VOGONS


First post, by ElectricMonk

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I found a wikipedia entry on MT-32 compatible games, and it mentioned a few that relied on bugs found in MT-32 OLD, and would hang/crash MT-32 new, but it also included tons that only support it via GM (sub-optimal at best).

Is there a master list somewhere that includes ALL games that were composed on the MT-32, or even a list of which synths (MT-32/SC-55/etc) were used to create the soundtracks for DOS games?

Lately, after crashing and burning while attempting to make a stacked soundfont of the best instrument samples I can find, I've decided to stick with the synth each games soundtrack was created on, to hear it the way it was intended. I do switch to OPL3 sf2, to hear how they *used* to sound on my crappy FM synth cards, and I'll use Musyng Kite (~900MB) for some GM soundtracks, just to see how it improves the experience (hint: not always)

Speaking of giant soundfonts, has there ever been a mirror of the Crisis GM 3.0.1 sf? I've tried downloading it from the author multiple times, but the transfer always dies partway through. I'm a network engineer, so I know the issue isn't on my end, but the help on the bismuth forums just blame the end-user and leave it at that. Very frustrating.

Reply 1 of 79, by raymangold

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It's really impossible to find a 'complete' list of anything due to the fact there are so many games that not everyone can know at once. For example, if you take a look through the 'games that support glide' lists, there are many glide games that I own that many people don't even know about and never have added to the list. The one on wikipedia is probably as complete as you're going to get.

In regards to SC-55 stuff, typically that can also encompass anything that's 'general midi' (although of course a few SC-55 exceptions). The SC-88 typically is a better choice as it also has an SC-55 mode.

"crappy FM synth cards"

--> OPL2/OPL3 in my opinion are quite fantastic. There are some games that sound 'crappy' in their MT-32 ports (such as Dune 1-- a fine example of where the MT-32 actually sounds bad for a game).
Also you have to keep in mind that there are many OPL3 clones that respond to FM synthesis commands differently... like ESS's EFSM, Crystal Semiconductor's Crystal FM... and of course the Adlib Gold which does oversampling to the OPL3 output giving it an almost surround effect.

And in regards to sound fonts... they don't behave like OPL3 because it's a real synthesizer dynamically doing everything in realtime. A soundfont is a static sample that cannot change ADSR, waveforms, etc (very similar to a ROMpler). You might be able to get a basic OPL3 soundfont for the windows midi instrument set, but there are no soundfonts for programs like adlib tracker 2, FM King, HSC tracker, Edlib, etc. Simply because... it's impossible. They use custom commands and parameters.

Reply 2 of 79, by Mau1wurf1977

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^^ spot on 😀

I've added a few games I picked up on while doing my Ultimate MT-32 tutorial video: http://youtu.be/5NUQpAZeAdo

Firstly you will need all the units and you need to play the game deep enough to become familiar with how it sounds. Then play it on the other unit and if you are lucky and there is a difference you might pick up on it.

So just focus on the games that you actually want to play, all the popular ones from Sierra, Lucasarts, Origin, the list is quite accurate. Many companies didn't (ab)use the MT-32 to the extent Sierra or Dynamix did with their custom sounds. So there might not be that many other games. If the games "just" do basic music then I doubt you will find any differences.

My website with reviews, demos, drivers, tutorials and more...
My YouTube channel

Reply 3 of 79, by Spikey

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I made one for Sierra games a while back, you can find it here:

http://www.sierramusiccentral.com/assorted/Hardware.doc

Any questions or revisions needed, let me know.

As far as FM synthesis goes, they can sound indeed crappy, like where the composer intended the music to play on a MT-32 or Sound Canvas (i.e. almost every Sierra game), but they shine when intentionally composed for. Loom is one example, almost any game made by Apogee software is another, Xargon is an Epic Megagames special favourite of mine.

Reply 4 of 79, by konc

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raymangold wrote:

...if you take a look through the 'games that support glide' lists, there are many glide games that I own that many people don't even know about and never have added to the list.

Sorry to deviate and not having anything useful to add to the this thread, but seriously, I'm hoping to enlighten us and contribute to these lists.

Reply 5 of 79, by HunterZ

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I guess it was already mentioned, but the community has tried to capture a list here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MT-32-c … _computer_games

It really is intended to capture all games that support the MT-32 family, as well as whether or not the soundtracks were originally composed with another synth in mind (e.g. General MIDI, Adlib OPL2, etc.).

