[HN Gopher] Chiptune.app
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Chiptune.app
        
       Author : lindtobias
       Score  : 497 points
       Date   : 2023-07-12 20:46 UTC (3 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (chiptune.app)
 (TXT) w3m dump (chiptune.app)
        
       | ugh123 wrote:
       | Anyone know the "fair usage" status for stuff like this? Can I
       | host this myself without getting hit by lawyers?
        
       | p2detar wrote:
       | The fact that there is a whole folder of Necros' tracks just
       | makes this amazing. What a great time to be a teenager that was.
       | Recommended:
       | 
       | Martian Lovesong
       | 
       | Point of Departure
       | 
       | Paranoid Android
        
         | moconnor wrote:
         | Great recommendations! Direct link:
         | https://chiptune.app/?play=Modland%2FNecros%2Fmartian%20love...
        
       | tptacek wrote:
       | God, I forgot how bad the Genesis sound synthesizer sounded.
        
       | panzi wrote:
       | Anyone can recommend anything to listen to on there? I already
       | know (since back then) and still regularly listen to:
       | 
       | - Unreal 1
       | 
       | - Megaman (1-7, X, ...)
       | 
       | - Super Metroid
       | 
       | - Chrono Trigger
       | 
       | - Zelda
       | 
       | Preferring actual chiptunes over MIDI.
        
         | nmz wrote:
         | Well...
         | 
         | GB
         | 
         | - Pokemon Silver
         | 
         | SNES
         | 
         | - Tales of Phantasia (It's probably top 5 in best OST for SNES)
         | 
         | - Donkey Kong series
         | 
         | - FF Series
         | 
         | - Terranigma Some good tracks, like:                 -
         | Evergreen       - Sanctuary           - Earthbound (not
         | recommended but I do enjoy some tracks)            - In winters
         | there is a genius            - Heartless Hotel            -
         | Megaton Walk             Some notes, Many of the tracks here
         | are actually pop music, (Even the Beatles!), but its been
         | mashed so much its indistinguishable. theres a nice youtube
         | video about it.                - Super Mario RPG (And my name
         | bookie is fantastic)           - Street Fighter 2           -
         | Kirby           - Sim City    (City is just 5/5)           -
         | Anything Mario really     (Kart, Bros)           - Spider man
         | Maximum Carnage           - Tetris Attack ("Forest stage" is
         | super chill)           - Uchuu Race Astro Go Go           -
         | Tetris & Dr mario (I've listened to this so much, I'm
         | 
         | unsure if its good)
         | 
         | - Tiny Toon Adventures: Buster Busts loose (A little zany but I
         | like a few)
         | 
         | - Zombies Ate My Neighbors                   Last but not least
         | is ZAMN, which has one of the best tracks for the SNES, Mars
         | needs cheerleaders (and also Pyramid of fear). It is genuinely
         | good
         | 
         | I could make a bigger list, but I think after PS1 and N64 costs
         | too much CPU and you're better off getting nonchiptune.
         | 
         | Some Mentions - Layton (DS) - Saga Frontier 2 (PS1) - dot hack
         | (PS2) - Megaman Battle Network Series (GBA)
         | 
         | Its strange, you have to dredge through so much chiptune to
         | find some tracks so recommendations list are always nice.
        
         | jakemauer wrote:
         | I still listen to all of the following regularly. Castlevania
         | IV and ActRaiser in particular have pretty incredible
         | arrangement and sound design for being so early in the system's
         | life.
         | 
         | From the Super NES:                 - Super Castlevania IV
         | - ActRaiser       - Axelay       - StarFox       - Gradius III
         | - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles In Time       - U.N.
         | Squadron       - Final Fantasy VI (III in the US)
         | 
         | From the Genesis:                 - Sonic 2       - Sonic 3 &
         | Knuckles       - Ranger-X
         | 
         | From the Unreal Tournament Soundtrack:                 08 -
         | Botmca       11 - Enigma       17 - Skyward Fire       28 -
         | Foregone Destruction
         | 
         | Note: I think there's something up with chipplayer.js' tracker
         | playback because some of these Unreal Tournament tracks were
         | definitely playing slower than they should.
        
