====================================================================== _ __ _ <>_ __ _ || /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ || A M I G A U P D A T E /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ || -News and Rumors- / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_|| (An Occasional Newsletter) BACK FOR THE FUTURE || ====================================================================== AMIGA and the Amiga logo are trademarks of Gateway 2000, Inc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 980206 A M I G A I N C . S P E A K S ! N E W C H I P D E C I S I O N N O T F I N A L W O R D C U C U G D O W N F O R N O W V I D E O T O A S T E R / F L Y E R S Y M P O S I U M P L A N N E W A M I G A M A G A Z I N E I N U K V U L C A N H I R I N G P R O G R A M M E R S S I L L Y S O F T W A R E - R E A L L Y ! O F F I C I A L S C A N D O U B L E R S P P C D A T A T Y P E S F 1 S O F T W A R E O P E N F O R B U S I N E S S O X Y P A T C H E R T O U S U S L E G A L P G P 5 A V A I L A B L E V U L C A N B A R E S I T S S O U L F E A T U R E - T H E A M I G A I N F O R M E R A N N E X ! Editor's Thoughts and Introduction: Today's issue is an excellent example of what makes doing the "Amiga Update" both a joy and, sometimes, a frustration. As you look through the issue you'll see a number of items with today's date on them. There's nothing more fun than getting an issue to you with news releases from the same day. The frustration is when you have an issue all set to go and something extraordinary lands in your mailbox. Today it was a very long, very insightful and very unusual release from Vulcan. A premier software developer for the Amiga, Vulcan's release is like little we've run before. Per their wishes we've included it as they wrote it, uncut and unedited except for reformatting to our page size and correcting some mis-punctuation that crept in (just missing apostrophes in abbreviations). Read it for yourself - no, it's not announcing the end of the world. The Vulcan story has made this issue larger than we prefer - we hope no one has mailbox problems as a result. If you do, please inform us. We're never quite sure how large to let issues grow and feedback is appreciated. We don't see the Amiga situation in quite the difficult terms Vulcan does, but then we're not trying to make a living from the Amiga games market. We do applaud their efforts to keep functioning in that market. They've proven to be a special company and we hope they're around for a long time to come. Also special is "The Amiga Informer". We're pleased to bring you another installment from the folks at TAI. We hope you enjoy it as well as the rest of the issue. A few words on the "Informer" are worth adding. "Amiga Update" is not a subsidiary of TAI, and in fact predates it. We mention this because an advertisement soon to appear in "The Informer" assumes otherwise, and we'd like to head off any confusion. We ARE voluntarily associated with TAI because of the quality in-depth journalism it's bringing to the Amiga community. You can read news here as it happens, and in TAI in more depth than we can present it. It's an association we value very much and intend to keep. If anything, we'll strengthen that association over time. We hope you enjoy this issue. Brad Webb, Editor ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A M I G A I N C . S P E A K S ! February 6th, 1998 To our AMIGA Community By Darreck Lisle, Events Coordinator AMIGA, Inc. Friends, have you been hearing those cries of, "The end is near? The end is near!" on the Internet and in your favorite Amiga magazine? We've heard them too, but with a difference! You see, what we're hearing is that the end of the 'bad old days' is here and the Amiga has a bright future ahead of it! Now, we're not going to say this will be easy and it certainly won't happen overnight. There are many things that need to be done. Not all of these things are obvious and few of them are what you would call high visibility changes. What we've got to do is dig the cellar again and rebuild the foundations of the Amiga and the Amiga market. You should already be seeing the results of this. For example: There are over a dozen licensees of the Amiga making Amigas and Amiga clones. New models with new features have already shipped. In the coming months you'll be seeing a lot more about these machines and you'll learn about companies with names like DCE, Index Information Systems, Micronik, Quick Pak, Nova Sector. You'll be able to buy Amigas that are faster, and more powerful, than ever before. As more of these machines get in the hands of the writers and editors out there, you'll find out about them. The Amiga games market is growing and taking control! Commodore determined the base configuration a game maker could count on for his audience. Now games like Myst, The Shadow of the Third Moon, Quake and others require CDROM, hard drives, and 4 megs or more of RAM. And guess what? The games are selling faster than ever because if a user didn't already have these features in their Amiga, they're getting their Amiga's upgraded! New software applications are coming out and old applications are getting upgraded. You can get Aladdin 4D 5.0, Tornado 3D 1.0, Electric Dreams, Wildfire, Directory Opus Magellan, ImageFX 3.0 and many, MANY, more titles. The Amiga trade shows are getting bigger and better than ever. Last year the Midwest Amiga Expo, St. Louis' Amiga '97 and Koln's Computer '97 set new attendance records for both Amiga dealer/company participation and for user attendance as well! This year we are looking forward to St. Louis' Amiga '98, International Amiga '98 in Toronto, Canada, AmiWest in Sacramento, the 1998 Midwest Amiga Expo (which promises to be twice as big yet again!), and shows again in the UK and Germany as well. Things aren't just happening within the Amiga community, no sir! Wired magazine and several news services have run stories about the Amiga revival. Mainstream computer magazines have been referring to 1998 as the year that alternative computer platforms, like the Amiga, will be gaining market share again. Amigas are still used in mission critical applications where reliability and integration has been the key. The Amiga goes to war in the M1 Abrams tank, up into space with the Space Shuttle and down to the ocean floor to help explore the wreck of the Titanic for James Cameron's film. Of course, nearly everyone's local television and cable station still has several Amigas in house for video work if you want something a bit closer to home! You're going to be seeing a lot more of our work take form over this year. More new "Powered by Amiga" based machines. An upgraded AmigaOS. Coordinated developer resources and user group resources. 