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Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Shooting Stars by Bag Raiders

This song came to my attention when I watched with my son an endless series of memes on YouTube. I didn't know what memes are, but it's mostly a short video with a duration of less than 1 minute, that should be funny. In lots of those memes, the original audio is replaced with some music. So when I watched the funny "Fat man does amazing dive"  


I just liked the music very much, which was "Shooting Stars" by the Bag Raiders   . from 2009 !! And the original video clip in Synthwave style (=80s style) is very enjoyable.

The original song seems to have 2 different parts that glued together by the 2 guys from Bad Raiders and not very good.
Part 1 was a bit sad and part 2 very happy.
So I had a plan to break down part 1 and 2, so you would here the refrain (part 2) more often and make the couplets of part 1 less monotone.

I made some preparations with Audacity, but then I started to search for remixes/mashups and this (Sol James Remix) seems to have the same idea and more, so I stopped with my own "radio edit".

However, I found lots of remixes/mashups and memes from 2017 !! So after 8 years, the song is still very much alive on YouTube.
Of course lots of rubbish, stolen ideas and failed trap music attempts, these below are my favorites that are in my opinion much better than the original.

Best Mashups:
Bag Raiders Vs. Amy Meredith - Shooting Stars (Double Trouble Mash Up) - YouTube
Smash Mouth - Shooting All Star - YouTube

Best Remixes:
Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars (POOLCLVB cover) | Deep'Paradise - YouTube
[Melodic Dubstep] | Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars [Refract Bootleg] - YouTube
Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars (Elephante Cover) [Premiere] - YouTube
Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars (Sol James Remix) - YouTube

Good remix, but when Kuba Te sings, it's awful:

Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars (Kuba Te Remix) - YouTube

Just like the original but the colors and the road follows the music awesome.

Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars ft. Rhys (Audiosurf Video Remix) - YouTube

As always if you want more: wiki

Monday, May 15, 2017

MSX Google week 20, 2017

Today I wanted to see what Google could find when you search for MSX and sample. With sample I ment digitized voices or music, but Google's first result was a bit weird.

Check this: http://msx.website/msx-vitus .

Are they selling viagra pills ?


I got a couple of real MSX result back, so here we go:


01) https://www.msx.org/forum/msx-talk/trading-and-collecting/rare-msx-sample-carts-ebay
Well, this had nothing to do with audio, just raw versions of the official games.
You really must be a fanatic MSX collector to buy these. I prefer original second hand version in the original box with a manual.
02) http://www.generation-msx.nl/software/toshiba/toshiba-home-computer-hx-10-sample-program/release/4080/
Another none audio sample, but I really like to see those Toshiba demo programs.
The MSX-1 graphics are not bad at all.

03) https://supersoniqs.com/projects/
These guys make new additional hardware for MSX, the PlaySoniq is their biggest project.
You can play with 2 monitors, better audio, play old Sega Master System games and...
Commodore 64/128SID musicfiles. Can you believe that ? Play Commodore 64 music on your MSX ?
04) http://www.grauw.nl/projects/#msx
Again not much samples, but some free MSX Musicdisks and Magazines are always welcome, dont you think ? I am not complaining.

05) http://smecers.appspot.com/SDCC_msx/index.htm
I am not sure what this is, it seems some kind of new program-language to create MSX-DOS programs with MSX-1/-2 graphics. Maybe just like Philip MSX-Logo.
The main page is linked to another website with some dull chess game.
I dont know, where this MSX page came from, a lazy webmaster forgot to delete ?

06) http://www.jeroenderwort.nl/muziek-programmeren/
This guy made music on MSX with Moonblaster and Moonsound, programmed his own music-editor and made some nice songs. He quit years ago, but from his first attempt
( Jer Musix Disk ) he made a video with 37 views and nobody liked it, so now he got 38 views and 1 thumbs up.
That's al for this week. It's a lot of different links, but I hope you find some of them special
enough to explore.

MSX Google week 19, 2017

I was in no condition to program/compile or edit music/videos, so I decided to look for MSX listings witg Google. Back in the days if you wanted new software cheap, you could buy a computermagazine and type over some listings.
If you were lucky the listing works all at once, most of the time you were tryiong to find typos. I did a lot of typing over listings, I even bought a couple of books full of listings when I started with MSX-ing.
It was very educational to see how those listings work, so I could improve them.

