Preview
The Autum Edition of "Naked Truth Magazine" by MindBender.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Magazine Personel:
MindBender .......................................... [Publisher/Editor]
The Acid Zcout ...................................... [Editor]
Welcome to Naked Truth Magazine, a text-based magazine made by myself and
The Acid Zcout who thought that it was time to give the mag-makers of the
PC-scene some competition. As this magazine was going to be released this
summer (but you know summer) everything was delayed which means most all
of the material is more or less old... real reason why it was not released
is that I never found a coder/gfx that was good and active enough for the
mag to finally reach the release point... atleast this is easy to read!
For next issue we will try to include as much fact/news as possible as there
has not been a really great mag since the BAD-Magazine days... (Hi, Bart)
The magazine will also include have a bunch of topics and interviews with all
kinds of people in and outside the scene, also there will be some updates on
what's going on ...
So this is what I can say so far... enjoy the reading, if you can <g>..
Greetings to: Hoson, Jimmy Jamez, Lord Cyric, Cyber Angel, Celestial Wizard,
Bluewater, Morbid Angel, Dr. Insanity, Tazman, Hula, M:ET,
Rygar, Chainsaw Massacre, Manhunter, Morbid Genius & Stoney
-- MindBender 2:nd October '95
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Hula
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The first interview is a earlier non-published interview with the SysOp of
ex:Rest in Peace and ex:Gods Realm... Razor / DOD member Hula. The interview
might be a bit out of date... but still a good interview...
M: Hi, this is MindBender for The Naked Truth Magazine... I want to ask you
some questions on the RIP subject, if that's ok ?
H: Yeah, is this the first issue ?
M: Yep correct.. the name is Naked Truth Magazine
H: OK, shoot !
M: How long have you been in the scene ?
H: I have been in the scene for about 2 years... but I remember the old
commadore days..
M: So what about Quackers ?
H: He has been around longer...
M: In your two years, any people in particular you learned not to deal
with, like people you dont like ?
H: Humm.. I am a pretty easy person to get along with.. I try to stay neutral
as a SysOp...
M: Can you give me a little background on 'Rest in Peace' ?
H: Sure, well first the History of RIP I guess. RIP the board was started by
a guy named Nuke.. he ran the board and brought it up to 12 nodes when
there were mostly 1-3 node boards around. His userbase was a Whos-Who of
the scene... For some reason he decided he didnt want to run it anymore
so he offered it to Quacker and I.
We had at the time been working on a deal with High Voltage to be their
new World Headquarters. We assumed the board and promised Nuke that it
would be run with the same high standards that he had made it on..
Unfortunatly our group HV got busted...and We took down the board for
security reasons... After some new modifications we put the board back
up and continued on....Business as usual...
Until most recently we had to take it back down after our security had
been comprimised.. So thats about it without going into great details :)
M: So what you mean is, the board was NOT busted ?!
H: Nope...The board was not busted...
M: What about the rumors that say you and Quackers got into a fight about how
the system should be runned which ended in the closedown ?
H: Well he and I are and always will be close friends..
M: So that rumour is false too ?
H: But those rumors are just that, not true... The RIP staff which was more
than just Quackers and I worked together on all things. Quackers was the
Politician.... He made the deals with groups etc...
M: OK, so what was the main reason you closed down the BBS this time.. I do
remember lasttime with 'Unlawful Entry' being busted etc. but now, why ?
H: Well you may want to ask him about that... All I can say is that Quackers
and I both wanted a place where groups could hang out and trade...
no attitudes.. Unfortunatly this was not possible.
M: Yep.. I guess, but why close down now ? You just got the word from
Quackers, closed down and didnt question it ?
H: Well Quackers had a visit... and I think at that point you have to
question your intentions in the scene...
M: From the feds or SPA, what ?
H: Well I would rather you ask him...
M: Yes, but I cant get ahold of him here, can I ?
H: No, he is basically outta the scene...
M: OK nevermind that, were there any fights on RIP betwen groups who wanted
to have the board as WHQ.. ?
H: Ohh sure, everyday !
M: Anything in particular that you remember ?
H: Well I had to turn down Eclipse WHQ becuase of my loyalty to RAZOR even
though at the time I was only RAZOR CHQ.
M: And what about the time you found out T.A.G. got busted.. I mean it was
just weeks after the RIP closedown...
H: I felt bad for Blackhawk... he is a cool guy and been around along time...
His board was an example of Quality. He worked very hard to get where he
was at...
M: You think maybe it could have been RIP.. ?
H: Sure it could have been RIP, Anytime a fellow SYSOP gets busted I feel bad.
M: What about security on RIP... any special things you remember to make it
untouchable for the feds ?
H: People in the scene dont relieze how hard it is to run a board so that the
questions falstions fall in the right places.. Alot of work and money...
M: Anything you would like to say to RAZOR 1911 team about the RIP closedown?
H: Not really...They understand my feelings about the group...
M: Anything you want to add ?
H: Yep, I think people need to start to learn to work together and stop
fucking eachother around... and that groups should enjoy the competition
they get from each other and not take it so personal.
And that when people get busted they should learn to Shutup!! :) hehehe..
M: What do you think of all these small new groups releasing Cd-rips/Trash..
H: Well they are a nessasary part of the scene, Pretty soon all games will
be on CD-ROM only...
M: You think RIP will get back online again *EVER* ?
H: Nope...As Quackers said "May it Rest in Peace!" hehehe well said :)
M: Yep, for sure... well ok it's been a pleassure working with you and thanks
alot for your time, doing this interview...
H: Well thats ok, I will get off my soapbox :), and Good luck with the mag!
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with M:ET
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Another interview made by my editor 'The Acid Zcout' was shot with M:ET, the
president of Rebels util division. Forgive us for the delay but finally we've
made it out in public...
T: Hi, this is The Acid Zcout from Naked Truth Magazine. I would like to make
an interview with you if that's ok ?
M: OK, go on...
T: So first of all .. I would like to know when you founded Rebels..
M: Well, Jake in Denmark founded it in 1985 on the amiga. I joined it in early
1986 and took over the group and have runned it since then...
T: What about this R2 thing.. can you tell me what that group was all about ?
M: Rebels & 2000ad was to famous amiga groups and we desided to get together
and release some trainers and utils in the beginning of our pc time but we
soon desided to make rebels the big one so the 2000ad guys joined in rebels
insted so now we are here hopfully to stay for a long time.
T: You first called it R2 and then went back to Rebels is that correct ?
M: Thats correct, R2 released a lot of PD stuff when i was busy with my work
and that was lame, so we desided to shape the reputation up by letting R2
die.
T: I understand, so about Rebels.. you first made demos when you started it up
right ? why move on to utils ?
M: Hehe, well utils is much easyer to get.. I can tell you this as rbs/amiga
leader we released a lot o demos/dentros/intros whatever and at my time as
Rebels amiga leader/founder we were never below top 4 demo group due to the
eurochart.. and about the pc demos, yes we will soon release a demo on the
pc which is about 6meg large with almost pure code.. and then we will go on
with the demo sceen on the PC to... So beware rebels is coming on the demo
sceen on the PC aswell very soon...
T: Any dates set for the demo release, I guess there's alot of demo-lovers out
there just waiting for it to be released..
M: I sure hope so.. but as all my experiance with demo coders tells me, they
are the lazyest people on the scene so i guess i'll never set a date..
but it will come and that in a near future..
T: OK, hehe so back to Rebels utility releases, how do you rank Rebels among
other release groups on util-scene... PWA, SCUM, DOD etc ?
M: Well PWA, SCUM and DOD are the three ultimate groups and with no doubt the
three biggest.. we are a small swedish group doing this for fun and release
about 5-20 meg a week i guess it makes us about avarage... but remember that
it is really hard to get the wares out of sweden as it is almoust impossible
calling with cards from sweden. Nowdays all things go through the net with a
lot of great work by Il Cattino and Manhunter.. i guess we are a bit big on
The internet scene also nowdays and in the future..
T: You think that the scene will be more and more based on the "net" ?
M: Ofcoz, but i think that's a shame becouse it will ruin the old "group/board"
feeling.
T: Yeah, about the group... what do you think about all the small/new groups ?
M: Hehe, if you have anyhing to release dont start a small group.. contact me
and I/Rebels will help..
T: So I remember once you had The Assasins Guild as World HQ.. what happened ?
M: It was in the beginning of the assasins era.. when it only hade 8 nodes..
now it's busted cause it got too public and too big.. and why we left it,
well we couldn't compete with either Razor 1911 nor PWA and as PWA didn't
want any competition at all we hade to leave it..
T: OK, I would like to know who you think was/is the coolest guy in the scene ?
M: I guess thats a pretty weird question.. but i really love Mr.Z on the C-64
and also Sodan/Magican42 on the amiga. The three people who showed the way
by their cool releases.. today there are no especialy cool dudes but a lot
of shitheads...
T: OK, so go over to the shitheads then..
M: Naah, I will give no name but here in Sweden we have a real lame local guy.
Half sysop on a big board... but no name... He is just lame and weird.
T: What do you hate most about the scene today ?
M: Well all 12-14 years guys wanna-be-cool and ofcourse there are alot of
older guys wanna-be-cool too. I hate that cause i think this shuld be
made for the fun of it.
T: Yep definatly.. so you had the Rebels HQ before, SysOp at Internal Affairs,
so what happened ?
M: Well my girlfriend could not stand it.. hehe so i moved my lines to another
BBS called Fatal Future and then we could not get along, so i desided to
restart internal, so now we are up and running on 4 nodes again..
T: About the groups, you've been in alot of groups.. I remember seeing your
name in TRSI and NEXUS..
M: When i sold my amiga and bougth a PC i joined Razor then i left cause my
military service, then i joined TRSI and for a short while Nexus.. but as
I wanna be the leader.. hehe i restarted Rebels again...
T: What about your favorite gamegroup then, you've been in a couple, which one
was your favorite ?
M: It is trsi but not cause the games, it's because the TRSI megademo on the
amiga it was so cool and i have loved them ever since..
T: Well that's about it... thanks for the interview...
M: OK, no problem see ya... and lets make all days party days..
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Morbid Angel
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Another interview made by The Acid Zcout follows with one of the remaining
people in Dominators. Alot of people might have wondered what happend to them
after a successful year 1994. Rumours talk about fights in the senior council,
trouble with the boards and much else.
To find out what really happened we tracked down 'Morbid Angel' to tell us
about the rise and fall of the 1994 release machine...
T: Hello, I'm The Acid Zcout from Naked Truth Magazines... I would like to
interview you on the subject Dominators, it that's fine with you ?
M: Thats cool with me, shoot!
T: Ok, so when did Dominators first startup ?
M: In 1987 on the C-64...
T: Quite some time ago... but then it was a game group right ?
M: Correct, on the PC its been utilities mostly.. we're looking into some
games though...
T: A comeback from the earliy C64 years, sounds nice... so I know you were
quite big on PC aswell in the matter of utils ofcourse, and not games...
Anyways something happened ?
M: Hmm yup.. like 6-8 months back we skipped most of the US section, after
Agents of Fortune was busted the US and the Euro part kinda seperated,
there wasn't much communication and a lot of guys were added to the
memberlist in US that we didn't knew of here.. it got out of control and
to make a long sorty very short we (The Euro half) cutted them free..
A lot of them were inactive, some skipped the scene some busted.. a few
of them we'd like to still have with us - but for various reasons we
couldn't. Also a few of them joined other utilities groups while still
being in DOM.. something we didn't think were ok.
T: So they never formed any groups on their own ? cause that seems to be the
most common way these days to prove oneself worthy to people...
M: They did infact.. the group name escapes me though, but intimidator, merlin
and a lot of the others talked about forming a new util group.. i dont know
what happend, but i havn't seen intimidator since then...
T: But right now you dont have any US boards left, is that correct ? I mean
still without Agents of Fortune there were plenty of good boards...
What about boards like False Intentions ?
M: There is one us board left, down at the moment though.. but yes other than
that one, no ones left.. and like i said earlier we'd have liked to keep a
few of them and perhaps we'll contact them to see if the interest is still
there...
T: I see, so you wanted to create a smaller, more active group... something
like the basics of Pirates /w attitudes ?
M: Kinda yes, in large group there tends to be no control of the members, like
it is now we know who is who and shit like that.. its controlled from the
senior staff..
T: I see, what happened to Dream Weaver, I remember him being alot in the US
at Agents of Fortune but I have not seen him since, what happened to him ?
M: I dont know, i havn't been in touch with many of the 'former' ones and
havn't been able to keep in touch with most of the boards overthere...
T: So nowdays when Dominators is not as active, I guess you must have gotten a
few offers to merge/join onto other groups, what's the reason you didn't ?
M: Hmmm.. dont get me wrong, Dominators is still in full effect, i like the
other dudes and never thought about joining other groups or merging what's
left...
T: So what about all the new util-releasers in the scene what do you think
about these groups ?
M: Well.. we all have to start someplace.. i really havn't got an opinion..
what i dislike is the way the scene is controlled by money these days..
everyone is selling and selling.. eventually they get busted.. i dislike
that..
T: I know what you mean, not REALLY what it was meant to be... So how do you
look at the future (1995-96) will Dominators do a comeback on game market
or stay put to the utilties ?
M: Currently we're looking into the games, lets see what that brings.. but the
future looks ok. We have all been busy with other things, and havn't had
much time for the group, but that should change over the summmer.
T: So to sum up this interview in one question, is DOM dead ?
M: No - never.. we're alive and kicking!
T: Thanks for doing this interview I see forward to catch more of your
releases in the near future...
M: OK cool.. no problem.. and be sure to catch our releases.. :)
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Cyber Angel
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Our next interview takes us to NYC and the leader of Phoenix CD-ROM division.
I said it before and I say it again, this interview is (like the others) a bit
old but I hope you all enjoy reading them anyways...
M: Hi this is MindBender for Naked Truth Magazine... I would like to ask you
some questions about the scene...
C: Sure thing
M: First of all where are you from and how long have you been in the scene ?
C: I am living in New York City, even though I originally come from Russia.
Have been in the scene for 2.5 years...
M: Oh so what group did you first join ?
C: At first, me and Sandstorm started a little group called Netrunners. We had
some problems, broke up and I started EDGE (original EDGE, nothing to do
with the SNES group that recently turned PC). EDGE merged into TRSi at the
very end of 1993
M: So you went TRSI.. why did you join there, financial problem in EDGE or
just organising problems ?
C: EDGE was a small group with few opportunities. However we had a few good
suppliers including the insider who was about to give us the final version
of Mortal Kombat (EDGE released several betas of it). We have received
offers from several groups, but a member or s TRSi sounded like the best
choice at the time. They had a very strong European division but few
suppliers in USA. EDGE had the USA backbone they could use.
M: So what happened in TRSI ? you where organising the US division ?
C: Yes, I came in as a US coordinator and was soon promoted to the US Leader.
However, TRSi did not come through with some of their promises and neither
me nor some of the US guys I worked with were happy. In April of '94 we
left TRSi to start a brand new group called Phoenix (PNX).
M: Exactly why did you leave TRSI ? what promises ?
C: We were unhappy with TRSi for several reasons. First, they failed to
provide the way to call out they promised to me and some other members.
They also have not honored several other agreements and we decided it
would be best to leave.
M: Was this at the same time as the TRSI splitted off to Legend ?
C: It was about a month or two earlier. The UK guys left TRSi when Legend was
formed and that was pretty much the final blow for that group.
M: So this was maybe also the reason why you left ?
C: Not really as there was no plans of creating Legend back in April or at
least I was not aware of it than. I never had any problems with the guys
over in UK, only with the German members of the group.
M: So what leader(s) in TRSI where bad guy(s) ?
C: When I came into the group I was talking mainly with VFast and Oliver
Stoned. The promises were given by both of them and they were equally
not fulfill. I have never dealt with Drunken Rom. I will also not call
anybody a "bad guy" as it was just an internal conflict. But my main
diffirences were with VFast.
M: So your first *REAL* group was formed... who founded it and is it true you
released more utils than games ?
C: Yes, it is. PNX was more of a utility group than a game group. It has
existed until the January of 95 and has released over 1.2 gigs of games
and applications. I was the leader of Phoenix, senior staff has shifted
at times but original seniors were Shadow Master, Kidcapri, Daviolator
and Psyco.
M: ...and at this time, you got in touch with Jimmy Jamez ? Or did you know
him all the way back from Russia ?
C: No, I did not know Jimmy Jamez back than. I did see occasional DOD
releases and was very interested in them, as DOD was based in my country
of birth. I have spoken to JJ and some other DOD members briefly in 1994
but it was not until this year we became friends and started working
together
M: So from this moment on, Drink or Die and Phoenix were in harmony, but
Jimmy Jamez got problems in DOD and you helped him out ...
C: Well, first time I started dealing with DOD was when their game division
has merged into TYRANNY. At that time, not PNX/DOD merge was planned.
