Assembly (demo party)

The Assembly demo party is a demoscene and gaming event in Finland. The main organizers of the event are Pekka Aakko ("Pehu" of Accession) and Jussi Laakkonen ("Abyss" of Future Crew). The event takes place every year between late July and early August, and lasts three to four days. The most recent Assembly was held from the 31 July to 3 August 2008 at Hartwall Areena in Helsinki.

In the beginning of the year 2007 Assembly Winter was announced. The new winter party is a more gaming oriented event in Tampere where the summer events continues the traditions of the original demoparty in Helsinki under the name Assembly Summer. Both parties will be held once a year.

History

The first Assembly was held from July 24th to July 26th 1992, in Kauniainen. It was organized by the Amiga demo groups Complex and Rebels, and the PC demo group Future Crew. The staff grew into a large non-profit group of individuals known as Assembly Organizing. Through the 1990s, Assembly grew so large that even exposition halls no longer sufficed, and only the largest of sports arenas met the partygoers' needs. In 1999 they rented the largest sports arena in the country, Hartwall Areena in Helsinki, with over 5000 visitors and 3500 computers on the ice rink.

The 2004 edition of the party also set up a record: in July 2004, QuakeCon [http://www.quakecon.org/forums/showthread.php?p=20891 announced] it was holding the world's first Doom 3 competitions on the event starting at August 12-14, roughly a week after the game's release on August 3. Assembly, however, [http://media.assembly.org/press/assembly2004_doom3_eng.pdf managed to snatch the first place] after acquiring copies of the game via FedEx with the help of some contacts in the United States and holding the competition during August 5-8.

As of 2007 the party has been held for sixteen consecutive years.

Competitions

The party includes multiple competitions, or compos including but not limited to:

* Demo
* 64k intro
* 4k intro
* Vocal music
* Instrumental music
* Drawn graphics
* Oldskool music/graphics/demo
* Fast graphics
* Short film (which replaced the wild compo and animation compo in 2004)
* Video game developing compo

For the first eight years of Assembly, the demo and intro competitions were split into separate PC and Amiga categories. Starting in 2000, the platforms have been combined, with PC (Windows or Linux), Amiga, Mac and even high-end consoles competing in the same demo and intro competitions. Similarly, Commodore 64 competitions were replaced with "oldskool" competitions that also allow entries for some other old platforms, such as various 8-bit systems and older Amigas.

Entries are submitted by demogroups and individual artists and are rated by judges. All demos which are deemed to be of a high enough standard are then shown on a big screen. Entries which break the competition rules (e.g. use copyrighted material, or aren't suitable for the category to which they are entered) are disqualified. People who are present at the arena vote for the entries, and the results are published on the Assembly website. The entries are usually made available by the artists at scene.org or on the artists own website.

Demo and intro competition winners

AssemblyTV

In recent years, Assembly has broadcast content from its in-house media effort AssemblyTV to local and national TV networks, as well as producing web streams for people to watch live over the internet - spots for hundreds, if not thousands of viewers are catered for and these streams have been watched all over the world, not just in Finland. In addition to the opening and closing ceremonies, the competitions and party reports are the educational sessions that are being helt during the time of the party broadcasted via AssemblyTV as well.

ARTtech seminars

ARTtech seminars are free to attend educational seminar sessions that are being helt during the time of the party at the venue location. The sessions cover various subjects that are usually related to the main party theme and idea, including sessions about programming (coding), graphic design, music composition, game development, hardware hacks, scene history and more.

See also

* Boozembly

In the press

* [http://wired-vig.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,45786,00.html?tw=wn_story_related "Girls Dig Demos Too"] by Steve Kettmann of Wired magazine. (August 3, 2001)

External links

* [http://www.assembly.org Assembly.org - Official website]
* [http://www.assemblytv.net Assemblytv.net - Official media]
* [http://www.mbnet.fi/jutut/assembly2006/ Assembly 2006 - MBnet] The Official Ezine of Assembly 2006.
* [http://www.pouet.net/party.php?which=7 Assembly] on Pouët
* [http://www.acid.org/radio/arts-ep06.mp3 The ARTS Radio] (MP3) contains an interview with the primary organizer of Assembly, Abyss of Future Crew.