01) http://msx.hansotten.com/magazines/mccm-disks/
Yeah, there are more sources to download those MCM/MCCM disks, full of listings and other MSX-stuff. It can be handy before you stsart to type over a listing from a MCM/MCCM magazine, right ?

02) http://www.amusementfactory.com.br/msx/kmg/?p=0&l=en
Not much to do with listings, but free download of a MSX-2 remake of the original KONAMI Knightmare is hard to resist. The music of level 1 got several remakes in the MSX music-scene. The best one I found on YouTube was this: https://youtu.be/y0b-bi7TMd4
(not made on any MSX...)


03) https://msxcassettes.wordpress.com/2011/04/18/toshiba-home-computer-hx-10-sample-program-19xxtoshibajpen/
I searched for samples, but in the end, this link fits more at the Google search for MSX listings. If you look in Ficheros , you find a lot of Spanish MSX games I never heard of and also a couple of listing compliations, I hope.
Start you Google translate and play those games on your MSX-Emulator !

04) http://members.ziggo.nl/the.incantation/
Again MCM/MCCM disks full of listings, but also a nice collection of MSX/PC tools you never knew they existed. Take a good look around here, I really liked FDsave and FDload, but a manual or something is not included.
Too bad, now we have to try and hope for the best.

05) http://www.illusionware.it/msx%20LD.html
Nothing to do with listings, but this rare website had some info about a very curious MSX hardware combo, a Palcom MSX-1 computer and a Pioneer LaserDisc player. There were a couple of (NTSC) games made for this special MSX, so in Europe you could not play those (PAL standard). Search the titles on YouTube, great cutscenes, but great gameplay ?
For example check out Astron Belt of Sega . Or search on YouTube with "MSX Laserdisc" to get plenty of Laserdisc gameplay

Well, that's enough for now, if you weant more links, check the next post.

Tuesday, May 9, 2017

Hollow Talk - Choir of Young Believers (The Bridge Opening/Closing Theme)

Recently I watched not only 2 "Death In Paradise" seasons, but also 3 seasons of "The Bridge" ( or should I say "Bron/Broen" ). They are very different from eachother, however my wife and I liked to watch both mixed up on our TV. The dark "Bridge" with the funny "Death" made our TV evenings very enjoyable.

Note: I watched the original 3 seasons from Denmark/Sweden, not any remake. I never liked detectives that need 10 episode to tell a story. But in any season of "The Bridge" every episode reveals part of the solution and leave you with new questions. That is impressive story-telling. Ofcourse the main-actors Saga, Martin and Hendrik play their roles amazingly true and you could believe they are real people in a real-life serie. It's not my intension to tell you what happened in Season 1,2 and 3, but I will give you a brief description.
Season 1: Saga and Martin work together against a serial killer, who turns out to be a ex-collega of Martin.
Season 2: Saga and Martin work again together again a eco-terrorist group, Martin gets arrested after murdering his ex-collega.
Season 3: Saga and her new partner Hendrik work together against a serial killer, who wants to destroy his family and everybody around it. In the end both dont work for the police anymore.

Not only the script, the actors, etc are excellent, the Opening and Closing Theme is really a tune you wont forget. It starts slowly and fits in the dark adventures of Saga and her partners. Then all at once at the end of each episode the second part of the song hits you like a hammer (and you have to adjust the volume of your TV).

The song is called Hollow Talk from Choir of Young Believers , I listened to the original on YouTube, but I believe the edited (shorter) version used in The Bridge is much better.
So I search for an ending with good audio, here is the ending of the final episode of season 2, when Martin got arrested. Check it out, and you know why "The Bridge" is such a great detective serie.

In November 2016 they started with season 4, the last season. Martin, Saga and Hendrik will be present, but we have to wait until in 2018 the serie can be seen.

Finally, even the car of Saga is as famous as the actors, an old Porsche 911.
There were plenty discussions about which model was used in "The Bridge" (all 3 seasons).