Later on, when some of the DOD members merged with VEN to start Prophecy,
I have brought PNX suppliers for DOD to help make it strong again and I
beleive I have made a right choice doing that.
M: Yep, what you say about DOD today, one of the top groups in the world ?
C: I think we are doing very well. There ARE flows - there always will be -
in any large group. We have our share of problems but the group is doing
a great job and all of us are having alot of fun which, after all, this
is all about.
M: Right, so DOD got PNX and you got TRN to take care of. Why did you form
TRN in the first place ? You thought PNX got a util-based name and wanted
it to be a *STRICT* gamegroup ? Also did everyone agree on merging PNX
with DOD... ?
C: Yes, thats the basic idea. When forming PNX I thought that releasing
both games and utils under the same label might work out, but I was
wrong. We started TYRANNY by simply moving all the PNX game suppliers
and crackers into it.. It was a VERY smallgroup at first, as I did not
have the time to manage it before Christmas.
This year we have done much more and are continuing to become better and
better. Expect alot of game releases from TRN shortly :)
M: Hey !.. no commercial please :)
C: Well its not my fault commercials in your E-Mag are so expensive...
I had to squeeze it in somewhere :)
There was no problems in the PNX/DOD merge. There was never a
competition between the two groups and no enemies in them.
M: But what about the Phoenix members ? Maybe they were rooted in that group
and didnt wanna leave ?
C: PNX was a cool name but since TYRANNY started me and some other CoOrds
paid too much attention to the Game side of the group and Phoenix was not
releasing actively during the last 2 months of its existence.
Suppliers were still there, but too lazy. The merge has caused them to
start working more actively again.
M: Yeah well, then who was the leaders of TYRRANY and why the name TYRRANY ?
most groups get their names from old amiga, this one was all new.. who
brought it up ?
C: Tyranny was started by me and EOS - as I said before we have not done much
in 1994 releasing alot of budget stuff. Later during the year Eos left to
Razor and when I restored the group, I have brought together alot of
experienced AND new people to help me run the group. Grifter, Caligula,
Nivek Ogre and Youngblood have done alot of work to help organize things
in the group.
We wanted to put together a group that would dominate the scene... and, of
course, we wanted a catchy name :) I was on the phone with Eos, and asked
him "what are the synonimes for Dictatorship or Domination - and the word
TYRANNY immediately came up. We thought it was perfect...
M: Well.. it's kinda nice.. I must say.. :) so, you had your own BBS, or did
I get that wrong ?
C: Thank you :) We hope to live up to it :) Yes... I used to run a board
remotely for a while. Source Of Reality (4/94-9/94), Millennium Matrix
(9/94-2/95). But I wanted to run my own board. Nothing big - a Games only
board, but a place where you could find a VERY large collection of games.
So I brought back Source Of Reality in my house, with very little hardware
but the game collection available on my BBS will soon reach 5 gigs.
M: Were you in TRSI while it had boards like Concept Elite, Gates of Asgard
and Unlawful Entry ?
C: Sure! I was responcible for kicking out Concepts Elite :)
M: Oh, so about Concept Elite, why did you kick it out.. I know RAZOR 1911
also kicked him before you ..
C: I had alot of diffirences with the sysop - even before joining TRSi. When
the question of moving WHQ came up I voted strongly to remove it from CE.
M: So can you tell me something more about this rag with the CE SysOp ?
C: It was not really a "rag". Concept Elite was local to me. Competition
between the boards is tough in New York and Loverman did not like the fact
that I was supporting another upcoming local board - X-Factor.
Loverman wanted to delete me from CE and he only did not becuase of me
joining TRSi. I do not think that a senior fighting with the sysop of the
WorldHQ is very healthy for the group, so when the opportunity came we
took the position away from that board.
M: But wasn't X-Factor in PNX or TRN ?
C: Yes, X-Factor was an EDGE CHQ, than it was a TRSi affiliate board, TRSi
Eastern HQ, PNX WHQ for a short while and now it is a TRN WHQ. We had a
stormy but interesting relationship with that BBS through the years :)
M: Lets go back to TRSI. As I was asking, Gates of Asgard... and Unlawful...
Was TRSI kicked of both by Legend or was it something else ?
C: Why UE and GOA kicked or left TRSi.. :) Well, at the point I left TRSi
GOA was still the WHQ and UE was a WHQ for High Voltage. So I guess I would
be the wrong person to ask :) Not to mention that I could not call out
much thanks to my friends in Germany. So I am surely a wrong person to
ask :)
M: OK, nevermind that...can you tell me anything about the S.E.L. story
C: S.E.L. story?
M: About The BBS SEL and the SysOp who was busted for childporno..
C: He does not really have any child porno (that BBS is also local to me).
What he has is a HUGE BBS with ALOT of disk space and good modems. At
one point I took that board into PNX hoping to make it fast relying on its
hardware setup. Unfortunately the sysop is just not cut out for running a
true elite board as we understand it... But there is no child pornography
on there as far as I know.
M: Well, Blaster (X-Factor SysOp) claimed that. Do these guys fight much ?
C: Blaster fights alot with everybody, *especially* any local competition. :)
I have never even seen him call into SEL. At SEL they've got about 30 gigs
of old stuff backed up but no X-rated crap. Not many new files there either
though :)
M: So lets talk about your Magazine... what can you tell me about it ?
C: Are you referring to "Cyber Angel's Totally Biased Warez Report"?
M: Yep I guess I am :)
C: I would not really call it a magazine... Report is probably the perfect
description. I have seen many diffirent "reports" and "mags" created to
review and rate the PC game scene and I really liked the one TRC used to
release in the winter of '94. Unfortunately he stopped and I picked up the
trial in January 95. I tried to make it very thorough, rating groups,
presenting monthly/total statistics and my opinion of the game ratings.
Got alot of good feedback from it as well as lot of rags. But making it has
always been alot of fun in itself.
M: So there will be a new one for this month ?
C: Sure! The May issue just came out a few days ago.
M: Oups.. :) guess I missed it...
C: I intend to keep doing it for as long as I can.
M: About the game XCOM-2... that is (as I see it) your major release EVER...
who supplied it and how did the supplier get it ?
C: Actually, I think our best release ever was Descent from Interplay
which we got 2 months before the stores. X-COM 2 was suplied by Psycho Stik
but it was a simple store pick up. The spreading war against Genesis on
that game was alot of fun though.
M: I heard you guys got help from RAZOR to spread it ?
C: RAZOR traders did help us spread the release. They would rather see us win
on it than Genesis that was a bigger threat at the time :) I beleive we
could have won on our own as well, but we could not have won on 90% of ALL
boards without them.
M: Later on Physco went to Eclipse and then RAZOR... why did he do that ? did
you blaim RAZOR for it ?
C: Physco Stik left because of the conflict we had with his friend, also a
TRN member: The Comanche. They have left the group together. There is no
bad blood between us though.
M: Oh, another conflict.. please tell..
C: There was a misunderstanding. Comanche have expected us to move the WHQ to
his BBS after Millennium Matrix went down but we had other plans. He was
unhappy with it and left the group.
M: What do you think of this Eclipse gathering, any particular reactions on
that group ?
C: I like Eclipse and am friends with alot of people in it. As I said in my
report, we still have to see whether they pass the test by time, but they
probably will easily.
M: About RTS, were they the official couriers of TYRRANY ?
C: RTS was a joke. MM (TRN WHQ at a time) became their USHQ for several weeks
and we got 0 BYTES (literally) of uploads from them. We removed them as
our Courier group and took Raw Meggage (founded by DeathStalker / Grifter).
They were doing pretty well for a while, but the group is gone now simply
because nobody had the time to keep it together.
M: My board was also RTS but never got *ONE* byte... very sad.. anyways is
TYRRANY established on InterNET ?
C: Sure is! #tyranny on IRC is not an active channel, but alot of our guys
hang out in #dod. We have some FTP sites and soon will list an e-mail
address we can be reached at in our NFO file.
M: So what you think of Scene today ?
C: I do not really like it when people start whining about how the scene was
great 1-2-3-10 years ago and how terrible it is now. We are changing, the
basic rules in the scene are still the same. The only thing that seriously
concerns me is that most games are released on CD now. Eventually, we will
all have to concentrate and fight over the CD ripped releases and I do not
feel comfortable with it yet.
M: Anyone in particular you like or hate more than others in the scene..
C: I have alot of enemies and even more friends in the scene. But hate is a
little too strong. Lets leave that to our REAL problems - not who beat who
to releasing some game.
