Game Development of the Former USSR
Chasm/CyberPunks Unity
Game Industry Development of the Former USSR
by chasm/cpu
I think this article will be of particular interest to our foreign friends, as well as to all newcomers who know nothing about the Spectrum from ten or more years ago. It is impossible to fully consider all the games that were released from 1991 to 2003 (because most of them were not good enough), so I decided to talk about the most popular games of that time.
It is known that the main development of the Russian Spectrum began in the late 80s, when perestroika was moving as fast as possible. Some foreign magazines periodically broke the information hunger that still existed. But, of course, it was difficult to get them, except for "Bajtek" from Poland. There were no connections between Spectrum users, and the emergence of the paper "Zx-Review" broke the ice that had frozen the minds of Spectrum enthusiasts. The army of readers grew every day, because at that time there were not many educated people, and the authors appeared attractive enough to be cyber-gods.
Some simple routine programs in BASIC began to appear on the pages of "Review," as the authors created a section on programming and began to teach readers not only to play. As a result, some people started writing programs in assembly language. Of course, there were also good works at the end of the 80s, for example, we can take "Pentis" by Tony Raug, this game consists of standard Tetris and two additional pentises and petrises. For comparison, it had shapes made up of more blocks. And we can rightly call it the first Russian game for Spectrum. In the early 90s, other Tetris-style games were released. The most interesting of the bare Tetrises were "Stek" by MPF, "Columns" by Piter ltd, and "Tetriller" by A.C.E. - a conversion from PC. Another popular type of games were strategy and economic games. The best of them: "Kingdom of Euphoria" by Silva, "President 2" by Oleg Kirasov, "Super President" by Balaganov, "Kingdom of Grain" by THD, "Space Trade" by Pavel Nikitin, and the first Russian arcade for two players "Cowboys Duel" by D.Zh. Stepanenko.
The most famous Russian game maker Vsevolod Mednonogov, also known as Copper Feet, began his career at that time. He released three games in 1991: "Durak" - a computer release of a card game, "Video Sport" - a Soviet imitation of a game console, and "Game Box" - a collection of mini-games, the last two games were written by his brother Alexey, who participated in all other works of Copper Feet. In 1992, he released "Tankodrom" - a good arcade with elements of strategy, and in 11 1993 "Buratin's Adventures" - the first Russian arcade/adventure game.
1993 brought a trend for logical games. And the people who were engaged in this were THD and Fanatic Stas. They released a series of logical games: "Weak Century," "Colors of Squares," "Pipe Mixing," "Water Mill," as well as "Russian Tetris."
Among other games released in 1993, we can mention: "Royal Debt" by Yarosha R., Zelenkevich D. - a conversion of a famous game, "Power Ball" by Flash - a very original version of "Arcanoid," "Hell Master" by Pavel Nikitin - in the style of "Boulder Dash," "Tetcolor" by Krasnoyarsk Soft - a mix of "Tetris" and "Columns," "SexTris" by Russian Soft - the first logical/arcade game that used erotic pictures.
But the real sensation of 1993 was the appearance of several new versions of the cult game for all Russian players "Elite." At that time, many people tried to improve this game, among them the first remix by THD, but it was buggy and unsuccessful, so it was difficult to play it comfortably. Later, Vladimir Kladov, also known as Shadow Soft, captured the minds of all "elite" players with a new, much better version of the game, it was very well rewritten, and it had many additional features that made it more playable than the branded version. Its difficulty was also at a higher level because the engine was modified, and many new game features appeared, such as new ships, etc. New equipment was added to Cobra MK-3, allowing travel from star to star using interstellar space and maintaining hyperdrive. There would be too much space to list all the new features and improvements of "Elite 3," it is enough to say that in addition to the three standard secret missions, the author added four more: "Mineral Life" - a task to find and explore mineral forms of life, "Alien Computer" - to complete this mission, you need to obtain alien items and a new generation spaceship "Cobra MK-4," where you can install more equipment. The next mission is "Star Wars." This is an emulation of the great war between humans and Thargoids, including rescue operations, cargo delivery missions, missions where you need to deliver a troop to an enemy station in deep space; if you agree to participate in these operations, you can earn a military rank up to colonel.
Shadow Soft expressed a desire to make "Elite 4." Further modernization of the game, where secret missions would be loaded from disk, and so on. Unfortunately, this project was lost in time.
The publishers of ZX-Review - Inforkom in 1994 started a new project called "Author's Program," and by the end of the year, it brought some good results. The side firm Inforkom - 'Formak' began selling compilations of games and system programs that were sent to ZX-Review from all over the country and nearby regions, but the level of programming and gameplay was not high.
Nevertheless, there were some games that stood out from other piles, such as action games: "Main Blow" by Chip, "Special Forces" by Chip&Rocky, "Mini Fly" by Galaxy, and "Fire Gear" by TM'M - the first Russian action game with a multi-level structure and an introduction and final video.
The love of all Russian players for "Lode Runner" and all conversions on other platforms resulted in some games: "Exit from the Dungeons" by Vetyutnev Vadim, "Treasure" by Technotime, and "Montana Jones 2" by Home Masters.
The phenomenon of the early 90s was the logical game "Colored Lines," which was written by the Russian company "Gamos" for the PC platform and became the most popular office game. From 1993 to 1996, almost ten different versions of this game were made for Spectrum. Surdakar, Vadim and Sergey Grepan, RSC, Mikhail Kovalev, CWC, and Genesis made the most interesting ones.
In 1994, there was a mass trend for "intellectual" games, driven by the popularization of such games in "ZX-Review" by Inforkom, so some products were created: "Destroyer" by Rensoft - based on "Rebel Star Raiders" and the first military game "Kulikovskaya Battle" by WE group. Adventure game fans were not left without attention; during this period, some games in Russian were made: "Lenin in October," "Cops," "Island of Vices" by Sergey Gusev, and "Magic Story. Dedication to Falkor" by V.Bodrov.
As in previous years, in 1994 many Tetris-style and logical/arcade games were released: "Night Tetris" by Chemist; "Color of Magic" by Genesis, "Fall of Diamonds" by Pritula Oleg - another version of "Columns"; "Mega Xonix" by Zaporizhzhya, "Roboxonix" by Chemist - a version of "Xonix."