Try to watch this serie, if you like detectives, this is the real thing.

Sunday, April 30, 2017

You're Wondering Why - Magnus Fiennes (Death In Paradise Opening Theme)

Now it's time for a feelgood song !!!

I already explained on YouTube why I created not a 10h version, So I will only say something about the serie itself.

Its basicly every time the same thing, on a tropical island there is a murder commited and in the end all suspects are gathered by the English inspector and this local team and the murderer is revealed.
I saw only Season 1 and 2 with Ben Miller and Sara Martins, they were a perfect team cause they were totally different characters and it shows in every Episode.
Sadly Ben Miller left in Season 3 (he was killed in the 1st episode).

Kris Marshall came along to solved it and stayed in the serie until in Season 6 Episode 6 he decided to stayed in London, so the other 2 Episodes of Season 6 were made with Ardal O'Hanion.

More changes were made, in Season 4 Episode 4 Sara Martins was replaced by Joséphine Jobert. She will be in Season 7 also I guess, together with Ardal O'Hanion.

Of course the local police officiers must be changed to, the younger Gary Carr was replaced by Tobi Bakare in Season 4 Episode 1.
Well I hope all those changes didnt effect the serie, meanwhile I have only good memories of Season 1 and 2.

I borrowed the pics from DVD boxes and the music from a YouTube clip of 45 seconds.
Then I started cutting and pasting with Audacity, until I had repeated the music 6 times.
I tried to start change the picture of the season everytime the music changes, but that didnt work very well.

 When published the video on YouTube, I had an idea to create maybe a better long version (better loop) so I started my Audacity and start cutting and pasting. The result was just as good as I expected so I decided to upload it to Soundcloud.

Soundcloud responded direct and the audio was removed due to copyright issues with Sony. I Googled and found out there was a CD released in 2011 by Sony with the theme song of Death In Paradise by Magnus Fiennes.

So I decided to upload it to my Mediafire and Pcloud if you want to hear an alternative long version.

BTW I found some interesting links I will share with you:
* Death In Paradise  - The Soundtrack
* Magnus Fiennes - The Composer/Cover Artist
* Death In Paradise Wiki - All you need to know

Or you can search at the BBC for short clips of each episode


Saturday, April 22, 2017

My Music Memories: The Hedgehog's Dilemma of 8bit bEtty

I post this song earlier on my Facebook (I forgot) and when I was looking to the video's ZooiTroep liked, I found this one again. It's a really sad song about 2 people, both too shy to talk to each other. Yeah, I'm still sky and doesn't like crowds full of people I don't know. I don't like being in the spotlights and when I had to talk in public I am still blushing.


Now something about the music, 8bit bEtty uses sounds MSX-ers are very familiar with, I am talking about the standard sound chip PSG. That's not all, he also uses male and female robotical voices (sort of text 2 speech) and let them sing along. 
It's really impressive and it makes the difference between other chiptune or bitpop artists.

This song "The Hedgehog's Dilemma" comes from the album "Fake the Bitters" and you can still buy it on bandcamp.com. 

I must say not all the songs are great, but you must listen the whole album for yourself to judge. And here comes the sad part, after the album "Fake The Bitters" 8bit bEtty stopped publishing.

According to his latest tweets he is in the game-industry. 
However I guess he uses an other alias then 8bit bEtty here.

Here the link to the album: "Fake the bitters" to listen.
If you move your mouse pointer over the titles you can click on lyrics too.

But for this track "The Hedgehog's Dilemma" I make an exception, here are the lyrics:

I am just a shy girl at heart
I wish I could say hi to you
why am I alone again tonight
when I am in a city filled with possibilities

I am just a shy boy at heart
and I know you expect me to say hi to you
I guess I'm afraid of what you'll say
so I guess I will read another book tonight by myself

And sometimes I wish things weren't this way
that I could change
but then I'd lose a sense of myself
Oh what a shame

I am always the girl alone at the show
I start to sweat when you say hello
I will make a reservation for one
I don't think that eating alone is fun

And sometimes I wish things weren't this way
that I could change
but then I'd lose a sense of myself
Oh what a shame

Someday I will find someone shy just like me
Someday I will find someone shy just like me
Someday I will find someone shy just like me
Someday
Someday


Someone shy just like you

Note:
About the title, here is a short explanation from YouTube user: my name is.
"the hedgehog's dilemma actually a metaphor . like, when it's cold, hedgehogs would like to cuddle but they kinda cant bc theyll hurt each other."


