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Hey guys,
Just thought I'd pass on a few links to some of my very favorite NES games chiptunes and offer a chance to hear some of yours -- you can probably expect a lot of NES-related things coming my way, since I grew up playing the thing so very much (and it's still hooked up in my living room right now, aside my Wii and Xbox 360~!) The NES was so very primitive, what with it's four basic channels and one extra sound channel -- but some composers really managed to evoke a lot of feeling for something that could do little more than blip, beep, whine, and fuzz in carefully orchestrated manners...
Blaster Master - Area 7
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44086_yamet/Blaster%20Master%20-%20Stage%207.mp3
Blaster Master is my all-time favorite NES game, a perfect balance of all the things I love, and an innovation in gameplay for it's time -- everything about the game was just fun, from jumping around in SOPHIA, to blasting enemies with your cannon and special weapons (and being able to aim up!) -- as well as treading out on foot and leaving the safety of SOPHIA to fight the bosses one-on-one. It's music was spiffy and catchy to boot, just to round it all off -- but the song that stands out most is this one, I find, as it creates a suddenly tense atmosphere where most of the areas in the game beforehand had a much more casual and calm feel to them, such as the water stage.
Journey to Silius - Stage 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44084_8oi1i/Journey%20to%20Silius%20-%20Stage%201.mp3
Journey to Silius had the same composer as Blaster Master, only several years later -- the NES days were Sunsoft's prime, where their game quality was often second-to-none, and their music quality truly second-to-none. Originally penned as a Terminator movie-lisence game, the deal fell through mid-production and they changed the game's story to be independent all it's own. The game really shines as soon as the first stage begins and you hear this song, who's powerful feel really shines as you run along a post-apocalyptic landscape, taking down all sorts of mechanical monsters. The bassline was specifically enhanced in this song using the extra sound channel that was rarely used by other composers.
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse - Level 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44640_2s9ib/Akumaj%C5%8D%20Densetsu%20-%20Konami%20-%20Beginning.mp3
The Japanese version of Castlevania III (of which this MP3 is from) actually had significantly higher sound quality than the US version -- the Japanese cart had extra hardware packed in that gave the game two extra square wave channels and an additional triangle wave channel, offering it more audio depth than any other NES game I know of. The hardware had to be removed for the US release, however, as the cartridge's shape didn't accommodate it very well -- if you'd like to see the difference, here's the US version of the same song. [Click!]
Jurassic Park - Level 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44085_xww32/Jurassic%20Park%20-%20Stage%201.mp3
This song is notable for it's powerful drum beats and heavy bass thumps, something that stands out amongst a slew of compositions that seem to lack both. This song's most notable for the fact that it's actually partly a remake of Martin Galway's Comic Bakery theme, possibly the most well-known chiptune there is!
Fester's Quest - Overworld
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44083_6qcqk/Fester%27s%20Quest%20-%20Overworld.mp3
Fester's Quest was a pretty awful game, which is sad since it was produced by Sunsoft, a company who's other titles have been heralded for their general awesomeness. You play as Uncle Fester, on a quest to stop aliens from destroying the city and save the citizens in the process. Basically a terrible bastardization of the top-down scenes in Blaster Master, just with insane difficulty and stolen sound effects. (Did I mention that all of the Sunsoft games on this list reuse numerous sound effects?) I playedthis game a lot as a kid, and while the game was generally bad and extremely hard and unrewarding, it, like Castlevania III, had hardware add-ons to give it numerous more audio channels, which allowed for this rather amazingly-crafted song. Why such a hardware modification worked in this game's US release, but not Castlevania III's is not quite clear.
Kirby's Adventure - Curtains of Ice
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44087_2zw2b/Kirby%27s%20Adventure%20-%20Curtains%20of%20Ice.mp3
While this song is not particularly amazing in it's composition, I've always had a particular fondness for it. It plays on the first nighttime snow/ice stages you encounter in the game, and truthfully, ever since I was a kid, this song's always what I've associated serene, snowy nights with -- it comes to my head every time I walk home alone in the soft snow at night~
Megaman II - Wily's Fortress
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44088_prsbx/Megaman%202%20-%20Wily%20Stage%201.mp3
Here's a classic I think everyone who owned a Nintendo knew, providing they had the skill to get past all of Wily's robot masters -- this song gets stuck in everyone's head, and rightly so -- the only thing I think it lacks is a cool drumbeat (the one it has is pretty quiet and nonessenstial). I'd like to see what someone talented could do if they replicated the song perfectly in Famitracker and added some amazing drums similar to the ones in Fester's quest and Jurassic Park above.
So anyways, let me know what some of yours are!