         | modeless wrote:
         | Vectorman 2 - Intro A
         | https://chiptune.app/?play=Sega%20Genesis%2FVectorman%202%2F...
         | 
         | Sonic 3 - Ice Cap Zone
         | https://chiptune.app/?play=Sega%20Genesis%2FSonic%20the%20He...
         | 
         | Note that these are links to individual songs, not just
         | folders, but you have to click once anywhere on the page before
         | the linked song will play.
         | 
         | I tried to find some other classics like the moon theme from
         | Ducktales or Flower Garden from Yoshi's Island or the Bust-A-
         | Move/Puzzle Bobble music but they're not present in their
         | original forms.
         | 
         | Also interesting is that they have CANYON.MID and PASSPORT.MID
         | in a folder with a ton of other songs from some software I've
         | never heard of called MidiSoft Recording Session. I wonder if
         | the others are any good?
         | https://chiptune.app/browse/Demo%20MIDI/MidiSoft%20Recording...
        
         | prmoustache wrote:
         | Thunderforce III - Stage 1 / hydra on the Sega Genesis /
         | Megadrive is probably one of mu favorite game music ever. But
         | really the whole playlist is nice.
         | 
         | https://chiptune.app/browse/Sega%20Genesis/Thunder%20Force%2...
         | 
         | Also on the same console I like a lot of soundtracks from games
         | that were ported from Amiga: Lemmings, Lotus, James Pond II,
         | they all have some kind of cert different character to
         | traditionnal consoles music.
        
         | div3rs3 wrote:
         | Lizardking's stuff is great, e.g. Triton Theme:
         | https://chiptune.app/?q=lizardking
        
       | jon_adler wrote:
       | I really enjoyed the Xtree Gold vibes of the website. I used to
       | own a Gravis Ultrasound back in the day, and this UI and music
       | took me back there.
        
         | m_walden wrote:
         | If you like Xtree Gold, then check out the updated successor:
         | 
         | ZTreeWin https://ztree.com/html/ztreewin.htm Free 30 day trial
         | period (USD $29.95)
        
       | kebman wrote:
       | I see there's an Project AY folder, but will there come any Atari
       | ST tunes? I'm specifically wondering about The Union Demo by The
       | Union (1989), including intro from The Carebears, and many more.
        
       | monstertank wrote:
       | search outrun-b.mod
       | 
       | I have been chasing a really cool remix for this track for ages.
       | It's like an amped up techno/psytrance remix...all I remember is
       | it was done by something team or team someone?
       | 
       | Does anyone know what I am after at all?
        
       | akleemans wrote:
       | Nice! Love the huge library, I wonder how much time was put into
       | compiling it.
       | 
       | Reminds me of a Chiptune player I made a wile ago (with
       | Chiptune.js), but with only like 20 predefined Cracktros. If
       | anyone is interested: kleemans.ch/static/chiptune
        
       | butz wrote:
       | Minor nitpick: volume slider is unstyled in Firefox. Great web
       | app otherwise, I love shuffle play feature.
        
       | Andrex wrote:
       | This is awesome! And maybe a good place to plug my similar
       | perpetually-almost-finished chipmusic app? It's basically the OP
       | link but shuffle-only, but you can sign up and favorite songs you
       | like (as well as keep track of your listening history).
       | 
       | https://chipmusic-f6069.web.app
       | 
       | It's supposed to display a random pixel art GIF from Giphy but
       | they probably changed the API in the last two years.
       | 
       | I originally had chipmusic.fm but $99/year for a domain is hard
       | during hard years.
        
       | 29athrowaway wrote:
       | They have Dancing Mad from Final Fantasy VI.
       | 
       | That composition is equivalent to painting the Sistine Chapel
       | with only crayons and making it look 95% the same.
       | 
       | Nobuo Uematsu is an impressive man.
        
       | cheerioty wrote:
       | "Let 'ss kick together!" .. All the Raizing soundtracks are just
       | pure fire.
        
       | neoromantique wrote:
       | Very nice interface, sadly no keygen music :(
        
       | altilunium wrote:
       | Just made a simple remix :
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWzK_wAPc68
       | 
       | Additional feature idea (for remixing)
       | 
       | - Play several tracks at once
       | 
       | - Keyboard shortcut to toggle each voice channel (soundboard)
        
       | fatfox wrote:
       | For anyone into SID, I can highly recommend C64 radio:
       | https://c64radio.com
        
         | teddyh wrote:
         | I would also suggest <https://kohina.com/>.
        
       | VonGuard wrote:
       | Man, I would kill to have this as a standalone app on my phone
       | with all of these midis loaded.
        
