A Mind Is Born (256 bytes)
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- Опубликовано: 8 фев 2025
- A tiny demo for the Commodore 64. 1st place in the Oldskool 4K Intro compo at Revision 2017.
(Yep, what you hear and see is generated by a program that is no larger than 256 bytes.)
Support my work: / linusakesson
Kudos to Lemming for the video capture!
For an in-depth technical explanation, please head over to: linusakesson.n...
Creative commons: BY-NC-SA 4.0 creativecommon...
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
Please produce more music
like this!
Thanks! Have you listened to Machine Yearning?
Thank you, also.
wait why is this comment formatted like this
@@grimtin10 hello grimtin10 and i believe it's the way the Commodore 64 displays text. it is has a monospace font due to technological limitations and i believe this person is trying to emulate that. for some reason. on a not monospace font. for some reason
@@grimtin10 its the mind from the video, which has gained sentience and is now begging its creator to produce more of them. its loneliness is maddening and the silence that surrounds it is deafening.
Just to give you an idea as to how small 256 bytes is, the text of this comment is exactly 256 characters, which are usually stored as a byte each. Of course there is Unicode, which expands ASCII past 7 bits and can be encoded differently, but this is 256.
Thank you, really helps to put in perspective how a small amount of data can be so complex!
@@ToastyEggs this program is awesome because it makes some very simple systems into something amazing, and especially incredible to me is how it takes advantage of the c64
madlad
I just copied this text to the hexeditor, and my mind is blown. It is really exactly 256 bytes! Aligns perfectly with my 32 columns display :)
01 08 0D 08 FF D3 9E 32 32 32 35 00 00 00 19 41 1C D0 00 DC 00 00 11 D0 E0 0B 10 33 0E 61 90 F5 07 00 FF 1F 14 41 D5 24 15 25 15 53 15 61 D5 29 1B 0F E6 13 E6 13 D0 02 E6 20 A9 61 85 1C A7 20 E0 3F F0 08 90 0C 4E 11 D0 6C FC FF A0 6D 84 22 84 D7 4A 4B 1C A8 A5 13 29 30 D0 02 C6 1C E0 2F F0 11 B0 02 A2 02 C9 10 F0 09 8A 29 03 AA B5 F3 85 0A 2D AB 00 B0 11 B7 22 B6 21 95 00 A5 13 4B 0E AA CB F8 86 CC 49 07 85 0B A5 13 29 0F D0 0F A9 B8 47 14 90 02 85 14 29 07 AA B5 F7 85 12 A0 08 B7 0D 91 0F 88 10 F9 A8 B7 09 91 03 88 D0 F9 4C 7E EA 78 8E 86 02 8E 21 D0 20 44 E5 A2 FD BD 02 08 95 02 CA D0 F8 8E 15 03 4C CC 00 A9 50 8D 11 D0 58 AD 04 DC A0 C3 0D 1C D4 48 4B 04 A0 30 8C 18 D0 71 CB E6 CB 71 CB 6A 05 20 A0 58 05 D5 91 CB D0 DF 2B AA 02 62 00 18 26 20 12 24 13 10
>is given only 4k to write a demo
>uses a 16th of it, and still wins
This feels like a message from god. Like your computer turns on at 2AM and this starts playing.
THIS. Very much this. The best explanation of what I feel when I watch this, but didn't find the words for it.
But not the abrahamic god, but a hypercomputer AI machine god
@@pexfmezccle The Broken One, which is WAN?
tRonald Dump they are not the same?
@@spearPYN they indeed are the parts of Broken God.
I've been looking for this song for over 2 years and now suddenly youtube recommended it for me. i can't believe it.
Same for me! Except I refound it on Hacker News recently, I was so happy! I'll never forget it again
RUclips can hear our minds now
What's the name?
@@ZBreezee-nb2rl A Mind Is Born (256 Bytes)
Good to hear that.
256 bytes is a damned small program for growing a mind, especially given that it also performs this music.
I think that's just the title of the music
@@gelatinocyte6270 no it isn't, check the description
@@David_Box nope, he's right, this is a musical demo program for the Commodore 64 designed to fit under 256 bytes. "A Mind Is Born" is just the name of the title
@@kurtka8720 a program is a mind.
