Scream Tracker 2 released by Future Crew

The final major trend we begin this chapter with is the rise of the demoscene. Cracking, which refers to the removal of a game’s copyright and duplication mechanisms, was a practice that began shortly after video games existed in the late ‘70 and early ’80s. What began with Crackers and Cracktros (programming, pirating and video game hobbyists who programmed introductions to cracked video games in groups) in the ’80s eventually branched off into the demoscene by the late ’80s. This split is believed to be the result of an interest in programming and creativity in the demoscene over piracy and questionably legal activities. Once certain groups such as Future Crew began producing more and more advanced mega-demos, which were strings of intros linked together, the demoscene began to more clearly distinguish itself. It wasn’t until the 1990s that the demoscene truly took off, however. To characterize the demoscene as entirely breaking from its cracker roots would be inaccurate, yet two groups, as we know of them today, did form. Crackers continue to focus on piracy to this day, which demosceners became much more interested in the technical skill of creative programming. The demoscene’s relevance to algorithmic art should be abundantly clear with this following quote from Jim “Trixter” Leonard a few years later in 1994:

“Around this time, a gradual shift occurred, from people cracking games to writing graphic/sound demonstrations that showed off the computer they had just learned to program. Sure, cracking games was still popular, but some people decided that learning about the machine and using it as a tool for creativity was cooler” than cracking one dime-store game after another.”