Among other releases of 1994, we can highlight: "Darkness" by Khanzis Sergey - a conversion of the Apple 2 game, "Fox Hunt" by Computer Rats, "Club Seka" by V.Bodrov - a computer implementation of a card game, "Clash" by Mas - the first PC implementation of "Scorched Earth" for Speccy, it has many settings during the game, and "Sunny Gummy" by Andrey Slabosnitsky - a pretty good game that resembled "Head over Heels."
But the most impressive breakthrough in the gaming industry was 1995. In March, Copper Feet released the Spectrum version of "UFO: Enemy Unknown" by Microprose. In the Speccy version, the tactical part was replaced with an arcade one, so instead of turn-based control, you had the option to control one soldier and run around the level, killing aliens. But the economic and scientific block remained the same as in the original.
"UFO" was not the only strategy game this year; Pan Code released the game "Scorpions: Die Machine," and Domen Soft finished their game based on R. Zelazny's novel "Amber Warriors." "Land of Myths" by Fantasy was another game made in 1995, it was very interesting, done in the style of "Kings Bounty." Another strategy game was "Pirates" by Nikodim, which was a conversion of the famous board game.
In the middle of summer, the electronic magazine "Spectrofon" opened a championship dedicated to the game "Virus" (and later "Virus 2"), which was written by S.V. Kukovyakin, this was a continuation of the famous "Life," where you could create and program your own viruses. On the battlefield, the strongest virus survived and destroyed other weaker opponents. Everyone could participate in the championship, but closer to the end of the year, mass interest began to wane.
The epidemic passion of Russian players for the Dizzy series and quests bore fruit in the form of the game "48 Irons" by Galaxy, a team from St. Petersburg. And, of course, this game became a mega-hit. The Russian language, a lot of humor, and some downloadable levels made this game glorious. By the way, the Phantom family has been trying to translate this game into English for a couple of years. The game engine was rebuilt, allowing for the preservation of the space occupied by the levels. And to make the language closer to the original English humor, the authors chose Agony^CC as the translator. The authors plan to release it in .TAP and possibly in .TRD.
Russian Dizzymania gave rise to many different sequels. Of course, there were many low-level works, but we can highlight some quality games, such as "Dizzy-X Journey to Russia" and "Dizzy-Y Return to Russia" by Speed Code, "Home Iceland Dizzy" by VS Prog, as well as a game that was released at the Chaos Constructions'01 game contest "Dizzy Underground" by Gogin.
Back to 1995. After some announcements in "Zx-Review" and in their own "Spectrofon," the creative group Step released the national mega-hit "Star Legacy." This arcade-adventure game has everything - good graphics, a well-thought-out script, many quests, and an original game engine.
Thus, it captivated the minds of players for a long time. After some time, several games were made on the same game engine, such as "Time Cop" by MoonSoft, "Mirror" by AWCG, "Teapot: Horror in the Apartment" by Optical Bros, "Sea Quest" by Taras, "Plutonia" by Twin Peaks, and "Virtue. Da dirty soul" by C-Jeff. In 2001, "Star Legacy" was ported to GBA by R-Lab, where the graphics were redone, the English language, of course, with the full spirit of the Russian version, etc. Currently, the creative group Step is working on PC, where they are also trying to produce quests. This year, several small game projects were released: "Regeneries" by Reserve (in the style of "Life"), "Python" by Surdakar, a couple of versions of "Battle City" - a game from the Dandy console (better to say NES, because Dandy was made later and was a clone of NES, so I assume that Battle City or TANK 91 were made for NES - translator's note), so from 1993 there were at least 3 releases. Adventure games "Knight Svyatogor and Sorcerer Karachun" by Demiurge Ash. "Talisman" by Ray and "Oregon" by Evgeny Berikov. In 1995, two different versions of the Russian clone of the TV show "Field of Wonders" were released by Softland and Outland. We also re-released some good logical games: conversion from PC and Amiga "Turn or Xor'em All" by Mad Max, "Minesweeper" by Simple Company (the best-made conversion), and "Pipe Dream" by Infosoft, "Hearts" by Barrisoft, this was an original logical game, "Open It" by Hazard Dreams. Of course, programmers did not forget about Tetris, "SexTris" by Silicon Brains - with stimulating erotic pictures between levels, "Trubis" by Sunny Tram - conversion from PC, "Magic Block" by DAB Lab - another "Columns," and the smoothest Tetris of all, which was made "Amiga Tetris" by Navigator.
The success of 1995 inspired game makers, and the next year saw the release of many quality games. Another major project was released this year, "UFO 2: Devils from the Deep" by the game-making monster - Copper Feet, at that time Slava did not make any improvements that he imagined for himself and simply made a quality conversion for Spectrum. Of course, there were some free interpretations, such as intercepting alien ships, he did this in the form of an arcade shooter, but in all other respects Copper Feet was more correct. He used original graphics in ufopedia. Naturally, he refined the main sprites, but the shape and content of the alien ship remained unchanged and looked like the original.
The passion of most Russian players for strategy games was satisfied to a sufficient extent. In addition to the already mentioned "UFO 2," the following were published: "Kings Bounty 2" by EJB - a conversion of the same game from PC, "Murk 3320" by Wanderer, and "Last Battle" by Hacker's Squad - a pretty good turn-based strategy in the style of a mix of "Laser Squad" and "Nether Earth," in this game for the first time on Speccy a "fog" mode was made, which did not allow observing the movement of enemy forces in unexplored territory. By the way, now the author is working on a conversion of "Last Battle" to PC, with a release planned for the end of 2004.
We can mention another sensational game of the beginning of that year "Prince of Persia" by Nikodim - very close to the original conversion. The graphics of the game and the smoothness of the character's movement were close to the Amiga version, from which this conversion was made.
Recalling last year's success of "Virus 1,2," Ivan Gudkov released "Soldier of the Future" - a logical continuation of the above-mentioned programs. In his game, you could program the behavior of several soldiers and send them to the battlefield. Personally, I was very interested in watching my creations attempt to destroy enemies in a convoluted maze; especially part of the graphics and interface in "SOF" were borrowed from the beloved "Laser Squad." You could also save your robot, allowing you to play with your friends' creations.
Also, this year was rich in logical games and logic with arcade elements. The first group includes "Hexxagon" by We, "Fifteen" by Greedy Guys, "Heavy Metal Mover" by UCM, "Magic Rings" by Global Corp, "Hundred" by X-Master, "Territory Capture" by Free Group, "Square Head" by Outland, "Magic Logic" by VVS, "Russian Logical Puzzle" by World Eyes, "Filler" by ZC, "Squards" by Spark, "Dizzy Warehouse" by Yuri Shapov - this time the author made Dizzy move washing machines in a "Socoban"-style game, "Klondike Solitaire" by Digital Reality, "Poker Dice" by Auryn, "Gold Rush" by SM - a computer version of a board game, "Corners" by Electrical Brain and "Donkey" by Devil. Remakes of "Lode Runner" with a much more expanded logical component were released by two groups: "King Valley" by We and "Klademiner" by Bitmunchers. Also, logical/arcade games include "Tank War" by Interceptor, "Double Xinox" by ZX Masters, "Dr. Mario" by Romantic Warriors, "Blockus" by Bitmunchers, "Trubes" by Panc, and "Home Tetris" by Russian Bear.
There were also many quests. The year 1996 began with such series as "Criminal Santa Claus" by ETC and "Smugly" by Crystal Dream, by the way, the third part of "Smugly" was presented in the style of "Astro Marine Corps." In addition to the first series of these games, we can mention "Winnie the Pooh's Adventures" by Softland, "Sliders" by MSD, and "Freddy McNefforde" by D.Zh. Hooligan - these were interactive comics, not quests.
Adventure lovers in Russian also received some pretty good games this year: "Ivan Tsarevich" by G&M, "The Last Horseman" by Kit, "Alien" by Terminator, "Medieval Story" by Human Soft, "Apollo" by Jocker-soft.
Cloud soft and Precision released "Land of Wizards." It was impossible to characterize this game as a pure RPG; rather, it was an advanced quest, as "ML" lacked the ability to develop hero characteristics and save the current state, however, the game was very interesting.
Since game producers for Spectrum were not limited by copyright law, trademarks and characters from other platforms were widely used, so some teams announced the release of demo versions and the beginning of production of such products as "Dune 2," "WarCraft," and "Mortal Kombat."
At the peak of the new flow, XL-Design released a demo version of "MK," which used large converted character sprites from Amiga, however, this product clearly showed that the use of qualitatively converted graphics makes it impossible to create a full conversion (the banal lack of memory). Therefore, AWS took a slightly different path and decided to reduce the size of the sprites and made them hand-drawn. Of course, this became a minus in the recognizability of the characters, but in this version, all super moves of all twelve heroes, fatalities, bability, as well as digital sound, which was converted from Amiga, were implemented, and the game remained very dynamic and challenging.
The arcade/action genre was also represented this year by the games "Ice Climber" by VDV Soft - a conversion from a game console, "Confusion" by Playgear - a variation of "Arcanoid," "Humanoid" by Shock - the author of this product was clearly fascinated by "Boulder Dash," mazes: "New Year's Story" by Binary Masters and "Dungeon" by Ivan Krut, as well as the rather voluminous "Return Home 4: Road to Hell" by K.Kav Soft. We can call this game, the fashionable term at that time, "doomlike." Of course, there was no three-dimensional graphics; this game can be compared to "Hired Guns" (Amiga), but for one player.
1997 was less productive compared to the previous year, however, several absolute mega-hits were released this year.
At the beginning of the year, "Operation R.R." was released - a devilishly funny and interesting arcade adventure game by Galaxy, which had already established itself in "48 Irons." Closer to the middle of the year, another game in a similar genre was released, based on the popular science fiction novel by the Strugatsky brothers "Roadside Picnic," foreign readers could see the film by the cult Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky "Stalker," this title was used by Jam^XPJ for the game.
Among other significant projects, we can note "Elopment. Way to Earth" by OHG, it can also be attributed to the genre of arcade adventure and compared to the famous "Saboteur," although in the OHG product, the quest component is more pronounced, "Fizzy" by Speed Co. - mainly an unremarkable game, so we remind of it because Unbeliever participated in this project, "Wizard of Oz" by Famous Faces Factory, "Mystery of the Ancient Castle" by Art Studio, as well as "Escape to Kharkhan" by AIR.
Due to the appearance of the "Quill" package in Russia in 1997, several pretty good adventures in Russian appeared: "Island of Darkness" by Pavel Moscow, "Diamond" by Dr. Laser, as well as "Examination Investigation" by Demiurge Ash.
In 1997, the trend of not losing interest in producing logical games brought: "Magic Strips" by Virtual Bros, "X-Reversy" by XL-Design, "Riddle" by Taras, "Bone Marrow in the World of Wisdom" by Reflection, "TeSo" by Ivan Krut, "Digital Tetris" by Batsoft, "Hexxagon 2" by Style Group, "Light Fields" by Magic Moon, "House of Geniuses" by Jupiter77 - a conversion of the game "Poly Peg" from Macintosh, as well as electronic versions of popular puzzles in Russia, pocket and board games: "Rubik's Cube" by Phantom Family, "Goat" by Accept, "Trinia" by RND, "Solitaire 'Four Rows'" by Studio Rubicon, and "Tic-Tac-Toe" by SHCG. The Promising Group took a slightly different path and released "The Last Courier" - a game at the intersection of arcade and puzzle.
Star Group went further and released a classic shooter for two players "Chopper Duel," where players killed the enemy's helicopter in real-time. Thanks to the decent design and speed of the engine, this process becomes exciting and captivating for a long time. The next year, the Alliance team released a logical continuation: "Choppers Deathmatch," however, "deathmatch" was not as dynamic as the product of the Star group.
The absolute arcade game (as the name suggests) was "Arcade Volleyball" by Rome'r - this was a conversion of "Headball" from PC. By the way, in 1998 ZX-Masters released another conversion of this game with a better engine and higher quality graphics, as well as good sound effects (using General Sound).
But the most important event of that year was the emergence of the absolute mega-hit among Speccy games "Black Raven." Initially, Copper Feet planned to name the game a more well-known brand - "WarCraft," but when he decided to take on this project, the "WC" brand was already occupied by one of the St. Petersburg teams, whose work was announced at the beginning of the game with that name. Changing the name of the project only freed Copper Feet's hands, as there was no need to completely copy the levels of the source. As for the gameplay of "Black Raven," it took all the best from "WarCraft 1,2" and can rightfully be considered the best real-time strategy on Spectrum.
It should be noted that the game occupied two disks and had two different companies with 16 levels (humans and kung) and also rendered a twenty-minute introductory video and two different versions of the final video.
A little later, already in 1999, Compu-Studio recompiled "BR," released a powerful level editor, as well as a disk with new missions for the game. Thanks to the emergence of this editor, in 2002 Metallurg released another disk with 15 levels, and in 2003, an unknown author created two disks with missions that differed in increased difficulty.
"Technodrome" by Real Soft was another good turn-based strategy of 1997 - its roots go back to "Laser Squad" and "Nether Earth," just like in "NE" - using robots created at bases, you had to capture all enemy bases. I must note that, despite the external resemblance, the gameplay differed from "LS" for the better. The long-term attachment of game makers to the unforgettable "Kings Bounty" manifested itself in another remake "Feudal Wars" by X-Studio.
The managerial game "Diller" by D.Zh. Hooligan took me back ten years and immersed me in the atmosphere that was at our "flea market," where I traded programs for Speccy. This game offered you to become a software vendor at the market, and the chronology of the game events is based on real facts from 1993 to 1997. Thus, it gave you the opportunity to become a regional dealer of Copper Feet, Step, Magic Soft, etc., and support and expand your business, and of course, earn the respect and love of everyone as the best software vendor for Spectrum in the city. The demo version of "Paradise Lost" by Digital Reality was the main force that pushed the authors of "Homer Simpson" to start their project, while the full version of "PL" had mass advertising but was never released. Although "Homer" also had a similar engine and graphics to "PL," it had its own "twist" in the form of the Simpsons' humor, which we all cherish in the unforgettable series.
The simulator genre has always been popular in Russia, and this year it was represented by a rather unconventional program. Instead of controlling a tank or a bomber, you had to spend some time on a quiet riverbank with a fishing rod in hand. In the game "Fisher" by Hard Code, you were offered a choice of several bodies of water, types of rods, and baits. Additionally, later on, you could compete for the number of fish caught.
The number of logic games released this year was even lower than last year, but among them, "Net Walk" by Style Group stood out - a very large product with many three-colored pictures between levels, it occupied two disks and was a conversion of the same game from Gamos. I think Gamos games cried out to be converted to Speccy (remember "Colour Lines"), so the next year Face Off released another version of "NW," which differed from the Style Group release in its much smaller size and more refined graphics. "Word Life" by Computer Rats Group could also be considered a logical continuation of Gamos's creation, but unlike "Colour Lines," you were offered to line up not simple colored balls but letters, which, when forming smart combinations, that is, to put it simply, Russian words - disappeared. Among other logic games, it is necessary to mention "Crossword" by Razzlers, "Devil's Curse" by S.E.I., "Figus" by Image Crew, and "Fast Breed" by MHCG - all games were graphically well executed and had sufficient complexity. MHCG also released "Wormpithon" - an interesting version of the well-known game, while Crushers made the arcade puzzle "The Flinstones. Fred in Magic Wood."
Gambling games were not forgotten, Free Group released the solitaire "Free Cell" and Strangers - "Blackjack."
At the intersection of logic and arcade appeared "Leprekon" by Omega Hacker Group - although the game's plot was not particularly novel (it was an old "Lode Runner"), the beautiful graphics, smooth engine, and good sound made me complete it fully. A little later, OHG released the second edition of "Leprekon" with two new additional levels.
But the main highlight of 1998, I think, was the emergence of minimalist yet no less crazy arcades. The initiator of the "Belarusian phenomenon," I believe, was Freeman^Asphyxia, who started it all with the release of "Kolobok Zoom" - a completely crazy shooter in the style of (as he defined it) "real-time aggression." After that came "Any Tank" by Optical Bros - an absolute arcade controlled by one button. There were also "Hunting on Moles" by Asphyxia, "Mobile Wars" by Mythos, and the series of 98-99 "Kill PC 1-3" by Rage - an arcade saga of PC haters and the New Year's arcade greeting "White Eagle. Comrade is known" by Fatality. The defecation of it all was "Kolobok Zoom 2" by Asphyxia and Fatality - thirty levels of a terrible battle accompanied by deadly sound effects and bright music. All this was executed in beautiful graphics with simply fantastic speed (especially noticeable when the hero picked up all the additional weapons). In the end, of course, there was the final battle and a great final video. In my opinion, "KZ2" was the best arcade on Speccy, no one did it better later.
By 1999, most game makers realized that producing games on a commercial basis had already become a thing of the past. This ended with low prices for consoles and used PCs, which caused an outflow of "pure" gamers from Spectrum. Also, the growing activity of hackers from last year exacerbated the situation, so sometimes authors earned only minimal money, just for beer. And in accordance with this fact, they ceased work on such projects as "The Black Raven 2," "Last Hero of the Light Force 2," and the sequels of "Monsterland" and "12 Secret Books." From this moment on, most games were written for pleasure, but there were still enthusiasts attracted by the process of creation.
Strangely enough, most of the games released that year could be divided into logic and strategy.
Jeez released "Kluxer" - a beta version of a fun puzzle, later, using the same idea, Optical Bros made a more grandiose beautiful "Clickmania"; Clevers released "4x4 Puzzle," Smokers "Take It," and Ascendancy completed a two-year work on the puzzle "Hamon IV." Also in Belarus, work was completed on "Fields of Logic" by AMD and "Tormozilka" by Amalitiya, and in Russia "Clocks" by Omega. "Tet Block" by Cyber Team and "Xixit" by Real Soft were other versions of the old hit "Columns," although it must be admitted that they were made at a fairly high level and using modern technologies.
The turn-based strategy "OWA vs Nato: Apocalypse" by Larri, which was released under the impression of the war in the Balkans. It was based on a scenario of possible developments of those years: Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine oppose NATO to start a third world war. "Ships" by Alexander Sizyenko was a turn-based tactic at sea, not a strategy. In 99, a game called "Cezar" was released - the first game from a rather productive team at that time, Action. This game was written in the style of "Sim City," where the player was offered to build and develop an ancient city, as well as complete various missions designed by the author. Very close to the strategy genre was the manager game "the Owner 2: the Millionaire" by Upsoft - you were offered to become the owner of some mines with all the problems related to this tough business.
