• The competition machine most likely will be a Intel Core2 Quad Q6700 with 2GB of RAM and a NVidia Quadro FX 5600 (even-beefier variant of a 8800 GTX) with 1.5GB of VRAM.
• We will use Windows XP (32 bit) with Service Pack 2, DirectX 9.0c (November 2007) and then-current drivers. We do not use Windows Vista (yet) because of its severe performance and compatibility issues; it is not yet very common and can't be relied to run a lot of programs that work just fine on XP (if you want to submit a Vista/DX10 demo, feel free to do so in the Console/Real Wild compo). We will not install any drivers or virtual machines to provide or improve DOS compatibility.
• No Linux entries. We had very few Linux entries when we accepted them, and since we usually get brand-new compo machines, there are usually no stable drivers available. We don't have time on the party to tweak around with experimental software, and since we can't guarantee smooth operation, we don't support it.
• Java/.NET entries are allowed in the Demo compo, but not in the intro compos. (Please contact us in advance if you plan to submit such a demo)
• You will have to state which graphics hardware your demo/intro is compatible to on the submission form ("Compatibility Chart"). Please do so truthfully.
• Maximum resolution is 1920x1080 pixels.
• All entries will be shown using aspect-ratio preserving stretch; that is, 4:3 and 16:10 video modes will be letterboxed (with a black border at the left and right sides), while 16:9 images get to use the full area of the big screen. We will not stretch 4:3 demos horizontally to fill the whole screen. Most importantly, do not set a 4:3 video mode then perform letterboxing yourself (it will needlessly cause your entry to be shown smaller than it needs to be).
• Pressing either ESC or Alt-F4 has to end the demo instantly.
• The entry has to be delivered as single .zip or .rar file.
• If your demo has a configuration dialog, either provide sensible defaults for the compo or specify the settings you want used on your submission form (we don't have the time to try out multiple configurations for each production).
• DirectX 9.0c (November 2007) runtime is available here (web installer) and here (full download) (contains, among other things, d3dx9_24.dll to d3dx9_36.dll).
• If you have no experience on how to make demos look good on the bigscreen, we strongly suggest reading this article by kb/farbrausch.
• Please consider making the demo's target resolution and aspect ratio selectable. Widescreen displays with 16:10 aspect ratio and HDTV screens with 16:9 aspect ratio are increasingly common - your demo should support this properly if possible (this is in addition to the guidelines above; we ensure that video modes will get displayed with proper aspect ratio, but most displays don't). In case you would code a resolution selector if only you weren't so damn lazy (sheesh!), Gargaj has written some code that kills your excuse. Though it only does resolution and leaves the aspect ratio stuff to you as homework, because apparently Gargaj is damn lazy too.

If you have questions or suggestions about these rules, contact the organizers at .

• Maximum size is 64MB (67108864 bytes) after unzipping/unraring of the demo archive for ALL files, including readmes etc. (Of course you can still have compressed data files with whatever algorithm you prefer).
• Maximum running time: 8 minutes (including loading/precalc).
• You may assume d3dx9_24.dll to d3dx9_36.dll are installed.
• Java/.NET entries are allowed.

• Maximum size is 65536 bytes for the executable. All other files in the archive will be deleted before showing the entry in the competition.
• Maximum running time: 8 minutes (including loading/precalc).
• Please note that neither msvcr70.dll, msvcr71.dll nor msvcr80.dll will be available on the compo machine!
• You may assume d3dx9_24.dll to d3dx9_36.dll are installed.
• Java/.NET entries are not allowed.

• Maximum size is 4096 bytes for the executable. All other files in the archive will be deleted before showing the entry in the competition.
• Maximum running time: 8 minutes (including loading/precalc).
• For the sake of getting more compatible entries this year, import by ordinal for DLLs with non-fixed ordinals is forbidden (don't even think about directly jumping into DLLs with hardcoded offsets!). Please use alternative, more compatible techniques like muhmacs import by hash to save on executable size. Thanks to peci, we have some import by hash source code available for anyone who is not familiar with the technique. Or just use a 4k packer like Crinkler, which does this automatically.
• It is okay to deliver bigger versions of the 4k along with the compo version (which must be <=4096 bytes) in the same archive. We will not show the bigger version in the compo. If your packer doesn't work on the compo machine, it's your problem. We will be able to provide you with details about the compo machine, though.
• Please note that neither msvcr70.dll, msvcr71.dll nor msvcr80.dll will be available on the compo machine!
• You may assume d3dx9_24.dll to d3dx9_36.dll are installed.
• Java/.NET entries are not allowed.