My Gaming Audio History: Dr. Mario (1990)

Next up in My Gaming Audio History is Dr. Mario.  What's better than Tetris?  Tetris with Mario!  Although there was a port of this to Game Boy, I only ever knew the NES version of this game.

The music in this game is by Hirokazu Tanaka who also composed the music for Duck Hunt, Earthbound, Metroid, and fittingly, Tetris.  The music in this game is fairly straight forward in use: there's music for the title screen and selection screen, and, like Tetris, there's a choice of music during the gameplay.  Otherwise, there's music when you win or lose the round or the hardest level of gameplay.  The ending is different depending on the difficultly, and that's reflected in the music as well.  If you beat the game on the highest level and speed, you hear a slightly different level clear than you would on a lower speed.  Also fascinating that the highest level clear music and the end game music are the same.

Something I was aware of when I was younger but had forgotten was that the "fever" music is quite a bit shorter than the "chill" music.  As I note below, the Chill music is nearly double in length compared with the Fever music.  Wonder why that choice was made?  Also thinking about the comparison of description between "fever" versus "chill."  One is clearly more upbeat than the other.  (Fever is 150 beats per minute, while Chill is a more moderate 128 bpm.)  Recent studies have shown that listening to music of too high intensity negatively impacts gaming performance.  I don't think Fever approaches that level, but cool to think about the ability to chose the background music.  I definitely remember thinking about and deliberately choosing which music would help me to focus better, so I feel certain that the connection between gameplay, focus, and accuracy was something I intuited as a young person.

Here's a long play from cubex55 (love this person!) so that you can see the ending screen if you never did.  I certainly never saw the UFO as a kid.

Dr. Mario has just a little less than 8 minutes of music.  This is way less than many other NES games released as late as 1990.  Perhaps this was because of the simultaneous release for the Game Boy?  Perhaps the design play was simply to keep the same music but to adjust for the nuances of each systems technical limitations.  The simplicity of gameplay definitely seems to be indicative of a Game Boy game, as is the short amount of music.


Here are my detailed notes as you're interested.  This music has a distinctly pop feel.  Reminds me of the 60s.  These notes were compiled using this soundtrack.

-Title Screen: 64 sec.  A major.  Intro A A' B A''.  Sounds like a 60s song, modulates to IV for the B section.  Heart and Soul sound?
-Mode Select: 19.5 sec.  F# major.  A B(4).
-Fever: 67 sec.  G major--> C major.  Intro (2) A A' (in C) B A' (4, 2nd half) C (break) (12).  This was the music I listened to most often when I played.  Reminds me a bit of Super Mario 3 Hammer Bros battle theme, which is also in C!  Boogie Woogie?
-Fever Clear: 22 sec.  E major.
-Chill:  1:59.  A minor (major moments).  Intro(4) A B C(4) D E F (12) G(4) H  Intro doesn't repeat with loop.  Almost twice as long as "Fever."  Through composed, but really mainly a set of variations over a bass.
-Chill Clear: 21 sec.  F major--> A minor.  Starts with same fanfare as Fever Clear.
-Game Over: 23.5 sec.  Chromatic.
-Game Over Vs: 53 sec.  E major.  Fanfare- A B A' B'.  A'/B' are melodic variations over the same bass.  Quite a bit longer and more developed than the regular game over music.  Were the designers giving more time for you to gloat?
-Level 20 Clear (low): 17 sec.  B major.  Intro- A.  Intro doesn't repeat.
-Level 20 Clear (UFO): 59.5 sec.  G major.  Intro A(4) B A(4) B'  Irregular meter.  4's of A and B add a beat.  Same musical theme of the low clear.
-Ending: Same music as Level 20 Clear UFO

Playing Games: Earthbound

My parents gave me a Wii U for my birthday present, and it came early, so I've been playing it in my spare time.  I've been playing numerous games which are new to me: Wind Waker, Super Mario Bros 3D World, and New Super Mario Bros U.  And I've also been playing an old game, Earthbound.