         | montag wrote:
         | Check out Modizer by yoyofr. (Hope it's still on the App Store)
        
       | tiborsaas wrote:
       | Looked for rave, stayed for Ravel :)
        
       | wackget wrote:
       | Dunno who made this site, but I have feedback:
       | 
       | 1. The on-site Feedback link sends you to Twitter where you must
       | become a paid, "verified user" to message the author. I am not
       | signing up for Twitter, much less PAYING for Twitter, to provide
       | feedback.
       | 
       | 2. Would be good if you could link directly to a track on the
       | website.
       | 
       | 3. You should be able to click anywhere on the current row to
       | start playing a track. Currently you have to click the track's
       | actual filename. Clickin the empty space after the filename does
       | nothing.
       | 
       | 4. There could be a top list / chart or at least a handful of
       | tracks on the home page which users can start playing right away
       | instead of having to manually search for something.
       | 
       | 5. No Bach in the classical folder?!
       | 
       | 6. Open source?
        
         | Pathogen-David wrote:
         | Not the author, but:
         | 
         | 1. The verified thing is a recent change
         | https://twitter.com/halomancer1/status/1680039297637040129
         | 
         | 6. It is, it'd definitely be nice if it was easier to find
         | https://github.com/mmontag/chip-player-js
        
       | Jakob wrote:
       | If you are on macOS, download the .mid file and open it in
       | Garageband and listen for how much (free!) MIDI synthesis has
       | improved.
        
         | wiradikusuma wrote:
         | You're right! Why is that? Shouldn't regardless of the app
         | (Chrome vs GarageBand) the sound be the same? I mean the
         | underlaying player should be the same right?
        
           | TazeTSchnitzel wrote:
           | MIDI files only contain a description of (simplifying
           | somewhat) the rhythm and base pitch of notes, and which
           | instruments they should be played on, so the realisation can
           | vary drastically depending on the particular system and
           | configuration (e.g. soundfont choice) it's played back with.
        
           | Jasper_ wrote:
           | MIDI does not have a sound. It's just instrument data. The
           | classic "MIDI sound" that you recognize is the Roland GM
           | soundkit shipped with Windows (an early version of Roland's
           | Virtual Sound Canvas product).
           | 
           | This website uses a different instrument set. You can
           | actually select which one it uses in the Settings panel, but
           | by default it uses Kenneth Rundt's GMGSx.sf2 (which does
           | sound quite a bit Roland-y to me), as shipped by SynthFont.
           | 
           | I don't know what instrument collection GarageBand uses.
        
           | Pathogen-David wrote:
           | That's the nature of MIDI files. They don't encode audio,
           | they encode a set of instruments with a list of notes. It's
           | up to whatever's playing them to provide what those
           | instruments actually sound like.
           | 
           | Here's an example of the same MIDI file being played back on
           | several different devices: https://youtu.be/eiMP-PlL6VM?t=954
           | It's clearly the same song on all of them, but it sounds
           | slightly different.
           | 
           | Modern browsers do not support MIDI playback on their own, so
           | chiptune.app is presumably doing it on its own with its own
           | (likely intentionally retro) sound font providing the
           | instruments.
           | 
           | Additionally even if macOS had its own system-level MIDI
           | synthesis (not sure if it does), GarageBand would actually
           | probably still be different since it's main purpose isn't
           | MIDI playback -- it's to be a DAW.
        
         | wiradikusuma wrote:
         | Btw I just want to say that I tried CANYON.MID and it sounds
         | _worse_ in GarageBand. I guess like using retina display to see
         | old JPEG files, the imperfections now visible.
        
       | jamesgreenleaf wrote:
       | https://chiptune.app/?play=Nintendo%20SNES%2FChrono%20Trigge...
        
       | cglong wrote:
       | Man, VGMusic.com was my Spotify in the 90's :)
       | 
       | I don't know much about the MIDI format, but there was one song
       | [1] that I used to love listening to on Windows 9x. I guess the
       | file took advantage of some 9x quirk, because the orchestration
       | is completely busted in modern Windows and macOS. I'm so happy
       | because this site plays it just the way I remember it!
       | 
       | [1]:
       | https://chiptune.app/?play=vgmusic.com%20MIDI%2Fconsole%2Fse...
        
         | Kye wrote:
         | MIDI has no sound on its own, so it depends on the thing
         | playing it. Windows' MIDI synthesis might have gotten worse, or
         | you remember it on the particular sound card you had with 9x.
         | 
         | Here's a video I found of one of my favorite games sounding
         | completely different from how I remember it:
         | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inn7IE6-wgY
        
         | Moru wrote:
         | Try the settings in the player, it has loads of soundfonts to
         | try, they all sound very different. If it's a midi file, it all
         | depends on what sound card or installed soundfont you had at
         | that time.
        
