Last Ninja 2 Central Park loader redone

[Ferral]

Matt Grey, the original composer to the C64 Last Ninja 2 has redone the Central Park loading tune, sounds absolutely superb, taking the best from the SID Chip Tune and rejigging it to be modern. He has put a lot of work into it and I must admit when I first heard about it was a little dubious with being a fan of the game and that particular piece of music to this day.

Check out the original here :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daI0CFZa9Ww


Now check out his modern remake here :

http://mattgray1.bandcamp.com/releases

[chuckskull]

That's brill. Cannon Fodder needs the same treatment.


Although that's a little less lo-fi than I remember.

What some people achieved with MIDI and chiptune back in the day really shows up a lot of modern game soundtracks. I don't think I've heard one this year I'll still catch myself humming in 20years. Best you can hope for is a solid orchestra or licensed music. Which is a shame because all that talent is still out there, perhaps more so than ever.

Another fave from a few years later;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2X_UyAXRL8

I much as I respect the ability and talent in something like the ME3 soundtrack, even chuck the CD on sometimes, it's good music. It just doesn't grab me like some of the oldies; I still remember the giant grin the first time I booted up the games and heard those two.

[Ferral]

I know, I remember hearing loading music for the first time ever, it was Rambo First Blood Pt 2 on the C64 and I remember running into the kitchen to my mum saying it has music while it loads!!

Last Ninja 2 soundtrack, especially the Central Park loader is a tune I always remember and still love. I play through the LN series every few months, going through each game over a few days (proper hardware loading from tape, not emulation). LN2 is by far my favorite out the trilogy and the music is just superb.

Another favorite soundtrack that I remember well and still play the game often on my Amiga is Turrican

[chuckskull]

Dammit Ferral now I'm buried under 30 tabs of Chiptune. Damn you and your nostalgia.

[Ferral]

It happens to me quite often, be looking at something on Youtube and something on the right will catch my eye so I open it and pause and end up with multiple tabs of paused ready to play stuff!!

It's not just nostalgia with me, a lot of the games and especially the C64 actually mean something personal to me, I was chatting with Zak about it the other day via sms. My entire collection of items are actually on Colexions, I know Corey who owns the site pretty well, good friend in America, there is also Sean on there who helps Corey out who is a great guy. There aren't many of us on there that actually collect 8 Bit computer stuff as the NES was bigger in America at the time.

If you want to check out what I have :

http://colexions.com/?p=mypage&u=iai...%20Pics&i=1402

Moved things around about 6 weeks ago to better utilize the screens I have, I do have other machines but they are under my Hardware category as situated in a different part of the house, access my different stuff by clicking the green My Collection Categories and you get a drop down and the different machines and software are all uploaded individually.

So back to awesome SID Tunes, how about Bionic Commando (The excellent European & UK release done by GO, not the horrendous American version that Capcom done themselves) :

[chuckskull]

I always had a love/hate relationship with that era. The stuff I got was always very second hand I have many memories of my 8 year old self just screaming at tapes. I generally don't agree that video games cause violence but I had a Spectrum 3 that most certainly could.

Only ever played the NES version of Bionic Commando. No idea if it was the good version but I liked it. Always meant to give Re-armed a go on XBLA, but never got around to it, been burnt many times by remakes, but looked ok from the vids I saw.

Given up on individual games now, into 1hr mixes. This youtuber has some great comps. https://www.youtube.com/user/myc64music/videos

Like this one from the guy who did Turrican https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2id...bKEa9w&index=9 Just found out he passed a few years ago Great music though.

Got me thinking it's amazing how many people I've never heard of had such an effect on my childhood, hell even my life. That's the anonymity of game development I suppose, just a name among many that flies past while you're still reflecting on the joy of their creation and the euphoria of finishing it and it was euphoric when you finished some of them. Tough as nails.

[Ferral]

Around 2 months back when I was playing through Last Ninja 2 taking screenshots with my phone and uploading them to Twitter a guy named Mev Dinc started chatting to me on Twitter, so I was chatting back on how LN2 influenced me and is still one of my favorite games of all time. I was thinking I know and recognise this name but just couldn't place the name, it only turns out he was the guy who created Vivid Images known for Hammerfist and First Samurai to name 2 of his famous games. I then realised just who he is, after finishing work on Last Ninja Remix to fulfill System 3's LN contract he formed Vivid Images and was one of the guys who worked on the ninja trilogy.

I was gobsmacked to say the least, he is such a great guy and I can honestly say it made my day connecting with him on Twitter and talking about the Last Ninja series.

[shaithis]

Awesome find, one of my favourite pre-Amiga games, I remember buying my brother some special edition box with a rubber shuriken and a bandanna/hood thing in it.

[Ferral]

You mean the limited edition version, there was stink kicked up by schools and the mask and star was taken out as kids were taking them to school and throwing them around. That's why now you only ever really see the version on eBay that has the map and manual.

Thankfully I have the full version and managed to get it before they removed the items

http://colexions.com/?p=blogshow&b=9211

[MaddAussie]

I miss the proper boxes games used to come in