Best soundtrack formats from the pre-digital era?

[ThunderPeel2001]

While everyone knows the Amiga version of the Secret of Monkey Island has the best music for that particular game, how do people feel about the PC versions or the other pre-digital audio games? (ie. everything before Full Throttle).

 

The reason I ask is that conventional wisdom states that Roland MT-32 is the most coveted versions of those original soundtracks, simply because it required an expensive piece of hardware/one extra download to listen to. And sure technically the sound quality is better... but I was playing around with DREAMM and Day of the Tentacle the other day and I think I preferred the Adlib version of the soundtrack. At least in certain rooms (eg. Jed and Ned's sculpture room).

 

Does anyone actively prefer the Adlib versions of soundtracks over the Roland ones? It's been so ingrained into me that "Roland was the best" that I've taken it for granted that anyone might actually prefer the "lesser" formats.

 

And what about the composers? Which versions are their preferred versions? Did they work harder on the Adlib versions and only see the Roland versions as nice extras, or did they always compose for Roland first?  Would be interesting to know (and it's probably answered in a 4 hour conversation with one of the somewhere ) ( @danielalbu) 

Edited February 29 by ThunderPeel2001

[TimeGentleman]

Yeah, I've always preferred SoundBlaster over Roland. Might be because that's how I originally played them, but to me it sounds beefier and more organic. Roland is too weedy and synthy for my tastes.

[Torbjörn Andersson]

On 2/28/2024 at 7:12 PM, ThunderPeel2001 said:

While everyone knows the Amiga version of the Secret of Monkey Island has the best music for that particular game

 

Err... we do? Maybe I've listened to sub-par recordings, but the ones I've heard didn't impress me. It just sounded a bit... I don't know... metallic? Toylike? I like the MT-32 and AdLib versions better. I'm not sure where I rate the Macintosh version, because I honestly don't know how close ScummVM's emulation of it is. (There have been improvements to the sound in earlier Mac SCUMM games recently, so I'm hoping that one will be next.)

[Scummbuddy]

https://youtu.be/DoVi1__jNsI?si=NzgDez7i0SpPw9L5

[Remi]

5 hours ago, Torbjörn Andersson said:

 

Err... we do? 

We do!

 

We. Do. 😠

[danielalbu]

On 2/28/2024 at 8:12 PM, ThunderPeel2001 said:

While everyone knows the Amiga version of the Secret of Monkey Island has the best music for that particular game, how do people feel about the PC versions or the other pre-digital audio games? (ie. everything before Full Throttle).

 

The reason I ask is that conventional wisdom states that Roland MT-32 is the most coveted versions of those original soundtracks, simply because it required an expensive piece of hardware/one extra download to listen to. And sure technically the sound quality is better... but I was playing around with DREAMM and Day of the Tentacle the other day and I think I preferred the Adlib version of the soundtrack. At least in certain rooms (eg. Jed and Ned's sculpture room).

 

Does anyone actively prefer the Adlib versions of soundtracks over the Roland ones? It's been so ingrained into me that "Roland was the best" that I've taken it for granted that anyone might actually prefer the "lesser" formats.

 

And what about the composers? Which versions are their preferred versions? Did they work harder on the Adlib versions and only see the Roland versions as nice extras, or did they always compose for Roland first?  Would be interesting to know (and it's probably answered in a 4 hour conversation with one of the somewhere ) ( @danielalbu) 

It's answered in some of the 4 hour conversations

Including some of the ones I already recorded and have yet to release (with Sierra composers Neal Grandstaff and Mark Seibert)

 

The short answer is: The composers composed for the Roland and then "downgraded" them for Adlib and downgraded again for the PC speaker.

 

A lot of the times I prefer the Adlib / Soundblaster versions because that's how I remember them from my childhood.

 

Edited March 1 by danielalbu

[Jake]

I’ll always have a fondness for the scratchy and weird Mac instrument library the early LucasArts games had because that’s what I grew up with, but at this point my favorite is the MT-32 version. It’s the only version of Monkey Island 2 you can actually turn up the volume for and it sounds better and better. 
 