However, other genres were also not forgotten, so for fans of fast button pressing, "Kick da Gaga" by Avalon/Rush was made - a beautifully made arcade, "Supaplex" by Flyman - a somewhat dull conversion of the same game from PC, "Gunman" by Alien Factory and Sage really good arcade shooter, "Mario Islands" by Omega Hackers Group - a quite decent version of a well-known platform game. Z-System and Graphics System continued the series of adventure comics, releasing the second and third parts of "Wolf." D.J.Hooligan again realized himself in the genre of interactive comics. However, this time the quest component was expressed more clearly; he released a rather massive game with lots of animations - "Explosion." Shuric Program debuted in a new genre for him; he wrote a text quest "Great Testing."
"Super Tetris" by Alex Art - was, in my opinion, the best Tetris on Speccy, with its engine's smoothness even better than "Amiga Tetris," which was the best for five years. Deciding to combine all the best in one game, Push and DGMS started working on "Mega Tetris 2000," however, despite its huge size and many different game modes and settings, this product turned out to be much less playable than the aforementioned "Super Tetris."
The popular mid-90s genre of non-deterministic games a la "Life" was represented this year by the game "Snake," written by Alexey Pelepeychenko. Although this game also had an advanced language for programming snakes, a pleasant interface, and quite good graphics, it was not as popular as "Virus" or "Soldier of the Future."
As in recent years, several computer versions of gambling games were released - "Poker" by Ma$ter, "Cobble 2," "Nine," "Patience" by V. Cherpasov.
The year 2000 pleased us with the completion of several projects that most players had long given up hope for.
After two years of torment and the transfer of sources from hand to hand, Light finally saw "Pussy." This was a well-made puzzle, completed by Razzlers. Since Asphyxia and Fatality renamed themselves to Free Art, at that time they were trying to create games for GBC on a commercial basis. Strangely enough, the first release of this game was carried out outside the former USSR - LCD obtained all rights to its distribution, and the initial "Pussy" was released on tape. However, thanks to the efforts of Maddy^PhF, this game was also released in TR-DOS version, it was optimized and fully repackaged.
Also this year, the beautiful quest "Crime Santa Claus: Deja Vu," which BrokImSoft promised to release last year, was completed. Crystal Dream decided not to make a separate release of "Smagly 3," which already had a demo version, and released "Smagly Anthology" - a whole disk that included the third arcade part, as well as the first and second quest parts.
The young team Action in 2000 began to increase its potential. At the beginning of that year, "The Eighth Department" was published - it was an arcade adventure based on the lives of secret agents. The game turned out to be very large and occupied almost half a disk, but it was a bit raw, and the good impression was spoiled by the total illiteracy of the author, who managed to make grammatical mistakes even in simple words. Nevertheless, Slip's activity was indeed great, because he almost single-handedly made the next product - "Empire 2000," which also had a large volume and occupied one disk. The genre of this game was a mix of the first game from Action "Cezar" with the well-known "King's Bounty," i.e., you had to build and develop a city, create an army, and destroy your enemies. The list of strategic games for Spectrum was replenished this year with another remake of "Rebel Star Riders" - "Soldatiki v1.2" by Alexander Sizyenko, however, this game differed from the prototype with a worse AI of opponents and a poor game engine.
Compared to the previous year, 2000 was rich in logic games and puzzles. N-Discovery and Cobra made "The Knight's Arena" and "10x10" - games with practically identical ideas. You were offered to move the course using a chess knight to clear the entire game field, but the game from N-Discovery was made at a higher level.
Among others, it is necessary to highlight the work of Studio Stall "Tower Pod" - a beautifully created conversion of "Pad" from PC. Also at that time were released: "Aliens" by Syndrome, "Honey World" by Alex Art, "Real Lines" by Saint - another attempt to improve "Colour Lines," "Strange Exhibits" by Prog Master, "Virtual Rubik's Cube" by VRCP - not very successful computer implementation of the well-known puzzle, "Japanese Contrast" by Fenomen - a collection of Japanese puzzles.
In the logic/arcade genre appeared "New Time Pacman" by Shuric and "XOR 2000" by D.Moroz - a game in the style of "Boulder Dash," but with a more clearly expressed logical component. "Deathmatch Arena" by Lynx and "Stagger" by Fenomen were pure arcades. I was also glad to see greetings from childhood: Horrorsoft released "Kool Eggs" - a very accurate imitation of the pocket electronic arcade "Well, Just You Wait!" which I played during Soviet times. By the way, a year earlier, Paradox released "Rabbit Jazzy," which was also based on the same game, however, in my opinion, the release by Horrorsoft looked much more attractive.
On January 1 of the new millennium, "Homer Simpson 2: Again in Russia" by Mr. Gluk and Co was released, they had been working on it for about two years. The game turned out to be better than the first part, the engine underwent changes, and again funny quests and humor allowed it to win the hearts of players.
But "Homer 2" became the last project of Mr. Gluk. "Yard Story" by Orion continued the traditions of "The Star Heritage," so it looked a bit like it. However, the very little attention the author paid to graphics and plot made it less appealing to players compared to other representatives of this genre.
In the spring, Triumph released the arcade racing game "Numb Cars" - unpretentious but gripping, and later "Thimble" - an imitation of the Russian national street game, i.e., the game of thimbles. The Siberian group stood out with logic games, they created "New Puzzle," and Studio Stall also released "Opener" (officially, it was part of the application to Adventurer 13, so it was released only in 2002, although it was made in 2001).
Arcades were represented by the works of Studio Stall - while I was playing "Stuckun," my brain just shut down, Delirium Tremens transferred their work to the spinal department with their "Cars" and began a series of paranoid games - all you need to do is destroy four enemy cars. Triebkraft delighted people with their remake of the fresh arcade "Super Bomberman 2" from Action - Poisoned CyberJack rewrote the game engine, music, and sound effects, and optimized memory usage, making his game a hit at the beginning of the year on par with "Homer 2."
Due to the emergence of a new nomination "32k Game Compo" at Chaos Constructions'99, many games were released at the party. Thus, back in 99, demos of "Curse of Xeen" by X-Master and "Babylon 5" by Troll were released at CC, while the aforementioned "Hamon IV" by Ascendancy and "Stagger" by Fenomen were presented to the public at Millennium 1900.
A similar situation occurred in 2000: the logic game "3D-Roost" by Fenomen was completed, but released only after MLN'1901. Also at this party were released "Technodrom. Millennium edition" by Real Soft - in the mln version, mouse support, new graphics, new maps, and new gameplay parts were added.
