Sega Genesis vs. SNES!?

[Jrecee]

So this tfm music maker thing, does it just have settings or plugins that emulate the genesis sound chip? I'd love to make genesis music. . . .

[jeffro11]

You have to create the sounds by setting each operator (4 per) per instrument. Each instrument also has channels, 0-7. 0 being used for harsh distorted guitar sounds, 7 for mellow calm notes. Or you can start using the application without much knowledge by simply visiting project2612.org and downloading the instruments from the most popular genesis games. Which is super handy because then you get to see how the real instruments were setup in your favorite games.

The YM2612 has 6 FM channels for you to use, and one DAC (sound samples, like a bass kick). The genesis also has a secondary sound chip SN76489, which gives you 3 additional PSG (square wave) channels and one Noise channel.

Tfm Music Maker sadly cannot utilize the SN76489 or the DAC on the YM2612. However you can get around that limitation and make some killer tracks pretty easily. On the website where the download is you can watch a simple tutorial which shows how to lay out a beat.

[flamepanther]

You know, I was thinking about it, and although the SPC700 couldn't emulate an FM synthesizer as someone suggested, there are a few ways developers could have simulated the distinctive "FM synth" sound on an SNES if they had so desired.

The most obvious route would be to sample an FM synthesizer. There are obvious limitations to this, but if done very carefully, it would work somewhat. I've heard an amazingly accurate recreation of the Spring Yard Zone BGM done in Impulse Tracker, although I suspect it uses more sound channels than the SNES has available in order to accomplish this. The results would probably have been awful, but it would have indeed resembled something (poorly) made with an FM synthesizer. If the composition was deliberately minimal enough, maybe something decent could have been done that way.

Alternatively, the SPC is able to accept direct streaming audio from the game ROM. Record a loop or an entire track from an actual FM synthesizer, and you've got as many voice channels as you care to put into the original composition. This would have been very costly though. If a developer wanted to go this route, they might as well record a real band instead of an FM synthesizer.

Lastly, it should have been possible to get real FM synthesis on the SNES by including a synthesizer in a game cartridge as an enhancement chip. That option seems as excessive as the others, but IMO would have been the most likely to happen. Sticking a RISC co-processor in a game cart to draw polygons for Star Fox, or to accelerate sprite movement and draw wire frames in Rockman X 2 & 3 seems excessive and unlikely as well, but it was done. Obviously nobody thought putting FM synthesis in an SNES game was necessary or worthwhile.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

You know, I was thinking about it, and although the SPC700 couldn't emulate an FM synthesizer as someone suggested, there are a few ways developers could have simulated the distinctive "FM synth" sound on an SNES if they had so desired.

The most obvious route would be to sample an FM synthesizer. There are obvious limitations to this, but if done very carefully, it would work somewhat. I've heard an amazingly accurate recreation of the Spring Yard Zone BGM done in Impulse Tracker, although I suspect it uses more sound channels than the SNES has available in order to accomplish this. The results would probably have been awful, but it would have indeed resembled something (poorly) made with an FM synthesizer. If the composition was deliberately minimal enough, maybe something decent could have been done that way.

Alternatively, the SPC is able to accept direct streaming audio from the game ROM. Record a loop or an entire track from an actual FM synthesizer, and you've got as many voice channels as you care to put into the original composition. This would have been very costly though. If a developer wanted to go this route, they might as well record a real band instead of an FM synthesizer.

Lastly, it should have been possible to get real FM synthesis on the SNES by including a synthesizer in a game cartridge as an enhancement chip. That option seems as excessive as the others, but IMO would have been the most likely to happen. Sticking a RISC co-processor in a game cart to draw polygons for Star Fox, or to accelerate sprite movement and draw wire frames in Rockman X 2 & 3 seems excessive and unlikely as well, but it was done. Obviously nobody thought putting FM synthesis in an SNES game was necessary or worthwhile.

It's a sampler synth. Adding more hardware is pointless.

For example:

TMNT IV in Arcades with FM:


TMNT IV at Home on SNES with the SPC chip:


It can sample the FM but because of the nature of the sound hardware itself the sound will get either altered slightly thanks to the SPC chip's reverb and delay defect, or completely mutilated if not changed to compensate for the hardware error.

Also, like most electronic instruments of the time the sound still has to go through the main audio processor to get to the output. This would have result in the music produced by an extra chip inevitably containing the wah-wah-woo defect caused by the sound circuitry of the SNES's SPC chip.

Also, RISC's are cheap compared to synthesizers. You can stick an FM sound chip in your cart but it'll drive the price up like mad as FM synths are and have always been expensive. (Think $150+ for a game with one inside)

Also, if you were making an SNES game and wanted FM sound the Genesis was a much more attractive and generally smarter decision. The reverse also applies if you wanted a sampled sound and were making a game for the Genesis.

Both can also play sampled voices and instruments. This is different than making music from a sample.

A sample based piece of music takes an incredibly short sample of a sound and stretches, modulates, slows down, speeds up, etc... etc... the sound to produce the end result.

Sampling actual voices and music requires you to store the actual sounds separately to be played back by either a DAC or specialized software.

Both the Genesis and the SNES had internal hardware DAC's on their sound chips the biggest issue was the size of the samples needed. The Genesis can produce incredibly clear and fluent voice samples on par with the SNES no problem, but it requires more storage space. Given the limitations of cartridges, the generally small storage space of earlier ones and expensive price of larger ROM sizes most devs simply opted to squeeze in smaller samples resulting in low quality crackly voices.

Of course the later cost cuts in the audio circuit by SEGA didn't help either, but that's due to general cost cutting and price reduction which occurs with all machines.

[flamepanther]

Also, RISC's are cheap compared to synthesizers. You can stick an FM sound chip in your cart but it'll drive the price up like mad as FM synths are and have always been expensive. (Think $150+ for a game with one inside)

Nevertheless, Konami included a modified YM2413 in one of their Famicom games. It must have seemed like a good idea.

[Mod_Man_Extreme]

Also, RISC's are cheap compared to synthesizers. You can stick an FM sound chip in your cart but it'll drive the price up like mad as FM synths are and have always been expensive. (Think $150+ for a game with one inside)

Nevertheless, Konami included a modified YM2413 in one of their Famicom games. It must have seemed like a good idea.

Modified as in custom and heavily neutered.

"Konami's VRC7 soundchip is a YM2413 derivative, used exclusively on the NES game Lagrange Point."

Used on a single game, and one that originally cost $180 brand new at that.

The VRC-6 chip and was included in the Japanese version of Castlevania 3 and like others in the VRC series including Lagrange Point used a simple 2 op square wave and saw wave design along with lacking it's own DAC in favor of the one inside the NES itself.

A far cry from it's original specifications, but I can see where you're coming from.

[3GenGames]

NES MMC5 included a lot more neat sound features, PPU screen attributes quadrupled, etc. If FM was that great, they'd of added a FM instead, not 2 more squares.


And in the end, if you had a good programmer, I wouldn't doubt the genesis could sound somewhat like a SNES, Just use the co-sound chip that had all those channels on it and DPCM for other crap and you'll be able to replicated most SNES effects at a CPU cycle cost IMO. I guess it does have an advantage there, but FM drums vs Noise channel drums, Noise sounds so much better. Almost like a real snare! (I am a drummer) So IMO it's just inferior, but guitar effects would be cool, but yet it's just not very good to use to me, since it's so muffled, it just sounds like crap. :/ Maybe playing some other squares/noise channels over that would help some, but I have no idea. It'd just have to be tested and see if there's a real difference.


Motorola should have made processors for computers, not Intel! 6809 and 68000 just rape.

[jeffro11]

The genesis had a noise channel and 3 square wave channels AND 5 FM channels, AND 1 FM/PCM channel. Your argument is invalid.

[renardqueenston]

topic is now FM vs Sample-based Chipmusic

[3GenGames]

The genesis had a noise channel and 3 square wave channels AND 5 FM channels, AND 1 FM/PCM channel. Your argument is invalid.

Exactly. Play a square with the same tone over the FM to make it sound less crappy.