       | badrabbit wrote:
       | Didn't have some stuff I looked for. Modarchive lookup might fix
       | all that.
        
       | gdubs wrote:
       | I can confirm this is the real deal by its inclusion of my
       | favorite soundtrack: Donkey Kong Country.
        
       | genewitch wrote:
       | I have midis not included in the onlymidis and midis folders. I
       | can mail a floppy disk with the fills!
        
       | flykespice wrote:
       | Great web app, I like the simple static page with 90s aesthetic.
       | 
       | My only complain is that track selection is inconsistent among
       | systems, for example on Sega Master System the game tracks is
       | spread among individual .vgm files but on Nintendo all the tracks
       | is contained on a single .nsf file, which I find disavantadgeous
       | compared to the former one because you have to go through all the
       | tracks to find what you want.
       | 
       | I would rather if track selection would be uniform on all systems
       | by spreading them to individual files like Sega Master System
       | does.
        
       | charred_patina wrote:
       | Wow, I previously had this domain with a similar project hosted
       | and just let it expire in March. I was really confused seeing it
       | at the top of HN.
       | 
       | "Wait why is my website on the front page of HN? I thought I let
       | the domain expire."
       | 
       | I don't mean to piggyback, but I want to show what I had hosted
       | here before:
       | 
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pEvu_nC2LQ
       | 
       | OPs project is obviously much more impressive, but it's cool to
       | me that the aesthetics are similar and both come from similar
       | places. A nice reminder that the internet is actually pretty
       | small I guess.
       | 
       | Also, I'd like to introduce people who may not be familiar with
       | Chiptunes and trackers to Tim Follin. Tim has a legendary status
       | among NES composers. His music doesn't even sound like it could
       | be coming from an NES sound chip:
       | 
       | https://chiptune.app/browse/Nintendo/Silver%20Surfer
        
       | omoikane wrote:
       | I see that some of the files came with a "txt" link that shows
       | some credit info, which is nice. But I can't find any credits for
       | the site itself, is that intentional?
        
       | Vekz wrote:
       | very cool I like the UI. Wish it had the catalog from
       | keygenjukebox do net though.
        
       | sph wrote:
       | Very cool but... there's my favourite track, Foregone Destruction
       | from UT99, but can't link it because the URL is too long, and for
       | some reason the song skips. :(
       | 
       | For the nostalgia, here it is:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_0G6WPuss4
        
       | thih9 wrote:
       | Beautiful!
       | 
       | Also, it's so unexpected to see this text-style UI scroll
       | smoothly or update the progress bar smoothly.
        
       | bronikowski wrote:
       | Am I blind or are there no SID modules? C64 is like 90% of
       | tracked music that I'm listening to. :(
        
         | Sharlin wrote:
         | C64 modules here:
         | https://chiptune.app/browse/Game%20Mods/-%20Arranged%20-/
         | 
         | Of course these are indeed _modules_ , arrangements by someone
         | else than the original composer, and not SID tunes per se.
        
         | nurettin wrote:
         | Now you get an entire thread of nerds explain you the
         | etymological history of sound chips and the huge differences
         | between a sid program and the mid format despite having
         | perfectly working converters in both directions.
        
         | daneel_w wrote:
         | In the scene people always set SIDs and tracker chiptunes
         | apart, because of how technically different the two are.
         | There's an enormous technical complexity of having to emulate
         | not just the SID chip (which still isn't 100% understood) but
         | also the 6510 CPU and even some of the C64's CIA timers to
         | accurately replay SIDs, whereas almost all sample-based tracker
         | music from the Amiga and PC need none of that effort. Replaying
         | SIDs is even more complicated than emulating e.g. SPC700 of the
         | SNES, the PSG sound of the SMS, or the YM/OPN2 synthesizer of
         | the MegaDrive.
        
           | kevin_thibedeau wrote:
           | Sample based tracker formats shouldn't be considered
           | chiptunes. The latter is supposed to mean sound generated by
           | dedicated hardware with automatic waveform generation,
           | envelopes, and filtering. Doing it all in software by mixing
           | samples isn't the same.
        
             | daneel_w wrote:
             | Sample-based tracker music and the Amiga scene is where the
             | term and the artistic style was born. The Amiga scene and
             | the musicians of that era are the authority.
        