(Also, I thought by the DOTT or Hit the Road era they had moved on to composing for SoundBlaster/Adlib cards? My memory was that MT-32 was the baseline in the early days but eventually they moved off it. Maybe not?)

[Torbjörn Andersson]

5 hours ago, Jake said:

I’ll always have a fondness for the scratchy and weird Mac instrument library the early LucasArts games had because that’s what I grew up with

 

Which games in particular? ScummVM has supported the Mac instruments from Loom, Monkey Island 1, Monkey Island 2, and Fate of Atlantis for quite some time. A more accurate player for Loom, and a completely new player for Last Crusade appeared in the development version recently, so I'm hoping that means a Monkey Island 1 will follow. But I believe Day of the Tentacle and Sam & Max also had custom Mac instruments, and those aren't supported at this time.

 

I'm always hoping someone who has actually heard the real thing could check it out to see how accurate it is.

 

5 hours ago, Jake said:

(Also, I thought by the DOTT or Hit the Road era they had moved on to composing for SoundBlaster/Adlib cards? My memory was that MT-32 was the baseline in the early days but eventually they moved off it. Maybe not?)

 

At least in the games that use iMUSE, each piece of music can appear in several forms, each tagged with an identifier to specify what hardware it's intended for. The DOS versions of Monkey Island 2 and Fate of Atlantis have music tagged as ADL (AdLib), ROL (MT-32), and even some SPK (PC speaker). Day of the Tentacle has ADL, ROL, and GMD (General MIDI).  In Sam & Max, everything appears to be simply tagged as MIDI.

 

Based on some very quick testing, so feel free to correct me.

[Jake]

I think it was Hit the Road I was thinking of that was made on/for general midi as opposed to a Roland thing. Zaarin, whose name I can never remember on this forum, would know better than me. (@s-island)
 

And my Mac music memories were MI2 and FOA.

[Torbjörn Andersson]

3 hours ago, Jake said:

And my Mac music memories were MI2 and FOA.

 

Ah yes, those have yet another tag for its version of the music, though the files still contain all (?) of the others. Though they're probably based on the MT-32 ones, because the instruments seem like a subset of it. At least in my copy of MI2 (which comes from the LucasArts Mac CD Game Pack), some of the Mac music is missing towards the end. ScummVM optionally falls back on using the Mac instruments with the MT-32 tracks, and it sounds good enough to me:

 

 

Edited March 2 by Torbjörn Andersson

[Bertrand Guégan]

I do personally prefer the adlib/soundblaster versions. Mainly for nostalgic reasons I suppose, but I really like the smooth and organic sound of it. 

 

For anyone interested about 90's PC music history (Adlib, Soundblaster, MT32, MIDI, you name it..), I highly recommend reading "History of PC game MIDI" (attached file).  

 

When I composed the soundtrack for Lucy Dreaming (a point and click adventure in pixel art), I did a lot of research about how to make music that could sound "era genuine".

This article helped me a lot and it was basically the start of my journey in that kind of music. A few month later I ended up composing a dual soundtrack for the game (Roland MT-32 and Adlib/Soundblaster) 😂

History_of_PC_Game_MIDI.pdf

[Serge]

On 3/2/2024 at 5:32 AM, Jake said:

I think it was Hit the Road I was thinking of that was made on/for general midi as opposed to a Roland thing. Zaarin, whose name I can never remember on this forum, would know better than me. (@s-island)

 

Both DOTT and Hit the Road were both still made for a Roland thing 🙂 - just not MT-32, but Roland SoundCanvas (55, I believe, but Zaarin knows better). I don't think there has been a MIDI-based SCUMM game ever that was originally composed (or arranged) for SoundBlaster or Adlib. But of course, that doesn't mean people aren't allowed to prefer them. 😁

[Jake]

Got it! Thanks serge. 

[Laserschwert]

I think it was in Daniel's interview with Clint Bajakian, where he mentioned that the Adlib versions were (always?) some kind of manual down-convert from the Roland tracks.