Life Is Strange - the mix - TnC OST Mixz "The Decision"

It was never my intention to make a 2nd post to any game, but as you can read in the description of the mix on YouTube, making this mix was a some kind of price I had to pay for getting the music and the game out of my head. 
I will use this post to tell you more about the mix itself.

I listened to couple of Life Is Strange soundtracks on YouTube and there were so many songs I liked a lot, mostly the more depressed sounded ones. 
I just wanted to hear those songs together so I started my old Mixmeister Fusion and let the automatic BPM determine how the playlist would look like. 

It turned out alright (I guess) with a mix of instrumental, mixed vocals of male/female and 
a balance in soft beginning and hard endings. 
I mean, most songs in the mix started very quietly and the erupt at the end. 
But it was hard to cross-fade those songs with all different BPMs (according to Mixmeister Fusion, that is). 

It took me 12 versions before all song transitions were fine. I kept on cutting / pasting / listening to the same transitions to find the perfect mixing in key ( in my case, mixing by ear, not by the beat).

So in the end, I had my mix, but it seemed logic, if I want to publish on YouTube I must do more than just showing a title picture during the playing of the mix. 
I made some notes for different versions of the video, and suddenly I had the idea when 
I listen to the mix I made.

What if, the whole video mix shows with short video's and the music itself, the state of mind of Max Caulfield to make in Episode 5 the final decision, sacrifice Chloe, her best friend or sacrifice the city Arcadia Bay. 
I used short videos from Episode 5, where Max walks to the Lighthouse and is reminded of all the good memories she had with Chloe, just before Max had to make the decision. 

So I started the mix with a short video of Max and Chloe before Max had to decide and end the video with a short video of the tornado. It only seems normal to name the mix "The Decision". 

Some of these memories of Max are seen in the mix, I had to cut a lot to get different memories and not let the background noise/music ruin the mix.

But there was more trouble ahead.
My video-editor could only handle 800x600 resolution, so the video quality is....bad. However the audio seems okay, so I uploaded it anyway. 

After uploading I tried to search for my video, but YouTube search didn't find it. 
Maybe it's better, cause there are so many well made fan video clips with scenes 
of Life Is Strange. If you hate the video, but like the mix, I have uploaded it to mixcloud

Check the links below for the video and mix.



The video or The Mix

Note: I wrote Mixz instead of Mix, cause it's not really a smooth mix with nice transitions between the songs (and I speed up all songs to 115%)

And finally: I found some other Life Is Strange links I had to share it with you:

A beautiful Wikipedia fan-made
A fan-made story for the prequel of Life Is Strange
A playlist of Life Is Strange instrumentals, each 10 minutes long

That's all folks for today !

Saturday, April 15, 2017

112 MSX Basic Games presents: PARAS.GAM (76)


In PARA'S you must take care of 4 skydivers/paragliders, that must land on a small island.
Not easy, cause 3 rockets are trying to hit you and the palm tree is also dangerous.

This was not an easy game to translate, cause the creator "Visser Design" didnt finish the game, so there was no score, no lives, no change in gameplay and a bad sprite collision and the player had no change of getting the para (skydiver) safe on the island. 

Why I tried to improve it ? Cause I liked the idea of the game. I added a short manual, speedup the intro screen, restored the score and lifes count code, make the position of the rockets random, updated the sprite collision and more 
I forgot already.

Be warned. This game PARA'S has a different way of calculating the score. You get 1 life (PARA'S) and if you fail you must try again. 
When you reached the 4 lifes the game is finished but...

You have to save the 4 skydivers before the counter go below zero. And your score is the counter, counting from 10000 til 0.

Very original, but I had to make some changes to make sure only players that resqued 4 skydivers can have a score.

There is not much sounds or soundeffects in the game, only when pressing fire or getting/losing a life. 