That is, if anyone's even here to respond~ <3
Just thought I'd pass on a few links to some of my very favorite NES games chiptunes and offer a chance to hear some of yours -- you can probably expect a lot of NES-related things coming my way, since I grew up playing the thing so very much (and it's still hooked up in my living room right now, aside my Wii and Xbox 360~!) The NES was so very primitive, what with it's four basic channels and one extra sound channel -- but some composers really managed to evoke a lot of feeling for something that could do little more than blip, beep, whine, and fuzz in carefully orchestrated manners...
Blaster Master - Area 7
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44086_yamet/Blaster%20Master%20-%20Stage%207.mp3
Blaster Master is my all-time favorite NES game, a perfect balance of all the things I love, and an innovation in gameplay for it's time -- everything about the game was just fun, from jumping around in SOPHIA, to blasting enemies with your cannon and special weapons (and being able to aim up!) -- as well as treading out on foot and leaving the safety of SOPHIA to fight the bosses one-on-one. It's music was spiffy and catchy to boot, just to round it all off -- but the song that stands out most is this one, I find, as it creates a suddenly tense atmosphere where most of the areas in the game beforehand had a much more casual and calm feel to them, such as the water stage.
Journey to Silius - Stage 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44084_8oi1i/Journey%20to%20Silius%20-%20Stage%201.mp3
Journey to Silius had the same composer as Blaster Master, only several years later -- the NES days were Sunsoft's prime, where their game quality was often second-to-none, and their music quality truly second-to-none. Originally penned as a Terminator movie-lisence game, the deal fell through mid-production and they changed the game's story to be independent all it's own. The game really shines as soon as the first stage begins and you hear this song, who's powerful feel really shines as you run along a post-apocalyptic landscape, taking down all sorts of mechanical monsters. The bassline was specifically enhanced in this song using the extra sound channel that was rarely used by other composers.
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse - Level 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44640_2s9ib/Akumaj%C5%8D%20Densetsu%20-%20Konami%20-%20Beginning.mp3
The Japanese version of Castlevania III (of which this MP3 is from) actually had significantly higher sound quality than the US version -- the Japanese cart had extra hardware packed in that gave the game two extra square wave channels and an additional triangle wave channel, offering it more audio depth than any other NES game I know of. The hardware had to be removed for the US release, however, as the cartridge's shape didn't accommodate it very well -- if you'd like to see the difference, here's the US version of the same song. [Click!]
Jurassic Park - Level 1
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44085_xww32/Jurassic%20Park%20-%20Stage%201.mp3
This song is notable for it's powerful drum beats and heavy bass thumps, something that stands out amongst a slew of compositions that seem to lack both. This song's most notable for the fact that it's actually partly a remake of Martin Galway's Comic Bakery theme, possibly the most well-known chiptune there is!
Fester's Quest - Overworld
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44083_6qcqk/Fester%27s%20Quest%20-%20Overworld.mp3
Fester's Quest was a pretty awful game, which is sad since it was produced by Sunsoft, a company who's other titles have been heralded for their general awesomeness. You play as Uncle Fester, on a quest to stop aliens from destroying the city and save the citizens in the process. Basically a terrible bastardization of the top-down scenes in Blaster Master, just with insane difficulty and stolen sound effects. (Did I mention that all of the Sunsoft games on this list reuse numerous sound effects?) I playedthis game a lot as a kid, and while the game was generally bad and extremely hard and unrewarding, it, like Castlevania III, had hardware add-ons to give it numerous more audio channels, which allowed for this rather amazingly-crafted song. Why such a hardware modification worked in this game's US release, but not Castlevania III's is not quite clear.
Kirby's Adventure - Curtains of Ice
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44087_2zw2b/Kirby%27s%20Adventure%20-%20Curtains%20of%20Ice.mp3
While this song is not particularly amazing in it's composition, I've always had a particular fondness for it. It plays on the first nighttime snow/ice stages you encounter in the game, and truthfully, ever since I was a kid, this song's always what I've associated serene, snowy nights with -- it comes to my head every time I walk home alone in the soft snow at night~
Megaman II - Wily's Fortress
http://www.upload-mp3.com/files/44088_prsbx/Megaman%202%20-%20Wily%20Stage%201.mp3
Here's a classic I think everyone who owned a Nintendo knew, providing they had the skill to get past all of Wily's robot masters -- this song gets stuck in everyone's head, and rightly so -- the only thing I think it lacks is a cool drumbeat (the one it has is pretty quiet and nonessenstial). I'd like to see what someone talented could do if they replicated the song perfectly in Famitracker and added some amazing drums similar to the ones in Fester's quest and Jurassic Park above.
So anyways, let me know what some of yours are!
That is, if anyone's even here to respond~ <3
