I was gonna say Dune but its OPL3...

Most adventures really. From Lucasarts and Sierra take your pick.

I liked the DOS Lemmings more than the Amiga Lemmings soundtrack.

carlostex wrote:

I was gonna say Dune but its OPL3...

Dune 1 is actually mostly OPL2... There are only what like, three or two songs that actually use OPL3 in them.

Dune's Amiga music is just as amazing as the OPL2 music though and it has a track that you only hear in the "OST" CD.

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Most adventures really. From Lucasarts and Sierra take your pick.

Lucasarts did AdLib better than Sierra... I've listened to the few Sierra games (Silpheed, Police Quest 2, Sorcerian) and the AdLib sounds completely horrible and lazily done.

EDIT: Now that I think about it, Lazer Squad had a better music theme to it on the Amiga than the OPL2 theme.

Yea but what about all the later ones? SQ4 was on the Amiga. Fewer colours, heaps of floppy discs and worse music. All the Dynamix games. The list goes on. Wing Commander...

The Stellar 7 music on the Amiga is trying to mimic the MT-32 from what I can tell... It get's rather hilariously annoying sounding when you get to the final stage.

I never played or head the later Sierra games because I got fed up with how the music guy treated the AdLib like a POS. Meanwhile you have games like Tyrian, Dune, KGB, Mega Race 1, and a few others that use it to the point where a sampled based synth just sounds pale in comparison.

KGB on the Amiga also features a track that doesn't appear on the PC version and it actually sounds quite nice. Though the PC version's OPL2 music is much more interesting there was nothing really that bad about the work done on the Amiga port, the artist was just that good with computer sound chips I guess...

DracoNihil wrote:

The Stellar 7 music on the Amiga is trying to mimic the MT-32 from what I can tell... It get's rather hilariously annoying sounding when you get to the final stage.

I never played or head the later Sierra games because I got fed up with how the music guy treated the AdLib like a POS. Meanwhile you have games like Tyrian, Dune, KGB, Mega Race 1, and a few others that use it to the point where a sampled based synth just sounds pale in comparison.

KGB on the Amiga also features a track that doesn't appear on the PC version and it actually sounds quite nice. Though the PC version's OPL2 music is much more interesting there was nothing really that bad about the work done on the Amiga port, the artist was just that good with computer sound chips I guess...

Using Sierra's Amiga ports as a comparison is slightly unfair, Sierra never had a real handle on the Amiga. The 16-color PC EGA versions of King's Quest V and Space Quest IV look better than the 32-color Amiga versions in my opinion. Even their support for the Atari ST was better because you could hook up an MT-32 to the built-in MIDI interface of every ST.

Why don't we just go all the way and decide exactly what were the earliest parts that you could assemble to build a PC that exceeded Amiga in every way? CPU, video, sound, graphical interface,etc.

That's easy. For me it was a 386 with VGA and Sound Blaster. BUT there are a TON of older games that are EGA and PC Speaker only on the PC. Not much you can about these.

Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

EGA and PC Speaker only on the PC. Not much you can about these.

Yes you can!!!

UltimaPatcher.exe

UltimaPatcher,

Ultima 1 to Ultima 9, Savage Empire, Martian Dreams, Ultima Uderworld, Ultima Uderworld 2, and Serpant Isle.

It does. "256 VGA Colors and MIDI sound for Ultima3.
1 - Vidio: VGA (256-color)
2 - Music: MIDI Music
3 - Autosave: Enabled
4 - Frame Limiter:
5 - Moon Phases:
6 - Save & Quit
7 - Quit without Saving

option: 1
option: 2

Ok, ok, fair enough 🤣

Well this topic certainly degenerated in a rather amusing way...

Not being specific to OPL2 alone,

1. Prince of Persia 1 music sounds better in OPL, imho. (I even prefer it to the MT-32 music which was added later on).

2. Secret of Monkey Island - I prefer the FM music to Amiga's.

3. Drakkhen had good OPL music, when you're moving around the countryside.

I guess CyberSphere doesn't count. OPL3... but also had a previous Amiga incarnation.

The OPL3 I'm willing to accept minorly but it's just the fact that I've been hearing really good music done on just the measly OPL2 that is the reason I started this thread.

Most FM Synthesis for DOS games does not really take advantage of the OPL3 features anyway.

Every game that supports FM music supports OPL2. Only few games were written to use the OPL3 (I think Descent is one, that I can think of right now. Even then, there's the option to choose the OPL2 in that game). Hence all games that supported OPL3 also had the OPL2 option in addition. In fact, if a game is said to support "Sound Blaster" in the specs label, it's understood to be OPL2. (With or without digitized voice support).

OPL3, though more advanced, did not last as long as the previous OPL generation due to the advent of General MIDI and the "wavetables".

You can simply choose the OPL2 option and compare with Amiga counterparts, even if the game has the option to use the OPL3 in the PC.

Amiga, though it had more sound channels in the beginning, against the OPL2 generaion SB cards, tended to sound monotonous due to heavy use of the strings synth across many games and started sounding monotonous. You come to know what type of music to expect even before you start playing the game. Yes, it was more realistic with digitized drum samples and so on in the MODs, but some samples were quite poor, and you can hear the distortion in these games. OPLx sound cleaner, though not as realistic sounding as the MODs.

Amiga captured the hearts of many in the sound department due to the capabilities of the sound chip to make use of the MOD-type of formats extensively from Day 1, which sounded more realistic - say the drums and piano against the weak FM sounds. And it also supported digitized voices, when all the PC users had was the Adlib. Or worse still, the PC speaker.

Of course, it would be unfair to compare MT-32/LAPC-I/SC being used in the PC with Amiga. It's just miles ahead.

And to add to my previous list :

4. Ultima VI

5. King's Quest V

6. Wing Commander

Versaitlity - a word that I would choose to describe the PC sound scene - during the reign of the DOS era. So many sound cards to choose from, and so many varieties. A programmer's nightmare, but a classic pc enthusiast's heaven.

Most games used the OPL3 solely for stereo sound output. The lack of voices hurt the Amiga more than anything. Zany Golf is quite painful to hear compared to the Apple IIgs version. The latter can output 15 voices (paired oscillator mode on the 5503DOC), plenty for a lively soundtrack and sound effects. On the Amiga you have the sound effects stealing voices from the music all the time!