Favorite Soundfont Music

Before video games had stronger technology for fully orchestrated/rock/techno music, they had to be replicated in soundfonts. We've had 8-bit soundfonts, 16-bit soundfonts, 32-bit soundfonts, and 64-bit soundfonts. For those of you members who don't know how they sound, here are some examples:

8-bit


16-bit


32-bit


64-bit


I will be making a poll to ask you guys which of these soundfonts are your favorites. I'll put "other" as an option in case if there's anymore soundfonts I've missed.

I LOVE Super Nintendo music. It sounds wonderful. Such a unique style that is retro but doesn't get annoying after awhile like the 8-bit beeps and boops.

Oddly, what I like best is what the GBA uses: 8-bit combined with a really crappy 16-bit soundfont. The hardware sucks so much and it was so outdated for its time that people who had to make music for it had to get real creative if they wanted it to be good. Sometimes it works well.

90FC3C said:

Oddly, what I like best is what the GBA uses: 8-bit combined with a really crappy 16-bit soundfont. The hardware sucks so much and it was so outdated for its time that people who had to make music for it had to get real creative if they wanted it to be good. Sometimes it works well.

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Pretty much. Some of the stuff on the GBA were really impressive.

As much as I love retro music, I'd still have to go with 64-bit. You can't beat the music mastermind that is Grant Kirkhope when it came to musical gems such as Donkey Kong 64 and Banjo Kazooie. Both of those had fantastic soundtracks.

As someone who likes to play around with retro "instruments," I don't think I really favor any over the other too much. They're all vastly unique from each-other in terms of how they sound. And when used properly, they can sound pretty amazing.

Spinosaurus said:

Pretty much. Some of the stuff on the GBA were really impressive.

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I think people would appreciate GBA music more if it wasn't always being compared to what the Super Nintendo could do. I suppose all the ports don't really help.

In addition, in the older generations certain studios tended to have a lock on certain sounds. Capcom and Konami's output on the NES is distinct from each other and anyone else despite sharing the hardware. The Famicom Disk System had an extra sound channel and certain developers added more audio trickery to their games

El Héroe Oscuro said:

As much as I love retro music, I'd still have to go with 64-bit. You can't beat the music mastermind that is Grant Kirkhope when it came to musical gems such as Donkey Kong 64 and Banjo Kazooie. Both of those had fantastic soundtracks.

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I prefer me some Koji Kondo before Kirkhope.

As good as Kirkhope is, he wasn't even the best at Rare.

I love me some David Wise 16 bit music

SypherAP said:

As someone who likes to play around with retro "instruments," I don't think I really favor any over the other too much. They're all vastly unique from each-other in terms of how they sound. And when used properly, they can sound pretty amazing.



I think people would appreciate GBA music more if it wasn't always being compared to what the Super Nintendo could do. I suppose all the ports don't really help.

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Oh God the ports. They were easily what gave GBA audio a bad name, and there were so many of them. I can't even touch the GBA Final Fantasies without applying their music restoration patches (that might be a bit extreme, really, but you get the point).

The Pokemon remakes weren't exactly shining examples either. But there was a lot of good GBA music out there (gonna go generic here and use the Ace Attorney series as an example, since they did a pretty good job at creating semi-three dimensional music.

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As for me, I'd imagine the 8-bit Soundfont is my favorite. When done well (which was surprisingly often in the days of the NES/GB and, heck, even today), the music can be snappy and memorable. Oftentimes songs that use this soundbite can avoid being repetitive because of their snappiness or, contrarily, will worm their way into your ear through repetition. All of the soundfonts are versatile, but I think the surprising diversity of what is a rather simple soundfont is astounding, and I really can't get enough of it.

machomuu said:

Oh God the ports. They were easily what gave GBA audio a bad name, and there were so many of them. I can't even touch the GBA Final Fantasies without applying their music restoration patches (that might be a bit extreme, really, but you get the point).

The Pokemon remakes weren't exactly shining examples either. But there was a lot of good GBA music out there (gonna go generic here and use the Ace Attorney series as an example, since they did a pretty good job at creating semi-three dimensional music.

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I actually think Final Fantasy is one of the few games that didn't suffer too badly from their ports. At least IV and V. VI was really pushing the super Nintendo, I think. So the difference would be much larger. Though, most of it's battle themes sounded pretty decent to me.

But yeah, I think games like MinishCap, and Mother 3 were the ones to really hit that sweet spot.

I'm going with 16 Bit, since it holds a lot of nostalgia value, and I generally like the way that it sounds.

SNES had the best music in games of all time.

Just take a gander at this classic to recognize the futility of any arguments:

Klippy said:

SNES had the best music in games of all time.

Just take a gander at this classic to recognize the futility of any arguments:

Spoiler:

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You chose Stickerbrush Symphony over Mining Melancholy!?

TRIFORCE89 said:

You chose Stickerbrush Symphony over Mining Melancholy!?

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Mining Melancholy is great, but Stickerbrush is pretty much the epitome of what SNES Donkey Kongs felt to me. Though a few other songs (Mining included) bring about the same feelings.

I admittedly have a bias towards Super Nintendo's soundfont (Super Castlevania IV + Donkey Kong Country series = BEST SOUNDS EVER), but I like all of them. Though I notice FFVII's soundfont (not sure if it's PSX's own soundfont, I know for sure the second one isn't) isn't listed, and those are good sounds as well. Interestingly FFVII has two soundfonts; one used for 99% of the game, and a special second one used for One Winged Angel.

I will say that the SNES is particularly impressive. David Wise's work on the Donkey Kong Country games really caused gaming press and consumers at the time to question one of the big selling points of CD games emerging at the time (Sega CD, PlayStation, etc.) - CD-quality audio. SNES could easily hold its own.

And then when combined with beautiful compositions? I have yet to play the game, but I find the original score to Final Fantasy VI to be simply beautiful

Stickerbush Symphony is cool but it ain't even in my top 5 of DKC2's tracks (especially after it got outdone by the amazing jazzy remix in Tropical Freeze's credits.)

Top 3 for real
1. Forest Interlude
2. Mining Melancholy
3. Hot Head Bop

In a Snow Bound Land and Disco Train make up the top 5.

Golden Sun's music on the GBA's 32 soundbit system is still darn good today:



In general, I lean more towards the SNES soundfront too. Majority of favourite classics are form there. ;__; <3