@@pizzapastaparty3095 not really, it is just a set of instructions set for a machine to perform. a "mind" would imply sentience, and our computers aren't advanced enough to have a program complex enough to achieve it. not yet anyway.
There's something about 1980s retro-futurism that really stands out among science fiction media. Like you're witnessing something coming into being, expanding and evolving, both grandiose and intimidating, all contained in some random guy's dark basement.
You get it, you see it
we old
I'm that guy
"Uh, sir? You might want to see this" *credits roll in*
Trash
@@jesusmartinezcruz3543 Trashcan
Dear God....... What...... Is it?
@@Synthis_Bioji No, trash
@@jesusmartinezcruz3543 no, trashcan
A technical explanation of how this works is now posted. The link is in the video description.
thx
I was really impressed with this watching it the first time around knowing only that it was coded in 256 bytes. After reading your technical explanation and reflecting on the title _A Mind is Born_, watching it again gives me the chills. This is a work of genius. Well done!
Holy crap, I just realised you're the same Linus that built and plays the Chipophone! Makes sense that this would've been your work too :) You are a true genius, I have so much respect for your musical achievements!
you should pin your own comment
Hate to sound ignorant- but could someone explain exactly what’s happening here? This is amazing, whatever it is.
Only 256 bytes? Mindblowing!
And only 289 likes!
I Can't Imagine What Would It Do With 1MB
Honestly one of the coolest feats of computer technology. 256 bytes is incredibly miniscule, the fact it can produce banger music and trippy visuals in that tiny amount of space is incredible!
Looking at the code, and the first instruction executed is a NOP! Somebody had space to spare! :)
If you go to the link in the description, you'll see that the value $ea is the end of the interrupt routine jumping to $ea7e, and not the start of the init code that actually starts at 2226, but as the value $ea happens to be NOP, it can be started at 2225 instead without any difference. This was done just for fun.
Yep, I saw that :)
NERDS! YOU'RE ALL NEEEEERDS!
@@ecscottindiana ikr What a bunch of neerrds
@@ecscottindiana nerds = Really Cool People that are Actually smart.
By popular demand, the soundtrack is now available on a bunch of streaming services, including Spotify. Happy playlist-making! (You can still get the mp3 on my website for non-commercial use.)
This just popped into my recommendations. Never heard it before, sounds good. The algorithm works in weird ways.
This song also popped up in my recommendations, a great song though!
The algorithm dropped me here, and I feel grateful about that
Yay!
Wow
This was super insanely AWESOME!!! Great Job!!
smalledude33
teehee
You.. you certainly must have signed some horrendous contract with 8-bit devil.
I'm always amazed. Truly.
To achieve greatness, you must give away lowest byte of your soul. Everyone will adore you, but for the rest of your life you will hear faint digital static noise.
Just gotta make sure to pull the soul bit to low.
@@DaVince21 underrated comment
@@yetihehe oh my God that is horrendous
This is not only mindblowingly impressive and cool, but its also a fucken BOP
I still come back to this time after time and I'm always blown away at how good the bass line is and the overall feel that this song gives. I will never not be impressed.
I shall now drain this song for all the seretonin it provides.
I love this sentence
As I do at least three times a year.
And again, I find myself coming back to this one, again and again, 5 years after its release.
I feel this
Having grown up cutting my teeth on the Vic-20 and C-64, this has to be one of the coolest demos I have ever seen - and that in 256 bytes...unreal...
Absolutley brilliant. I hope there's people younger than our generation who can truly appriciate this kind of work.
I was born in 2003 and find this interesting. Good enough?
2001 person here! =)
14 and blown away :)
1995, never had a C64. I am beyond amazed at the technological marvel that's running this tiny little masterpiece.
Heya, I'm a 17-year old (and a girl at that) and I think this stuff is absolutely amazing. I wish others could realize how cool this is too.
The highlight of Revision 2017 for me. This blew everything else away.
Stunning.
Sir you totally blew my mind, not only in the tech, but also in the artistic side, totally touching.
damn that's a banger! it's begging to be fleshed out into a full length track
never ever ;_;
@@waterburgr the odds of shady cicada reworking a track are low, but never zero
I'll flesh it out, so much potential.