M: So, got any last wise words for this interview ?
C: Not really... Just play it fair, competition is alot more fun on SNES or
Amiga because there are much less rag wars in those scenes. I hope we can
accomplish the same on PC someday.
M: I hope so too, well thnx for this interview and good luck with TYRRANY in
the future !
C: Thank you! Good luck with the magazine, I am looking forward to it...
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Lord Cyric
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following interview is giving us a bit of inside of the nexus/razor case
and how TRC & Lord Cyric got along together in Eclipse...
M: Hi Lord Cyric this is MindBender from Naked Truth Magazine, I would like to
interview you a little bit about the scene...
L: Hello MindBender, I will gladly do this...
M: So tell me, how long have you been in the scene ?
L: Well, I started with my c64 and a 300 bpd modem ... <GRIN> ... well if you
mean the PC scene, I guess it's a few years... Let me think... 3 years ago
I started with PC... But before i got my PC i was doing some trading 'n
stuff on the amiga scene.
M: Altogether how long ?
L: 5 years or something, but i wasn't very active in the beginning...
M: About NEXUS, when did you first join and how ?
L: As my name was pretty known back then I was sort of invited... But I guess
it was 8 months ago or something. It was in a chat with moonstar on Mirage
M: So he invited you as a member, later you became the Leader together with
The Gecko and Torgall... what did you do to reach this position ?
L: Well, I was very active, that's true... Lets say that I was getting along
very good with the rest of the inner circle of Nexus, and they asked me if
I would rather like to coordinate 'n stuff..
M: OK, so you became the coordinator... NEXUS went quite well but suddenly
something happened and the group went down... I would like to know what
made a group as good as NEXUS suddenly just die...
L: Well... We had alot of suppliers. and good ones too. But well, ya know
it's a always a question of money, and that we ran out of in the end..
M: Torgall & Vixon who were both Founders of the group were very active but
suddenly they both stopped, why did they leave the scene and did it have
something to do with Nexus running out of cash ?
L: You're tight on that one... Well, I guess Torgall got pretty tired of
everything in the end, and just didn't have any more money to spend on
phonebills, cards etc etc... Vixon i don't know so much about, but rumours
say that the Feds got in contact with him in some way and scared him to
quit or something...
M: So, Nexus went down... What happened to the members ?
L: Well, many of them are members in minor (local?) groups now i guess...
Nothing big. I guess some have even quit the scene, with all these busts
and stuff hanging around...
M: But, then some of them joined onto Razor 1911.. The Gecko and Speed Racer
both joined on to the Razor force... why didn't you ?
L: I guess i can't keep up with the tempo in RAZOR ;) .. We can just say
that I'm not that active, and I wouldn't like being just some dead weight.
M: Did it have something to do with the rags between you and Razor Ex:Leader
The Renegade Chemist ?
L: Well, we were never getting along with eachother, and I guess he talked
alot of shit about me too... So , yes I guess it has something to do with
that too..
M: Then, today you both guys are amazingly enough together in the same group,
Eclipse must be the most crazy group of all time joining together alot of
people that really hated eachothers guts...
L: Yep, but nowadays we're just avoid eachother :) ... And that about Eclipse
is true... But it sure works as a cracking group don't you think?
M: I do agree .. Back to Nexus, what happened to the old NEXUS boards.. many
guys still wonder what happened to Coyotes Member and Corrupt and why they
had to shut down Road Runner / Moral Decay ?
L: I'm not so sure that I'm allowed to answer this question... Well, they
wouldn't be happy with me then perhaps;) But let's say that alot of
fucking sky high phonebills made them put the boards down...
M: Can you try to be a *LITTLE* more specific, please ?
L: I understand.. Well, Coyote got some fucking line noise and stuff on his
lines (Suppose it's the Feds way to scare us) so he just couldn't go on
with his boards with low cps transfers and stuff... He also got some
strange phonecalls from guys saying they were the police, and asking alot
of stupid questions about piracy and stuff.... But that's just what he
told me... Cant't tell if it's the truth or not.... But let's say so:)
M: I read something about coyotes member was starting a band ?
L: Dont know.......
M: Can you tell me why Moral Decay went down ?
L: Didn't I ? Well ok, I guess i forgot to answer that... I don't know this
sysop personally, so I just have the rumours I've heard on this one too
(sorry). But what I made out of it, I guess he moved to his girlfriend,
and she wasn't very fond of having alot of computer stuff around, but as
I said before - I'm not sure..
M: As you were the courier coordinator you must have seen alot of couriers and
boards, what is your favorite bbs/courier ever ?
L: Well, tough question. I liked Moral Decay alot.. But then there's many of
other great boards too, for example: State of Devolution, Mirage and
Assassins Guild ... When it comes to couriers, I guess my favourite (even
though he was a razor member) is (or at least was) Razor Blade. Another one
I really like is your Swedish guy, Raw Liquid!
M: So after you quitted NEXUS it's been quite around you... what have you been
doing until you joined Eclipse ?
L: That's precisely what I haven't! I haven't done much! Well, I just don't
have all the time needed anymore.
M: But in this time, you got alot of offers from other groups about joining ?
L: Well, I got some offer from PWA in joining as a coordinator. But why should
I do that? I don't have the time, and as I said before, I don't like to be
any dead weight..
M: Yeah, well I know you have been hated alot in the scene .. I once saw your
name in the topspot of a 'Most Hated Guys' chart. So why people hate you ?
what have you *REALLY* done ?
L: Well:) ehrm.... I have done nothing, I swear:) No, but most of those who
"hate" me is just fucking lamers, which I rejected in joining Nexus for
example... And maybe it has something to do with everyone talking shit
about me and stuff... I don't really know, but it must be for some reason.
M: Is The Renegade Chemist one of those ?
L: Sure he is... But I don't think he hates me anymore... I can't say we get
along, but at least we don't fight anymore...
M: What was your fight all about ? I remember reading about stuff on Mirage..
L: Well, he said that he had payed me for 500 AT&T credit cards, and couldn't
deliver, but i never got any money from him, and I explained that to him.
It might have something to do with something else too, But mainly of that.
M: So what you really hate about the scene today ? the money-makers, all the
CD-rips, the wanna-be:s.. what ?
L: Well, I hate 'em all honestly:) But what I hate most, and can't stand is
all these fucking new, small & lame groups, just releasing alot of shit
like CD-ripoffs for example!
M: But dont you think the CD-rips have to be released as mostly all games will
be on CD only very soon..
L: Sure, they have to be released perhaps, but where is the competition?
It's not very hard to take a CD and copy the shit into 25 disks or
something and release it... Any lamer with money to buy a new game on CD
can do it...
M: Is there anyone you really like/hate in the scene, and in that case why ?
L: Well, If there's anyone i like... You! <GRIN> .. Tough question.... Who I
hate... Torgall... He's talking alot of shit, and doesn't know what he's
talking about..
M: What was your first thought when you found out Nexus guys joined Razor and
now Razor 1911 is lead by Ex:Nexus only... ?
L: Well... My first thought... I was disappointed, that's for sure.. But what
could I do about it? ...
M: I guess, so why did you suddenly join Eclipse ?
L: I had a feeling that this group would go far... And to beat Razor has
always been something I have wished for since Nexus...
M: Maybe even revenge on The Gecko and Speed Racer for letting Nexus down ?
L: Yes... mainly... And I have never liked RAZOR... But Eclipse kicks ass!
M: So how do you feel now being in Eclipse is it as good as you hoped ?
L: Sure it is... Just look at these releases. I like it, I love it :) ..
M: Any special comments why Eclipse will continue to rule ?
L: We have all suppliers we need (and more), we have a great courier team,
and everything works out fine (at least at the moment)!
M: Finally, is there anything you would like to say to the people out there
about the scene or just anything ?
L: Eclipse will rule! If you think you can keep up with our tempo, you
should apply for a membership. And a big Fuck Off to Torgall too... Burn
in hell!..
M: Oups, well thanks for doing this interview and I wish you good luck in
the future with Eclipse !
L: Thanks, and au revoir!
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Jimmy Jamez
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This interview takes us to Moscow, Russia to visit the highly respected Legend
on utilities & InterNET, Jimmy Jamez... as always... delayed release makes the
interview out of date...
M: Hi, this is MindBender from Naked Truth Magazines, we would like to
make an interview with you on the DOD topic.
J: Okay.. go ahead man..:).. limited time but i am glad to give you some
information...
M: Well first of all, when did you start in the scene ?
