forget the year that I plunged blade into pumpkin and created the sinister and ghastly iPod-o-Lantern. And I’ve taken part in several r/Retrobattlestations competitions designed to scare the bytes out of unsuspecting vintage computing aficionados, using an Amiga 1000 on two different occasions as well as an Apple //e.
Indeed, All Hallows’ Eve and vintage computing seem to go rather nicely together. So, without further ado, I hope you enjoy the demos I’ve chosen to scare share with you this season.
C64 – Hokuto Force’s Pumpkin Joyness (2016)
Amiga OCS – Syntax Party Crew’s RSIDM Halloween Experience (2009)
C64 – Hokuto Force’s Halloween the 40th Anniversary Celebration Demo (2018)
Atari 7800 – Atari 7800 Happy Halloween Demo (2007)
Uzebox (2 chip board) – Clay Cowgill’s Halloween Demo (2008)
C64 – Exceed, Resource & The Dreams’ Cauldron 101% (2007)
Atari 2600 – Chris Read’s Atari 2600 Halloween Demo
C64 – TFM’s Halloween Celebration Demo (1991)
Amiga OCS – Richie on the Moon’s Ghostown (2017)
Amiga OCS – my own BASIC r/Retrobattlestations entry (2013)
That last one, in BASIC, is not a demoscene production, but I thought I’d slip it in — forgive me. Hope you enjoyed the show. This might just become a yearly post tradition.
