15 issues ago...
...Hugi contained the following news and rumours:
"ADET - Polish diskmag editors, such as Dj Regal, are still planning to make an international scene mag in English language. They formed a group called ADET (Amber Diskmag Editing Team). A first official, coded announcement of the mag was released in December, including an appeal for contributions to enrich the international diskmag scene. The diskmag 'Total Disaster' by Tatanka has merged with Amber. All English articles from TD will be moved there, and Amber will use TD's engine as well as GFX and music." Amber, edited by Dj Regal, who was also the main editor of Tankard, was a pretty decent diskmag. It was really the first English-language diskmag from Poland (not Legend, which was mentioned in the Hugi 13 news corner; Legended ended up as a Polish-language mag). It's a pity that only two issues (plus an announcement issue #0) were released.
"EXCEED - The era of this succesful group since 1996 has ended. This crew plans a last demonstration called 'Berlin'. Not only exd members will work on this production, but their friends worldwide will be present and help, too. The release date is not fixed yet, but they really want to do their best. Latest bunkerravers were: baste (art), d-lee (organising), deansdale (music), imode (music), nns (code), react (code), shaman (music), ts (art), warpig (art). Some of them will leave the scene, others only the group. Maybe you will hear about them in the future again, but with a totally new image and style." One issue later, the resurrection of Exceed was announced.
"FREAX (book) - is a scenebook project started by Tomcat. Check out the new website (...) for FAQ." Today we can announce the release of Freax volume #1, which deals with the Amiga and C64 scenes.
"HEADCRASH - opened a Demoparty Link page (...) and are looking for graphicians from Germany to join them." The Demoparty Link page still exists. It's nowadays located at calendar.demoparty.de.
"MOON HUNTERS - Civax is planning to start a new site called CFXWeb. CFX is Coders F/X, his BBS in Israel and the center of the Israeli scene. Still, the site will not contain any files. It will rely on Trebel. The site will mainly have online events, chats, msgs, maybe some multi-user games and a lot of tutorials in coding/graphics and tracking. Also, he is planning a new kind of news section - Technology news. He will rely on the Network magazine for regular scene news." CFXweb became one of the most popular websites both for demo and game development. It is primarily a news site; in addition, it hosts articles and download links. Contrary to this announcement, it has always been independent from any other resource such as Trebel and (the already defunct) Network "Scene Central".
"MYTH (coder) - released a X-Mas '98 Special Edition of his Giana Sisters game, featuring new levels, new sound and new effects."
"NOTHING - Rumours say that Cremax had a car crash and was taken to hospital. We hope that he is fine and will have a long life!"
"PAIN (diskmag) - Fred stopped his job as the Pain main editor due to lack of time and more serious projects with Calodox but remains co-editor. The new main editors are Cockroach and Iquito, both from Switzerland. A new Pain issue should be released soon. A Linux interface is also available now." Fred later returned as main editor until he designated Asc and Unlock as his successors.
"RAMJAM - Macaw joined. Surfing and Not were arrested in Munich/Germany on their way to The Party 1998 for pissing at a cathedral drunken. They were released after spending more than four hours behind iron bars. The journalist Knut Eivind Straume reported about this incident in his TP8 report in a big Norwegian newspaper. He mentioned Surfing's name and handle. The Norwegian scene was shocked, and the news quickly spread all over the world through IRC."
"SCENET (scene directory) - Ghandy took over the Sceners e-mail database from Lord and just released the 27th issue. SCENET contains sceners' emails, group/person/party/diskmag & other useful scenish URLs, FTP servers, telnet boards with static IP addresses etc. Ghandy is looking for people to support Scenet." This was the foundation of today's Diskmag.de scene portal.
"THE DIGITAL PHILOSOPHERS - is a new group founded by the former Utopian management section (Zippy, Blade, PearlHunter). It is not a traditional demogroup but a modern art group that focuses on modern art, experimental poetry, audio-engineering, etc."
"THE KOOL - is a new joke group formed by Ambient Move, Velvet, Xenon, and Poti. Their main activity is boozing."
"THE LOST PATROL - released a trainer for the x-mas edition and version 1.31 of Myth's Giana Sisters."
"THE UTOPIANS - have been closed, mainly due to time problems by its president Zippy."
"TWO HEADED SQUIRREL - This new online magazine by mckracken can now be found at ..."
"UNIVERSE - are going to release issue 5 of their English/Russian diskmag Armor of Gods in March. The demo DiVE is almost finished."
"VINILO (diskmag) - Arlequin is working on a South American demoscene magazine. The first issue of Vinilo will be released at the end of march. So far, he has got about 170k of notes about coding, tracking, comments, e-mail guides and other things. He thinks about doing an official South American demoscene web page, too." Vinilo or Vinyl #1 was released soon after that and although it was quite decent, it unfortunately remained the only issue.