October 3, 2001

5:55 PM

Do you miss the music from your old NES games?Well if you do, be sure to check out the minibosses. They're a band that only plays the songs to classic video games from the Nintendo Entertainment System. Great stuff. I particularly enjoyed the Wizards & Warriors track amusing, since I was addicted to that game when I was younger. Also, am I the only one who thinks there should be a new console system DEDICATED to only 2D games? 3D games are neat 'n all, but I don't think enough good 2D games are being made anymore. The Gameboy Advance is probably the only system doing that sort of thing right now, but it's just a portable.
posted by kingmissile (22 comments total)

I think the last great 2D game to hit the shelves was that Castlevania game for Playstation. Anybody know of anything more recent?
posted by saladin at 6:04 PM on October 3, 2001

Between this site and Electric Funstuff's new song about Civilization, my day is made! Now all I need to do is take a quick jaunt down to Quest Studios and the trifecta will be complete.

(Yes, I'm unnaturally obsessed with video & computer game music. Leave me to my shame)
posted by brookedel at 6:35 PM on October 3, 2001

Bangioh =)
There's a Castlevania game for the Gameboy Advance as well
posted by Darke at 6:43 PM on October 3, 2001

The Minibosses have been on my mp3 playlist for over a year now. Great stuff. Thanks for spreading the word about them.
posted by toddshot at 6:46 PM on October 3, 2001

Capcom's 2D fighters for the Dreamcast are really good. (Marvel vs. Capcom 1 & 2, Capcom vs. SNK 1 & 2, SFIII 3rd Impact, etc.) If you're not into that, Bangai-O, a shootemup, and Worms, a strategy game are good as well.
posted by SergeM at 6:49 PM on October 3, 2001

I play a lot of old NES and Master System games on my PC through emulators. *Thinks* "games will never be that good again..." I wonder what sales would be like if Nintendo decided to release a whole heap of classic games on one disk for the N64 or GameCube. An NES game is an average of 200k, I'm sure they could fit hundreds of the suckers onto a modern gaming disk. I'd buy it for sure. Nothing beats Mario 3 IMO!!
posted by Jase_B at 6:56 PM on October 3, 2001

'My Hero'. So much fun on one little card.
posted by hellinskira at 7:01 PM on October 3, 2001

if i wanted to hear old NES songs, i'd just listen to the latest songs from the rap scene (i.e. Cash Money Millionaires) for jacked samples.

dr. mario on chill was something else, though.
posted by lotsofno at 7:23 PM on October 3, 2001

Jase_b....I had the same idea. The 760-someodd games (including 3rd party) for NES would fit on a GC disk no problem. It'd be great, and it would give them some ammunition in their fight against emulation. Most of us emulators only want to play the old games, and I know it's worth 50 bucks to many to be able to play 'Zelda' on a cart without a dead battery.

As far as 2d only systems, what's the point? The PS2 and DC (especially the PS2) have enough 2d power to do basically anything a 2d game would require. For example, a sprite is similar to a textured polygon with no z-axis, so theoretically there could be 100's of thousands of sprites per screen. Capcom SNK 2 and Bangiah-Oh are some damn sprite-intensive games and they're nowhere near taxing the systems they're built for.

What we do need, though, is an American version of DDR 5th Mix =).
posted by Kevs at 7:26 PM on October 3, 2001

or make your own music.
posted by sad_otter at 7:43 PM on October 3, 2001

I love this idea. I would love to see old NES games ported onto either GBA carts or one big GC disk (though navigation might get to be a problem on GC.) Incidentally, the best NES game of all time was Battletoads. Sorry, Mario fans; I like the plumber as much as anyone, but Battletoads is simply a better game.
Besides, 'Toads had better music, which was what this thread was originally about, wasn't it?
posted by Yelling At Nothing at 8:50 PM on October 3, 2001

Cool, glad to see I've got a lot of fellow 8-bit fans here. There's some really good flash game parodies of the original NES games out there. And more and more of them are popping up all the time (newgrounds is always getting more of them). So who knows, if Nintendo won't release a disk with all the old games on it for the GameCube, perhaps they'll all end up as Flash games on the web sooner or later?

BTW, I think the games with the best music were: Wizards and Warriors, Ghosts 'n Goblins, and of course Castlevania.
posted by kingmissile at 9:03 PM on October 3, 2001

It would give them some ammunition in their fight against emulation.

Excuse my ignorance, but are the gaming companies really fighting against emulation? I can see how they'd be fighting against the emulation of games and systems on the market, but the NES, Master System, (Super NES?) etc. have all been off the market for a while now.
posted by Jase_B at 9:42 PM on October 3, 2001

It would give them some ammunition in their fight against emulation.

Excuse my ignorance, but are the gaming companies really fighting against emulation? I can see how they'd be fighting against the emulation of games and systems on the market, but the NES, Master System, (Super NES?) etc. have all been off the market for a while now.
posted by Jase_B at 9:42 PM on October 3, 2001

If you've ever gone looking for ROMs, then you'd know that it is enforced.

I don't think that 2D sprite based gaming is dead, it's just not very common. Take strategy/RTS games for example; or the new Civilization, there are still a lot of them that are polygon free. And there's those Capcom/SNK fighting games (Guilty Gear looks impressive), but I'm not particularly fond of those.

With the exception of Castlevania, there really is a lack of the more classical sprite based games. Zelda 3, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 3, Super Metroid, Secret of Mana, even the old Mega Mans are in my opinion the pinacles. They had some of the best old school music to boot.

I miss those days of gaming. sigh.
posted by mkn at 10:57 PM on October 3, 2001

oh baby. castlevania on the GBA is the daddy.
posted by Frasermoo at 12:11 AM on October 4, 2001

SMB3 is just about the only game i play anymore. i have the all-stars game pak for my super nintendo (blowing into the cartridge and the console of my old NES was getting a little too taxing on the lungs), and whiz through the three games on a saturday about three times a year.

oh, and mario kart on the super NES? only the best racing game ever.

on topic, the minibosses are out of phoenix, i believe. i've seen them play at a few shows with some of my friends' bands. they're lotsa fun. my personal favorites are the commando levels/bosses.
posted by carsonb at 1:05 AM on October 4, 2001

I am the GBA Castlevania's hoe!
posted by prototype_octavius at 7:38 AM on October 4, 2001

Here are streaming mp3s of many of the original tunes. Most of these are more "electronic" than "rock" sounding.
posted by O9scar at 9:03 AM on October 4, 2001

the audio on the c64 version of skate or die was the rockingest thing ever ...

"SKATE SK-SK-SK-SKATE OR DIE DUH-DUH-DUH-DUH-DUH-DUH-DIE DIE!"
posted by fishfucker at 11:04 AM on October 4, 2001

by the way -- that streaming feed rocks so much -- thanks O9scar... we're considering using it as our PBX hold music....
posted by fishfucker at 11:10 AM on October 4, 2001

There's also WTMK: Mario Radio from the Mushroom Kingdom.
posted by misterioso at 11:14 AM on October 4, 2001