           | terlisimo wrote:
           | > also the 6510 CPU and even some of the C64's CIA timers
           | 
           | yes, but also the VIC timers and the PLA. So basically you
           | need all of the c64 chips emulated, at least in part :)
           | 
           | I wrote a simple SID player for fun and I feel like it's 20%
           | shy of being a full c64 emulator, all it needs is video
           | output and keyboard/joystick input.
        
             | xmcqdpt2 wrote:
             | I have a physical SID chip and I was looking at
             | implementations of players and ... was shocked at how
             | complicated they are. I guess it makes sense though: SID
             | files are tiny because they are in effect full C64 native
             | programs that generate music. It would be hard to do
             | otherwise on that platform.
             | 
             | I wrote a simple program that transformed basic (60hz, no
             | PCM-style hacks) SID programs to like sequence of byte
             | instructions for the SID chip so that I could replay
             | without emulating and the file sizes are massive compared
             | to the original!
             | 
             | Here is an awesome single file SID player written in C,
             | 
             | https://github.com/mlund/csid/blob/master/csid.c
        
           | chromoblob wrote:
           | Meanwhile, there's GoatTracker (tracker for SID music).
        
             | daneel_w wrote:
             | And SID Factory and a couple of others.
        
               | mdp2021 wrote:
               | Any recommendation for Multi-SID? There should exist a
               | six channels GoatTracker - I am not sure anything else is
               | available.
        
         | Sharlin wrote:
         | Yeah, it's a bit strange omission.
        
           | mdp2021 wrote:
           | Playing samples in patterns and computing coded sound are
           | completely different efforts.
        
             | Sharlin wrote:
             | But the site already has _tons_ of tracker music, as well
             | as other not-strictly-chiptunes like an incredible number
             | of .mid versions of classical music and contemporary pop
             | songs of all things.
        
               | mdp2021 wrote:
               | Tracker files: audio samples as instruments played by a
               | table of notes and variations.
               | 
               | MIDI files: a table of notes and variations for playing
               | default samples for instruments.
               | 
               | Chip synthesis programs: code that generates sequences of
               | sounds, requiring some specific synth engine.
               | 
               | The former two have a radically different (lack of)
               | complexity compared to the latter...
        
               | Sharlin wrote:
               | I know, but I don't understand your point. The site is
               | full of .mids and mods, as well as other mod-like formats
               | ripped from various devices. I'm not even sure if it does
               | have any actual chiptunes, as in synthetized in realtime!
        
               | mdp2021 wrote:
               | You wrote that you find it a <<strange omission>> not to
               | have included SID tunes in a collection of <<mids and
               | mods>>. Well, simply, the coder must have had an engine
               | capable of playing the latter, which is simple - and not
               | an engine capable of playing the former, which is
               | complex.
        
             | [deleted]
        
         | montag wrote:
         | You are not blind! This is my personal bias showing, I should
         | really add SID modules to the catalog.
        
         | snowram wrote:
         | May I recommand to you the High Voltage Sid Collection? It is a
         | collection of curated SID songs in a neat package, and it is
         | updated regularly! https://www.hvsc.c64.org/
        
           | bronikowski wrote:
           | Oh, I have HVSC, probably on most of my devices. I was
           | expressing surprise about the project's lack of SIDs not my
           | lack of it! :-D
        
           | Audiophilip wrote:
           | The whole HVSC is available on DeepSID, an online SID player:
           | https://deepsid.chordian.net/
        
         | terlisimo wrote:
         | To be fair, nobody called c64 music "chip music", it was just
         | "music/tunes" because c64 music is really just code so in a way
         | all of it was chip music (excepting some digi tunes).
         | 
         | The term chip music was coined on amigas and newer computers to
         | differentiate it from regular sample based music.
        
       | qwertox wrote:
       | What is playing this back? When using the inspector, I see it
       | actually downloads the .mid file. I didn't grant Chrome access to
       | my MIDI devices (not that I'd have any connected) and it was
       | still playing the audio.
       | 
       | Is it playing it back with some internal samples and a playback
       | feature, relaying it to the OS, or is this a Javascript player?
       | 
       | --
       | 
       | Oh wait, I just turned on the Visualizer, which makes me think
       | that this is all done in Javascript, including the audio
       | rendering?
        
         | boomlinde wrote:
         | I'd guess the hard work is done by the WebAssembly blob. There
         | are open libraries written in C and C++ for the rendering of
         | just about any audio format into a sample buffer. For General
         | MIDI playback you could use e.g. the TiMidity++ or FluidSynth
         | libraries, which use instrument data from SoundFont files.
        