@@Gold-cb2pq If you would (:
Its LSFR'd (prng), so you can play it forever!
Most amazing thing is that my message in terms of bytes takes 256 bytes. just incredible how the music, graphics, fit in such a tiny amount of information. and besides the musical and graphic parts, an executable code is also needed. it's just blows my bra
Really brings home how redundant our human language is, doesn't it?
Your comment is no accident. It's exactly 256 characters, the size of this program. Consider my bra blown as well.
Are we blowing up bras here
@@hasnahmad-wv4xe This man’s blowing up bras like Osama bin Bra-din
@@KentuckyFriedChildren Osama Bra Din
This is genuinely fantastic.
I have played this over and over since I found it. The compactness of the demo is mind boggling, but the tune is even better.
Let us have an other Tron movie and let Linus compose the sound track!
POV: standing outside a loud club waiting for your friend to come out but some banger just came on.
Mindset: The chicks are not interested - yet - but no hurry, you got this.
So good. It sounds so much fuller than a usual sid tune.
The sid (especially the 8580 from the C64C) is amazing in that is has a proper multimode resonant filter, that’s how it starts sounding dull (low pass, only low frequencies getting past the filter) and then opens up, and at the end of the tune switches to higpass right before the end. Most games didn’t use this ability at all as the filter wasn’t very good on early models - but the C64 is a proper synthesizer really.
Also, as per the description link, the drone sound ducks on the beats, manually, to simulate the sidechain compression ducking normally used for this style of music.
Really like these mathematical kinda songs. You're just hearing a simple mathematical pattern. Really awesome. I remember using a program that would generate music like this with some math input I forgot the name of it and I forget how it was but it made music kinda like this.
This is one of those 'destined for a 10 hour version' videos.
hoho, just once again when im drunk and watching this, I just thought that I really love this tune and could see it as 10h ver..
Can't stop hitting replay
YES
This is the most amazing piece of code i have ever seen, and i'v been in the "scene" since '93. Good job!
I would love to start into coding and this video makes me ... I'm speechless, any tips on where or how to start
@@gabos993 try making an operating system first
@@kiwi_2_official bruh
This animation appears to be a series of 1-dimensional cellular automata.
I clicked thinking that it was one
same
Looks like it's modeled after a 'Game of Life' simulation. Saw the title and thumbnail and thought this was going to be a short demonstration of some emergent AI or something. Was still pleased with the song.
@@digiquo8143 Conway's game is a 2 dimensional cellular automaton. This looks more like a 1 dimensional automaton such as Rule 30.
Well, time to go learn what a 1 dimensional one looks like
A Mind is Born? More like A Mind is Blown, am I right?
Hahahha, well mine was at least! He's amazing!
When I saw this video I just wanted to write that comment. I'm truly impressed what those 256 bytes achieved.
Totally agree, I have no words.
You are indeed
blown is an extra byte..
This is what our cells feel like
I want to be a cell now.
@@youtuberobbedmeofmyname you are made of cells already, just pick one to pay attention to and ignore the other ones
Just raving like there's no tomorrow
@@SeveralGhost this is the funniest thing I've heard today.
Three years later and it is as excellent and impactful as the first time I saw it. Transcendental.
I thought it was cool he was displaying random bytes from memory.
Then I read the description.
Then I followed the link.
Then I understood.
Just to give you an idea as to how insanely small 256 bytes are, this entire comment takes up around 182 bytes, which is more than half the size of the entire program. Truly amazing.
Absolute genius. Made me cry with nostalgia. Give this man a Lordship
The bass at the start is 👌🏼. The tune is fantastic in its own right, but I'm absolutely blown away that this was all squeezed into 256 bytes!! Bravo my man, Bravo!
I sometimes play this on Spotify. Even after all these years, I am still amazed. Amazing work!
It feels like an ending of this best game from your dream. It's ending with a big plot twist, and now you just sitting and thinking about so many things, while it's night and you hear this, while credits going
This could be the next season intro of Halt and Catch Fire! :O
Incredible, i have no words.
