Re: playing music from GS games

[Mitchell Spector <mitch2gs@hotmail.com>]

"Matthew S. Carpenter" <superpsycho@comcast.net> wrote:

>Bill Garber wrote:
>
>> <http://homepage.mac.com/superpsycho/.Music/sound_samples/zany_golf_intro.mp
>> 3>
>> 
>> AWESOME!!!!!!  Now I need to put a sound card back into my IIgs.  :o)
>
>That audio was recorded off the IIgs's regular mono headphone jack... 
>though I'm sure ZanyGolf doesn't do stereo anyway.

    Only for sound effects oddly, the music soundtrack was monaural.
There's a bit of an audible background humming/feedback in that
recording, though there's better treble than in my recordings (as mentioned
in my other post, at the time I used an ISA based sound card). You'd really
only notice if you compared them side by side with high end speakers. :)
(I can FTP these somewhere if there's interest).

    You're better off recording through the headphone jack in the case of
Zany Golf, otherwise, with a stereo card, all the audio is forced into one
speaker channel with the other silent (the headphone port doubles it to
the left/right channel).

>I do wish I had a sound card... a stereo sound card.  I have the parts 
>to put two together by a schematic I found on csa2 faqs... I even found 
>a place <www.pcbexpress.com> that could produce three pcb's for it for 
>$60 total and I installed their freeware software on my Dad's 
>computer... (since it didn't have a Mac version... eventually I'll get 
>Vertual PC for OS X and maybe try it again I keep telling myself)  but I 
>ended up getting overwhelmed by all the options and kinda gave up.... so 
>the parts just kinda sit in a bag somewhere around here.... that was 
>like 3 years ago... maybe even longer now that I think about it.

    How about tracking down a MDIdeas stand-alone stereo card on eBay?
Looking at completed auctions, one recently sold with the piggyback digitizer
daughterboard for just over US$20.

    I actually have every IIgs stereo card released in my collection, minus
the GStereo and Futuresound. 

>Actually the opposite brings the music volume to about the same level as 
>the noise(which can be pretty loud on the IIgs's headphone jack... a 
>steady hum there.. a click here... a beep beep from reading or writing a 
>floppy there...)  the Volume of the music doesn't affect the volume of 
>the noise, so turning the music up and the record level down is the only 
>way that could fix it. (not that it's all that bad as is..and to a 
>certain extent I've kinda gotten used to the noise... to an extent that 
>I think I'd probably miss it if it were vanished entierly.)

    This is fairly typical with the original 256K (ROM 00, 01) motherboard.
You'll pick up lots of stray electronic background noise from the ADB 
bus and the floppy drives. That's completely fixed with a ROM 3 board.

>> How long does the timer run??? I didn't know there was one.  :o)
>> 
>Well, I'm not sure exactly, but it starts out with a certain amount of 
>time in the first level.  The faster you are in one level the more time 
>you get in the next level.  I sometimes run out of time in the second to 
>last level.  In the last level I usually run out of shots rather than 

    There is no timer or time limit, Zany Golf gives you unlimited time for
each hole. Maybe you're thinking of the _bonuses_ that randomly 
pop-up (they're not specific to any level, in fact you can go through
all the holes without any bonus challenges appearing). There's the 
fairy bonus which disappears after a few minutes, and then there's
the ball stroke bonus which has a count-down timer.

    The stroke bonus plays a quick guitar tune before the level starts
(with a printed message) the fairy bonus is a kind of a long bell tune 
at the start of the level, and you'll see a red fairy with wings on the
course somewhere.

>time, but I have never ever make it through the last level.... cuz I 
>suck what can I say?  Zany Golf is very addictive but it pisses me off 
>when I loose at the last level. I just can't get it right.  I had a 
>freind back around 1991 who could get it right every time... A freakin' 
>....well.. he was probably born same year as I... 1983.... so what... 8? 
>no.... 7 year old... and... ah... GAH!  did I mention that I just suck?

    Ever get through to the 'secret' level? There are two ways, either
complete the 'Energy' level within par (I've never bothered myself)
or take the shortcut, but hitting the ball into the mouse hole located
at the bottom right corner (wait for his eyes to turn red!).

    On a note of interested, I spoke to Will Harvey several years back
about reclassifying Zany Golf as freeware, he was agreeable to the
idea, but unfortunately he said Electronic Arts holds the copyright.
I still think to this day, it has the most creative and impressive computer
synthesized music ever created for a game!

Mitchell Spector