1998 is going to be a fun ride! Darreck Lisle Events Coordinator Amiga, Inc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- N E W C H I P D E C I S I O N N O T F I N A L W O R D 03 Feb 1998 {The following statemen is from the ICOA, Industry Council for Open Amiga. Brad} I talked to Amiga Inc today and can clarify a few points, mainly from Joe Torre's Q&A. * Amiga Inc have not chosen the next processor yet. They are still talking to chip makers, both well known and not well known. They do not want to sell the Amiga short and wish to chose the best price/performance processor that can take the Amiga into the next decade and keep it there, ahead of the crowd. * Because of this, they recognise that there will be a deficiency in processing power compared to the other platforms, which will not be corrected until the next processor is chosen and HW and SW can be created for it. * Thus they are keen to promote an interim architecture, a HW machine still based on a 68K processor but utilising an alternative co-processor, thus the announcement of the 68K+PPC or Alpha or whatever. This is NOT an announcement of support for Phase 5. It is a directive to any HW manufacturer out there that they can proceed to produce to this architecture. Thus there can be PowerUp, there can be a Boxer with PPC or Alpha, there could be Pios with a 68K + PPC processor card. * The ICOA is open to creating a HW working group to standardising this architecture. * More importantly, SW developers will require a common API to write to for this architecture, one that makes maximum use of the architecture whilst providing a common interface, allowing Amiga SW to run on any 68K+ machine. The ICOA already has an SDE WG in the works and would be very amenable to the creation of a WG to create this industry wide standard. * As Joe mentioned, Alain Penders, Olaf Barthel and I have been working under contract for AInc since late November on putting together a technical spec for OS3.5, one that provides as much as possible within the time and resource limitations that exist. We have contacted many in the developer community to ask them for their advice, comment and co-operation. Jeff did not want to announce this since it is Gw2K policy not to announce anything until it is ready but since Joe spilt the beans, then now ppl can know the truth, that Amiga Inc have been doing as much as they can in the background, contrary to what certain other ppl may have been trying to imply. I hope that this clarifies a few points - if there are any other questions then I will try to answer them but this will have to be done on the understanding that the three of us are under strict NDA and that Amiga Inc do follow the GW2K policy of no announcements until the product is ready. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- C U C U G D O W N F O R N O W 6 Feb 1998 Just a little update to let you know that the Amiga Web Directory web site (http://www.cucug.org/amiga.html) will probably be down until Monday the 9th or Tuesday the 10th. The server which hosts the CUCUG site has suffered some mechanical problems which are being addressed. We thank you for your concern and your patience. -Kevin Hisel CUCUG ---------------------------------------------------------------------- V I D E O T O A S T E R / F L Y E R S Y M P O S I U M 05 Feb 1998 The Professional Video Toaster/Flyer Users Group announces the SAN DIEGO SYMPOSIUM on March 6,7,8. See the latest versions of software/hardware. This is your chance to learn from the people that create and use the products that make the T/F the best bang for the buck anywhere. Meet them in a more personal setting and ask the questions that you want to ask. Come see the latest innovations, learn, party and have fun in San Diego, home to the SuperBowl 1998. Hear from: Tim Jenison - Video Toaster inventor/Newtek founder Joe Tracy - Flyer Guru, Editor-In-Chief of Newtekniques Aussie - from Ozware: Co-Pilot Video/Audio, Multicam, Fast Frames Bohus Blahut - from Legacy Maker: Compositing, Layering ImageFX Jeff White - of Visual Inspirations: Control Tower, Visual Effects Dan Wolf - of MegageM: AV8R Pro++ Nova Designs - ImageFX team Pro Wave team: RenderFX, ProMix Arpeggio team: Tunebuilder Newtek's Lightwave team: Lightwave for Video, Compositing, Flying Logos Tom Lively: Networking with T/F, Amiga OS and more third party developers to come........ Over 40 classes in a classroom environment. Flyer edited video awards dinner Friday. Party on Saturday. Increase your knowledge & profitability with the Toaster/Flyer. More details on theWebsite at: http://www.sdtoaster.com/ http://www.sdtoaster.com/schedule.html Schedule of Topics http://www.sdtoaster.com/transportation.html Transportation http://www.sdtoaster.com/accommodations.html Accommodations http://www.sdtoaster.com/pricing.html Pricing Info http://www.sdtoaster.com/sponsors.html Sponsor Links http://www.sdtoaster.com/feedback.html Feedback Early Registration until Feb. 13th.! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- P L A N N E W A M I G A M A G A Z I N E I N U K New UK Amiga Magazine Amiga Energy Planned Infinite Frontiers, producers of the popular Star Trek Amiga diskzine, The Final Frontier and the highly rated slideshow series, Holodeck and Illusions are pleased to announce the addition of another 'zine to its sucessful line of paper 'zines which currently includes The Final Frontier Phase II, Visions, The Continuing Voyages and The Cybertronian Times... AMIGA ENERGY Amiga Energy is currently being planned for a first issue release in the next 4-6 weeks. The 'zine, as with all Infinite Frontiers releases, is produced on Amiga systems by Amiga fans and will be an A5 mono publication, published on a bi-monthly basis. Pre-orders for the first issue are now being taken. Projected prices are £1.25 for the standard version and £1.75 with floppy disk covermount. Postage and packing is charged at 25p for UK mainland and 50p for worldwide... We are pleased to thank Petro at Amiga International, Inc. and Lisa at Vulcan Software for thier help and support. Amiga Energy will feature a mixture of news, articles, reviews (hard&software) covering all sectors of the Amiga market. Of course we will also include readers ads and letters as soon as we can! For more details, information on advertising or general queries (or if you want to send a letter for the letters page!) write to us at the address below or email us via: infinite.frontiers@mcmail.com Our website is currently under construction at: http://www.infinitefrontiers.mcmail.com/ Please send IMOs, UK drawn cheques and postal orders, made payable to Infinite Frontiers to Amiga Energy, Infinite Frontiers, PO Box 8966, Great Barr, Birmingham, B43 5ST, ENGLAND. About Infinite Frontiers Infinite Frontiers was started as a small sci-fi group producing paper fanzines several years ago, by Simon Plumbe. Currently in existance as a non-profit making organisation, co-ordinated by Simon Plumbe and Colin Gunn, Infinite Froniters exists to entertain and educate. 1991 saw the launch of our first major sucess, The Final Frontier.This Star Trek fanzine was a little different to most in that it was on Amiga floppy disk. The mag featured not only text, but artwork from Tobias Richter and eventually from Mark Platts & Gary Moffat plus music from the likes of Bjorn Lynne and Allister Brimble. Infinite Frontiers other Amiga based releases included the Holodeck series of Star Trek slideshows (including the worlds first high density 1.76Mb Amiga disk slideshow) , the Illusions series of sci-fi & fantasy slideshows, and CD World. More recently, while we carry on developing the floppy based work we have branched back out into paper-based 'zine publishing. Current releases include, The Final Frontier Phase 2 (Star Trek), Visions (general sci-fi & fantasy), The Continuing Voyages (Star Trek fiction), and The Cybertronian Times (Transformers). Several other titles are in development. The Amiga has gone hand in hand with Infinite Frontiers providing us with the tools we have needed to create our productions. The Amiga is absolutely vital to our paper publications (we use both Wordworth and Final Writer for layout plus ProText, DPaint V, Personal Paint 7.1 and other packages). The Amiga also played a very important part in the convention for fans of Star Trek we held in Birmingham, England during August of 1996. Amiga Energy is a way we hope to give something back. We have plans for Amiga Energy and hope it will compliment the two current UK produced Amiga magazines, and, we hope, come some way to fill the gaps left by the cancellation of the Amiga magazines we have lost in the last couple of years. As part of our thankyou, instead of just 1 disk on the coverdisk version of the magazine (which will be the normal situation), issue 1 will have covermounted our licenseware 2 disk release, Holodeck 10. Thank you for your attention, Sven Harvey (co-editor, Amiga Energy) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- V U L C A N H I R I N G P R O G R A M M E R S February 4th, 1998 Vulcan Software Is Looking For Talented Programmers Vulcans D.S.P. team who are responsible