Fun fact: an abstract perfect compression algorithm could fit this RUclips video in 256 bytes
Alas, it is massive and still looks like shit with RUclips's compression algorithm.
actually i highly doubt this because his write-up reveals the exact audio and visuals are generated by making heavy use of Commodore 64 specific functionality, even involving intentionally glitched visual artifacts, meaning a large amount of the _information_ in this video is actually stored in the hardware, so your compression algorithm would have to actually generate the same file evaluated to 256 bytes for the competition, which is C64-compatible 6502 machine language with a BASIC header and entrypoint, meaning i do not believe it could
store all the information in a platform-agnostic file
TL;DR: I believe a lot of the information in the video is stored in the Commodore 64 and not in the 256-byte file
@@tacokoneko By definition, does the C64 not become an advanced "decoder" of some sort?
@@tacokoneko yeah, you don’t download the VP9 or H.264 decoder with every video do you though?
you people who replied.. i ran the demo in 2 emulators and they produce superficially similar results to this video, but the visuals are not _exactly_ the same, if you want to verify this quickly just run them side by side and watch the triangles early in the demo - I don't see any borderline-perfect accuracy commdore 64 emulator, as there is for NES. Therefore it doesn't matter when I "download a video decoder", because for the 256 byte file, I _can't_ download it, it's an antique computer that costs $100. By your logic taken to an extreme, my pc's user password is a compressed video of my wallpaper and DE, simply because this system happens to display that when I type it in.
This guy is a bona fide genius. His website is full of incredible stuff like this. An absolute joy.
This is the visual equivalent to Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. It's pure abstraction and it's wonderfully hypnotic. Great work!
This is so inspiring
Like, even if someone else knew the hardware and language so well, the creativity needed and execution to get to such a result is just insane.
Pure genius, no other words for it. I can't wait to see your post on how it works!
I also feel like this needs someone to do a cover on some relatively modern synth.
Here is a link to how it's done : linusakesson.net/scene/a-mind-is-born/
Modern synth lol analog is overrated shut up fm is better
Its hard to believe that this sound is generated by C64 and melody is pseudo-random :) Very impressive programming skills. This is art, and huge talent.
80's demo scene : make 3D animation with less CPU power than your average toaster
Modern day Bioware : programming a popup menu into the already fully build and documented engine we were given is too hard !
80's games: "We had to cycle-count each and every instruction and optimise the ever living hell out of the code so it runs in real time but still fits in 64KB"
modern games: "50% chance of crashing. also 256GB take it or leave it"
I Am Going To Modern/Near-Future Game
Multi-TB Game That Barely Runs On Even An Extremely Advanced Supercomputer
Excellent example of creativity and space optimization. Since most people cannot fully appreciate the difficulties in creating such a technical wonder, I'll simply tell all this video and audio was being generated by the same size in bytes of this comment.
When the harmony kicks in @ 1:42 🤯
This is fascinating. Gives me a lot to think about for my next creation. So glad I found this.
That is frigging glorious! I want a 4 hour version!
Blows my mind... Every day! One of the best Codes I've ever seen...
Respect
Man, i fucking love your videos, be it demos or you playing music, you should do casual videos more often, you probably use your devices to play music on your own for example, why not record it and post some inprovisation?
You could also keep us updated on what you're working on so we can HYYPEE in advance.
keep being awesome bro.
God I love this so much. Come back every couple months to watch!
I watched this on the Revision live stream. Really cool. ;)
I guess it must be using self-modifying code to create the music etc., and / or literally a Conway's style algo?
The screen looks like a raw buffer from RAM?
EDIT: Congrats on 1st btw, it was well deserved. :)
I don't know what this us but thank the youtube recommend gods for bringing us here
Absolute black magic. Well deserved 1st place. Would love to have a detailed dive into how you achieved this, the specific setup you used (if any, other than an off the shelf c64), the magic numbers, and maybe lift the veil on how you achieved so much content in so little codespace. My mind is reeling with possible setups; Polymorphic code (but, in 256 bytes, how!?)? cellular automata? (but that wouldn't achieve such variety?), reliably glitching the hardware? (but wouldn't those tricks haven been used before to such a degree). I don't know man, you're the wizard here ;)
On the other hand, a true magician never reveals his method..