At CC'01, the following picture was observed: since the game competition had strict limits of 32 kb, the arcade shooter "Hunt on sparrows Born to kill" by Green Bit Group, the logic game "Farspace" by Mayhem, and a short version of "Arcanoid" by Drv53b6 were allowed to participate. And for its size, the undisputed leader "Dizzy Underground" by Gogin was thrown out, as was another weak remake on the same theme - "Dizzy B" by N-Discovery.
The beginning of 2002 was marked by the release of "Kill Pokemon" by Delirium Tremens - in this arcade shooter, you had to kill 50 Pokémon, specifically Pikachu. Personally, I was annoyed by the "Pokemon" cartoon, and I had a lot of fun killing those bastards. Then in February, Triebkraft and 4th Dimension released the Spectrum version of another arcade shooter - "Moorhuhn: First Blood." This version featured greater visualization.
The N-Discovery team developed the "IF Creator" package for creating text games, a la Interactive Fiction - a genre of books that began to gain popularity in Russia. With this package, N-Discovery made "Adventure of your dream," which showcased the advantages of "IF Creator."
Sam Style released "Battle Field" - a turn-based tactic for 1-4 players. This game was intended as a component of the "WindowZ'02" package. In my opinion, the game was not made very professionally, and many settings and quite good graphics did not save it due to the lack of the ability to play against the computer.
In 2002, there was another attempt to start producing games on a commercial basis. The group Perspective announced the "Your Game" contest, which invited all game producers for Spectrum to participate. The organizers of this contest set a prize fund and determined the time frame. By the end of summer, Perspective released a compilation of demos of six games that participated in the contest. The winners were chosen by absentee voting. Anyone interested could vote while the games were prepared for release, and the money from their sales was transferred to the prize fund. However, later a free version of the compilation "Your Game" was published on Virtual TR-DOS. Among the other games presented in this contest, it is necessary to highlight the winner - "Abe's Mission (escape) part 1" by Brothers. This game was a remake of "Oddworld: Abe's Odyssey." It had quite well-converted graphics, smooth movement, and quests transferred from the original material, which distinguished it from other games that participated in the contest. The compilation also included "Mine" by SCG - an arcade game for team play. You were offered to equip yourself with various gear (tools, devices, and other types of explosives) to kill your enemies. The enemies also received similar gear, making the gameplay an exciting brawl that required not only reaction but also sharpness of mind. "The Dome" by Studio Stall continued the traditions of "Nether Earth," however, the game differed from its prototype in the absence of the ability to independently design robots and a weaker AI of your computer opponent. "The Courier 2: the Lost world" by Perspective was a continuation of the first parts of this series, which was published in 1997. The genre of the game did not change - it was also an arcade puzzle, but the engine was advanced and improved. Real Soft released a computer implementation of the board game "Manager" at this contest (the Soviet version of "Monopoly"). It was written in 1996, but until that time had not been released. The game was mainly written in BASIC and had an inconvenient interface, so in my opinion, Real Soft formally participated in "Your Game," presenting its early, not entirely successful development. "Super Mario Bros" by Gogin was a playable demo with four levels; it lacked sound effects (only music was present) and various features from the original game, which somewhat spoiled the experience. Nevertheless, Gogin used a multilayer engine with horizontal scrolling for the first time on Spectrum, making even this demo visually appealing and also compelling to play. The release of the full version was planned for early 2003 but was not realized.
At the beginning of 2003, there was silence that lasted until spring when Ice'Di^Triumph released "Lord of Darkness" - an IF adventure made with the help of the N-Discovery package. The game is based on the cult "Lord of the Rings" and used some undocumented commands of "IF Creator," allowing Ice'Di to incorporate combat elements into the gameplay. Unfortunately, despite the game's large size (about 800 locations), it could be solved quite easily and quickly. "Deadventure" by ACH was also written using "IFC," this game has a good scenario and several alternative endings.
The incurable mania of the Clown and the Wizard for Pokémon resulted in another release from Delirium Tremens, where there were such characters - "Gotta catch'em all." One can make a clear diagnosis for the authors - slow schizophrenia; the plot of the game revolved around guessing the combination of Pokémon, in addition, there were three bars with nine Pokémon each, i.e., it turned out 9^3=729 options, and completing this with 9 lives, in my opinion, is impossible ;) Also, this summer were released the aforementioned "Virtue. Da dirty soul" by C-Jeff and "Doctor Ouchithurts," a conversion of "Dr. Mario" from Nintendo.
Inspired by the success of "Your Game'02," the Perspective group decided to start publishing and distributing the last game from the Action team - "Dune: Imperia 2," which was written in the real-time strategy genre. It should be noted that this was the largest scale project ever distributed in the former USSR, something similar was only done by Inforkom earlier. However, Perspective went further and acted as a serious publisher; they not only offered the game but also the game box, i.e., a complete game set, a printed short story based on the game, and an audio cassette with original musical tracks. However, this initiative did not bring great success due to the low quality of the game; it only worked in TR-DOS, and memory requirements were 256 kilobytes (in addition, the game usually only worked on computers with memory expansion according to the Pentagon standard). It should be noted that in "Dune: Imperia 2" you could only play with TURBO mode, i.e., it was very slow, which was a bit surprising when comparing its characteristics and gameplay quality with "Black Raven."
Also, Perspective announced the next contest "Your Game'03," but most game makers ignored it, preferring to showcase at the CAFe'03 game contest.
Mostly all games presented at that party were in the form of demos: Virtual Masters brought a demo of "Darkwing Duck" - a conversion of a famous platform game and "EroTris" - a very crude Tetris with erotic pictures between levels. Green Bit Group showcased a pre-release of "Death Valley" - a mix of "Lemmings" and "Worms," they had been working on it for about three years to complete. And "Fire and Ice" by N-Discovery was presented in compiled blocks showing various game situations, which, however, did not prevent it from taking first place. The full version of this beautiful puzzle based on the Namco game was released much later, only on December 30. Only Studio Stall presented full versions, showcasing the arcade adventure "Lethargy: the apathetic dream," which someone called "Myth 2" due to its graphics and similar plot. However, "Lethargy" differed from its prototype by having a larger number of locations and a variety of character equipment. "Milas Kazmus" by Cyber-Punks Unity - an arcade shooter could also be considered its full version, but there was no intro, no additional music, and no final video, due to the desire to make it 32 kb.