I just completed a pass at fixing the IBM PC list links, and finally converted it to a sortable table. I've been meaning to do this for years now! It's probably good that I procrastinated, as I'm fairly good at using sed and regular expressions now, which cut down on the manual labor.

Reply 6 of 79, by Mok

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HunterZ wrote:

I guess it was already mentioned, but the community has tried to capture a list here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MT-32-c … _computer_games

It really is intended to capture all games that support the MT-32 family, as well as whether or not the soundtracks were originally composed with another synth in mind (e.g. General MIDI, Adlib OPL2, etc.).

I just completed a pass at fixing the IBM PC list links, and finally converted it to a sortable table. I've been meaning to do this for years now! It's probably good that I procrastinated, as I'm fairly good at using sed and regular expressions now, which cut down on the manual labor.

The list is very incomplete though. Quick compare with the list of hoot drivers I created at some point (unfortunately while I can tell these titles have music, I can't really say if out-of-the-box so will require verification... but at least a pointer where to look):

1942: The Pacific Air War
Across the Rhine
Altered Destiny
Ashes of Empire
Back to the Future II
Back to the Future III
Bram Stoker's Dracula
Buck Rogers 2: Matrix Cubed
Campaign
Campaign II
Cannon Fodder
Captive
Carrier Strike
Challenge of 5 Realms
Champions of Krynn
Championship Manager 92
Chip's Challenge
Daemon's Gate
Dark Queen of Krynn
Daughter of Serpents
David Leadbetter's Golf
Day of the Viper
Days of Thunder
Deluxe Trivial Pursuit
Die Höhlenwelt Saga: Der Leuchtende Kristall
Dungeon Hack
E-Motion / The Game of Harmony
Ecstatica
European Champions
F-14 Tomcat
F-19 Stealth Fighter
Fade to Black
FIFA International Soccer
Floor 13
G-Force (by Simis, according to moby it's a re-release of mig-29 super fulcrum, but the original is Adlib only)
Gateworld (and later parts)
Gazza II
Global Effect
Hardball IV
Hexx
Humans III
Imperium
Inherit the Earth
Jack Nicklaus Golf & Course Design: Signature Edition
Jack Nicklaus' Unlimited Golf
Joe Montana Football
John Madden Football II
KGB
Keef the Thief
King's Table: The Legend of Ragnarok
LA Law: The Computer Game
Lands of Lore
Last Action Hero
Legends of Valour
Lemmings 3D
Les Manley in: Lost in L.A.
Les Manley in: Search for the King
Loopz
Low Blow
Magic Candle II
Magic Carpet II
MegaTraveller II
Moonstone
Nicky Boom
Nicky Boom 2
Omar Sharif on Bridge
Pacific Islands
Pinball Dreams
Pirates! Gold
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Power Drift
Rags to Riches: The Financial Market Simulation
Raiden
Rally Championships
Red Storm Rising
Rome: Pathway to Power
Rules of Engagement
Sargon V: World Class Chess
Shadoworlds
Shanghai II: Dragon's Eye
Silent Service II
Slater & Charlie Go Camping
Slipstream 5000
Snoopy's Game Club
Space Crusade
Space MAX
Special Forces
Spellcraft: Aspects of Valor
SSN-21 Seawolf
Stratego
Super Space Invaders
Task Force 1942
Terminator 2: The Arcade Game
The Bard's Tale Construction Set
The Bard's Tale III
The Games '92 - España
The Godfather
The Killing Cloud
The Legacy
The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Serrated Scalpel
The Manhole
The Return of Medusa
The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants
Theatre of Death
Theme Park
Thunderhawk AH-73M
Tornado
Troddlers
Trog
Troika
Twilight 2000
Ultimate NFL Coaches Club Football
War in the Gulf
Whizz
Wizardry VII: Crusaders of the Dark Savant
Wonderland
WWF Wrestlemania
XF5700 Mantis Experimental Fighter

And this is probably still very incomplete 🙁

(Un)related curiosities:

Putty Squad (unreleased, demo only, but all the music is in)

PC version of Cannon Fodder actually includes vocals for the famous (on amiga) intro song but disabled as they probably failed to make it working for their deadline (some words are cut, you can force it and mt32+sb by altering intro executable). Maybe some later re-releases actually play it properly? No idea.

Some from "not available" list actually have mt-32 support, likely not working due to driver bugs/missing files:

- Fatal Racing/Whiplash (probably missing a short remapping sysex gm->mt32, available in other gremlin games from that time)
- Discworld (supports emulating GM via sample.mt, AFAIR cd version has broken OPL music too, due to wrong timbre file emulating MT32 and not GM, unlike the floppy version)
- Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo (has special MT-32 versions of all of the songs, no idea if it's really broken in-game)

Reply 7 of 79, by HunterZ

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Please consider updating the list! It's only as good as everyone in the community makes it.

It occurred to me that J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings Vol I & II list support for MT-32 but that they are not listed. Since I have those games and an MT-32, I should test them to see if they should be added to the main list, or the false list.

I just added wiz7 because I've played it with my MT-32.

Given when it was released, I can't imagine that Fade to Black is a native MT-32 game.

Edit: Tested and added the LotR games. I think they may have been composed more with Adlib in mind. The second game sounds better, but it also sounds good on SB Pro because it takes advantage of its stereo OPL capability.

Reply 8 of 79, by Mok

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HunterZ wrote:

Given when it was released, I can't imagine that Fade to Black is a native MT-32 game.

It uses MSS3, so it was only up to the game creators to support it or not. And in this case, there are special versions of each song for OPL/GM/MT32 and AFAIR GUS. Unfortunately, the music isn't anything special 😖

Reply 10 of 79, by collector

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Not a single Sierra game in that entire list when Sierra was one of the most prominent in the use of MT-32.

The Sierra Help Pages -- New Sierra Game Installers -- Sierra Game Patches -- New Non-Sierra Game Installers

Reply 11 of 79, by Mok

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Stiletto wrote:

Wow, a Mok sighting! Hi Mok! 😀

I actually visit this forum quite often, just don't write. I'm not doing anything interesting with retro stuff for quite some time 🙁

collector wrote:

Not a single Sierra game in that entire list when Sierra was one of the most prominent in the use of MT-32.

If you are talking about the mini list I posted above, it only contains titles that aren't already on the wikipedia list posted by HunterZ. And actually there's "Slater & Charlie Go Camping" so... fail 😏

Reply 12 of 79, by HunterZ

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I didn't create the wikipedia list - it looks like NewRisingSun started it in 2006 - I just converted it from a bulleted list into a sortable table, and updated some of the links and added a few entries.

Reply 13 of 79, by Kirben

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What is the best way to confirm which games take advantage of the Roland MT-32? it is clear in earlier games that only offer a Roland MT-32 option for music, but not so clear on later games which offer both General MIDI and Roland MT-32 options for music.

I'm using DosBox, with the Munt emulator as a test environment.

Mok wrote:

PC version of Cannon Fodder actually includes vocals for the famous (on amiga) intro song but disabled as they probably failed to make it working for their deadline (some words are cut, you can force it and mt32+sb by altering intro executable). Maybe some later re-releases actually play it properly? No idea.

Do you know the specific changes required to enable mt32+sb in the introduction of Cannon Fodder?

Reply 15 of 79, by Spikey

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Generally speaking, almost any game which has both options was composed for General MIDI. Certainly true for 1993 and later, can go either way 1991-1992 (most Sierra games in this time period were MT-32 games, with a couple exceptions like QFG3, see my list for details). Once General MIDI came in as the standard, dedicated MT-32 support died off pretty quickly, although Sierra (for example) didn't make the switch until mid-92, and even then supported the MT-32 pretty faithfully until mid-93, when the GM scores were simply routed to the MT-32 with no additional effort other than the MT-32 being sent a GM preset bank (of sorts).

Reply 16 of 79, by bloodbat

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I took some time to correct, streamline, make an open format (PDF) and complete Spikey's list. The bulk of the work's still his 😀.
I find alphabetical lists much more convenient when combing for folders or D-Fend profiles, so here are two versions: one sorted alphabetically and the other by year, both group together games by their hardware (i.e all AGI Tandy games are in one section, all MT-32 in another section, etc.).
Enjoy!

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  • Filename
    sierra games music by year.pdf
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    428 downloads
    File comment
    The list by years.
    File license
    Fair use/fair dealing exception
  • Filename
    sierra games music by name.pdf
    File size
    38.75 KiB
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    355 downloads
    File comment
    The list by alphabet.
    File license
    Fair use/fair dealing exception

Reply 19 of 79, by PhilsComputerLab

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Great list!

Interesting with Dagger of Amon Ra, I always though it was a General MIDI game. Must play it again one day 😀

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