I could add some sea-sounds, but is it really necessary ?
You can be the judge by playing it:

Mediafire/Pcloud

 

112 MSX Basic Games presents: KESHISAR.GAM (75)

I never could have figure out what the purpose of the game KESHISAR was, cause it was made in Japan. It had English texts, but without a manual I was lost here.

Lucky me, Jan Hartman had made a txtfile in Dutch to explain what was wrong with the original game and how to play it. That was really something.

Now I could play the game and knowing what to do.

It's of course a puzzle game without any time limit
(YEZZ !!!), but if you make
the wrong decision you need to start over.

The game was by Richard Naka for MSX-2(+) and runs in SCREEN 5.
I really was amazed by the small animation, the fast gameplay and the nice graphics (without loading any additional pictures).

The purpose of the game is making squares and rectangles from the pieces on the screen by rotation them with the spacebar, pressing RETURN make them disappear. 
If the screen is empty, you will rewarded with a nice simple drawing and you may go to the next stage. There are 10 stages, plenty of choice I must say. 

This is the 2nd non-Europe MSX Basic game and I have tried to see how it works. 
It was so complex I gave up and inserted only a manual in it.


I am a little worried I choose too many mind games for my 112 MSX Basic Games list, 
I hope you don't mind.

NOTE: The screenshot on the right shows the solution of STAGE 0, to get you started.

At: Mediafire/Pcloud

TnC on the big WWW

The more I blog the more I come across many links to logos, persons and organisations that are also named TnC, or Noise Collector or even TnC Stuff.

Well when I started the first blog I named myself TnM, that is short for The Noise Maker
and changed it to TnC to be more original. Time goes by and I see I was wrong again.

So if you find me here, you must googled "tnc msx".
Good job !

I have some MSX posts in mind in the near future so stay tuned.
But dont expect reviews of the lastest MSX games, check other websites for that.

If you interested in older MSX stuff, check this blog.

Bye Bye.


Tuesday, April 11, 2017

112 MSX Basic Games presents: PATIENCE.GAM (77)


At first I didnt want any YAHTZEE or PATIENCE related games in the 112 list, but this Patience version was so different and yet so playable I felt like I had to put it into the 112 MSX Basic Games list.

Actually the full name is C.U.C. Patience, a listing from the C.U.C. magazine specially for SpectraVideo (and later also MSX) users.
All software they published in their magazines or tapes were made for both SpectraVideo and MSX, very nice feature.

I didnt remove all SpectraVideo related codes in the listing, I just translated and added some kind of Highscore. The Dutch manual in Dutch was a bit long to translate and I had to play the game for more than 10 times before I had a proper working Highscore. Last but not least I changed also the cursor into blue, cause the intro-screen was blue too and I could better see where the cursor was (yeah Im getting old).

By the way, its amazing how the letters C.U.C. and word Patience are displayed in the intro. Wow ! That must be tough to make !
The cursorspeed may be a little too sensitive, I removed all spaces and variables after the NEXT-commands to speedup the intro-screen and generating the play-screen. So now it runs faster, but the cursor too, sorry !

I could explain how the game works, but I think my translation in the game itself will be enough. Like any other Patience game you have to make rows from 2 until King from the same type. That would be enough to start.
   The game is not capable of checking if the game is finished or if there are no valid moves for you. I guess checking it would make the game much slower and maybe unplayable.
That's the only disadvantage of C.U.C. Patience I could find.

Have a lot of fun trying to beat my Highscore (4975 !!!)

Mediafire/Pcloud


112 MSX Basic Games presents: MINDBUST.GAM (78)

I wanted to continue with the 112 MSX Basic Games serie, but it was hard to select the next game for the list. Mostly cause I didnt want another Pacman/Snakey/Othello clone or another (Dutch) text-adventure, so I had to search harder.

By accident I started a program called "DENKER.BAS" (THINKER.BAS in English), which turned out the be a real mindbuster. It was an old listing from the magazine "COMPUTE",which was also converted to MSX-1 by Jurre van Dijken.


Many cross-platform games are text-only, this one uses the features of SCREEN 1 very well. So it looks fine on MSX-1 and its very difficult too.
I can assure you !!!

