We’re taking you out to the ball game in this short and fun episode covering music from 3 Sega System 16 baseball games: Major League, Super League and Excite League. It’s late 80s baseball from Japanese arcades, so it’s 2D sprites, digitized samples and YM2151 FM patches all the way down. No composers confirmed but Tohru Nakabayashi, Hiroshi Kawaguchi and Katsuhiro Hayashi are the prime suspects. We hope you enjoy the music!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 32:10 — 44.2MB)
F-1 Super Battle is a racing game from 1994 for Jaleco’s Mega System 32 arcade board. It’s notable features are that it still features sprite graphics fairly late for an arcade game, and the upright arcade cabinet is a somewhat unusual egg shape. No composer information in this mini episode, but that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the music!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 20:58 — 29.0MB)
Street Cleaner: The Video Game released for PC and Switch in 2021 is a classic 2D side-scroller inspired by NES action games like Ninja Gaiden, Castlevania and Sunsoft’s Batman. It was developed by Creaky Lantern Games, an indie game studio run by Jesse Bishop and Brooks Bishop (no relation). It is a very real game based on the fictional Street Cleaner 80s revenge film(s) on which Jesse based his artist name. In the game you take the role of Jack Slade whose mission is to clean up the mean streets of San Diego with your trusty bat and gun.
Today’s guest is Jesse, better known as Street Cleaner, a synthwave artist and video game music composer. Jesse has been producing synthwave for over a decade and in recent years his work has appeared in a number of games. Some of his projects include Wasteland 3, Hypergun, Exception and he recently had a track on Chex Quest HD! We had an absolute blast talking with Jesse about the game, the Street Cleaner project, Creaky Lantern Games, and life in general. As always, we hope you enjoy the show as much as we did!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:46:28 — 146.4MB)
Today’s special guest is Tom Salta, a hugely talented and accomplished artist and producer. He’s worked in film, TV, ads and games for over 30 years and has produced with legends like Bobby Brown, Cher and Peter Gabriel. He’s spent the last 20 years working in games including Cold Fear and Red Steel and some of the world’s largest franchises like Tom Clancy, Just Dance, Prince of Persia, Halo, Killer Instinct, Wolfenstein and PUBG.
Join us as we chat with Tom about his game music career over the past 20 years, from his breakout tracks to more recent hits. He’s a stylistic chameleon and no two tracks sound alike, so you’re in for a treat! A big thanks to our previous guest Nick Marinelli of VGIC for connecting us with Tom Salta!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:21:06 — 111.5MB)
Today we have Nick Marinelli joining us, former head of MAGFest and longtime VGM aficionado. The focus of the show is on the development and history of the VGM community, from its awkward adolescence to the large and growing movement that it is today, which we are very happy to be a part of.
Nick brings to us a selection of arrangements, covers and remixes of the most tried and true classics, with some dating back over 20 years. While we don’t always “play the hits” on the show, we love them all the same and their influence on VGM is undeniable. It’s a huge reason why many joined the community and why we started the show in the first place. If you’ve been around VGM as long as we have, this will be a walk down memory lane. Join us as we talk about our shared memories of being in the VGM community over the past few decades.
Nick also runs Video Games in Concert, an organization that represents and books artists for live VGM performances as well as educational outreach. If you’re interested in booking some of Nick’s artists check it out for your home, venue or company party. Email Nick [at] gamemusic [dot] rocks for more info.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:42:37 — 141.2MB)
On today’s episode we’re joined by Rob aka Xerxes of Hardcore Gaming 101’s “Top 47k Games” podcast. We talk about his background, how the podcast is made, the excellent resource Hardcore Gaming 101, along with our usual jovial banter. Rob brings us a selection of fantastic deep cuts of early to mid 90s Japanese VGM used in the show, most of which are intro and ending tunes. It’s a really fun show and as always we hope you enjoy it as much as we do.
Shout out to our friend Norm aka @normallyretro for lending his voice to the HG101 Golf Remix and the main Top 47k Games theme song. Dogs Bower!
Also a big thanks to Dee Liteyears for providing the delightful episode artwork! Follow them on Twitter @DeeLiteyears. Dogs Bower (and Bubsy)!
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:49:44 — 150.9MB)