This has nothing to do with NES-dev, but some people here seems to be quite involved in GBA-dev, and the GB sound hardware is very similar to NES. (no matter how much people will come here and straight listing the numerous differences).
As people may or may not know, because the GBA has GB/GBC backwards compatibility, the sound hardware for GB/GBC which consist of 4 PSG channels (two square wave channels, one customizable wave channel and one white noise channel), is also available from the GBA side. To allow more evolved synthetic music two other channels are at disposeal and games could mix several software sampled channels in them.
While many games uses those 2 latter channels extensively to get SNES-like quality sound, there is also a surprisingly high number of games who makes a limited usage of them and uses the old 4 channels from the original GB to do their music and/or sound effects. This make some games sound retro and have that unique GBA sound that mixes GB and SNES quality sound.
So I'd like people to list here GBA games that does a good usage of the old GB channels despite the presence of the new GBA channels.
- Mega Man Battle Network series : Almost all music of the whole series is done mainly with the old channels for melodies and basslines, only some drums and synth typically done with the GBA channels. Only a minority of songs in the series have their melody on new channels. Not only that but many sound effects uses the old channels too, awesomely. They do clever volume enveloppe and pitch effects that push the old channels to their limits.
- Mega Man & Bass : Despite the original music being on the SNES, they used the old channels for all baselines and many melodies, keeping other things inchanged. There is also many volume and pitch effects. It sounds really great, in fact the bassline sometimes sounds even better than the original SNES music. However they didn't use the old channels for sound effects.
- Sword of Mana : Old channels used extensively in music, but they didn't feel like using them too much either which is good. And *all* sound effects of the game uses the old channels exclusively. There lacks some really good effects in the music (no vibratoes or pitch effects), but the sounds effects are really awesome so this is great anyway.
- Dragon Quest Monsters - Caravan Heart : Minor usage of them in the music, but they are used again for *all* sound effects on the game, and as this is the tradition in the Dragon Quest series, all sound effects must sound like the original NES. The usage of old channels makes it sound much more accurately like the original NES than what you can hear on other Dragon Quest games released on modern systems.
- Fire Emblem serires : The music doesn't use the old channels at all, but several sound effects does and it sounds really exiting, especially the critical hit SFX that sounds incredibly extiting, and would not sound that good with the new channels.
As people may or may not know, because the GBA has GB/GBC backwards compatibility, the sound hardware for GB/GBC which consist of 4 PSG channels (two square wave channels, one customizable wave channel and one white noise channel), is also available from the GBA side. To allow more evolved synthetic music two other channels are at disposeal and games could mix several software sampled channels in them.
While many games uses those 2 latter channels extensively to get SNES-like quality sound, there is also a surprisingly high number of games who makes a limited usage of them and uses the old 4 channels from the original GB to do their music and/or sound effects. This make some games sound retro and have that unique GBA sound that mixes GB and SNES quality sound.
So I'd like people to list here GBA games that does a good usage of the old GB channels despite the presence of the new GBA channels.
- Mega Man Battle Network series : Almost all music of the whole series is done mainly with the old channels for melodies and basslines, only some drums and synth typically done with the GBA channels. Only a minority of songs in the series have their melody on new channels. Not only that but many sound effects uses the old channels too, awesomely. They do clever volume enveloppe and pitch effects that push the old channels to their limits.
- Mega Man & Bass : Despite the original music being on the SNES, they used the old channels for all baselines and many melodies, keeping other things inchanged. There is also many volume and pitch effects. It sounds really great, in fact the bassline sometimes sounds even better than the original SNES music. However they didn't use the old channels for sound effects.
- Sword of Mana : Old channels used extensively in music, but they didn't feel like using them too much either which is good. And *all* sound effects of the game uses the old channels exclusively. There lacks some really good effects in the music (no vibratoes or pitch effects), but the sounds effects are really awesome so this is great anyway.
- Dragon Quest Monsters - Caravan Heart : Minor usage of them in the music, but they are used again for *all* sound effects on the game, and as this is the tradition in the Dragon Quest series, all sound effects must sound like the original NES. The usage of old channels makes it sound much more accurately like the original NES than what you can hear on other Dragon Quest games released on modern systems.
- Fire Emblem serires : The music doesn't use the old channels at all, but several sound effects does and it sounds really exiting, especially the critical hit SFX that sounds incredibly extiting, and would not sound that good with the new channels.