Looking for an old DOS screensaver \ VOGONS

Looking for an old DOS screensaver

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First post, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 02:07

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I recall it looked like this:
-Mostly black background
-Maybe a checker-patterned floor with some red color in the scene
-In the foreground, there were around 5 chrome ball-bearings/pinballs hovering slightly over the floor, spinning in a circular formation

Thinking back, I'll guess that this was just a few frames rendered in something like POVRay and looped continuously. It was a very smooth animation and you could see the reflections of everything in the ball-bearings.

Does this ring a bell for anyone? I can't even guess what the name was.

Reply 1 of 11, by leileilol

Posted on 2022-10-24, 03:29

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Crystal Dream by Triton?

long live PCem

Reply 2 of 11, by Sphere478

Posted on 2022-10-24, 03:39

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Pretty slick for dos.

So it was actually a screensaver? As in dos would time out and it would activate?

Would it activate while running programs or just in dos mode?

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Reply 3 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 03:46

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leileilol wrote on 2022-10-24, 03:29:

Crystal Dream by Triton?

That's not the one, but thanks for mentioning it! I've never seen that one before. It's quite a good guess though. There's an extremely similar scene it that demo. The major difference is that the balls/orbs are circling parallel to the floor and not perpendicularly through it.

Last edited by Dormat on 2022-10-24, 04:01. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 4 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 03:49

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Sphere478 wrote on 2022-10-24, 03:39:

Pretty slick for dos.

So it was actually a screensaver? As in dos would time out and it would activate?

Would it activate while running programs or just in dos mode?

No, screensaver is, perhaps, an inaccurate description. If I recall correctly, it was one (maybe two) file and did not invoke any memory residency (TSR).

Reply 5 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 03:51

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Further, it had no sound at all.

Reply 6 of 11, by liqmat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 04:37

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I bet it was a FLIC animation. There are literally dozens if not hundreds of those from the 1990s. FLI, FLC and FLX files were everywhere back in those days.

Reply 7 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 05:04

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liqmat wrote on 2022-10-24, 04:37:

I bet it was a FLIC animation. There are literally dozens if not hundreds of those from the 1990s. FLI, FLC and FLX files were everywhere back in those days.

After looking a this pack, I think you could be right: https://archive.org/details/3d_flics_2
But, that give me a new thing to search for, so thank you!

Reply 8 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 06:14

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Does anyone know of any repos or old shareware CDs that have a bunch of FLIs?
I reviewed all the links at FLIC (FLI/FLC) Animations, but don't see the one I'm looking for.

Last edited by Dormat on 2022-10-24, 06:20. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 9 of 11, by Pierre32

Posted on 2022-10-24, 06:17

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Dormat wrote on 2022-10-24, 06:14:

Does anyone know of any repos or old shareware CDs that have a bunch of FLIs?
I reviewed all the files at FLIC (FLI/FLC) Animations, but don't see the one I'm looking for.

This might be useful. A search engine that indexes the contents of every CD ROM on archive.org: http://discmaster.textfiles.com/

Reply 10 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 06:55

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Pierre32 wrote on 2022-10-24, 06:17:

Dormat wrote on 2022-10-24, 06:14:

Does anyone know of any repos or old shareware CDs that have a bunch of FLIs?
I reviewed all the files at FLIC (FLI/FLC) Animations, but don't see the one I'm looking for.

This might be useful. A search engine that indexes the contents of every CD ROM on archive.org: http://discmaster.textfiles.com/

Wow. It even shows preview thumbnails. That's very powerful. Thanks!

Reply 11 of 11, by Dormat

Posted on 2022-10-24, 07:40

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The one below is very close, but now that I look at this one, I remember that the two circular groups of steel balls are on the same plane, one inside the other, spinning opposing directions and the view is above the plane of the balls.
http://discmaster.textfiles.com/view/6145/wos … .ZIP/8STEEL.FLI

Maybe it only ever got distributed as an EXE..

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