for the Amiga CDRom project (Almagica Scions of A Forgotton World) are looking for talented programmers to join their team. Various programming tasks are open, that cover: AI-Sub system Communication-Sub system GFX Sub system Music/Sfx-Sub system Main system Full details of the requirements are explained in depth at the vulcan website http://www.vulcan.co.uk or you can contact one of the follwoing D.S.P. team members: Bjorn Hagstrom Jimmy Westerlund Fredrik Svensson ---------------------------------------------------------------------- S I L L Y S O F T W A R E - R E A L L Y ! {The following refers to a real WWW site - we checked it out. We didn't, however, work up the courage to try any of the software at the site - yet. Actually, some of it looks quite fun. Brad} 3 Feb 1998 The Silly Software web site has some Amiga games written by us (Silly Software) which are now availible for download. Cheers Deano deano@zetnet.co.uk http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/sillysoftware/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- O F F I C I A L S C A N D O U B L E R S 4 February 1998 "Powered by AMIGA" License For MicroniK Scandoubler MicroniK Computer Service from Leverkusen, Germany, is licensed by AMIGA International, Inc. to sell own Scandoublers under the "Powered by AMIGA" logo. MicroniK was one of the first companies to produce so called "Scandoublers" which enable AMIGAs to be connected to standard PC monitors. For the moment, the licence ist exclusively given to MicroniK until June 30th, 1998. "It is important that we explore an open AMIGA platform, use industry standard components to make it cheaper to produce, faster to develop and easier to upgrade", said Petro Tyschtschenko, Managing Director AMIGA International, Inc.and responsible for worldwide Sales and Marketing. For further information check http://www.micronik.de/index3_e.html, the MicroniK website ---------------------------------------------------------------------- P P C D A T A T Y P E S 4 February, 1998 Andreas_Kleinert Hi, just wanted to put a small note, that two PPC optimized OS 3 datatypes are on the way, consisting of the normal 68k datatype plus an (optional) ELF module for the PPC part. These two datatypes are akJFIF (for JPEG files) and akPNG (for PNG files). Usage of the PPC part is limited to registered users (via keyfile) and for use with the AWeb-II WWW browser only - other callers will automatically be scheduled in a fallback to 68k code. To be uploaded to Aminet tomorrow, if no technical problems do appear. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- F 1 S O F T W A R E O P E N F O R B U S I N E S S 06 February, 1998 Upon the recent completion and conversion of the F1 Software catalogue, I have now officially become open to the public for trade. F1 Software contains Amiga titles never before seen in the USA, ranging from games, to utilities, educational software, musician aids, and many other category's. The catalogue is freely downloadable, both in a HTML format, and Amigaguide, from http://www.mushy-pd.demon.co.uk/f1software/index.html and comes complete with screenshots, full title descriptions, and everything else you could possibly need to know. If you would like to contact me, you can do so by email at mushypd@redrose.net or by telephone at (717) 367 6210. My postal address is on the webpage, and placed through-out the catalogue. Thanks for your time. Andrew "Mushroom" Kellett ---------------------------------------------------------------------- O X Y P A T C H E R T O U S 6 February, 1998 New Generation Software of Germany has authorized Dimensions Computers of the USA to distribute and promote their "Oxypatcher" software. Oxypatcher is a program to enhance the performance of any Amiga using an 040 or 060 processor. The Oxyron Patcher handles calls to the processor's FPU (68882 math co-processor), which the native OS library system does quite poorly, resulting in a performance increase of up to 20 times when using New Generation's product. Oxypatcher is currently the only software package available for all 040/060 users, except those with Phase5 accelerators, who have Cyberpatcher, which only works in conjunction with a Phase5 accelerator card. In virtually all cases, Oxypatcher is equal to or faster than even Cyberpatcher. More information on the Oxyron patcher is available in German and English at: http://homepages.microdata.de/~michael/OXYPAT.HTM It is thus sincerely recommended that all owners of QuikPak, ACT Apollo, GVP/GVP-M, and A3640 boards, including all 68040 A4000 and A4000T computers, as well as 4000T/060 models look into the Oxyron Patcher. This software package can provide you with an inexpensive yet major performance increase. Dimensions Computers is a full-service Amiga dealer offering a comprehensive online catalog, found at the URL below. In accordance with their usual competitive pricing, they are offering a preliminary price of only $25 per copy of OxyPatcher! Dimensions Computers can be contacted by dealers, distributors, and endusers seeking more information on the Oxyron Patcher in the following ways: World Wide Web: http://nrex.net/dimensions/ E-Mail: dimensions@nrex.net Telephone: (888) 534-6367 Or simply click one of our banners on the Amiga Web Directory! Accepting VISA/MASTERCARD/COD/PREPAY Orders with SSL Security on-line. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- U S L E G A L P G P 5 A V A I L A B L E 6 February, 1998 On 28-Jan-1998, it was reported (correctly) that Amiga PGP5 is only available to NON-US citizens. I have since (4-Feb-1998) updated Amiga PGP5 to be legal for import and use by US/Canadian citizens as well. There is now TWO versions of Amiga PGP5. The patented RSA Encryption/Decryption routines have been removed in the USA/Canada version to allow for legal use and downloading. Would you be so kind as to advise your readers of the (updated) NEW versions. The web address is still the same: http://www.amitar.com.au/~stef/ Thank you very much for your time and effort... Stefan Zakarias {stef@amitar.com.au} ---------------------------------------------------------------------- V U L C A N B A R E S I T S S O U L 6 Feb 1998 STATEMENT TO THE AMIGA COMMUNITY From VULCAN SOFTWARE LIMITED --- Wow! where to begin? We have been inundated with emails regarding our future plans for 1998, some best wishes, some disgust, some confusion and some worries. As Vulcan is the oldest, most active, longest surviving Development and Publishing company the Amiga has left I feel a certain responsibility towards the Amiga community and would like to make an official statement to endorse some facts about the Amigas commercial market and Vulcans plans for the future. This statement is very long indeed and comes from the heart, hopefully it will answer all the questions `I receive daily` about the decisions and changing direction of Vulcan aswell as giving a true account of our experiences over the last 4 years in the Amiga market. I dont know what reaction this statement will receive but, as it is based on our commitments, efforts and dreams for the Amiga platform then I am hoping it will be understood. TRUTH ----- Not many companies have really spoken out about the past, current and future Amiga market, instead wild rumours seem to circulate based on past events and lies, I feel it is about time to lay down some facts about the Amiga market, some are not what people want to hear, some are already well known, some simply are so unbelievable they make you weep. Nevertheless with our 4 years experience in this ever changing market I feel we are in a very good position to be able to comment truthfully and openly about the Amiga market which is based on our experience and ventures. Background & Overview --------------------- Since 1994 Vulcan has been developing and Publishing Amiga games for the Amiga market. To date we have released 10 x floppy titles, 3 x CDRom titles and have several Amiga CDRom titles