From the very beginning of 2004, another release from Action appeared on Virtual TR-DOS - "Empire 3," again an RTS but with RPG elements. As far as I can judge, this game was made for the "Your Game'03" contest, but due to the failure of that contest, it was not released until then. "Empire 3" had a more advanced engine and interface, however, frankly speaking, the graphics were stolen from "Black Raven 1,2," the requirement for turbo mode and 256 kb of memory again did not allow it to become popular, which was promoted by Slip this time not thinking about universal memory support and, in my opinion, ignored other types of expanded memory besides Pentagon 512. I don’t know about ATM and Profi, but on my Scorpion, the game did not work.
In the early 90s, many so-called "hackers" (which referred to both coders and crackers) appeared in the territory of the former USSR, and they did not have the opportunity to write full-fledged games because most of them could not write good music and draw quality graphics. However, this did not stop them, and later the software market began to fill with numerous remixes of foreign games.
At that time, everything was limited to adding AY music (sometimes even homemade), fixing and repackaging for machines with 128 kb, and implementing the game for TR-DOS (loading levels, saving/loading game states), but nevertheless, some people went further and made full remakes with new levels, graphics, and music.
Among these games, one can highlight new versions of such games as "Batty 3,4" by Surdakar; "Krakout 3" by Belozursky A.; several remakes of "Lode Runner" - several different versions from Fantadrom, Biotech, and Image; "Boulder Dash 5,6" by Kraskovsky Vas.; the version of "Lemmings" for Spectrum in 1995 was globally rewritten by Rst7^CodeBusters - the engine was accelerated, and the levels were repackaged, allowing all levels to be saved in 128 kb. Also, in 96, Logros released "Lemmings 2," which contained 70 new levels.
As I mentioned above, on the wave of "dizzymania," a huge number of remixes of this super popular game appeared, besides the already mentioned quality releases, there were also pathetic homemade games that differed not only in worse programming implementation but also in absolutely illogical quests: "Last Will Dizzy" by an unknown author, "New Dizzy" by V.Kutin, D.Paltuzov, "Dizzy 8: Little Joke" by P.A.Soft, Timur, and "Dizzy A&B" by N-Discovery. Also, "Laser Squad" was very popular. At that time, various versions of this game appeared, and some mission editors (the best of which was made by Wredosoftware), and we could all observe the emergence of mediocre additional levels for this wonderful game - there was one "masterpiece," one shot at any barrel exploded all of them with a subsequent chain reaction lasting five minutes or so. However, among others, one can highlight the remix of "Super Laser Squad" by Chip&Chap, ZS+Vek, which contained 7 new high-quality levels.
Also, against the general background, some products can be highlighted, not only adapted for TR-DOS but also completely rewritten (additional music, graphics, bug fixes, added programming, final version): "Nether Earth. Special Edition" + 11 additional levels from ZS, "Advanced Nether Earth" from Eternity Industry, "Draconus" from Seamans and Dream Team, "Heavy on the Magic!" from Real Soft, "Times of Lore" and "Dragons of Flame" from CyberPunks Unity.
In 96-97, the X-Trade team was developing General Sound - a sound card for Speccy. It was released in several variants (memory size, etc.), this card had digital sound with parameters close to Amiga, which was so popular at that time in Speccy circles. The original projects that initially used GS, as I remember, were only "Headball" from ZX-Masters and "Net Walk" from Style; it was also planned to use digital sound in "The Black Raven 1,2," besides, for the second part of the game, all samples had already been made. However, all the advantages of this device's sound can be appreciated in some remixes of old games that began to be produced in '97. Undoubtedly, masterpieces were the cult games "Chase H. Q. 1" and "Target Renegade" by Mike Bloom, who made GS versions of these games with music and sound effects ported from Amiga and PC. Good remixes include "Barbarian" by Moroz, "Comando Tracer" by Syndrome, "Dan Dare. Pilot of the Future," "Krakout," "Lee Enfield" by Phantom Family, "Navy Moves 1" by Triumph, "Power Boat Simulator," "Renegade," "Y.S.Capers Scatz," "Zynaps" by Mike Bloom, "Xecutor" by Stinger, "Rex 1,2" by CPG, "Batty" by Nova. And this was just a small list of releases, as such work continues to this day by various teams.
Finally, it should be said about demo versions of interesting projects that did not see completion, although if the full versions of these games had been completed, most of them would have become mega-hits.
When, in the mid-90s, the level of Spectrum coding reached a sufficiently high level, many people decided to realize the dream of all players and port "Doom" to the 8-bit platform. There were some attempts to write a "doomlike" engine, in particular, such attempts, shall we say, not very impressive, were made by Cobra and Syndicate, but they did not achieve the realization of enemies. However, in 1997, a sensation occurred - Digital Reality released a well-made demo containing the first level of "Doom." It had three video modes (two chunks with attributes and one monochrome in a small window, but with high resolution), as well as four types of weapons, ammunition, medkits, armor, and two types of monsters that could already be killed. A little later, Alone Coder released "Wolf 3D," however, with a good engine (smooth movement in a large window, normally opening doors) in that demo, despite the presence of several types of weapons, the monsters were harmless, i.e., they were implemented but remained motionless and impervious to the player's weapons. But the most successful, in my opinion, was the last demo (by the way, it was published in the supplement to Adventurer#13) of the game "Citadel" from Stalker. The engine changed over several years and in the end - it combined all the best that was in "Doom" from Digital Reality and "Wolf 3D" from Alone Coder. In addition to three video modes, active enemies, several types of weapons, and normal door implementation, there was an attempt to implement dynamic lighting for explosions and ammunition. It is also necessary to mention another unfinished but very promising project - "ZX Duke Nukem," developed by Volga Soft. There was no demo of this game as such, but this engine could be explored in the article and sources published in "Adventurer #13," it was also used in the trackmo "Love Gun," which was written by the same Volga Soft. In my opinion, this is one of the fastest (along with "Awaken") 3D engines on Spectrum, allowing for truly fast hi-rez 3D games. For example, one could say that if this technology had been applied in games like "Driller" or "Total Eclipse," they would have run 5-6 times faster.
In 1996, the electronic magazine "Spectrofon" published a demo of the cult RTS "Dune 2," this first conversion was made by Perestroika, of course, the attempt to realize this type of strategy was not so successful, if many units were produced, the game would start to lag, but this demo showed us that an RTS could be made on Speccy. As I wrote above, at the end of the following year, "Black Raven" was released and became immortal, raising competition to a very high level. As far as I know, Copper Feet refused to complete "BW2" for financial reasons, however, judging by the final demo published in 2000, this game was supposed to have many advantages, a new engine, and updated graphics. There could also be flying units, an expanded list of spells, and a more advanced gameplay. Among the unfinished but promised projects in the RTS genre, one can note "Operation 'Oil'" from Alexoft and Berserker, and "Jackals" from The Mad Mailmen League, both of these games had more integrated unit and structure sprites, as well as some additional features that favorably distinguished them from "BW1."