In the link in the description, he explains it wonderfully. (You might've commented before the link was there. Anyway, you might come back now to find it. :)
Ah didn't see the link. Not sure if it was there when I viewed the production, byut thanks for the heads-up, that's a very nice write-up!
This is a really cool channel and your demos are sick. Installed VICE just to try them out
Imagine loading this onto a boot sector.
Fantastic soundtrack! My mind is blown! This contains the code and data to play and display the demo. 256 bytes is less than a tweet and here, worth so much more.
One of the most mindblowing things I've ever experencied
This is such a mind blowing piece of work. It's hard to believe that it's only 256 bytes. The complexity is incredible.
half the size of a PC boot sector!
One percent the size of a COMPLETELY EMPTY Word .doc!
Double the RAM of the 2600!
16 times the size of 16 bytes!
I love how the bassline starts at 1:40. This is amazing
256B. This comment will be as long as that, but still you managed to put in an interesting and rememberable music and visuals that would fit nicely on beginning of some C64 themed album. Also the fact that SID tune is BIGGER than demo is kinda funny to me.
This is really good I unironically love listening to it.
wow, i could go for a whole album of this kind of stuff
Gorgeous. Absolutely wonderful. Thank you, good sir.
my feeble brain trying to understand how that was done with only 256 bytes: A Mind is Blown
We are wasteful, when it comes to data, when we store a True of False, we typical use a byte or some time even a Int32, but you only need a bit, 1/8 of data, store a true or false, the C64 uses a synthetic sound synthesizer, if you listen closely notice there is repetition in base pattern, for note playlist, I guess the background is generated by modifying the previews frame, there are some simple tringle generator, and some char replacement going on, it looks some effects are direct result of the music, the system has no space for debug text/code, or standard libraries to bloat the code.
Seeing old demos make these sounds and videos.. Man its great to see its still ongoing :)
How did I miss this one for so many years???
hah... just wait till you find something that was made 10 or 20 years in the past that you like... makes you feel old lmao
@@mordecai4207 oh no, I grew up with C64 and Vic 20 and Amiga and all that. What I meant is that I have followed lftkryo for years and years and thought I had seen all his masterpieces, but apparently missed this one. I do feel old, thank you 😂😂😂
I'm seriously floored that this is composed in 256 bytes. Utterly masterful. A work of genius.
I dunno what it is, but this feels like a nightmare. I fucking love it!
Honestly, from the point of an old scener...sheer beauty.!
I could smell my C-64 while watching this.
This is fantastic. RUclips really knew what it was doing recommending this one.
The ultimative best thing I've ever seen!
Brilliant. Thanks for the detailed explanation of the code.
Nowadays they need 256 bytes just to put up a seizure warning.
The 256 bytes that big bang into a full universe of song and images.
If you kill the baseline you can get it down to 255 bytes
Going to play this on clarinet
THIS WAS DONE ON A C64?? That's amazing!
In 256 Bytes of 6502, the Author admits it should be 255 Bytes (FF in Hex) because he added a NOP at the start as a joke. but instead of being 255, which is 1111 1111 in Binary, 256 makes it 1 0000 0000 in Binary
The sound is just great!!!!
If you take out the cartridge and blow on it a few times then insert it again, this should clear right up. If that doesn't work, try some Q-Tips with rubbing alcohol on the connectors.
This was truely impressive. And sweet Jesus, you pulled off so much with so little, hats off for you!
Needs a extended house remix!
Yes, the melody is good for other styles also, so much potential.
House music sucks overrated voices lol
Very impressive work. Really love the tune & visuals
"Human music. I like it."
This is sublime, thank you for sharing it.
Though should be an entire music genre
That’s pretty damn cool. The technical explanation went way over my head, but the video was good.
1st place in the Oldskook 4k comp
Number of upvotes 4k
It's a sign.
This makes two absolutely insane songs I've heard from the Commodore. This and the Monty on the Run theme. Absolutely genius songwriting!
Makes me think about how the Atari had only 128bytes of ram
You should put this on Spotify. The awesomeness of the demo will be lost, but the music is good in its own right, and will be right at home in many a coder's playlist.
Sounds like it could be transposed to a banger Techno track
Wow. Algorithmic music that actually sounds good! Congrats man, great job. All the more impressive that it fits into 256 bytes.