...sometimes they come back...

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                      "TOXIC MAGAZINE # 18" by TYPHOON
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system.... ST/STE/Falcon with RGB (VGA not tested)

credits... intro by DUNE
           shell by THYREX of LOUD!

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Yes... it is back, one of  the  oldest  disk magazines on  ST suddenly  appeared
again at the end of the last year and not only this... it appeared together with
an intro by another band who wasn't  seen for many years  on the screen too, the
old hope for ST demos back in the middle of the nineties, DUNE.

As you know "TOXIC MAGAZINE" suffered since long times under the language it was
written in, french. In times, were the magazine  was founded, it was released as
english publication, in times as there was a big and  active french scene. Later
on it changed  its language into french, but in a  time as the  french scene was
shrinking and as other magazines like UCM changed their language into english to
get more readers since also the german scene was shrinking...

Yes, and somewhen I heard that TOXIC magazine will change to english as well, as
it was announced with the online issue.

But now, as issue  18 hit the lines of the  ST scene, it shows that  nothing has
happened at all. Nearly the whole magazine is still written in french  and so it
is over longer view it's own gravedigger.

Since STsurvivor  has left the  TOXIC mag to go on with  UNDERCOVER, STrider, or
maybe better known as The Beast, has taken over the job of the main editor.

The magazine still features  the shell  coded by THYREX of LOUD! and as known it
is a quiet ok one, it looks a bit boring with  the time, but anyway, it does its
job good and I will, because it is the most interesting thing  about a magazine,
mainly focuse on the contents now.

"TOXIC 18" features nearly 6o articles of various topics. Since "TOXIC" was born
as scene magazine it still features a lot of scene oriented articles and so it's
a shame that the most of them are written in french only, esp. since there are a
few ones that couldn't be found in a  similar way in english  publications, just
as an articles about the french LUCKY & TIGROU PARTY 3, the VIP party as well as
the RTS 2 party and so the views of the  french sceners  are staying  out of our
world. But here we have a nice point, this issue features reports and info files
about 5 parties... gosh! Furthermore  the Atari related  part goes on with scene
news and  an overview  about demo groups (that is written  in english  but quiet
incomplete and  filled with  several wrong  informations), reviews  of demos and
games, public domain  softwares, tested games on  PaCifiST, coding  tips (mainly
for GFA programmers), several interviews and so on.

Unfortunately the half of the articles are about other topics, so there is a big
part about  cars and  motorsport (what the hell?!), articles  about Manga stuff,
internet, the chaos  theory, song lyrics, general music  articles and so on. But
since french isn't an easy language, the most of  those articles  could hide her
sense for  me. My school french  was just good  enough to  check out  some Atari
related snippets in the scene  related articles and I don't wanted to try out my
abilities  in using a  translation book for articles without deeper  sense in my
eyes...

Anyway, what's left, except the last words?!

Hmmm... TOXIC mag  is still a  phenomenon for me, just like the NARSIL magazine,
because even if the mass of people that can be reached with french is shrinking,
as well  as the support, the  people behind the magazine still hold on their old
language instead  of using english to reach a bigger community. This is very sad
because  TOXIC mag features  as always  several  interesting  articles about the
Atari scene, esp. in France  and sometimes they write stuff about things we have
not heard about so far... The shell  is still a good one, but wasn't  developped
any further  since longer  time. Esp. I wonder why no music  was included in the
magazine and so you're reading it in completely silence... :/
Ok... that's it... you can check it  out if you're  a frenchie or can speak some
words and understand french slang... For the rest just the kewl intro is of some
interest.

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contents........  7o % - a lot of articles but suffers under the language
shell...........  7o % - no scrolling, but still good, a few pixel stuff as well
shell grafix....  4o % - hmmm... not brainblasting in comparison with other mags
shell musix.....  oo % - where? what?
intro ..........  75 % - kewl old school intro by DUNE...
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overall.........  51 % - the problem is clear... not complete use and language
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Damn... when will TOXIC mag will be released in english?!

.tSCc.                                                                   moondog
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