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History

1987 - The origins
La Mascotte (c64)

The beginning of this story takes place in Dijon (France) in 1987. Oreille (formerly known as OCS: Oreille Cracking Service), Pet's Band and Bretzel were all at the same school. Pet's Band and Bretzel already knew each other, with Bretzel introducing Oreille to Pet's Band. Oreille was a coder and Pet's Band wanted to make a demo-maker group. Also, the fact that they lived just a few kilo-meters away from each other made it much easier to start the project. Prior to this, in 1986, Pet’s Band had also contacted Mercure, whose address he had found in the computer magazine Hebdogiciel. Mercure, at the time, was living in Lodève, 550km south of Dijon.

May 1987: Pet's Band and OCS released their first demo 'Cartoon Homage Tex Avery'. The name of the group had not yet been decided but the name of the founding members appeared in this production: OCS, Pet's Band and Mercure.
22/07/1987: Their second demo 'The Giver Demo' was released and the name End Of Century was used. Later Pet's Band revealed that he picked up the name End Of Century from a song by Prince. In fact their first three demos were very simple: just some pictures and few effects. But after the 4th one (Robert The Mercenary), they changed the concept and focused more on stories and 2d-animations.

Therefore, the founding members were: Oreille (ex-OCS), Pet's Band, Bretzel (all from Dijon area) and Mercure (from Lodève). End Of Century officially started its activities in July 1987 as a French based c64 demo group.

Eleven demos were released in 1987:
'Cartoon Homage Tex Avery', 'The Giver Demo', 'Robot Sex 1', 'Robert The Mercenary', 'Comic Demo', 'EOC 1987', 'The EOC's Show', 'Monster eyes', 'Country Games', 'Canal -' and 'Walk In The Night'.

Labels for 5'1/4 floppydisks (Pets Band, 1988), 103x38mm Labels for 5'1/4 floppydisks (Pets Band, 1988), 103x38mm Labels for 5'1/4 floppydisks (Pets Band, 1988), 103x38mm

Labels for 5'1/4" floppydisks (Pets Band, 1988), 103x38mm

1988 - Final Year with the c64

A new demo was produced in March 1988: 'Music Machine'. This demo had many parts that contained lots of animations. Another four demos were released later that year: 'Gee Bee Air Rally', 'Black Demo', 'Heroic Fantasy' and 'The Last One'. The members announced they were nearing the end of their c64 activities in the demo 'Heroic Fantasy'. Their last demo for the c64 ('The Last One') was released in August 1988. The number '1999' is to be seen for the very first time in a picture from Pet's Band in this last demo, under the name of the group.
End Of Century became End of Century 1999.

A total of 16 demos (including 'Cartoon Homage Tex Avery') were released on c64 between May 1987 and August 1988. At that time, the scene was just overflooded with demos containing technical effects and very few productions had cartoon based animations. The group focused on funny animations, good graphics and having a story in their products: this was its trademark. In fact, no group made as many 2D animations in their demos as EOC did. A concept the team kept when it moved to the Amiga platform.

1989 - Back on Amiga
Label for 3'1/2 disk (Pets Band, 1989), 154x140mm

Labels for 3'1/2" disk (drawned by Pets Band)

May 1989: the group entered the Amiga scene with the release of a megademo. Two new members joined: Moa (coder, brother of Oreille, coming from the Amstrad scene) et Paranoïak (swapper). Another member, Xérès (swapper) joined in November 1989, a year in which four demos were produced ('Megademo 1', 'Robert The Mercenary 2', 'Precious Stones Intro' and 'New Beat 666')

At the end of 1989, the team was composed of: Oreille, Pets Band, Mercure, Bretzel, Moa, Paranoïak, Xérès.

1990 - EOC 1999 France, England and Australia

May 1990: a new coder named CRC joined the group. To be stronger, EOC 1999 had to get some members abroad. The idea was actually to pick up new members who could start a new section outside France. So Mercure gave Sirius One the mission to build an English section while Paranoïak recruited some new members (Dundee, Deviate, Shaka and Voo Doo Ray) based in Adelaïde in Australia.