J: Heh.. not a complicated question.. i started working with a modem around
4-5 years ago..and scene.. around 3 years ago
M: OK, so when did you start up the 'Drink or Die' team..?
J: Hmmm... letme say exactly.. around 21st of April, 1993..:))
M: Hehe, good memory.. so whats going on in DOD right now ?
J: I guess everybody knows what is going on in DOD.. group is large and
working pretty okay..dont see many competitors besides PWA for the
moment...
M: So you dont see SCUM and PCY as *REAL* competition ?
J: SCUM - no.. SCUM lost reputation releasing those never-ending win95
builds.. some games from cd:s.. not a quality stuff that util group
need to release...
PCY.. hmm.. not a big deal..just dont want advertise those dudes at all.
It can be a good group if it will change attitude to other people...
Hate is not a good feeling on scene...
M: What you think about the scene today, any different from when you started ?
J: Hehe..what different?? everything changed..:).. when i started i was
nothing but a weak russian boy that was interested in puters.. now i am a
strong man that leads many people.
M: About the hate, who do you hate and who, you think hate you ?
J: Yes..today is more hate then before.. i remember good old Mirage, UE days
only some local fights with Lord Cyric or maybe Fanfan when he just
appeared..but nothing serious. OK.. hate for me..it is hard to explain..
i try not to hate people, but sometimes they do something very bad for you
to stay and look on it.. all you can do - to make a back impact..
I really dont hate anybody..but i dont like PCY senior staff and GNS staff.
M: and what you think of all the small newcommer groups trying to suying to
survive ?
J: Hehe..DOD was a newcomer sometimes too..:)..all you need - just to want
something very much and do it.. if you are enough patient and can
communicate with dudes - you an make your group #1
You just need to know what ya want.. become a cool group or just remain a
lame cd-rip games releaser.
M: So about Phoenix and Tyrrany.. Phoenix merge with DOD and so on, can you
tell me what really happened ?
J: What happened?? it is a long story but i will try to tell it in few words:
I had some local problems and was inactive for few weeks in late february.
During this time some DOD dudes decided to take over and start their own
group.. coz they dont like anybody ruling them..
When i returned i found that around 5-6 ppl left..including senior member
and some supplier..it was a hard-time-for-me-and-Alex (Cyber Angel) who
shown himself real friend and sacrificed his group Phoenix to save me for
scene for all that time..but he really helped me in that god damn february.
I known Cyber Angel for 1.5 years already..so.. we just lived in peace..
Without him there will be no more Jimmy Jamez...
M: What about the SEL incident with Silver Bullet ?
J: I dont know that story..sorry..cannot help in it..:( cannot catch up all
information... head is enough busy..:)
M: OK, so what does it take to be the leader of a group i a group in the
class of DOD... ?
J: You know it is like a habit..not very difficult if you work in it for
years..but could be very complicated for a newbie..:)
You just need to be patient, dedicated, spend enough time and things will
go okay for you and your group..
M: What happened to all the HQ:s in DOD ?!?!
J: What ya mean? why they're all lost??
M: Well DOD had quite many BBS:s, now most of them are gone ...
J: The story is: DOD WHQ -Rest In Peace was busted, DOD USHQ - Silo.. we had
some problems with sysop - Comanche and exluded him and his bbs from the
group, latest DOD WHQ - Millenium Matrix - was closed and now we have many
cool boards too.. awesome canadian bbs - Biohazard, of coz USHQ - The Wall
and the most experienced sysop there - Roland, also new Courier HQ -
Southern Comfort. Around 4 distro sites and member boards...
M: So why did DOD suddenly get this good, DOD has always been there but right
now it seems to be the major force...
J: Hehe..nobody knows that.. maybe coz of the good leader? Or maybe right
attitude..many dude like us coz we are always friendly and ready to help..
remember.. scene is not just a releasing force.. it is a strong
labyrinth of communication between people... I try to be friendly and that
helps to get new suppliers and simply cool dudes...
M: Well how is the russian scene coming up... !?
J: In the beginning we never could compete with any foreign ...we started and
we made the russian warez scene..
M: Anyone in particular you would like to greet in the scene ?
J: Ohh..a lot of dudes.. but first of all of coz my greatbud Cyber Angel,
Youngblood, Roland, Interviewer (hehe), Mr.Blazer & YumYum all PWA dudes..
Anybody on scene who contacted me and live in peace with me...
M: So, anything you would like to say at last to all the pirates out there ?!
J: What can i say..Just work hard and sell your soul for the warezdevil..
I will always like this pirate brotherhood...
M: I guess thats it, thankyou very much for the interview and good luck !
J: Sure.. was glad to give this one for you..hope to see this mag soon !
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Tazman
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here comes a unfinished interview with Legend leading figure 'Tazman' who gave
this interview just before he dropped out of the scene...
M: Hi, this is MindBender from Naked Truth Magazines asking some questions
about yourself and the groups you been into...
T: Hi what do ya wanna know?
M: First of all I would like to know where you're from and how long you been
in the scene...
T: I'm from London, England and been in the scene for 1 guess 3 years.,
M: You started up in TRSI ?
T: Nope i started as a pay leecher on Concept Elite in NYC
M: Hihi, and then ?
T: then i became a pay leecher on Unlawful Entry
M: ..and.. then ? :)
T: And then i relised i had enough time to trade instead of leeching and
became one of the best traders around.
M: So you became a trader, in what group ?
T: Purely independent, an top trade on the fastest bbs's at the time. Those
were the days of Razorblade,Slain etc etc
M: Then you started to supply ?
T: Nope then Oliver Stoned kept Ringing me every 5 mons begging me to join
TRSI as a Trader so finally i agreed to stop him calling me.
M: Finally in TRSI... how did that group work ?
T: Work? It didn't hehe basically 3 german dudes ran it Oliver,Vfast and
Druken Rom. Oliver talked a lot and phoned a lot ,Vfast ripped
everyone off and Drunken paid for the originals.
M: ...and in TRSI you met Troops and Troll ? can you tell me something about
this thing the three T's from uk ?
T: Na Troops got me into the scene, i met him and he taught me to Bluebox and
I bought my 1st modem and never even called a UK bbs for 6 months, getting
in at the top:)
Troll was a M8 of troops from b4 alos another guy troops taught how to BB.
M: But who of you guys supplied ?!?! I know some of you did ... I remember
you used to beat the Razor/Hybrid suppliers in UK all the time..
T: Haha dude this is a long story:) We were the best Uk suppiers for probably
2 years. Na maybe not that long but who cares..
M: Oups, forgot about prestige and all... please tell me abou it !
T: After a while trading in Trsi they kept bugging me and troops to go and
pick up originals from stores. Finally we agreed as i didn't have a car
Troops went to pick up a game and brought it to my house as i had two
modems to spread.
Amazing for us we beat The competition at the time i think Hot Tuna and
it carried on from there, Troops got Troll to start giving him lifts on
his Moterbick because it was quicker throught the London traffic.
And then they'd come back to my house most of the time with the game. We
supplied a few games but the big one that got us noticed was Ultima 7,
When the "famous" motorbike accident happened.
M: Oh, I dont remember this one, please go on...
T: Yep, Troops and Troll picked up Ultima 8 and brought it to my house.
I was on 3 nodes on the TRSI whq, Mirage and UE in the chat room on TRSI
whq when 1 of of our traders spotted a Razor courier uploading Ultima 8.
Troops and Troll dropped the game at my house and i started releasing it
but we thought that razor was also releasing it and we were in a spreading
race so troops rushed to get home to help with the spreading and troll
crashed the bike and they went to the pub instead and got drunk :)
It wasn't a serious accident just a couple of bruises and scratches..
and in the end razor weren't even releasing it it was one of their
traders playing games by uploading fake filenames:):)
M: About TRSI.. what was the reason you droped it and formed Legend and did
it have something to do with Cyber Angel & co. leaving ?
T: Well we never even thought of leaving TRSI before despite lots of people
asking us to leave but then one day bluebox died in the UK and we didn't
have any cc's so Troops payed to call The WHQ and posted a msg in the TRSI
conference saying that it had died and we had no cc's and asking for one
of the leaders to call us and supply some after 4 days still no one had
called so we decided to quit the group. We talked to all the groups and
troops wanted to join PE becoz he knew Speedmaster...
I talked him out of that :)...
And then out of the blue Westbam called and said that half of razor
including all the original suppliers was gonna quit and form a new group
called Legend. I really didn't believe him especially when he said Butcher
was gonna leave but then a couple of hours later Butcher called and said it
was true. Putting the Razor 1911 original supliers and the main TRSI ones
together seemed like a really kick ass group. We knew we could take the
TRSI WHQ with us as he was a good mate of ours so we decided to do it.
M: In an earlier made interview Cyber Angel claimed that TRSI seniors did a
couple of promises they did not keep. Is that true and did you see any
internal conflicts in TRSI ?
T: Not really to me but when the time came when we needed some cc's they
couldn't come up with any so hasta la vista baby. I always got paid and
stuff so no problems there...
M: Who came up with the name Legend ? I know it was formed once before by
The Unknown and other Razor 1911 members but that time it merged TDT and
disapeared, who brought it up this time ?
T: Westbam and Butcher used to be in the old C64 Legend so it came from there.
M: It had nothin to do with The Unknown ?
T: Nope
M: Do you know why Butcher left Razor 1911 or just why anyone did? I mean it
did quite well at that time..
T: Yes, other Leaders were ripping the pay-site money and keeping it for
themselves..
M: Who where those leaders ?
T: Well look at the NFO files of then time and it's obvious who they were.
...The line went down and I have not had any luck with ending off the interview
so the interview with Tazman ends here...
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Interview with Dr.Insanity
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The last interview in this magazine pictures PTG/GNS leader Dr.Insanity just
before he took a break from the scene and closed down Digital Underground...
M: Hi I am MindBender from Naked Truth Magazine, I would like to make an
interview about your time in the scene ..
D: Hello there ...
M: First of all I like to know where you are from and how long you been in the
scene..
D: I've lived in Maryland for most of my life, area code 301, and I have been
in the scene for about 8 years
M: So where did it all start off, Pentagram ?
D: No it all started MUCH further back than PTG ... It all began actually on a
Macintosh in about '87.
M: But... when we're talking the PC scene...
D: Well, believe it or not ... the Mac scene was so lame i was in the PC scene
even when I had the Mac! I was on the major boards at that time ... FiRM
(original FiRM) boards ... PTL, MCM, BCC, etc ... I was really big into
phreaking/hacking back then ... called worldwide. Back in '87 - 88, I got
the best modem out there ... a 14.4k HST DUAL STANDARD ... They retailed at
about $1500, and I was one of the few who got one (at only $550!!) ...
M: So you started up in FIRM ?
D: No, the first real PC group I was in was the NAP/PA - North American Pirate
Phreak Alliance ... with Mr. Sike, Phoebus Apollo, Darkstar, Mr Camaro,
etc ... this group tore the WHOLE USA wide open making it a NATIONAL scene
instead of small local one.
Before NAP/PA .. it took weeks for releases to be spread ... we opened up
the scene by making phreaking more commonplace and giving out the knowledge
on how to do it ... NAP/PA was like the first national network of pirate &
phreak boards ... many of the biggest boards of the time were in NAP/PA.
We wrote a lot of text files, many of which you can still find on p/h/a
boards, many authored by myself.
At about that time the MCM (Miami Cracking Machine - headed by Line Noise)
merged with another group to form the original INC (Int Network of Crackers) ... many INC boards were also
NAP/PA boards... (this is like '89 or so) ... by this time FiRM had more or
less died off (old timers like Software Surgeon retired, as well as Knack,
THe Maestro, etc). INC's only real competition was the newly formed THG
(The Humble Guys) -- which was formed by Candyman - THG was a group formed
from the Amiga scene ... and they played DIRTY.
In about '90, I joined INC ... and worked for them coding intros and stuff
(made a nice INC plasma loader ;) --- I was a memberboard ...
This is when The Digital Underground first went up, in about late '89 ...
before TDU I ran The Infinite Hierarchy (Macintosh). I was running Celerity
back then, and was one of the original beta testers for Celerity ...
Celerity was like the BEST BBS software at the time .. CelerityNET was made
up of the TOP boards world-wide (small net of about 30 boards).
M: Did this Digital Underground have anything to do with the EuropeanHQ of INC
also called Digital Underground ?
D: No, Teddy's TDU came in like middle of '91 when I left the scene for about
a year ... I was the first EVER TDU in the world. I had the name even before
the rap group :)
Anyways, I was in INC and ran Celerity for about 1-2 years. In the end of
1990 I switched to a BBS software called ELITE, written by a great p/h/a guy
I new in California ... only about 5 boards world-wide ran Elite BBS.
OK, so for about the 2 years I was in INC. INC *RULED* THE WORLD. We were #1
forever ... Line Noise was a great leader and organizer and with Cool Hand
and great crackers like Jenetic Bytemare, Bit Manipulator, etc we kicked ass
THG was second ... there was the original PE (Public Enemy), etc ... some
other smaller groups ...
D: In middle of '91 I left the scene for personal reasons ... and when I came
back in late 92 ... things were DIFFERENT in the SCENE.
M: Why did INC die ?
D: INC died ... why? I wasnt really around during the time. But this is what I
think .. Line Noise went away to College and quit the scene. FLT (Fairlight)
came up STRONG and kicked ass for like half a year ... with THG, PE, and new
groups like TRSI in there too ... when I came back in '92 ... FLT was almost
dead .. INC was basically dead with just THE JET releasing lame kiddie stuff
Razor 1911 was looking to be the NEW kicking group ...
So from like late '92 to middle '93 I was just hanging around doing BBSing
as a hobby ... I put TDU back up again ... 1 node. It was still one of the
better boards locally ... (in 301). By the middle of '93 another new group
came around ... UNT (original Untouchables) with Bandieto, etc ...
M: How did UNT start ? Wasn't it made up by old Razor 1911 people ?
D: UNT and Razor began a big rivalry ... and when PTG was formed ... with guys
like Lord Thinker, Youngblood, Eos, etc ... there was a BIG PTG-Razor war..
Bandieto and The Renegade Chemist HATED eachother. UNT actually began as a
totally LOCAL group .. guys in 301, 703. UNT did very well... and became big
nationally and world-wide ... at this time, the Razor WHQ, Apocalypse, was
in 703. Bandieto convinced the sysops of Apoc to join UNT (or what was then
going to be PTG) and when that happened, the Razor-PTG wars began..
M: What happened to Apocalypse ?
D: Well, the sysops of Apoc (POW and Whistler) moved to California and put up
a smaller BBS ... we made them a memberboard ... and Whistler actually did
supply a release or two from a company close to where he was living.
But they then both moved back to my area ... POW now works about 20 min from
my home (and I have a 250mb HD of his) and Whister lives very close to where
I work .. Whistler is still listed as GNS member.
M: So when UNT started.. rumours say they stole originals from other groups ?
D: UNT never stole releases, just UNT was so fast for just a local group that
people made up lies about them.. no actually i joined PTG ... when it was
formed more or less .. I was never in UNT. If UNT had had a good cracker,
they would have had all the BIG Origin stuff like 'Strike Commander' etc.
M: Why did UNT die... I know UNT releases like hell for a while but suddenly it
all just stopped.. but everything got back when PTG was formed...
D: UNT didn't die ... it merged with some other guys and another group and
became PTG ...
M: What about the guy in UNT called Butterball, remember him ? Was he really
killed in a carcrash or something ?
D: Butterball didnt die .. he got very hurt ... but that was all after the PTG
days ... that happened to him like 7-8 months ago I think ?
M: I heard from someone he got killed in a accident back in the UNT time...
D: No, Butterball called TDU only a few weeks ago. He almost died in the
accident, but he made it!
M: Ok, so tell me about PTG !
D: PTG started off with Lands of Lore and never stopped ... PTG kicked ass for
all of 1994 ... the only month we 'lost' was November when Zeus supplied
like everything. In PTG I was one of the main suppliers ... I supplied most
of the bigger titles like the Sierra stuff (Gabriel Knight, etc) I supplied
probably about 100 titles.
M: So what about the conflicts in the PTG leadership ?
D: Well ... Bandieto is a very good leader but there were personality conflicts
between Bandieto and Lord Thinker ... and LT left the group..
The main leaders at the very beginning were Bandieto, Lord Thinker, Young-
blood and The Professor (SysOp of Ice Station Zebra, PTG WHQ).
But soon after all this, LT left the group because he couldnt get along
with Bandieto ...
M: Why did Lord Thinker really leave, you have any closeup information ?
D: Not really ... just both guys really wanted to lead ...
M: What about Youngblood, him and The Professor left too... and what happened
to 'Ice Station Zebra' ?
D: No Prof and YB didnt leave ... let me tell ya what happened ... OK so PTG is
formed with the 4 leaders... then LT leaves ... still, all this time, PTG is
KICKING the ass of razor ... Bandieto and TRC are going at it on the big
boards (Elusive was #1 at this time). At this time (middle of 94), I am the
top supplier for PTG ... and I am in 301 and Bandieto is in 703 -- and these
two area codes are LOCAL calls (free). So, Bandieto gets the idea to move
the WHQ from ISZ to my BBS, TDU. This would make spreading and coordination
for the group a lot easier since YB was moving to 703 around this time too.
BUT ... Professor was not very happy with this idea... and after a stupid
little war with text files being release and stuff (most of the contents
being lies), Prof just decided to quit the group.
So now the leaders were Bandieto and Youngblood. I was the new WHQ ... now
with 3 nodes, and I had just switched to PCBoard ... But I became a leader
of PTG very soon after this.
M: So what happened to 'Ice Station Zebra'.. heard a car crash into the house
where Professor lived and wrecked the computer (another lie ?).
D: No that isnt true ... Prof. left and he ran his bbs for a month or two and
then he got in to some money problems ... from what I heard someone charged
a lot of collect calls to his BBS numbers and he was forced to pay them ...
I still have his voice # at work ...
M: What made PTG such a successful group ? can you give me some reasons ?
D: The main reasons why PTG was so successful (and GNS too) are:
1. Me! :) no seriously ... I was a very good supplier ... I supplied a
shitload of titles for all the groups I've been in.
2. Local WHQ ... when I got an original, I could put it online to the WHQ
(at my house) ... it took 5 mins! We never could lose to our own WHQ
and could concentrate to spread to other boards (mirage, UE, etc).
3. Werner & Tardy --- THE BEST SPREADER -- we NEVER lost a release EVER
(PTG or GNS) where W&T was helping us spread... 10+ nodes at the same
time is UNBEATABLE.
4. Good organization .. with Bandieto, with me.. with Fanfan ...
Oh btw, I still havent told ya why YoungBlood got kicked ...
When Bandieto left the scene because he got a job .. it was me Fanfan and
Youngblood leading ... (Fanfan started as a doc writer but he turned out to
be a good organizer/supplier and so became leader). Anyways, we learned that
Youngblood stole $400 from the group so Fanfan and I kicked him out.
M: Can you tell me something about Kimble/BitBug & his board House of Coolness.
How did it get on PTG and what happened to it ?
D: Kimble/HOC was in PTG before I was even in PTG ... he was the German HQ when
ISZ was the WHQ ... he basically supplied our Euros with cc and stuff like
that ... I never have even talked to Kimble and I never have gotten into
the whole cc thing so I dont know too much about that.
M: Also I would like to know what happened to 'Momentary Laps of Reason' that
had about 15 nodes back in the PTG days. Did it get busted ?
D: MLOR just went down .. he was our Courier HQ (for PTG) ... he called my BBS
still almost everyday up until last week when I took TDU down .. he started
a business I think and didnt want his BBS to mess him up legally so took it
down to be safe (MLOR went down in Winter of 94 i think).
M: So about you making huge supplies to groups, could you like in short words
give me 'Dr Insanity's manual in how to supply games' How did you do it, and
what's the supplying job like ?
D: Sorry -- but I cant tell the world how I did/am/can still supply games ...
TOP SECRET :)
M: Maybe just a hint ?
D: Well, to tell u the truth ... we supplied games using every method in the
book and more...
M: As you supplied alot of games throughout the years, what is your FAVORITE
release ever (you or someone else supplied) ?
D: Hmm.. hard question ... a favorite oldie game I love is AUTO DUEL by Origin
& Steve Jackson Games... this is from like 88 :) lets see... i really loved
Syndicate ! ... Dune was cool ... XCOM 1 was awesome
M: Who supplied them ?
D: I think XCOM1 was TRSI.. Dune, maybe TDT ? I dunno ... I love Blackthorne
from GNS ... Auto Duel ... i think that was FiRM ...
M: How was is to lead PTG ? I mean alot of work ? what was good, what was bad ?
D: It was a LOT of work ... I probably spent 75% of my day (everyday) running
PTG and then GNS ... you have to be waiting from about 5am to about 5pm
every day to see if a release is coming that day ... a lot of waiting...
M: So what did you *REALLY* get out of it ? I mean what is your BIG score/goal
in the scene ? reputation, money, what ?
D: I did this for about a year! can u believe it?!! I am glad I am finally out
of it ;).. Well, I got a couple things out of it ...
Personal Satisfaction -- I really liked running a BBS (TDU) .. it's the main
reason I got into the scene .. I've been running a BBS of one kind or
another for like 7 years ... and running the main BBS for PTG and GNS, the
#1 PC GROUP, is well ... pretty cool! TDU was awesome ... over 120mb per
day .. very nicely organizer file dirs ... hundreds of calls per day from
all parts of the world ... reputation...
I never made any money from the scene ... I spent a lot actually .. in phone
bills ... hardware, etc...
One thing, which when I still think about now, I think is so cool is that
the files which I released ... like the PTG and GNS files which I supplied,
wrote the NFO for, etc ... within about 1 hour of me putting it on TDU,
would then be ALL OVER THE WORLD -- 100's of copies in 1 hour... 1000's in
a day ... and now with CD-burners.. my NFO's, my writing, is going to be
PERMANENTLY recorded someplace... manyplaces! If I go to another country
and find someone who is into computers... I can tell them that I was
"DR. INSANITY" of "GNS" and they will know me! That is cool man..
I also met a lot of cool people in the scene ... many good friends ... not
only in the states, but in the world..
M: What about FanFan, when did you first meet him and how was FanFan to work
with in Pentagram / Genesis ?
D: I first met FanFan in like Oct, 94 ... I gave him an original to write docs
and a solve for ... Bandieto and I asked him to join PTG because he was
releasing really good docs on independent..
Fanfan is a cool guy ... he is very serious .. and really determined ... You
have to be, to run a #1 games group ... like everyone says TRC is a freak,
well, Fanfan is sorta a freak too ..
Fanfan is also very smart ... and can tell a situation very well ... he has
made numerous decisions for the group which were very good.
There is still alot of history i havent talked about yet .. like the merge
with Legend, etc.
M: OK about the Legend merge. When Legend first formed it seemed like they took
almost EVERY release out there... didn't they give PTG a hard time before
Butcher got busted and they merged with you guys ?
D: No I dont really agree ... Legend was getting everything FROM EUROPE ...
Legend almost never got any USA stuff except for the lame crap which Shadow
Master got ... PTG ruled USA ... Legend got all of UK and some of other
parts of Europe ... PTG had basically no Euro division..
TRSI was asking PTG to join with them ... and we were thinking about it ..
but it never worked out with us and Vfast and Oliver...
But when Legend asked us ... Wolverine and Tazman and company ... we thought
about it and it seems like a great idea ...
D: Nexus I think had asked Legend to join them and Legend denied them but then
Legend came to us and we thought it was cool .. Bandieto didnt want us to do
it, because he liked the PTG name .. but FanFan and I didnt really mind so
much.
M: So about Genesis... who came up with that name, why did Tazman come to you
and how did the Razor guys react on first leaving razor for something new
(Legend) and then end up in the "enemy" group ?
D: I think I came up with the name ... we struggled over the name for a few
days and actually lost a release because we hadnt decided yet ...
I think the Legend guys came to us because we were #1 from the USA. they
were #1 in the UK ... together we could be the top all the way around ...
I also think because Butcher was busted, they needed help for the Euros to
be able to call...
I think the Razor guys were pissed.. but they were always pissed at us
because we beat them every month. But then again, they just had Zeus so
they were kinda happy i guess...
M: Why did you pick the name Genesis ?
D: I think I picked the name Genesis because that's what we were .. GENESIS ..
the birth of a new group .. something totally different which was gonna
rock the scene...
M: So the RAZOR war continued in a new era.. RAZOR vs GENESIS... incidents like
the XCOM2 release from TYRRANY that RAZOR couriered just to make you lose...
and the time GENESIS boycotted T.A.G.
D: Yeah .. well, acutally, if you remember, when Bandieto left the scene and
Fanfan and I took over as leaders of PTG ... we made PEACE with all the
groups except for NX (Fanfan hates the Gecko) ... even with Razor we were
sorta friendly ... only TRC and LT would rag at us ... but PTG had a policy
of NO RAGGING but when GNS was formed ... some of the ragging came back ...
all because of TRC ...
Well, on the XCOM2 ... if I had been in town, we would have had the game
about 2 hours before and wouldnt have lost ... but without me, we got the
game late and so we had to race ... Razor (TRC) would do anything to piss
us off and keep us from crushing the scene.