still in production which includes some PPC specific projects. PAST ---- In 1994 we developed our first title, as you all know, this cult classic (Valhalla) was either hated or loved, either way this title was developed, manufactured and Published, but most importantly it was distributed in retail outlets around the UK using a software distribution company. The point here is that this fully boxed floppy based title was available in the shops! At that time in the UK there were 8 Amiga magazines, all of which reviewed the title, carried demos of the title and advertised the title not to mention newspaper coverage, radio coverage, television coverage with personal appearances and interviews. The upshot was, that if an Amiga user heard about Valhalla and liked the product then the next time they went into their computer shop they could pluck it from the shelf and buy it. PERFECT MODEL ------------- Sounds perfect doesnt it? And it was, as it meant a developer could develop a product, a publisher could publish a product, a distributor could distribute a product, a magazine could advertise and review the product, a retailer could sell the product and a user could buy the product. When the Amiga market in the UK worked like this it was fair all round, and everybody made money from their efforts as tens of thousand of units could be sold in the first week of launch. WHAT DID IT RELY ON ------------------- The above model relied completely on one thing to make it all work, and that was, that there had to be a good healthy `available pool` of Amiga buying users and accessibility. Sure the Model would fail if inferior products were developed but overall the only reason a publisher published, a distributor distributed and a retailer sold was due to the users purchase. Adding to this model the Amiga user could only purchase the product if they new about it from magazines and other media and also had access to the product via shops, so its easy to see that the whole intricate commercial Amiga software market was finely balanced and self perpetuating. Of course the Amiga users had to have an Amiga! :) WHAT WENT WRONG --------------- The 69 thousand dollar question, many things went wrong with this model, becoming apparent in the middle of 1994. Dont forget, that at this time in the UK you could go into any high street electrical store and buy an Amiga computer and many pieces of software from publishers as it was a rife and healthy commercial market. What went wrong can be blamed on many things but to start with, this was the year that Commodore went into liquidation, reasons why have always been given and attributed but for now I am only interested in what happened with the Amiga commercial market. HARDWARE TO BLAME? ------------------ In 1994 the most popular Amiga computer in the UK was the A500, Some lucky users had souped up A500`s in the `desktop form` of the A1500 and there were also some A2000`s. Commodore tried to push the Amiga hardware forward, the market saw the A500+ were a percentage of loyal users upgraded instantly, we saw upgraded Operating Software, we saw the dying CDTV, we saw the A600 which sounded great with its 1Mb chip but was smaller and cheaper looking, we saw the dying CD32 (way ahead of its time) and we eventually saw the A1200 with 2Mb chip, AGA chipset and 68020 CPU. Throughout this gradual advancement we saw many third party devices such as external/internal Hard Drives, ram expansions, extra floppy drives, flicker fixers, monitors, accelerators, OS chip upgrades and many more interesting devices for connection. Sure these hardware improvements were absolutely vital to the Amiga`s future (as if a technology stays still it dies) but with so many failings of hardware launches the UK Amiga community was definitely becoming split and diversity was rife. For example you had Amiga users screaming for AGA specific or CD32 specific or Hard Drive Installable specific aswell as floppy A500 users still wanting 1Mb floppy based titles. This was not too much of a big problem but developers and publishers had to strike a balance whether to support the low spec machines for bigger sales or higher spec machines to advance the market or in some cases both but there was something vitally important missing and that was an owner of the Amiga who could officially advance its technology. OTHER COMPETITION ----------------- Just around the corner in 1994 something was happening, it was called the PC, now the PC was used all around the world but mainly in educational and business situations. The big change was when PC hardware prices tumbled and PC technical specifications rose, both at incredible rates and I also believe a game `I had never heard of` called DOOM had something to do with it! Suddenly average home computer users could find themselves in a position were they could afford a PC, after all thats what they used at work or at school and its technology was being pushed and advanced at incredible rates and DOOM offered something unique and wonderful to games enthusiasts. PUBLISHERS ---------- The big publishers at this time (many who had begun on the Amiga platform) saw an opportunity to develop for this growing market, and why not? After all they were mainly business motivated and with the Amigas technology in a temporary halted state it seemed a good gamble. I remember at that time (in June 94) when Vulcan was working on our next Amiga title `Valhalla II` that all the companies we spoke to on a regular basis kept saying that they were going to PC formats. It was a strange time as I began to notice distributors and retailers and users alike all asking if we were developing for PC, `no` we said, `whats wrong with the Amiga market?` we said, `its a big market and we have only just begun`... AS TIME WENT ON --------------- From June 94 to June 95 it became apparent that this delicate commercial Amiga market model had been altered, with no new Amiga hardware to compete, with Amiga users moving to PC, magazines moving to PC, Developers and Publishers moving to PC, distributors moving to PC and retailers moving to PC the whole thing was hit hard. By the time Vulcans third Amiga floppy title `TimeKeepers` was released in June 95 there was no longer a distribution network in the UK, our Amiga products (and others) found it harder to be available to Amiga users via the shop shelf. This was mainly due to the distributors who would only distribute a title if it was on the PC format as this was the format that the retailers could sell and the users were buying in vast quantities. Now sure there were still Amiga users around the country who wanted Amiga titles but due to the way business decisions dictate market changes the majority market soon became the minority market and things got harder. I remember many heated conversations with distributors trying to get them to stock our Amiga titles and often blamed them for killing the Amiga market but at the end of the day the Amiga platform had no active owner, no new hardware development, fewer users, fewer developers, fewer publishers and allot of PC competition. AND ON... --------- Vulcan had a decision to make, we either went with the flow and switched to PC or.....and heres the or.....adapt to the changing market and base our companies future on a dream. We chose the latter, we believed that it would only be a matter of time before a new owner was found for the Amiga and when it was supported again we believed we would be right at the top of the proverbial ladder as a mainstream development and publishing company on the Amiga platform. HOW TO SURVIVE WITH NO COMMERCIAL RETAIL MARKET ----------------------------------------------- Many people over the years have enquired as to how Vulcan managed to survive in the Amiga market were others could not and this has been the key to our existence. In June 95 to account for the lack of retail support in the UK we set-up Vulcan Mail Order to provide our products direct to