Some releases of turn-based strategies were also planned. Cubekin Vitaliy tried to port "Civilization," and the demo was no different from the original. Phantom Family released a demo of the very popular strategy game "Master of Orion" among fan circles, however, due to its incompleteness, it is impossible to talk about the quality of the final product, but even just the name of the game "MoO" would have made many people play. "Mechanic Wars" from Green Fort was written under the influence of "Heroes of Might and Magic," but had a futuristic plot with the possibility of developing science, so it looked like the same "Master of Orion" and "Reunion." In the military strategy genre, one can highlight "Empire" from Virtual Vision Group, however, after the release of the second demo, this group left Spectrum and renamed itself Team Power Amiga.
If we are talking about Amiga, it is necessary to remember one mega-hit of this platform - "Walker." Alien Factory was engaged in porting this game for four years and achieved brilliant success. The final
Contents of the publication: Adventurer #15
- Editorial
elph: предлагая себя...
- Editorial
alff: перемены это воздух которым мы дышим...
- Editorial
miguel: ...title ..title by myself
- Editorial
chasm: Кстати, вы читали правила cc04?
- Editorial
создатели журнала.
- News
актуальные новости от: Research, Arhon, Gasman, Fatal Snipe, Skrju, ZX Time team, Newart, Elph.
- News
c-jeff о причинах закрытия музыкального проекта "emphasis".
- News
взгляд Moran/CPU на текущее состояние дел в группе СPU.
- News
sq: "я включил ZX-Stag, отошeл на несколько метров, сел на колени на ковeр и начал..."
- Scene
Elph'a удивляется появлению Demo работ, не несущих в себе не то что глубин, а хотя бы попыток исследования своих чувств и размышлений.
- Scene
Бунтующий демосценер.
- Scene
History of making demo "WeeD".
- Scene
отчет Miguel/CPU о CAFe'2003.
- Scene
Шшшшш - БУМ! это где это я? аха на CAFe'2003.
- Scene
отчет буржуя Pyromaniac о поездке на русское пати CAF'e 2003.
- Scene
От пати до пати: репортажи с CAFe'03 и FOReVer 5 и их сравнение.
- Scene
отчет о концерте в Варшаве группы AY Riders.
- Scene
рассказ Gasman'a о том как он знакомил британских обывателей с демосценой на Notcon 2004.
- Scene
рассказ о выставка группы GALZA.
- Scene
GALZA exhibition 2004.
- Scene
Moran затевает графический конкурс черно-белых картинок.
- Scene
Dive Into Monolith (GFX compo).
- Interface
Реакции Спектрумистов на Adventurer#14: вопросы и ответы.
- Interface
Музыка бывает разная. Каждый из нас понимает ее по-своему, у нас разные вкусы...
- Interface
AS C-major...
- Interface
интервью с рыбинским музыкантом Ahim.
- Interface
interview with Ahim.
- Interface
Moran/CPU interview.
- Interface
интервью с рыбинским кодером и музыкантом Moran/CPU.
- Interface
интервью с музыкантом C-jeff.
- Interface
c-jeff interview.
- Interface
интервью с британским музыкнтом Gasman/Raww.
- Interface
Gasman interview.
- Interface
интервью с пермским музыкнтом Kej-Jee.
- Interface
Kej-Jee interview.
- Interface
интервью с рыбинским музыкантом и художником Miguel/CPU.
- Interface
Miguel/CPU interview.
- Interface
интервью с Alone Coder.
- Interface
Alone Coder interview.
- Interface
интервью с краснодарским музыкантом Nik-O.
- Interface
Nik-O interview.
- Interface
интервью с чайковским музыкантом Riskej.
- Interface
Riskej/OCA interview.
- Interface
Yerzmyey/HPRG interview.
- Interface
интервью с польским музыкантом Yerzmyey/HPRG.
- Scene
опрос производителей игр "Что вас заставляет делать игры для спектрума в это странное время?"
- Interface
gamemakers questionnarie.
- Interface
интервью с издателем кассетных игр Cronosoft.
- Interface
gaming like it used to be! (cronosoft interview)
- Interface
Alex Xor о положеннии дел игровой индустрии на ZX Spectrum.
- Interface
Analizing ZX Spectrum games 2003 year.
- Interface
elph: "игры, в которые я не играл".
- Interface
elph: games, i haven't played.
- Interface
moran: "Почему я играю".
- Interface
Confessions of a serial gamer.
- Reviews
обзор демок 2003 года: Detroyt, Why?, Extazy, Microcosm, Wirne, Alienate, Sailor, The Source, Evenless, Fuck You Scene, Caprize, Resurrection, demo22, Weed, China Restaurant.
- Reviews
demo 2003 review: Detroyt, Why?, Extazy, Microcosm, Wirne, Alienate, Sailor, The Source, Evenless, Fuck You Scene, Caprize, Resurrection, demo22, Weed, China Restaurant.
- Reviews
История развития игровой индустрии на постсоветском пространстве: 1991-1999 года.
- Reviews
История развития игровой индустрии на постсоветском пространстве: 1999-2004 года.
- Reviews - Chasm
The article discusses the development of modifications and remakes of classic games for the ZX Spectrum platform. Key projects include enhanced versions of 'Nether Earth' and new sound capabilities with General Sound. Additionally, it reviews attempts to create Doom-like engines and real-time strategies.
- Reviews
Тенденции развития спектрумовской игровой индустрии.
- Reviews
Tendencies of ZX Spectrum game industry development.
- Tutorials
Больше цвета!!! Описание паковщика цветного видео из демки Weed.
- Tutorials
More colours!!! Description packer color video from the demo "Weed".
- Tutorials
hewle splines - программ для создания сплайновых кривых.
- Tutorials - alff
hewle splines.
- Ottyag
ничего.
- Software
втоpая веpсия схемы IDE-HDD адаптеpа для ZX Spectrum.
- Interface
интервью с пермским музыкантом Siril/4D.
- Scene
AY Riders live in Warsaw.