Earthbound must be one of my favorite RPGs of all time.  The tongue in cheek nature of the gameplay and text is amazing.  And the music by Hirokazu Tanaka and Keiichi Suzuki is just incredible-- from the sampling of All You Need is Love to the remakes of The Champs Tequila and The Dallas Rag, it's an incredible montage of various Americana audio.  Here's a video that I made to show in my Video Game Music class about some of these audio references.  (I'll embed once it's available.)

I'd forgotten that the main goal for most of the game is to collect the melodies of different locations throughout the game.  I love that your progress through the game is measured in this way musically.  This reminds me a bit of a Zelda game where you learn different melodies throughout the game.  I do give Zelda a one-up over Earthbound because the songs you learn activate different in game powers and in Earthbound, you simply collect the melodies and don't really "use" them during gameplay.  Also, it's kind of lame that the last tune you collect from the Fire Spring is just tonic. The countermelody is cool too, and you don't hear that until this moment when you have all the melodies collected:

Also cool, but primitive, are the concert performances by Venus and The Runaway Five, which I've blogged about before.  Enjoyed re-playing this game, remembering the music and audio...  if you haven't played it before, I totally recommend it.

My Gaming Audio History: Super Mario Land (1989)

Super Mario Land was released at the same time as the Game Boy, and everyone who got a Game Boy knew you had to get Super Mario to go with it!  What a blast from the past to watch this!  I've done a little reading about the GB and its audio capabilities were similar to the NES.  Four channels of sound possible.  Usually a percussive track was one of them.  Otherwise, bass, melody, and an often homorhythmic harmony voice that dropped out to produce sound effects as needed.  I actually remember playing this game a lot and liking the music.  The graphics were hard to see on the Game Boy screen, but it was a hand held game!

Hirokazu Tanaka.  Here's a composer I didn't know I knew so well.  That's one of the coolest things about this project: learning who's res.  I suppose the same thing might be possible if one actually searched out the composers of pop music from the radio.  It's really interesting to learn whose music I'm hearing and connecting the dots between the music of games I grew up playing.  Perhaps as I continue, and certainly when I'm done with the My Gaming Audio History, I'll be able to examine similarities in the styles of composers across genres, platforms, and throughout their careers.

Love the classical references in the score: Offenbach's Can Can is the invincibility music, and Rock-a-Bye baby for game over!  My favorite themes are the Submarine/Airplane music and End Game music, which reference SMB in certain moments with melodic and rhythmic shapes.  My other favorite theme is the Chai theme-- pentatonic and so stereotypically Asian sounding!  Almost 5 minutes of music in this game, though internal repetitions mean there's slightly less memory needed than the amount to store 5 full minutes of music.

Here's a link to the soundtrack and my notes on each theme:

-Birabuto: C major.  27 sec.  2 sec intro doesn't repeat.  A A' B.  The high off beat punctuations at the end of the two A sections remind me very much of part of the ground theme in SMB 3.
-Coin room: C major. 4 sec.
-Invincibility: Ab major.  8 sec.  Can-can!  (Infernal Ballad- Offenbach this 8 bars starts at :40)  Love the classical reference!
-Level complete: E.  3 sec.  Planing 5ths.
-Oh! Daisy: G major/G minor.  10 sec, 8 sec intro doesn't loop.  Starts in major, 8 sec (5 bars-- similar to SML ground theme) then switches to diminished arepeggios when "Daisy" transforms into a bug.
-Muda theme: A major.  26 sec.  <3 sec intro doesn't repeat.  A-A-B
-Submarine/Airplane: C major. 19 sec.  1 sec intro doesn't repeat.  A A' B. Compositional similarities to the original SMB theme, but inverted-- not strictly.  I loved the underwater worlds and remember thinking the music was similar to SMB even as a kid.
-Easton theme: G minor.  23 sec.  A A B.  Sounds very "Eastern" (otherworldly, old) with the harmonic minor scale.  The lowered 2 scale degree adds even more interest to the melody.
-Chai theme: G major.  49 sec.  A-A-B.  2 sec intro doesn't repeat.  Starts with P4s planing in a stereotypical Asian sound.  Pentatonic.  Old world but with a rock beat to it too.  This is by far my favorite music in the game, simply because of its cleverness.
-Boss fight: Eb. 3 sec.  Very chromatic.  Descending Eb-Bb and arpeggiating diminished chord.
-Final battle: D.  18 sec.  6 sec intro doesn't repeat.  Very chromatic!
-End game: E major.  89 sec.  A-A'-B-C-C'-D(11).  Begins with the same music from an unsuccessful castle rescue (27 sec) then an 8 bar transition (B) and then into the final music which loops (C-C'-D).  The C sections begin very similarly to SMB ground theme in shape and rhythm, but is not an exact replica.
-Bonus game: G major.  5 sec.  Ragtime?
-Game over: C major.  5 sec.  "Rock-a-bye baby" sound-a-like!

