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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 16, 2017 12:08:46 GMT -5
www.giantbomb.com/profile/alianger/lists/top-early-game-music-1980-1984/360019/I'm mainly looking for stuff that's longer than 5-15 second jingles or that's at least technically impressive for the period. I stopped at 1984 since the game music world kinda blows up both for arcades and home consoles after that with the FM chips, prog-style electronic works on C64, and the Amiga. Then there's not a huge change in terms of sound quality or style (with a few exceptions like the ambient Solvalou OST and the laserdisc FMV games' OSTs) for a few years until redbook audio in games happens. I'm also aware that cutting it there means you miss out on a lot of later music that really pushes each sound chip, but I have made lists per sound chip already and they are overwhelmingly big.
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Post by condroid on Jun 16, 2017 17:31:43 GMT -5
Just some random thoughts: Audio tapes were a popular medium in the early 80s and some developers used them to store music that was played alongside the game. This was pretty common on Atari computers where games often featured an audio track ( sample 1, sample 2, sample 3). Other examples for this would be Journey (Arcade) or Deus Ex Machina (ZX Spectrum) which has 40+ minutes of music and narration. Completely missing are all the laser disc games from that era (like Dragon's Lair, Cobra Command, Thayer's Quest, etc) Look up Gary Gilbertson, who also did a few game soundtracks for the Atari 800 The PC-8801mkII SR was released in 1985, and was the first model to feature an FM chip. That means that all the PC-88 games you have listed either have a wrong release date, or had their FM soundtrack added in a later version. There are also a few games with incorrect release dates: Comic Bakery (C64,1986), Legend of Kage (Arcade,1985), Elite (C64,1985)
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Post by backgroundnoise on Jun 16, 2017 18:04:42 GMT -5
Not sure if the quality is exactly what you are looking for, but here are some suggestions: Digger (1983): Popcorn via the PC speaker: I liked it well enough; granted, it was one of the few DOS games on my old black and yellow machine that had anything worth listening to, so I might be biased (still beats listening to PC speaker Yankee Doodle Dandee); couldn't find a music only video; Alley Cat (1984): the weird thing about the game is that the Tandy 3 Voice music was available via the PCjr but not any of the Tandy machines even though both had the same music card; Circus Charlie (1984): couldn't find any audio playing at the proper speed; Dragon Buster (1984): I personally find the soundtrack painful to listen to, but it's still music; Antarctic Adventure (1984): it might have supported the Konami SCC, but the hardware wasn't available untill 1987
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 16, 2017 18:20:05 GMT -5
condroid: Huh, interesting! Did they ever play in sync with gameplay? Is sample 3 showing a cutscene synced with the tape? I'm not sure I should count it since it seems like more of a separate medium, kinda like maps that come with the game instead of being in the game. If the spectrum example is synced to gameplay then I'll add it, that's really cool and ahead of its time. Nice audio quality too. I was aware of Dragon's Lair though I couldn't find a music rip when making the list and later forgot about it. I'll look into the rest, thanks. Edit: For Legend of Kage, I went with this date which could be wrong of course: www.arcade-history.com/?page=detail&id=1369
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 16, 2017 19:25:24 GMT -5
backgroundnoise: Is this the right speed (Digger)?: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digger_(video_game)"Digger used a pulse width modulation sound system which was unusual and advanced for 1983.[citation needed]" I'm wondering about that because it sounds very much like a Beeper chip when it's not doing anything too fancy: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj8nCdspavY&t=9m5sLinked to the vgmrips upload for Circus Charlie. Dragon Buster sounds alright.. up until 1m50s hehe. Thanks.
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Post by condroid on Jun 16, 2017 21:21:47 GMT -5
condroid: Huh, interesting! Did they ever play in sync with gameplay? Is sample 3 showing a cutscene synced with the tape? I'm not sure I should count it since it seems like more of a separate medium, kinda like maps that come with the game instead of being in the game. If the spectrum example is synced to gameplay then I'll add it, that's really cool and ahead of its time. Nice audio quality too. Edit: For Legend of Kage, I went with this date which could be wrong of course: www.arcade-history.com/?page=detail&id=1369The tape examples all run in sync with the game, although they all work a little bit differently: Atari dual track tapes: these are essentially regular stereo tapes, but only one track is used for game data. The other track contains audio that can be used in various ways. Very common was to play audio while the game was loading, but there are also cases where this was used in-game for tutorials, narration, or simply background music. Here is a better example for how this worked. Journey: the arcade machine has a cassette player that is started at some point in the game. Deus Ex Machina: contains a separate audio tape that has to be run in sync with the game. re: Legend of Kage - check the trivia section of that page. Although the copyright says 1984, the game was actually released in 1985. Some other suggestions: 1980: Rally-X (Arcade), Carnival (Arcade, cover)1981: Amidar (Arcade), New Rally-X (Arcade)1982: Mr. Do's Castle (Arcade), Alpine Ski (Arcade), Jungle King (Arcade)1983: Libble Rabble (Arcade), Up'n Down (Arcade), Super Pipeline (C64, mostly covers), Moon Dust (C64, art game with computer-generated music)1984: Flight Path 737 (C64), Tube Panic (Arcade), Aerobics (Atari), Break Street (C64)
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 17, 2017 8:35:21 GMT -5
Alright, thanks. Removed Kage and added most of the rest, Moondust is already in there.
Edit: Good remixes or later chiptune versions of the tracks on the list are also welcome.
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Post by condroid on Jun 18, 2017 16:11:32 GMT -5
Alright, thanks. Removed Kage and added most of the rest, Moondust is already in there. Edit: Good remixes or later chiptune versions of the tracks on the list are also welcome. I just want to mention that these Atari tapes are just some random examples I found on Youtube. There are a ton of other games with tape soundtracks that you could list. Most of them are pretty cheesy but some actually have legitimately good music.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 18, 2017 17:41:03 GMT -5
Yeah, pretty cool. I'm not really finding anything good on YT so any links are appreciated.
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Post by backgroundnoise on Jun 23, 2017 7:11:00 GMT -5
If this is to be believed, pulse width modulation was used to playback digitized sound (pitch-shifting seems like a more likely answer). The music for Digger is at the proper speed. Altering the cycles doesn't change the tempo, just the pitch and length of the notes up to a certain point until you can't hear it anymore at around 50 000. The only other information I was able to find about the sound is a sentence on the FAQ for a fan made remastered version ("The noise made when you complete a level is polyphonic if no background music has been played since the game was started.").
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Jun 23, 2017 8:04:37 GMT -5
Nice link there, thanks.
Seems it should sound more advanced if PWM was used, but yeah. I'll leave its entry as is for now.
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Post by phediuk on Mar 4, 2018 3:02:09 GMT -5
Snafu for the Intellivision (1981) might be the first console game with actual music.
Also note that Russell Lieblich worked on the game solely as a composer (i.e., he didn't design the game itself), which might also be a first, at least in the console space.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Mar 4, 2018 6:25:15 GMT -5
Thanks, added it to the site.
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Post by condroid on Mar 4, 2018 8:18:18 GMT -5
There are earlier Intellivision games with music like the one below. The copyright says 1978 but according to Mobygames this was released a year later.
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Post by ommadawnyawn2 on Mar 4, 2018 9:14:19 GMT -5
Alright, cool. I've decided not to cover very short jingles though, or anything pre-1980 unless it's more than that.
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