The boycott of TAG happened because we got the game Ecstatica, from the UK
(Troops/Tazman/Troll) and so did Hot Tuna for Razor. we got it much earlier
and Tazman uploaded disk by disk to TDU ... meanwhile Fanfan and W&T were
downloading it .. when we got around and started to call TAG, Hot Tuna was
already uploading the Razor ... so I logged on with a node, Tazman with a
node, W&T wth a node, and FanFan with a node and we were goin to UL the 13
disk release and CRUSH Razor ..
You see, GNS had the BEST couriering and the BEST coordination. each of us
knew which disks we were going to UL and we could have had all 13 disks up
in about 1 hour while it took Hot Tuna about 3 hours ...
Anyway .. the reason we boycotted TAG is because ALL OF THE GNS guys LOST
CARREIER ... not once, but EVERY TIME WE LOGGED ON ... I lost carrier to TAG
that day about 80 TIMES !!! NO JOKE ... anyways ... WE LOST to TAG and we
could have and should have WON ... later we talked to Blackhawk and he told
us that Razor guys (TRC, PHaroah, others) called up his's WIFE and told her
how to hang up nodes and to hang up to all the GNS people (they gave her the
names to hang up on) ... we boycotted TAG because BH did not nuke the Razor
release .. he LEFT THE GNS release NUKED for 1 week, and he never gave any
apologize, and in his public msg he KISSED the ass of Razor. When Fanfan and
I talked to BH before he posted his msg, he talked about how he was so
pissed and that he was gonna quit Razor, but in his msg he was totally
kissing the ass of TRC ... it was something we couldn't take altogether ...
If Miragte was up and was the WHQ of Razor, I KNOW MIRAGE would have handled
this situation a lot more fairly.
Go back and read the GNS NFO's for like Blackthorne and Hardball 4 for more
information.
M: Anyways, you seen alot or people come and go in the scene, anyone in parti-
cular you like/hate more than the rest ?
D: Well, there are a number of people that I dont like .. but I dont want to
mention them because they dont deserve my time
Some guys who I would like to send greets to are: Mr. Sike, Jenetic Bytemare
Line Noise, Invisible Stalker, Ryu, Software Surgeon, Knack, The Maestro,
Fistandantilus, Rad Man, The Alternate, Vfast, Troops, Oliver Stoned,
Hard Core, Slavelord, Bandieto, FanFan, Hans, Werner & Tardy + many more..
I think I might write a littel farewell to the scene text file this week...
for formally say goodbye to everyone..
M: So what has really went bad in the scene since you first started ?
D: Some things which killed/are killing the scene are: cc busts --- BIG ... it
all started with Butcher ... I think he might have turned in most of the
rest of people who were busted afterwards .. that killed alot of the trading
from Europe, etc..
Another thing is just in general, there are fewer disk games coming out ...
more and more CD-ROM ... so far in 1995 it has been good, but I think for
the winter of 95 there will be few disk games... that is killing the games
scene ...
There are too few really big boards now .. and the big ones (lots of nodes)
SUCK because there are no good traders ...
M: After Tazman retired, only you and FanFan (old PTG staff) is in head of GNS.
Why not move back to call the group PTG ?
D: Well, Tazman didnt really 'retire' .. we didnt want him in the group anymore
He only supplied like 2 games for us ever, and he was sent a lot of money
and no longer was active for us so we more or less dropped him ... him and
Troops got i in a big fight about a month or two before this as well and
hated each other..
I dont think we changed names because its not good to always change names..
no stability ..
M: So about the always continuing RAZOR war... did it end as the "old" RAZOR's
went into Eclipse (of is FanFan / Gecko still fighting) ?
D: No .. no matter what TRC always starts up crap with us ... and personally I
dont care anymore ... TRC is a major loser and a social reject of some kind
or just a freak ...
I dont think Fanfan's fighting with anybody .. there are no active wars
right now .. acually, GNS gets along VERY well with Razor (the Speed Racer)
management ..
M: Who will lead GNS + TDUJAM in the Future ? FanFan himself ?
D: GNS and TDUJAM will be lead by Fanfan ... I might do some stuff for TDUJAM
but thats about it for me ... in fact, I might put up a BBS again in a year
or something like that ... I will still call some boards and be on the net
sometimes..
M: So what about Eclipse... rumours say you guys aint to found of it..
D: I dont like any group TRC is in ... because he corrupts people .. tells them
lies, spreads lies, and just rags ... if TRC was not in Eclipse, we'd have
NO problem ... seems to me like Hoson has a problem with us ...
You notice how like NO group greets us ? not eclipse, not trn, not razor,
nobody ... I'm a nice guy ... how come never any greets ?
M: So tell me, what you think will happen with the game scene ? will Genesis,
Razor and the other groups restart on CD or will the diskgroups die ?
D: I really dont know how the games scene will go ... I HOPE there will always
be a difference between disk game groups and cd-groups.
I think for CD ... there HAS to be a limit ... right now TDUJAM wont do
anything more than 30 disks ... I KNOW we get probably all the CD's before
everyone else ... but we wont put out a 40 disk thing like ROM 1911 does or
other lamer groups ..
M: So finally, why are you quitting the scene and do you think you will *EVER*
be back ?
D: I am quitting the scene to concentrate on work and school and life in
general more ... this summer I've been doing a lot of travelling ... I just
got back from the Bahamas ... I am leaving to go on a cross-country (from
East Coast to West Coast and back) on my motorcyle (Kawasaki Ninja ZX-6)
with a friend etc ... next year I will be living at school instead of at
home on this trip I'm taking .. i'd like to meet as many scene guys as I can
I've been doing the scene stuff as a hobby for like ever but only seriously
(being a major part of a BIG group) for like the last 2 years.
When I was in INC I wasnt nearly as involved as I was in PTG and GNS
M: So when you will be gone, who will run TDU ?
D: TDU is moving to a new location .. new sysop (dunno handle yet) ... it will
be up probably next day or two.. with 7-8 nodes ringdown.
M: Is there any wise words you would like to add to this interview ?
D: As Sigmund Freud said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar ;) Watch your back.
Big Brother is Watching You. PTG in '94! GNS in '95! Long Live TDU!
Quoting Terminator: I'll Be Back. :)
M: thnx for this interview... and good luck in the future !
D: OK gnite dude ... nice chatting ... dont rag me in your mag :))
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Most wanted pirate in the world - Popularity Poll
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Last but not least, we made a popularity poll based on the question "who do you
rate as the coolest person in the scene" with a 1-3 scale... the result gave us
441 votes (147 voters) by direct-voting or e-mail that gave us this result...
01) Jimmy Jamez --------------- 78 votes -- (17,6%)
02) Cyber Angel --------------- 24 votes -- (5,4%)
03) Youngblood ---------------- 18 votes -- (4,1%)
04) Hardcore ------------------ 15 votes -- (3,5%)
05) Mikeysoft ----------------- 14 votes -- (3,4%)
Randall Flagg ------------- 14 votes -- (3,4%)
07) Dorian Hawkmoon ----------- 13 votes -- (2,7%)
Hoson --------------------- 13 votes -- (2,7%)
09) Sector9 ------------------- 12 votes -- (2,7%)
10) The Renegade Chemist ------ 11 votes -- (2,6%)
11) Butcher ------------------- 10 votes -- (2,6%)
12) Fan Fan LaTulipe ---------- 09 votes -- (2,5%)
13) The Gecko ----------------- 08 votes -- (2,4%)
Janno --------------------- 08 votes -- (2,4%)
Orion --------------------- 08 votes -- (2,4%)
16) Snake --------------------- 07 votes -- (2,3%)
Studster ------------------ 07 votes -- (2,3%)
18) The Speed Racer ----------- 06 votes -- (2,2%)
Toyman -------------------- 06 votes -- (2,2%)
20) Crackpot ------------------ 05 votes -- (2,1%)
----------------------------------------------------
!!) Other votes -------------- 155 votes -- (35,1%)
----------------------------------------------------
Total votes -------------- 441 votes -- (100%)
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Well that's it for this issue, we're happy for finally getting it out and even
if some of the material is not up-to-date it's better late than never...
If you want to contact 'Naked Truth Magazine' to leave comments on our work,
information for next issue, sexual guiding or anything else, please send all
e-mail to: mindbndr@algonet.se
We would also appreciate applies from ascii/ansi/VGA artists, editors and more
idea-makers to give this magazine some "extra-cheese"...
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Naked Truth Magazine - It's our dream, and your nightmare...