Summer 1990: Another coder named Stormbringer joined the group and made the demo 'Space Islands'. A very big production was on track: the Megademo 2. But Moa, who was in charge of making the code, decided to stop and quit the scene. CRC took over the job and finished this megademo, becoming the main coder of the group (French section). He then coded both ‘Knickknack’ and ‘Living Scroll’ which were released by Mercure at Prime'90 (Tilburg, The Netherlands, 11/08/1990). The pixel artist Randam joined later in October 1990. The last demo of this year was 'A Journey to Nowhere' released by CRC and Mercure at the Vision and Mirage X-Mas party (Tilburg, The Netherlands, 22/12/1990).

In total, 9 French EOC productions were released in 1990: 'All Around The World Intro', 'Space Islands', 'Megademo 2', 'Knickknack', 'Living Scroll', 'Neon Skates', 'All Around The World Loader', 'CRC Intro' and 'A Journey To Nowhere'.

At the end of 1990, the French members consisted of: Oreille, Pets Band, Mercure, Bretzel, Paranoïak, Xérès, Stormbringer, CRC, Ramdam

Members in France, 1990

Sommer 1990 in Dijon (Pets Band's HQ). From left to right: Xérès, Bretzel, Moa, CRC (back), Oreille, Paranoïak, Pets Band, Mercure.

Autocollant (Pets Band, 1990), 70x34mm Autocollant (Pets Band, 1990), 70x34mm

Stickers (drawn by Pets Band)

Animations in the Megademo 2

Animations of the mascot in the Megademo 2 (drawn by Pets Band)

1991 - EOC 1999 International
La Mascotte (1992)

The English members produced their first demos in 1990 and it encouraged the French section to go ahead with the expansion of the group abroad. The French section wanted to be more popular and have a good number of releases. So they incorporated more members from several countries; England, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Finland and The Netherlands. The British section was very productive with Michael (Devistator) at the wheel and it produced a good volume of demos until 1993.

Meanwhile, in the French section: some new spreaders joined such as the mighty duo Mery And Cypher with their long contact list. A new graphics artist, Larry, came in May. He cooperated on the demo 'Hurry up' released at the Amega party (Porsgrunn, Norway, 28-30th June 1991). It was a real pity that Larry joined the group so late, given his great potential and ability to make great graphics and animations.

Later, in June, the group Arcenix joined. They wanted to keep the name Arcenix so they formed a sub-group of EOC 1999. October 1991: The duo Mery and Cypher finished their coop: Mery quit for Profecy while Cypher stayed.

8 productions in total were produced in 1991 by the French section: 'Another Dream Loader 1', 'Southern Sensitivity Loader', 'Minis Loader', 'Hurry Up', 'Another Dream Bee-Loader', 'Mixolydian Music-disk 1', 'The Amga Party Demo' and '7th Sense'.

By the end of 1991, the members in France were: Pets Band, Mercure, Bretzel, Paranoïak, CRC, Stormbringer, Ramdam, Cypher, Wedge, Larry, Müesli, Arcenix (Nic, Bruce, Log), Quaid.

1992 - Time of Decline!
Drawing for the 1992 new edition EOC t-shirt and sweater (Larry, 1992), 20x36cm.

Drawing for the 1992 new edition EOC
t-shirt and sweater (Larry, 1992), 20x36cm.

The Hangloose BBS was opened by the sysop Cypher. The musician Madzic joined the sub-group Arcenix. But during the year 1992 the coders in France were unable to produce something, either due to studies or that they just were tired of the whole thing. The group was in sharp decline. Some series of demo-packs were maintained and the new demos of the British section were packed into those series. This was a way to survive and to have something to release. Some members made some works for the Beach-Party demo trilogy. Finally, the annulment of this party summer 1992 led to the withdrawal of all the last active French members. Then all the remaining members abroad left one by one. Only the English section was strong enough and continued to produce until 1993.

All in all, over 70 members from all around the globe worked for EOC in the period 1987-1993.

Artwork: Mercure (1992) Artwork: Mercure (1992)

Artwork: Mercure (1992)

2017 - www.endofcentury.com
La Mascotte (1992)

2017: 30 years have passed since the birth of the group. This website celebrates the three decades of EOC! Mercure decided to design the official website of the group. Håkon cooperated with the front-end. Anyway, it was high time that people get the real facts about the group and forget the inaccurate and misleading information published by many scene related websites.
Mercure and Oreille agreed to abandon the number 1999 and the group again took the name End Of Century, without the number, as it was at the very start.


End Of Century