English Amiga Board - View Single Post - The Hall of Light - The First Ten Years (2002-2012)

CodyJarrett · 09 December 2012, 17:45

Surprising as it may seem, next Friday sees the tenth anniversary of the Hall of Light's public launch. The website went live on Saturday 14th December 2002 although work had been happening behind the scenes and offline earlier that year and before.

The HOL evolved from an earlier idea for a game database which was called the EAB's Amiga Game Database (AGD). There was already a website called the Amiga Games Database but it seems that RCK just picked a descriptive working title.

I had been working on a separate offline list of Amiga games which was prompted by Amiga Power's "Absolute Power" guide (http://amr.abime.net/issue_24 and http://amr.abime.net/issue_27). Amiga Power's guide attempted to list every Amiga game ever and it later became a book called, you've guessed it, The Official Guide to Every Amiga Game Ever (although it did miss out quite a lot of games!)

My Amiga list aimed to provide screenshots for all the games listed in Amiga Power's book and I created lots of the so-called Double Barrel Screenshots (DBS) with a titlescreen on the left and an in-game screen on the right. It also featured some Amiga Power mini-reviews. The list turned into a set of HTML pages which was viewed locally or from a CD but was only ever a personal project. It was called Those Were the Days and looked horrible. I also did screenshots for non-Amiga platforms.

Shield your eyes!

Anyway, I joined up with Twistin' Ghost and Walker who were doing something similar and we decided to create a combined database. We discussed it on a custom forum created using an old system called "ezboard". I found the phrase "Hall of Light" in an extremely obscure text and suggested it as a slightly pretentious name to suggest illumination of the dark recesses of Amiga gaming!

Eventually we joined forces with RCK who was coding EAB's game database system and that project became the Hall of Light.

The site looked like this before its launch:

The EAB was the meeting point for discussions about the new database. Others joined the core team; Codetapper, DrBong, andreas, Belgarath, Duke, Galaxy and Joe Maroni although some of the original team left after a disagreement.

This is what the site looked like after launch:

The HOL has also been built by its contributors who are listed on the team page (http://hol.abime.net/hol_team.php) and with help from others including Toni Wilen, the SPS team, the WHDLoad team and tomcat666 (more details here: http://hol.abime.net/hol_faq.php?section=thanksto).

The problem with any project like the HOL, which is done in spare time, for free and without any adverts, is that it's difficult to keep up the enthusiasm. This highly scientific interest graph demonstrates:

That's why I'm happy that the HOL is still here and that it has been joined by other associated Abime projects such as the Amiga Magazine Rack, Amiga Point of View, Amiga Games That Weren't and, more recently, Amiga Lore.

The site has also been improved over the years with new features like the game maps, magazine scores, more screenshots and lots more. Still, it's not complete and the ongoing quest for accuracy continues.

Now all we need is for RCK to add some of the other features we're still waiting for!

09 December 2012, 17:45	#1
CodyJarrett Global Moderator Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: UK Age: 46 Posts: 6,160	The Hall of Light - The First Ten Years (2002-2012) Surprising as it may seem, next Friday sees the tenth anniversary of the Hall of Light's public launch. The website went live on Saturday 14th December 2002 although work had been happening behind the scenes and offline earlier that year and before. The HOL evolved from an earlier idea for a game database which was called the EAB's Amiga Game Database (AGD). There was already a website called the Amiga Games Database but it seems that RCK just picked a descriptive working title. I had been working on a separate offline list of Amiga games which was prompted by Amiga Power's "Absolute Power" guide (http://amr.abime.net/issue_24 and http://amr.abime.net/issue_27). Amiga Power's guide attempted to list every Amiga game ever and it later became a book called, you've guessed it, The Official Guide to Every Amiga Game Ever (although it did miss out quite a lot of games!) My Amiga list aimed to provide screenshots for all the games listed in Amiga Power's book and I created lots of the so-called Double Barrel Screenshots (DBS) with a titlescreen on the left and an in-game screen on the right. It also featured some Amiga Power mini-reviews. The list turned into a set of HTML pages which was viewed locally or from a CD but was only ever a personal project. It was called Those Were the Days and looked horrible. I also did screenshots for non-Amiga platforms. Shield your eyes! Anyway, I joined up with Twistin' Ghost and Walker who were doing something similar and we decided to create a combined database. We discussed it on a custom forum created using an old system called "ezboard". I found the phrase "Hall of Light" in an extremely obscure text and suggested it as a slightly pretentious name to suggest illumination of the dark recesses of Amiga gaming! Eventually we joined forces with RCK who was coding EAB's game database system and that project became the Hall of Light. The site looked like this before its launch: The EAB was the meeting point for discussions about the new database. Others joined the core team; Codetapper, DrBong, andreas, Belgarath, Duke, Galaxy and Joe Maroni although some of the original team left after a disagreement. This is what the site looked like after launch: The HOL has also been built by its contributors who are listed on the team page (http://hol.abime.net/hol_team.php) and with help from others including Toni Wilen, the SPS team, the WHDLoad team and tomcat666 (more details here: http://hol.abime.net/hol_faq.php?section=thanksto). The problem with any project like the HOL, which is done in spare time, for free and without any adverts, is that it's difficult to keep up the enthusiasm. This highly scientific interest graph demonstrates: That's why I'm happy that the HOL is still here and that it has been joined by other associated Abime projects such as the Amiga Magazine Rack, Amiga Point of View, Amiga Games That Weren't and, more recently, Amiga Lore. The site has also been improved over the years with new features like the game maps, magazine scores, more screenshots and lots more. Still, it's not complete and the ongoing quest for accuracy continues. Now all we need is for RCK to add some of the other features we're still waiting for! Last edited by CodyJarrett; 03 November 2020 at 21:34.