My Gaming Audio History: Tetris (1989)

Here's the first Game Boy game I'm revisiting in My Gaming Audio History.  I played this game a bit, but my mom really liked it a lot!  I wasn't very good at the game-- I got too stressed out when the pieces started speeding up.  But, I loved the option of selecting what music I wanted to hear.  As best I can tell from looking back at the games I played, this would've been the first game with a musical option to choose the audio I wanted.

Music is commonly credited as being by Hirokazu Tanaka.  This is true to an extent, as, to the best of my knowledge, he did compose the B theme, opening music, and high score screen music; however, he only arranged the A and C themes for Game Boy, he didn't compose them. A is a traditional Russian song and C is a movement of a French Suite by Bach.   It's very fitting that the A music is a traditional Russian folk song since Tetris was created by a Russian computer engineer.

The music's pretty simple, with three choices that play throughout the game.  Since there's no way to win, even if you max out your score, there's no ending music needed.  Since I've not examined any GB games before, I'm not sure how much music to expect in a typical game, but I'm keeping in mind that this game has about 3 minutes of music, and of course, some sections repeat.  Here's a little gameplay if you've been under a rock and don't recognize this game somehow.

Opening: Eb minor to Eb major.  38 sec.  A B B' I love the countermelody that comes in at B'.  This music makes use of all four GB channels, as you can hear, Bass, Melody, Harmony, and Percussion.  The other musical pieces don't use all the voices to allow for sound effects during gameplay.  This is a cool piece of music; I love the B section!

Theme A: A minor.  39 sec.  A A B  An arrangement of the traditional Russian song Korobeiniki.  The translation of this song talks about a young guy selling and haggling to a young woman while flirting all the while.

Theme B:  E minor.  35 sec.  Irregular phrase pattern: Intro (4) A6 -A'10 -B8 -B'8 -C8.  I can't find anyone who recognizing this song on the internet and I don't either.  I'm thinking it Tanaka's own composition then.  It's definitely the most musically "interesting" of the three pieces (forgive me, Bach).  I like the irregular phrase patterns.  It also just sounds more like typical video game music.

Theme C:  F# minor.  38 sec.  A A' B C.  This is an arrangement of the Menuet section of Bach's 3rd French Suite in B minor.  You can hear the amazing Glenn Gould play it in this video (5:48-6:25).  The only difference between the Tetris version and the original, other than the key, is that the last four bars of the piece are removed, probably to allow for looping without an ending cadence.

High scores: A minor.  30 sec.  A-A'.  Samba.  Reminds me of FF7 Costa del Sol music, which is in the same key!

Surveying Literature: Sound in Video Games (Eric Pidkameny)

I found a copy of Eric Pidkameny's essay, Sound in Video Games, in a larger collection of essays, The Video Game Explosion, edited by Mark J. P. Wolf.  I also know Pidkameny has an earlier essay that's available online, Levels of Sound, and months ago when I found it, I made a note to finish reading it.  That article is a little bit longer, while Sound in Video Games is a short, largely a historic article that briefly charts the aural and technological progress of game sound, and then turns to the idea of Adaptive Audio and synergy between game music and other fields.  This is an excellent, concise game audio history that whets the appetite for more information in a variety of game audio areas.  A great place to start if you're wanting to learn more.

