Been a while ! Here’s a collection of songs from the vast Gold Box Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and co PC games. I chose to include Adlib versions only for coherency, except for Pool of Radiance which is Tandy (and was also used for Curse of the Azure Bonds).
Pretty atmospheric medieval tunes here, as often on this blog. I didn’t record any of this myself and compiled various recordings I gathered on the web along the years.
01. Pool of Radiance – Theme (Tandy)
02. Eye of the Beholder – Westwood Associates Logo
03. Eye of the Beholder – Introduction Part 1
04. Eye of the Beholder – Introduction Part 2
05. Eye of the Beholder – Character Generation
06. Eye of the Beholder – Ending Theme
07. Champions of Krynn – Title Screen
08. Secret of the Silver Blades – Title Screen
09. DragonStrike – Introduction
10. DragonStrike – Cut Scenes
11. DragonStrike – Missions 1
12. DragonStrike – Missions 2
13. DragonStrike – Missions 3
14. DragonStrike – Promotion
15. DragonStrike – Ending
16. DragonStrike – Game Over
17. Shadow Sorcerer – Title Screen
18. Gateway to the Savage Frontier – Title Screen
19. Treasures of the Savage Frontier – Title Screen
20. Death Knights of Krynn – Title Screen
21. Death Knights of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 1
22. Death Knights of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 2
23. Death Knights of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 3
24. Death Knights of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 4
25. Death Knights of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 5
26. Death Knights of Krynn – Ending Theme
27. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Introduction
28. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Character Generation
29. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Old Woman
30. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Nadia and Joril
31. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Ira
32. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Insal the Quick
33. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Khelben Blackstaff
34. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Apparition
35. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Tanglor Awake
36. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Trapped Cleric
37. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Dran Draggore Encounter 1
38. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Alain
39. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Dran Draggore Encounter 2
40. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – King of the Frost Giants
41. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Ojel
42. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Shrunken Frost Giant
43. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Finale Part 1
44. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Finale Part 2
45. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Finale Part 3
46. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Ending Theme
47. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Staff Roll
48. Eye of the Beholder II The Legend of Darkmoon – Unknown Song 2
49. Dark Queen of Krynn – Title Screen
50. Dark Queen of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 1
51. Dark Queen of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 2
52. Dark Queen of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 3
53. Dark Queen of Krynn – Cutscene Theme 4
54. Dark Queen of Krynn – A Battle Begins…
55. Dark Queen of Krynn – Celebration
56. Dark Queen of Krynn – Unknown Song 1
57. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Introduction
58. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Florin Falconhand
59. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Mausoleum
60. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Isharn Hammerfell
61. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Captain Fflar
62. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Forest Trail
63. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Delmair Rallyhorn
64. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Delmair Transforms
65. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Forest Ghost
66. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Myth Drannor
67. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Rex
68. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Mages’ Guild
69. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Bugenius
70. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Going Underwater
71. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Acwellan
72. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Betrayal
73. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Father Jon
74. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Temple of Lathander
75. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Lathander
76. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of Tabitha
77. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Dhauzimmer
78. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Heroes’ Feast
79. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Theme of the Dark God
80. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Ending Theme
81. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Unused Song 1
82. Eye of the Beholder III Assault on Myth Drannor – Unused Song 2
83. Dungeon Hack – Scene One
84. Dungeon Hack – Scene Two
85. Dungeon Hack – End
Western RPG music ! It’s been a while eh ? I have already posted some older Might & Magic tunes in the past, and I thought I would add the CDDA rip I made from episode 6. The excellent Tim Tully isn’t there anymore, and have been replaced by the Baca/King/Romero trio that will compose most of the franchise soundtracks for a while. While the next Might & Magic and Heroes games will focus more on bombastic, choir driven soundtracks, this one still relies on simple, atmospheric melodies, which I personally prefer. The mood goes from eerie to dark, and many nostalgic chords feel the soul of the veteran RPG player with this is old craving for adventures in an unknown fantasy land.
More Wizardry Gaiden ! Ripped recently this time, from Kingshriek‘s GBS archives.
Compared to episode 3, the first 2 Wizardry Gaiden games stand less by their beautiful melodies than by their kickass battle themes. It always amazes me to see the power and passion some composers could pull from a couple primitive wave sound channels. I definitely encourage you guys to find the arrange albums for these series. In fact, basically anything Ikuro Fujiwara is worth getting. :3
edit: “Actually, the rips were done by anonymous 2CH ripper (and later reripped from GBR to GBS by ugetab). Kingshriek did the GBS from Wizardry 1-3 remakes, not the gaiden ones.” Thanks Knurek !