Somehow I solved puzzle number 2 more faster than number 1. I wasnt patient enough to solved puzzle 3, it was too hypnotic for my eyes, so I quit early. Sorry.

All other info can be found in the REM lines at the beginning of the listing.
Yes, another MIND GAMES, but one not to miss. What a great conversion, Jurre !

Find it at: Mediafire / Pcloud


Saturday, April 1, 2017

The MSX-1 DrumComputer (COMPDRUM.BAS)

Before I owned a Philips Music Module I liked to messin' around with SOUND command and created random-sound-geneators and my own sound-effects for use in MSX-Basic games.

Then I found this program, called DRUM a listing in the Dutch MSX Computer Magazine 10.
It was ( and is still)  an amazing MSX Basic program, made by  Eric Madrange, where you can listen to a lot of different drum-patterns (check out JAZZ ROCK) or create your own.


Of course the last feature, the drum-editor, was the best, cause you could save and load your home-made drum-rhythms easily.

Well, it was very basic, you can only add a bass-drum, snare-drum and a hihat to your drum-pattern. So no tom-tom or cymbal like in other editors (Moonblaster).
Still it impressive how it works, without reading a manual or remembering pages of key bindings.

Specially for this post I created some new drum-patterns and translate it were needed
the listing into English. You find the downloadlinks below.

* Good old Mediafire *
* The new Pcloud *

And I made specially for this post a short video, here.

Monday, February 20, 2017

TnC Collected works : TnC SoundZ & DemoZ Disk Part 2

Here is already Part 2 of the Soundz & DemoZ Disk Collection and is called:
the Parole / Digi Collection.
On this disk you can find some digitized pictures made by mine NMS880 and a collection
of tools (PAROLE) from FRANCE, which still is the only MSX program that can generated Text to Speech !!! I will create a other Post this nice program, so here below is some other interesting stuff (I hope).

Here is a program I worked very hard to make it work but  I stopped working after version 1.7. I still didnt figure out what the differences are between the 1.6 and 1.7 version. The 1.6 version had copyrights of Jos-Tel, the 1.7 version not.
With this program you can create some kind of playlist of FM-Basic listings and it runs on MSX-1 and MSX-2, it stores this information in VRAM in a very clever way. With CTRL-STOP and F1 you can go to the next song.
It was very tough to translated it and keep it working...


Here we have maybe the best FM conversion Elko Duijm had ever made for the FM-Pac (A.P. Duijm is his real name, never asked were it stands for). Of course everybody knows the first notes of Toccata et Fuga, but Elko tried to create an version with an organ that would sound like there original.
So no bass and drums or edited in any way.



This is really painful, my attempt to create Text 2 Speech
for MSX with Wordstore+.
I tried to let it speak Dutch by sampling my own voice.
Due to the limitations of Wordstore+ (it could only handle less than 26 parts of the sample) and the bad recording
it can only say abbreviations in Dutch, like ABN, KLM, etc.
Strangely I made the program in 1990 already in English.
Why oh why ?


Here is one of the only digitized pictures I ever made with my NMS8280. I created those with DIGITIZE-2 program, also on this disk. On one afternoon I just connected my computer to the TV and started digitizing realtime. The results were so good I never did it ever again...
This picture is one of the best, it's a screenshot of the game Boggle on a Dutch TV-channel.
I believe the NMS8280 was very overrated, 256 colours on 256x212 pixels was just not enough to create nice digi's.


So have fun with this Part 2, ofcourse you will find much more programs and music than the ones I mentioned above, just like on Part 1.
Just start the disk and check the menu, if you dont believe me...





Sunday, February 19, 2017

TnC Collected works : TnC SoundZ & DemoZ Disk Part 1

This year I started a new collection, called the Soundz & DemoZ Disk Collection.
It's has the same menu as the ToolZ & DemoZ Disks (the text is in different colours) and will contain everything I made (or helped with) for MSX,  related to noise and music.
That's why you hear in the menu a soundeffect and any demo has now some sounds too.

Every Part will be named after the mainpart on the disk.
Part 1 is called "The HaaiDemo Edition". Hereby some more info about what's on thise dfisk.

On the right a screenshot from that demo. I didnt created those pictures full of Dutch shark jokes (Haai = shark), but I made the title screen and the main demo program. I didnt make those screenwipes too, I somehow tuned it to make the wipes a bit faster. Better listen with your speakers on low volume, some wipes takes some time and the noises can be really annoying after a while.




On the left a sort of mozaik generator for MSX-1.
There is some colorspill, here it makes the generated GFX only better and I added some sounds.
On SCREEN 5 it will generate a bit faster (or with KUN-Basic compiler), but I wanted to prove to myself that MSX-1 can generate nice random GFX too.




Next we have the DUST IN THE WIND collection of EMP-Soft.
Of course made by Elko Duijm original, but the FM-version seem a bit boring, so I created the Mad PK Version.
In that version I added a extra voice-channel to the original with specially selected Instruments. I believe Elko liked and hated some of them, to me I succeed in making it less monotoon. The PSG-version with strange combinations of
the S and M parameters of the PLAY command and was translated into German, still don't know why...

Last and least is my attempt to create some original MSX-2 Demo in MSX-Basic It has only 5 parts, mostly modified listings from K&K of MCM. However the introscreen was completly made by me. The sounds were already added in the 2nd version of the demo, so I changed nothing when I included it on this disk.




Now its time to say sorry. I lost my Pcloud account, cause it was linked to a mailaddress, which is now out of order. So all recent files are only available via Mediafire, I guess.

I created a new one a Pcloud so here are the links: Mediafire / Pcloud






Tuesday, January 17, 2017

My Music Memories: Monstercat Favs

Well, this is a memory from not long ago.

In 2015 I learned (via my son) that the hottest music used in countless YouTube videos, RoBlox games, etc etc came from Monstercat.

A music label, specialized in Trap, Dubstep, Electro, Nu-Disco, Glitch-Hop, DnB and more I forgot.

Their logo is very famous and there were lots of Monstercat logos to choose from, I choose this one above, because I like the colours and the semi chaotic style. Below you see an other logo, my son used it as background on his desktop PC for more than a year.

Monstercat became hot in 2013 (I think), but back in 2015 I discovered and learned to like Trap, Glitch-Hop and Dubstep of Monstercat artists.
So instead of downloading all tracks separately or download only the mixes, I decided to create some YouTube playlists.
I made a rather larger one (154 videos) and a shorter one (37 tracks).
Hope you enjoy these tracks, mostly instrumental but some have nice vocals too.

In 2016 the hype seemed to go away and I got back to the music I listened already for years at mix.dj, like Progressive Trance, Deep-House and Techno variations.
Until at the end of 2016 I discovered a new music-style, but that's for another post...



Thursday, January 12, 2017

112 MSX Basic games presents: 112-MENU.BAS (games 99 - 79)

There is no better way to start my blog in the new year, with the next 112 MSX Basic games selection on disk. This time all the games from 99 until 79:

99)    DIPSHIT.GAM
98)    HEXAPION.GAM
97)    MOSQUITO.GAM
96)    SLOPSLAP.GAM
95)    DUCKSHOT.GAM
94)    SUPERLA.GAM
93)    CRAZY-G.GAM
92)    CAVERN.GAM
91)    JACKJUMP.GAM
90)    THELIFT.GAM
89)    KARATE.GAM
88)    KLEIDUIF.GAM
87)    UNTIL-0.GAM
86)    ASTRO.GAM
85)    CLOWN.GAM
84)    HORROR.GAM
83)    SUMITUP.GAM
82)    NED-HELI.GAM
81)    TRADER.GAM
80)    STARJET.GAM
79)    THEWALL.GAM

The list contains lots of action and some puzzle/mind games.
It's not mixed like the first collection, so only HEXAPOIN, SUMITUP, NED-HELI and TRADER
are not joystick wreckers. It contains also my first (finished) game ever UNTIL-0
and a 2-player game KARATE.

But even in the action games there are some differences.
There are shooting games like: MOSQUITO, SLOPSLAP, DUCKSHOT and KLEIDUIF.
Platform games like: SUPERLA, CAVERN, JACKJUMP, THELIFT, ASTRO, HORROR, STARJET and THEWALL.
Don't know how to name the category of the rest of the action games like: DIPSHIT, CLOWN and CRAZY-G.