the Amiga user. VULCAN MAIL ORDER ----------------- This turned out to be an excellent move for Vulcan at the time as it meant that Vulcan as a developer and Publisher could now distribute and sell our own products direct to the user which meant allot more revenue was generated for per title (as we cut out the middle men) and allowed us to sell our titles cheaper (around 12.99 as opposed to 24.99) which resulted in more Amiga users buying our software due to the price drop and the direct personal attention they received through our company. Because of this unique set-up (being 3 companies in 1) we were able to continue as normal and did not notice the pinch in the Amiga market as other companies had, towards the end of 95 we released Hillsea Lido and had just started signing external development teams to our label, the year ahead 1996 was looking great! PIONEERING ---------- In 1996 Vulcan took on a pioneering role and we dedicated allot of our time to getting our products back in the UK shops, alas without much success. We did however start to supply many independent retail outlets in the UK with our software range but could not convince any UK mainstream distributor to stock our products in favour of PC titles. Beginning our expansion and aswell as selling our products to Mail Order users and UK retail outlets we started to convert and develop our titles for the German market. Running up to the middle of 1996 we saw Valhalla III and the TimeKeepers Expansion being released with now 6 external development teams signed to the Vulcan label. To keep pushing forward we founded Vulcans own International Distribution Company whos main purpose was to distribute our products by bulk retail and wholesale outlets around the world. Vulcan Distribution supplied our products to retailers spanning 14 countries, Vulcan Mail Order supplied our products to many thousands of registered users, Vulcan Development signed up many teams and individuals. Briefly (now and then) we glimpsed at the Amiga markets commercial situation, but only briefly. RECAP AND WARNINGS ------------------ To recap, by the middle of 96, there was still no Amiga owner (or perhaps there was a brief handling by an Eskimo? or something), very slowly we began to notice some new changes. Amiga magazines were starting to close and many Vulcan registered users were asking to be removed from the Vulcan database as they had moved to the PC platform. Now this change should have been more noticeable to us and a bigger warning sign but as we had now entered the world distribution market, were now supporting other languages, were receiving allot of publicity and talking to allot more developers, we got carried away with our own companies expansion. The run up to the end of 96 saw us release Bograts AGA and Jetpilot.....Happy X-mas! :) THE SMACK IN THE MOUTH ---------------------- January 1997 was the hardest month of Vulcans entire existence, I still joke about the fact that Santa Claus delivered a Playstation or Multimedia PC to every household for Xmas of 96. Literally overnight Vulcans Amiga Mail order sales plummeted, now we are not just talking about latest release performance, if we were then I could understand the change but we are talking about all Vulcan titles that sold regular and maintained a constant level for years suddenly decreasing to an all time low. We lost over 4,000 registered Amiga users in a 4 week period, Vulcan Distribution saw previous bulk purchasing retailers around the world go bankrupt, we saw wholesalers ceasing to order, we saw more Amiga magazines fold, we saw development companies go into liquidation, we saw developers leave the Amiga platform, we saw hell itself and all at Vulcan had to come to terms with this new reality. PLODDING ON ----------- End of January 97 we plodded on, releasing Burnout AGA and Tiny Troops, we feared the worst and were proven right, the sales were not there in any quantity to justify the investment. Sure we could say its the type of title but sales right across the spectrum of the entire range were getting smaller and smaller, registered users, retailers and web ordering was diminishing fast. By March 1997 we had 2 Amiga magazines left in the UK and in vain we saw many small Amiga companies start up and try to do something like, Mediasoft who tried to publish a new Amiga fanzine, Direct software who promised new hardware bundles, both of which folded, we saw long established mail order companies like Premier Mail Order collapse along with others. The commercial Amiga software market was at rock bottom with only the strongest companies surviving. COMPETITION ----------- Thinking back to March 97 we saw PC computers in shops, not just in shops but in a world of their own, namely PC World were they had slowly been selling to millions of users all around the world. Walk in and be bombarded with hundreds of PC system choices that had plenty hardware and software support. Now Im not talking an 020 CPU, 2Mb Memory, extended keyboard with a floppy drive attached for 350.00 via mail order, No no, Im talking all singing all dancing complete systems at 133Mhz, 16Mb memory, Graphics Cards, Hard Drives, modems, Monitors, keyboards, floppy drives, sound cards, software bundles and a bill gates special promotion devil hat for 500.00 in every shop in the high street that has been advertised to the hilt in every paper, magazine, television program you can imagine. Now anyone in the Amiga community knows that the Amiga has a far better approach to things but lets face it if your a family purchaser who uses a PC at work and your kids use a PC at school or your a student who uses a PC at college or your a games freak who simply must have Doom, Quake, Tomb Raider, Star Trek, Theme Hospital and zillions of other software tiles and applications `right now` then it doesnt take Einstein to figure out what the average computer purchaser will buy. I mean, just look at the Investment, the hardware, the software, the promotions and the technology that the PC has had over the previous years compared to the orphaned Amiga with no owner. MIRACLE ------- Would you believe it! We couldnt! Just as everything was about to hit the fan, in March 97 the Amiga found an owner, not just any owner but an owner with money, namely Gateway 2000. Immediately Vulcan planned for the future! Our dreams that held us tight were going to happen, our hopes raised at the prospect of new Amigas being made, perhaps a complete unit ready to buy that will be marketed, distributed all over the world and available to users in the high street shops at a price that would compete with current PC`s and with technology to match. Vulcans plans for the rest of 1997 was to make Amiga titles for higher specifications, we chose to go CDRom only with all future titles knowing that we could catch up with PC competition, we started catering from other language support to ensure world wide penetration, we invested heavily in our company and started to live again, we signed up more development teams, we started on higher specification development strategies catering for graphics cards and sound cards. Throughout the rest of 97 we published Strangers, Uropa2 and Finally Odyssey which were all re-vamped and turned into Multi language Amiga CDRom titles. Hellpigs the Multi-CDRom adventure was going to be awesome, Wasted Dreams was looking incredible, Hard Target the virtua cop clone is looking fantastic, Genetic Species is absolutely outstanding, Breed2000 was being revamped, Valhalla IIII was re-written to cater for full actor speech, 3D Games creator was re-designed to cater for Graphics cards, JetPilot expansion was initiated, Desolate was signed, overall 1997 was looking great with renewed hope, Phase 5 with PPC boards, Vulcan signing the World Foundry with PPC projects like Explorer and Maim & Mangle, investing in development hardware, PPC boards, Graphics Cards, faster processors, going to Cologne and meeting the new