Been a while, heh ? This one is an old rip of mine. I’ll just quote the nfo:
I never played this game, except for the tiny part that became required when ripping the music. The reason I ripped this game is the arrange album based on it: “Wizardry Gaiden III ~ Scripture of the Dark” (COCC-11006) which was arranged by Ikuro Fujiwara himself and is simply wonderful. It was a pleasant surprise to find that the greatness of this album wasn’t due to extra melodies like it’s sometimes the case, but rather to the fact that the original game music it is based on is good to start with.
I searched for a while for a way to rip GBS directly from the ROM and tried the jap utility GBSND that some site describe like GB ROM to GBS utility (they lie or just don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about). After I understood that it’s in fact an utility to convert SND logs extracted with the jap GB emulator DBOY, I gave up on it and decided to record the audio from the game. I fortunately found a code unblocking a Bonus Mode which unlocked a Sound Test and could record the whole thing (enter ” -PIN- ” including spaces in the Training Ground to unlock it).
I then encoded the WAVs to MP3 APS and named the tracks partly after the arrange album.
So I could get my hands on this hard to find 1993 CD-ROM version. I was pleasantly surprised to notice it indeed had redbood (CDDA) tracks, and here they are.
They were arranged from Charles Deenen’s compositions by Eric Heberling. The main theme sounds more like the early PC version while the shire theme surprisingly sounds exactly like the SNES version. I’m sad the arrangements aren’t that great too, as they lose much of the atmosphere of the originals by using an almost constant “blaring trumpet” synth style. Well, it’s still pretty cool to have new versions. :3
Most ingame tracks are very long and loop a bunch of times. Track 5 sadly skips a lot, which I’ll try to fix if I can find another ISO. Tracks 6 to 16 contain dialogues.
Listening again to Stronghold music made me rip that one. Quite similar to the Stronghold rip, except longer and contains actual medieval/renaissance compositions as well as some more synthy stuff.
Special tracks and medleys anciently accessible online on the game’s official site were added to the tracklist.
Excellent music to an excellent game. Stronghold is a medieval castle battle simulation, and it looks as gorgeous as it sounds. Very medieval sounds here too.
What’s in this archive are 22khz ogg files converted from the game’s weird raw format. You can also find mp3s of a slightly enhanced version that was edited by Robert Euvino himself at Stronghold Heaven.
As avid fans of the book, me and my brother bought the SNES version of this in the early 90ies. Offended by both the image it gave of Tolkien’s work and the horrible gameplay, it was one of the few games we actually resold. If one positive thing we remembered though, it was the music …
Years later, internet is here and I’m in my early web scouring moments. I discover the wonderful SPC format, and naturally searches, among tons of others, for Interplay’s Lord of the Rings music. In vain, since it turns out some weird drivers make the game music undumpable.
After a while, armed with a SNES emulator, action replay codes and a wave recorder, I decide to record the game music myself. I’ll go through the game in a couple hours to discover it contains a grand total of 4 tunes, all of which accessible in the first 20 minutes of the game … unless of course the last Moria level featured something new or the game actually had an ending theme, which I doubt. I’ll probably never know since the game froze while entering the Moria. A common bug happening even on true SNES hardware, I read … ~_~
Anyway, the music, while short, is still great especially the main theme. It was composed by good old Charles Deenen, whom I actually discovered at that time by the way.
Searching around, I noticed other versions of the game existed, and recorded the C64 and Amiga versions as well. They sound very much alike without being completely similar. They’re also completely ripped off Basil Poledouris’s Flesh + Blood score, unless it’s actually a traditional medieval composition, which I also doubt. Nonetheless pretty awesome too, and included in this archive.
What’s now missing is the PC DOS recording, which could be full of Adlib greatness. And of course the one and only sequel of that intended trilogy: the Volume 2 also on PC DOS.
Those are recordings of the DOS versions of Might & Magic 3, 4 & 5. Very atmospheric, melodic, medievalish chiptunes which are perfect to listen to late at night. Personally spent countless hours doing so, at least. 4 and 5 are specially remarkable, and were both composed by Tim Tully.
Those recordings were done by Lord Skylark. Many thanks to him ~
Here’s a short recording of the music from Castles II on the Amiga. It was composed by Charles Deenen, a western video game music composer favorite of mine. Not That I like everything by him, but his most medieval sounding works are truly delightful to my little ears. So yeah, another medieval-ish chiptune release, there.
I am a big listener of Medieval music in general and, as I said already, like medievalish chiptunes a lot. I think simple chiptunes with their clear separated sounds are very appropriate to render medieval music constructions, like it’s also the case with Baroque harpsichord or organ melodies.
Anyway, here are recordings of the music from the PC88/98 versions of Ultima 3, 4 5 and 6. As a medieval and video game music listener, I couldnt not love music from the Ultima games, and the Japanese retro PCs versions stand among my favorites. Those were ripped from Rophon‘s S98 game logs.
More Wizardry Gaiden ! Ripped recently this time, f
Been a while, heh ? This one is an old rip of mine. I’ll just quote the nfo:
