Crack intro
A crack intro, also known as a cracktro, loader, or just intro, is a small introduction sequence added to cracked software, designed to inform the user of which "cracking crew" or individual cracker was responsible for removing the software's copy protection and distributing the crack.[1][2] Many people who did the actual cracking did this competitively. They even credited themselves alongside the software publisher's name in their custom cracktro screens.[3] It had to look good to impress viewers as well as peers, and sometimes the result was more impressive than the pirated game itself.[4][better source needed] They first appeared on Apple II computer in the late 1970s, early 1980s.[2][5][6] The early text screens are in many ways similar to graffiti, although they invaded the private sphere and not the public space.[7][8]
These first appeared on ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amstrad CPC games that were distributed around the world via Bulletin Board Systems (BBSes) and floppy disk copying.[9] Initially the intros consisted of simple messages, but they grew progressively more complex as they became a medium to demonstrate the purported superiority of a cracking group.[5] Even the commercially available ISEPIC cartridge, which produced memory dumps of copy-protected Commodore 64 software, added a custom crack intro to the snapshots it produced.[10]vi
A 12 hour video recently appeared on Youtube on the "Zeusdaz Unemulated Retro Game Channel" showing around 231 of these crack intro's back-to-back on the Commodore 64 along with several Amiga cracktro marathons: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgbf-opvW5M
Crack intros became more sophisticated on more advanced systems such as the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST, as well as some IBM PC clone systems with sound cards.[9]
As a result, crack intros began to feature big colourful effects, music, and scrollers.[11] Cracking groups would use the intros not just to gain credit for cracking, but to advertise their BBSes, greet friends, and give themselves recognition.[5] Messages were frequently of a vulgar nature, and on some occasions made threats of violence against software companies or the members of some rival crack group.[5]
Crack intro programming eventually became an art form in its own right, and people started coding intros without attaching them to a crack just to show off how well they could program. This evolved into the demoscene.[1]
Crack intros that use chiptunes live on today in the form of background music for small programs intended to remove the software protection on commercial and shareware software that has limited or dumbed-down capabilities. Sometimes this is simply in the form of a program that generates a software package's serial number, usually referred to as a keygen. These chiptunes are now still accessible as downloadable musicdisks or musicpacks.[12]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 5.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
Further reading
- Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- Patryk Wasiak, ‘Illegal Guys’. A History of Digital Subcultures in Europe during the 1980s, in: Zeithistorische Forschungen/Studies in Contemporary History, Online-Ausgabe, 9 (2012), H. 2
- Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Read online: http://www.scheib.net/play/demos/what/borzyskowski/.
- Hastik, Canan; Steinmetz, Arnd (2012a): Demoscene Artists and Community. In Bours, Patrick; Humm, Bernhard; Loew, Robert; Stengel, Ingo; Walsh, Paul (eds.): Proceedings of CERC 2012, pp. 43–48.
- Driscoll, Kevin; Diaz, Joshua (2009): Endless Loop: A Brief History of Chiptunes. Transformative Works and Cultures 9, 2009.
- Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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External links
- World of C64 Crackintros – A large collection of C64 cracktros in native "prg" file format (supported by most C64 emulators)
- Defacto2 – Hundreds of cracktros, loaders and installers for the PC
- Amiga Music Preservation – Thousands of cracktros in all tracker formats.
- Chiptune.com – A chiptune dedicated website containing thousands of chiptunes from Amiga and other formats. The website itself emulates the Amiga Workbench 1.3.de:Demoszene#Ursprünge in den Heimcomputern der 1980er