I tried to change each of these games according the 5 rules I mentioned in the first
release of the 112 MSX Basic Games 112 til 100:

1) an intro displaying the title of the game
2) short introduction about the story in the game
3) short howto play and which controls will work
4) saving a highscore during playing the game
5) should stop nicely after CTRL-STOP or other mentioned key.
6) the difficulty should be increased during playing

But sometimes I forgot 5) or didn't how to apply 6) into the game.
I hope you don't mind and play these games anyway, they really deserve it.
Have a lot of fun !!

Mediafire  / Pcloud

NB: I don't own the book in the picture, but lot of my MSX Basic games came from books like this and lots of magazines. Of course some were downloaded from Viditel sites and MSX-BBSes (maybe I will post something about this period, this was all before everybody had internet and e-mail).

Wednesday, January 11, 2017

112 MSX Basic Games presents: THEWALL.GAM (79)

I wil release the next disk with all 112 games until 80 soon, but first I want to let you show this MSX-2 game THEWALL.GAM.
You could say it's plays a lot like Tetris, but the computer does some dirty tricks
to stop you from getting any score.
You have to move your sprite from left to right to avoid the falling blocks and get
on the high wall to fly away with the air balloon.

The name THEWALL stands for the Berlin Wall and this game is about helping people escape with the air balloon, while the Berlin Wall is build.

Not all part are MSX-2 only, only the main game. So the game has very playable speed
and looks good at the same time. Maybe a better programmer could make an MSX-1 Basic only version, I think it's a waste of my time.

I have seen other Tetris look-a-like games made in MSX-Basic, but as I said before in my 112 MSX-Basic games list, I dont want just another Pacman or Tetris clone.
It should be more original than giving it a different name, like Happer or Crunchman...

Mediafire / Pcloud

NB: This game was made by a Dutchie and the overal theme is a bit strange.

112 MSX Basic Games presents: STARJET.GAM (80)

Here is another action game and it's totally made in MSX Basic only !!!
I know it's just another "DON'T HIT THE WALLS" game, but the response on the cursorkeys and joystick is fast enough to make it playable, it has 7 levels and it sabes your best score.
That is not bad at all...

It took me a while before I found out how to complete a level, cause there were no instructions. I looked in the listing and lucky for me the programmer had left some Dutch comments here and there.
With this info and playing more than 10 times I was able to create instructions and modified some layouts to make them better and...
I found out there were 2 ways to play it, a sort of Campagne mode and a Test mode.

The programmer forgot to let the player choose, that's why I added a menu to let the player choose between the Campagne mode, which means you have to play all levels one after another with only 3 JETS. And the Test mode, just to find out the best way to succeed.
Only if you choose the Campagne mode you can get a highscore, well that makes sense...

The goal is to get to the white dot first and go back to the yellow F, without hitting anything with your STARJET. If you do the opposite you must start the level all over again.

I hope you like this simple game as much as me. It's 1 player only, but if you ae better than the highscore, the game will ask for your name and will remember if you keep playing it.

Mediafire / Pcloud



112 MSX Basic Games presents: TRADER.GAM (81)

I was already working on this one in 2016, but because the translations messed around with the GFX, I had to trial and error a lot before it looked fine after translation.


That was not all, the original game didnt end before one of the player had earned 100 dollar.
All players start with 50 and I found out it took at least more than 20 rounds to complete the game. 
So I  kept on trying until I could configure the game by let the player(s) choose how many rounds they wanna play. 

At least 5, otherwise it's more luck than being smart 
to win the game. 
The game is called TRADER.GAM with a good reason.
With 2 dices you must decide if you buy/sell shares or 
let the rate of the shares go up or down. 

You can play with max 3 players, but beware if you dont fill in a name and let MSX join the game. 
MSX hates to loose and I am not sure it doesnt fool around with those dices...You have been warned !!!

There are plenty of those decision making games on MSX, most of them are text-only and this one has a nice GFX interface. One of the reasons I picked this one out.
The other reason was the playability.

Mediafire / Pcloud