I'm not able to find much information about Eric Pidkameny online.  If he has a website or a bio somewhere online, I'd like to know the link.  One of the cool things about this project is not just that I'm learning more about the audio in games I've played and where scholarship is with game audio, but I'm also learning about who is interested in this kind of study.  It's really becoming cool to connect virtually with these like minds!  I've got a meeting next week to discuss some grants possible from UM that I could win to travel and investigate game music at some conferences.  So hopefully some of these virtual connections I'm making will soon turn into vis-a-vis ones!

As a fan of Final Fantasy games, I was really struck that he takes time to mention the music in Final Fantasy 3 (I would say FF 6) as one of the most important games in terms of game music.  He writes: "In FF3 (6), each hero and villain in the game had his or her own musical leitmotif, which played whenever that character became the focus of the story.  The musical accompaniment was a form of wordless narration, giving insight to the game's characters and events in a way that text alone could not."

There wasn't so much here that was entirely new to me in terms of thought, although I did spend a little bit of time investigating some of the games that are mentioned whose audio I hadn't heard before.  Therefore, in a similar thread with my list of the games Karen Collins mentions in Game Sound, here are the games that Eric lists in this article, in the order he lists them:

Games:

PONG -- first audio
Space Invaders -- first continuous music
Pac-Man -- musical interludes/cutscenes
Berzerk -- dialogue
Sinistar -- dialogue
Dragon's Lair -- digital audio
Super Mario Bros -- new era of game sound
Star Wars: X-Wing -- adaptive audio
Ocarina of Time -- adaptive audio, also highlighting Koji Kondo
Metroid -- these three are some of Nintendo's most popular franchises
Dr. Mario -- also highlighting Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka in these three
Earthbound -- these three are some of Nintendo's most popular franchises
Final Fantasy 3 (6) -- use of leitmotifs, Uematsu is one of the first internationally famous sound designers
Dance Dance Revolution -- music and rhythm based dancing as a part of gameplay
The Sims 2 -- user designated soundtracks blur the distinction of what is game audio
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas -- user designated soundtracks blur the distinction of what is game audio
Defender -- these two serve as bookends to understand the progression of audio
Chrono Trigger -- these two serve as bookends to understand the progression of audio
Half-Life 2 -- almost all the soundtrack is diegetic music
Halo 2 -- video game music's first move onto the Billboard 200 chart

My Gaming Audio History: Duck Hunt (1985)

Today's blog is on the NES title Duck Hunt.  I owned this as part of a double release in 1988 for the NES as an introductory console of Super Mario Bros and Duck Hunt.  It was the only game we owned that took the NES Zapper, but I played it a lot.

Who composed the audio?  Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka is the composer of this series.  He also composed Metroid, which I never played, but I had a friend, Harris, in college who raved about the music.  From him, I came to know that the Metroid soundtrack is very well done and now see is very well known.

What is the audio experience?  There's title screen music, music at the beginning of each game, music when you kill the two ducks successfully in the round, and music at the end of each level of gameplay.  In terms of sound effects: there's the dog barking as he smells the ducks to start the round, the ducks quacking as they fly away, the gunshots, the sound of the dog laughing at your poor shooting.  In the clay shooting game, there's the sound of the clay shots leaving and the sound of you shooting them.  In both games, there's the sound of your "score" being tallied at the end of the round.  Pretty simplistic, this game audio is more in line with the audio from the Atari games than a continuous audio that's already been seen in Super Mario Bros and is just around the corner in most NES games.

How does the audio experience draw the player more deeply into the game?  Obviously, the sound of the shooting, dog barking, and ducks quacking make the game more realistic.  The music at the beginning of the game and in between the rounds of gameplay serve as punctuations to the game.  Certainly not the best and most integrated audio we've heard yet, but in reality, this gameplay was more about the innovation of using the NES Zapper for a different gaming experience than it was about the audio.

Key relationship?  The title screen music is in Db major, the every two duck fanfare is in Ab, and the beginning game music in C major, so there's a bit of a disconnect tonally there, but I don't really connect all this music yet since there are huge silences in the music.  In the clay shooting game, the music initial music in E major.  Still here, the fanfare at the end of the levels in in C major.

Fun game, I played it a lot.  Never really paid much mind to the audio, but it's cool to know it's from from a composer who'd become well know for his game audio composition.  All in all, only about 30 seconds of game audio!