owners of the Amiga, new contacts, new possibilities, everyone I spoke to was excited, magazines were happy, developers were happy, publishers were happy, I was ecstatic at Sadeness starting in the games market, finally some good competition, I helped AliveMedia start up their games publishing company and finally felt like the market was coming together, I was encouraged by Aurora works entering the publishing market from across the water, Amiga shows began popping up, Ohio, Italy, Germany Belgium, what a brilliant beginning to the rest of 1997 indeed! ...but all the while....software sales were falling, companies were closing, projects were being cancelled...... Forget it! because Amiga speeches were being made, hope was back with vengeance, everyone I spoke to was on a high, other developers stated CDRom only titles, more projects were being developed for graphics cards, high CPUs and now PPC specific......we saw the potential in the platform, we opened up Vulcan America to supply our titles to America and Canada, our expanding development and publishing responsibilities became more demanding so we transferred our Mail order operations to Weird Science Limited and we transferred our Distribution company to GTI in Germany so we could spend more energy in our development dream, we established a development network of support and help for all our new Amiga development teams, we concentrated on bigger and better Amiga CDRom productions, we were on the road to glory! Nothing could alter our destiny, nothing can stop the Amiga being reborn! .....this is where we were wrong..... 2 things, just 2 little things kicked us where it hurts.................... .....one thing is something we RELIED on, and the other is something we ASSUMED. SOMETHING WE RELIED ON ---------------------- The Amiga has something unique, a community, many individuals and companies who believe in the Amiga and its future with many users around the world. All sounds great but lets analyse it in detail to get a complete picture of what the Amiga community is made up from and what makes it work commercially. You've got Amiga magazines all around the world who love doing what they do, putting so much of their lives into their jobs and all need advertising revenue and Amiga users buying their magazines to continue. You've got Amiga web promoters who, review Amiga software and hardware and offer excellent Amiga support to users around the world with information and news, they do this because they love doing it and many are non-profit orientated. You've got hardware development companies like Index and Phase5 who are trying to push the Amigas hardware forward, realising there is a commercial gap to be filled and doing what they do out of inspiration, they depend totally on the Amiga users buying their hardware. You've got shops and mail order companies around the world who sell hardware and peripherals who advertise in magazines who all rely on Amiga user upgrading their hardware. You've got shops and mail order companies selling software around the world who advertise in magazines who all rely on Publishers publishing and Amiga users purchasing new software. You've got dedicated Amiga distribution companies who exist in the minority market who all rely on the Amiga retailers purchasing the Software. You've got thousands of talented artists, musicians, coders, developers and teams who invest their time, money and lives to create software on their prized platform because its in their blood who all rely on the Amiga Publishers Publishing their creations. You've got Amiga publishers who publish Amiga products, invest their time, money and lives into producing and marketing Amiga titles and making them available in the market place to retailers and distributors who rely on the Amiga developers developing and the Amiga users purchasing the software. The list goes on and on but the moral of the story and the `simplistic flow chart` dictates that every single related Amiga company and active individual in the Amiga commercial market all rely on each other, and all rely ultimately on one thing to make it all possible! One thing that makes everything else work. One thing to give it a purpose and a way of making a living. One thing to ensure magazines keep printing new issues. One thing to ensure hardware developers continue to progress. One thing to keep all the retail outlets in business. One thing to ensure the publishers remain. One thing to ensure the developers remain. One thing to keep the Amiga Alive! And that one thing is the Amiga user Buying the merchandise, whether its magazines, hardware or software. I cant speak for magazines sales but there are fewer magazines around with extremely low ABCs compared to 94. I cant speak for Hardware sales but I do know we get so many complaints about supporting CDRoms, Graphic Cards, fast CPUs, Hard Drives and even AGA...and why Genetic Species wont be on floppy for the A500 :) However I can speak for software sales and sadly this element has decreased ridiculously over the last 4 years from mail order, retail and wholesale all around the world. They say that hundreds of thousands of Amiga users still use their Amigas, I honestly dont know the number but I do know that Amiga software piracy is rife and with the total Amiga buying user base at its lowest current level, that there is simply no longer enough users left who BUY software to justify the developers and publishers investment. PIRACY ------ A quick note about piracy. It does sadden me to see our latest Amiga releases and other recent Amiga titles available on pirated CD`s. It tears me up to think that people are making money from the illegal duplication instead of my developers, my company, my distributors and all the other hard working people in the Amiga industry who deserve that revenue, however I do not blame the pirates or the piracy for the current Amiga situation. Piracy is rife in any industry whether its, designer jeans, music, video or other computer platforms but because the buying share of these markets is large enough, it can sustain the illegality and still continue. The Amiga market however cannot sustain the piracy due to its size, an Amiga users who uses pirated software cannot really care about the Amigas future so do not enter into the equation but the Amiga users who truly cares about the Amiga`s future make up the users who BUY. USERS WHO BUY ------------- The Amiga user who BUYs is the thing we relied on (and many other companies too). Yes there are allot of you out there who have upgraded your machines, bought your towers, bought your CD drives, bought your Memory and CPU upgrades and bought all the latest software and my hat comes off to you, I understand that you also share the same frustrations as we do and that you have done everything in your power to help keep the Amiga market alive, but unfortunately your numbers are at an all time low right across the scale all around the world. This results in developers, publishers, distributors, retailers and mail order companies all feeling the squeeze and licking their wounds. SOMETHING WE ASSUMED -------------------- From March to December 1997 (10 months) Vulcan prepared for the Amigas future, I know things dont happen overnight but with the Amiga market being at its most critical and at its lowest point ever I knew that if Vulcans dreams and hopes for the Amiga as a commercially successful platform did not materialise in that specific period of time then the Amiga market would never recover. Perhaps its time to share Vulcans vision, I know from my experience and my logic that the only way the Amiga computer can ever make a commercial comeback (and I enforce the word commercial) and for the Amiga to once again have stupendous and vast software development, once again have millions of buying software users, once again have huge publicity with a plethora of magazines, once again have hundreds of publishers, retail outlets, distributors, once again have continued and advanced 3rd party hardware development, once again be the leading computer in technological advancements and as a result once again be the best home computer used throughout the world, it all comes down to one essential ingredient called...................Money. Certainly by licensing the Amiga technology and allowing many companies to build components, motherboards, and complete systems allows the Amigas technology to progress but we must ask ourselves a simple question, who is going to buy this upgraded technology? Certainly not the new computer purchaser in the high street, as for one they cant see it in their shops, would be hard pushed to hear about its availability, cannot see the vast software support to the scale of other platforms and certainly would not be turned on by the end price of the components or systems being sold. So that simply leaves the existing Amiga users and loyal enthusiastic upgraders. The problem is that this number alone is way too small. This means that re-sellers of systems and components need to rely on mail order and specialised outlets and due to small potential sales it requires higher purchase prices which causes the vicious circle creating fewer upgraders. Not even thinking about the small amount of developers and publishers who would support this new technology due to the small amount of potential software sales. You see the idea of technological advancement with PPC, Graphics Cards, 3D Chips, better motherboards faster CPUs, towers etc. is all very well and all something I believe the Amiga needs but the current Amiga community or market is already way too small to make any of this worth while. To me it seems that, the companies and users who really care about the Amigas future and have stuck it out through the worst of times and invested a good number of years of their life into the Amiga and want to build the Amigas future suddenly have the whole responsibility, with all the risk, expense and investment to bring the Amiga back to glory, this is something that will not happen at the current level, no matter how hard Phase5, Index and other hardware companies try, no matter how hard developers push the limits, no matter how hard Publisher promote, no matter how hard the re-sellers sell and no matter how hard the existing users buy, this approach is never going to work due to the size of the existing user base and it will never encourage new users to the platform as there is no cohesion, no distribution, no marketing, no price benefits, no software support and no overall direction for it to become apparent and compete in the world computer industry. MONEY ----- The only way the Amiga has a chance of revival in Vulcans opinion is Money! Money poured into the cream plastic until it spews out the sides, money at the level of Sonys investment into its Playstation. We are talking a complete base Tower computer system, with High resolution Monitor, keyboard, floppy drive, a 24xSpeed CDRom, 1Gig to 10Gig hard drive, a modem, A graphics card with 4Mb on board, 3D Chipset, 32Mb memory, combined 060 CPU with 200Mhz PPC board, Mpeg decoders, sound card, external speakers, (backward compatible only) AGA chipset, new operating system, pre-installed web broswers, Email applications, word processors, spreadsheet and accountancy software, and bundled games software which has all been invested into and acquired for the purpose and finally the word AMIGA on the outside. This is not good enough on its own, no far from it, this needs to manufactured in masses by one company or at least co-ordinated by one company, this needs to be sold to distributors and re-sellers all around the world, this item needs to be available to buy in every shop on the planet, this system need to be backed up by world-wide advertising and marketing promotional campaigns in consumer press, magazines, radio and television adverts, it needs to be launched as an awesome computer with an incredible future that is an alternative the current PC platform and finally this system has to be around the user buying price of 400 to enable it to work. Anything less, anything removed, anything left out and the Amiga has not got a hope in hell of catching up in the ever moving commercial computer market....even the above specs will only work with dedicated software, massive marketing and extremely low price point. No money will be made by the company who initiates these actions, on the contrary money will be lost as the hardware and software would cost far more than the distribution price, but the money spent now will be creating a future goldmine with greater potential than any one can imagine. If this `base level` launch was combined with investment in future hardware advancements, investment in software support to allow developers to excel it would give reasons for publishers, magazines and shops to once again think `Amiga` and this dream will become a reality. Currently the Amiga community has all the people and companies available to make the above system a reality...the thing lacking is the direction and the money. REFLECT ------- So to reflect, Vulcans Amiga vision and Vulcans existence in the commercial Amiga market relies on 2 things which are not making themselves apparent. Throughout the last 10 months our Amiga development and Publishing continues whilst the commercial Amiga market gets worse. If Vulcan continues its recent strategy on the same level of waiting for the Amiga market to recover whilst still investing in a decreasing and more diversified market then it would only be a matter of time before Vulcan Software would cease to exist and only the 2 mentioned things can alter that fate for us and others. As we have invested so much of our lives into the Amiga market, we do not wish or intend to leave it, but rather see it through to its ultimate destiny, as with any good book or film the Amiga market is the similar where you never know whats going to happen next. The only way Vulcan can remain active in the Amiga market and to support its future to the full is if we can stay financially sound, strong in resource and talents and function as a successful business. This is why in 1998 Vulcan plan to develop entertainment titles for the PC and Playstation platforms where there is a combined and large active user base. Certainly we are aware that these markets are saturated but these market do have active distribution network with millions of potential customers. AMIGA TITLE CANCELLATIONS ------------------------- To enable a smooth transition to other platforms we have invested a great deal in our teams and development operations and as a consequence many Amiga development projects have been cancelled namely, Breed2000 CDRom, 3D Games Creator CDRom, JetPilot expansion CDRom and Valhalla IIII CDRom so the teams and individuals can concentrate on other formats and other projects. This is a decision that didnt come easy for us but one that is vital to our future plans that enable us to support the Amiga. AMIGA TITLE CONSEQUENTIAL EFFECTS --------------------------------- As a consequence of the last 10 months the development team responsible for Hellpigs the Multi-CD adventure title has halted development of that title and also decided to move onto other business ventures. AMIGA TITLE PENDING ------------------- Currently the Wasted Dreams development team is waiting another few months to see if anything happens in the Amiga market that would indicate a reason to continue with their development plans. AMIGA TITLE FUTURE RELEASES --------------------------- Genetic Species CDRom is all ready for a February 98 launch and close behind it we will see Desolate CDRom and Hard Target CDRom closely followed by the Genetic Species World Creator CDRom. AMIGA DIRECTION --------------- Our future Amiga development is based on extremely high specifications and will take advantage of Graphics Cards, fast CPUs and 060/PPC boards. We are actively supplying a selection of our developers with PPC boards and along with Explorer 2260 and Maim&Mangle we will see other exciting high specification Amiga titles being developed and published by Vulcan through 1998. PUBLISHING ---------- We will still operate our Amiga Publishing operations and actively sign new Amiga development teams and individuals. As long as there are developers developing for the Amiga we will always be available as a mainstream commercial publisher. OVERVIEW -------- I hope all the above will clarify Vulcans future plans and that it shows that our plans are not carried out in spite or malice but are simply choices that our company is forced to make if we are to continue. Vulcan as with many other Amiga companies have worked extremely hard and you will find no one more loyal to the Amigas future than we `are` and `have been`, but we simply cannot change the Amigas future with all our efforts alone. 2 things are needed if the Amiga is going to survive, 1 thing is in your grasp and the other is the responsibility of the owner of the Amiga. Live Long & Prosper! Paul Carrington BA Director Vulcan Software Limited --------------------------------------------------- (c) 1998 Vulcan Software Ltd. This document must not be altered or extracted, if used in a news context it must remain `as is` with no editing to ensure statement adheres to Vulcans wishes. Kind Regards Paul Carrington BA (Director) Vulcan Software Limited http://www.vulcan.co.uk ---------------------------------------------------------------------- _ __ _ __ _ ____ _ _ The AMIGA /\\ |\ || |\ || || \\ / I N F O R M E R /__\\ | \ || | \ || ||-- \\ / \\__| \||_ | \||_ ||___ _/\\_ Section ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Draw studio v1.1 CD Review ========================== Originally appearing in issue 7 of The Informer, Apr/May 1997 DrawStudio is an hybrid illustration package that blurs the borders between a structured drawing program (such as ProVector) and a traditional paint program (such as PersonalPaint). With the release of DrawStudio, desktop publishers and graphic artists alike will find a program that fills a need long neglected. The CD includes DrawStudio v1.1, ImageStudio v2.3.0, and TextureStudio. These programs are not covered by this review, but their inclusion more than makes up for the higher cost of the CD version. Also included on the CD are a wealth of textures, photographs, postscript fonts, clip art, special effects and more. DrawStudio requires a minimum of 3 Mb RAM, 020+ CPU, Amiga OS 2.04+ and a hard drive. I recommend a decent 030 CPU for anything greater than 8-Bit work, an FPU and 6 Mb of RAM. This review was conducted on an A1200 with a 060 CPU w/FPU, 4X CD-ROM and 32 Mb of RAM. Installation couldn't be easier, just drag and drop the program icon from the CD to your hard drive. The program cannot be run from the CD. The supplied 96 page manual is well written and informative. DrawStudio requires Magic User Interface to run. By now, most Amigans realize the benefit of MUI, and it should be installed on every Amiga system. There is so much to DrawStudio I don't know where to begin. It is an art program, but with a different approach. Unlike a traditional paint program, every single object you create has it's own attributes. Once an object is created, you can go back to it at any time to change any feature. Object attributes are changed through menus that allow everything from pen thickness to pattern fills. Objects and text can be filled with gradients, patterns, or any bitmap graphic image. Areas of bitmaps can be made transparent, allowing the background to show through. Text handling (Adobe Type 1) is superb, allowing for warping, text on a curve or along any line. Bezier line manipulation is extensive with editing, cutting and joining features that can make any shape. Multiple projects can be opened at one time and DrawStudio supports multiple pages. A powerful feature is layering. Layers are like transparent sheets placed over a page, enabling you to see the layer (and its objects) below. This allows you to, say, draw a background on one layer and then add foreground objects on the next layer. There is also a snap feature that helps you connect any shape or line to the exact point on any other object you want, without overlay. The align feature gives you many ways to align objects to themselves, or to the page. Full ARexx support and included scripts provide automatic shadowing and multi-shaped boxes. Hotkeys make often used effects a snap. The program offers many display options. You can work in 1-Bit (black and white and very fast), 8-Bit gray, 8-Bit color or 24-Bit. All objects are stored internally in 24-Bit, providing smooth printing output. File support is strong with the ability to load and save IFF-ILBM, GIF, JPEG, TIFF, BMP, and PCX bitmaps. DrawStudio can also import DR2D-IFF (Amiga standard structure format) and save PostScript and EPS. There is also promised support for illustrator 88 and illus (PageStream 3+) import/export filters. DrawStudio bitmap exporting is superb with DPI resolutions adjustments and powerful anti-aliasing. This feature is essential for creating professinial web page graphics or titles, a task for which DrawStudio is well suited. I could continue with the many features of DrawStudio, but must now turn to the dislikes. Hmm. I don't have any of real importance though. If I must complain, I think that some of the object attribute features are too deeply buried in menus,but configuration of Hotkeys solves this. The amount of provided ARexx scripts are quite limited also. I ran into some strange intermittent pixel interference at the bottom of pages when changing between various screen display modes. There was also some printing alignment trouble when using the Enprint printer driver, but when using TurboPrint 5, print output seemed to be fine. Finally, the manual could use a better index, but since many programs don't even provide a printed manual, I shouldn't really complain. DrawStudio is a fabulous program. For an early release version it contains a wealth of features. It ran flawlessly, without a single crash or hang. It will take a long time to find the limits to this program's potential. In the DTP/webpage development area, DrawStudio is a God send, and I expect to use it extensively. The authors, Graham and Andy Dean, are devout and long time Amiga developers and have designed a top quality program that deserves our support. While not a replacement to a traditional paint program, it is an essential supplement to any serious graphic artist's set of programs. Once you use it, you will wonder how you ever did without. This program deserves an A. LH Publishing offers the following support: phone: +44 (0) 1908-370-230; Fax: +44 (0) 1909-640-371; Email; larry@em.powernet.co.uk; URL: http://www.ajdean.co.uk/studio/ds/html. The website will offer new import/export filters for free when available. A demo version of DrawStudio is also available at the website. The retail price for DrawStudio is Approximately US $120. LH Publishing, 13 Gairloch Ave. Bletchley MK2 3DH, England Rating: A Fletcher Haug ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Amiga Update on the net: some issues available at: http://www.sharbor.com/amiga/news/ (in html format) Australian Mirror Site: http://www.comcen.com.au/~paulm/index.html All back issues available (in ASCII text) at: http://www.globaldialog.com/AdventureCentral/AU/index.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1998 by Brad Webb. Freely distributable, if not modified. ====================================================================== _ __ _ <>_ __ _ || /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ || Brad Webb/AmigaUpdate /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ || bandr@globaldialog.com / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_ || ======================================================================