GODS - RUMOURS REJECTED
- THE TRUTH TO BE TOLD -


___For  years  now, we all have been amazed by productions brought to us by the
norwegian   group   Gods.    Since  1990  and  beyond,  the  golden  age  of
amiga-scening, the diskmagazine "DISC" has been amongst us, and for a lot of
us, it has brought nothing but pleasure.  But that isn't the only good thing
Gods  has  produced;  slideshows,  intros,  demos and packs - the list seems
never-ending.
___However,  a  few  months back, in March 1998, Gods were faced with the worst
possible problem a group can encounter:  Zerox, the main organizer, left the
group, causing anarchy and chaos amongst the remaining members.
___INSOMNIA  decided  to  have  a chat with the man behind the group; norwegian
scene-legend Zerox - original founder of Gods.

___"I  decided  to  leave  the  scene  at the very end of February because of a
sudden  depression.   I  had  been waiting for the new source of my magazine
DISC  for  nearly  3 years, and I began to doubt whether or not I would ever
receive it."
___Zerox smiles a sheepish grin, before continuing:
___"In  addition  to  that we were having some internal problems in Gods, and I
was  fed up with the situation.  I thought about it for a while, then I told
my  closest  scene  friends  that  I  had  left the scene, and thereby Gods.
Shortly  after,  Gods  lost  more or less all of its amiga-members.  A Shame
really."
___Just  some of those members who quit Gods in March 1998 include Sixpack, now
a  member  of  Haujobb, Joint, a well-renowned raytracer, Ghandy, the famous
editor,   Wade,   the   talented  graphician,  and  Caramel,  the  norwegian
tracker-king.   For  some  reason,  Zerox's  words:   "A shame really", just
doesn't  seem  to  cover  it.   For  any  other  group, such losses would be
unbearable.   For  Gods however, they were disposable of, as Zerox proves by
telling us about the future:

___"Gods are back to being a small crew.  We won't hear about people wanting to
leave  in  the future - which is very good.  The people which are now in the
group  are  real  friends,  and you can soon expect to see us releasing some
quality  productions.   Our  first goal is to establish ourself on the amiga
once  again,  then we, the remaining 7 guys of the once great Gods-team will
release a commercial DISC intro, the diskmagazine DISC issue 11, a slideshow
called  Divine  featuring  graphics  done  by Brigdeclaw, and perhaps a pack
named   Hitpack.   Hopefully  some  people  will  enjoy  these  soon-to-come
productions  from  our  side  and try joining our forces.  I believe we will
prevail."
___Current  members  of  Gods  are now Odin (code), Liszt (music), Chris (org +
inet-projects),  Bridgeclaw  (gfx,  music),  Xbarr (code, 3d), Typhoon (gfx,
music),  Ghandy  (which  rejoined  Gods  a  few months after leaving) and of
course Zerox, responsible for DISC.  Zerox is of the opinion that Gods still
stand strong on the scene, despite of the fact that the two coders, Odin and
Xbarr,  now  are  spending  all of their time coding on the PC.  Not strange
really,  considering  their  past winning the Gathering '98 party with their
debut-demo entitled "Evolution".  The demo was also entered in the democompo
at Mekka&Symposium, where it was ranked 3rd place.
___Zerox himself is a 24 year-old student living in Norway.  He has been on the
scene  for  roughly  11 years, which is quite impressive considering that he
also  tries  to  have  a social life.  He started his career on the scene by
doing  what  most  of  us have done at one point or another - playing games.
However, games soon proved too simple for young mister Zerox, and he quickly
moved  onto  the  scene,  settling in his first group entitled Argon, having
members  all the way from South Africa to Norway.  After Argon, Zerox was in
a  number of groups, ranging in quality, before he finally ended up in Iris,
becoming  the  norwegian  organizer.   The  Rendezvous  '93  party  became a
turning-point  for  Zerox,  making  him  leave  Iris to found his own group,
taking  with  him  the  best  members  of  Iris.  These members were Zytrox,
Zendar,  Sixpack,  Eagle and DZG.  Brigdeclaw was persuaded to leave TRSI to
join  Gods,  whilst  Pantera,  Sealapex  and  C-Quence  joined in from other
groups.   After  a  few  months,  things picked up rapidly, and Iris-founder
Chris, his coding companion Little, the talented coder Odin and the musician
Liszt  was  happily taken under the wing by Zerox.  He named his group after
what he wanted the members to become for other sceners - Gods.
___"When we started we were very optimisitic", Zerox tells us...  "We had after
my  opinion  some  of  the  best and most active sceners around, and we were
hoping  to  become one of the top groups on the scene.  The ambition with my
group  Gods  was  to  produce  not only demos, and/or not only packs, but to
supply  the  scene  with  a  wide  variety  of productions, ranging from the
smallest  of intros to the biggest of diskmagazines.  However, over the past
years  we've  had  to customize our goals as we've mainly had just one coder
available.   In  some  senses  you  could say that my group Gods have lost a
dimension..."
___Zerox  has  been  on  the  scene for a long while, and during those years of
scening,  he has seen a lot of good friends leave the scene forever, leaving
little or no trace of their current activities.
___"I  actually miss a lot of sceners that meant something special to me.  They
were  my  friends,  and  now  they are gone." For 11 years, Zerox has stayed
faithful  to the scene whilst others have turned their back to it...  "These
days  I  have  lost  contact with almost everyone...  The last person I lost
contact with was Blaze of Balance, which I have known since 1988.  Last year
he disappeared completly.  A shame really..."
___Zerox  pauses for a moment, probably thinking of his lost friends, before he
continues, obviously trying to pick up the mood.
___"Despite  of  the many sad moments that I've experienced on the scene, there
are so many good tales to tell of.  Duing the Gathering '97 for instance, I,
Sixpack  and  Caramel went to a local night-club called "the Rock".  Most of
us  weren't able of picking up any nice females, but Sixpack hit the jackpot
and sat chatting with a girl all night...  She wanted to meet him again, she
told him, but just before leaving we discovered that the guy sitting next to
her on the other side actually was her boyfriend.  All I can say is that I'm
glad we made it out of that club alive!"
___Still alive however, is DISC - the ancient diskmag from the past.  Zerox can
tell us that he's working hard on it, and that it will be released some time
in  the  future, depending on the amount of support which is collected.  The
editors  involved on it are Lord Helmet, Ghandy, Sixpack, Wade and Darkhawk,
which  truly  is a most impressive range of writers.  Hopefully, we will all
be  able  to view it for ourselfs soon, along with other quality productions
from the legendary group called Gods - a group which simply won't drop dead.

"When all others fail we will prevail!"
Zerox/Gods, ad 1998









by Soda (c) Insomnia'98