           | twoodfin wrote:
           | The settings offer a variety of playback options, including
           | FluidSynth--with a choice of SoundFonts--or direct Web MIDI.
           | 
           | This is wild. Anyone who's more into this space than I am
           | have any editorial comments on the various SoundFont options?
           | 
           |  _...listening to Space Quest III..._
        
             | boomlinde wrote:
             | The Roland SC-55/SCC-1 one would probably be an authentic
             | sounding choice for GM/GS game soundtracks after the early
             | 90s, since a lot of the soundtracks were actually composed
             | with it. Doom (and its sequel), Duke Nukem 3D, Descent, the
             | Warcraft games (though the WC2 composer(s?) used an SC-88
             | as well) just off the top of my head.
             | 
             | Or Masquerade 55, if you want higher fidelity but with
             | SC-55 replacement in mind.
             | 
             | Space Quest III predates General MIDI altogether. I assume
             | that the original soundtrack was composed for the Roland
             | MT-32 and that the ones you are listening to have been
             | remade into GM by fans, or maybe it was added in a later
             | version. It would be nice if this player contained an MT-32
             | emulator since so many Sierra (and other) game soundtracks
             | were composed for it specifically. Such a thing already
             | exists: https://github.com/munt/munt
        
             | montag wrote:
             | GMGSx Plus is basically a Roland SC-55 sound-alike, except
             | with the Piano patch swapped with a nicer one from
             | GeneralUser GS. Good tradeoff of size and sound quality.
             | 
             | There's a huge variance in Soundfont quality, and the craft
             | put in by Soundfont authors to program all the modulators
             | properly makes a huge difference. GeneralUser is one of the
             | best. https://schristiancollins.com/generaluser.php
        
         | bryans wrote:
         | MIDI playback does not require a device and is baked into the
         | OS via QuickTime's synthesizer and Microsoft GS Wavetable
         | Synth.
        
       | 1letterunixname wrote:
       | That the MIDI instruments are so good and the emulated playback
       | is so accurate is amazing. It sounds better on my iPad Pro than
       | it ever did on a large 4:3 TV. Damn impressive.
       | 
       | Many hours wasted on this 2P game with a neighbor:
       | https://chiptune.app/browse/Nintendo/Jackal
        
       | jensgk wrote:
       | The classical piano pieces sound great in the Pianoteq VST.
        
         | ghusbands wrote:
         | Where is that option? It's not in the list of SoundFonts that I
         | see.
        
       | jimmydddd wrote:
       | Are these all actual tracks from games? I'm a jazz fan and I
       | never knew tunes by Chic Corea, Wayne Shorter, etc., were
       | incorporated into games?
        
         | aflag wrote:
         | I think some of them are just midi versions of famous songs.
        
       | Netcob wrote:
       | I love the visualizer, how you can basically follow along on that
       | keyboard at the top.
        
       | khazhoux wrote:
       | The fact that the songs play instantly when you click makes me
       | sad for literally all modern software.
        
         | ziml77 wrote:
         | They don't though? I just clicked between two tracks a few
         | times. Each time I switch there is a very clear delay between
         | the click and the playback starting. You can even visually tell
         | there's a delay because the row only becomes highlighted when
         | playback of that track starts.
        
           | mdp2021 wrote:
           | Check the download graphs in your browser's network activity
           | monitor.
        
         | Waterluvian wrote:
         | Not sure I follow. I just tried with Spotify on my phone and
         | desktop (oooh Electron spooky) and any song plays instantly.
        
           | sealeck wrote:
           | I actually find that Spotify is super buggy. If I switch
           | devices it doesn't work (I have to select the new device at
           | least five times), when I go underground with my phone it's
           | super slow to realise that I've lost connection, and I
           | usually have to restart the app for it to continue playing
           | music.
        
             | azemetre wrote:
             | My major issue with Spotify is that they keep changing the
             | UX on me every week. I hate being part of some terrible a/b
             | testing that I didn't consent too. They already have my
             | money, why do they feel the need to tamper with my
             | experience more? It's extremely infuriating.
             | 
             | I remember something was posted to HN a while ago about
             | exporting your playlists from Spotify. That's my current
             | hurdle to leaving the platform, if I can do that and
             | whichever service allows me to import these playlists I'll
             | be leaving.
        
               | gymbeaux wrote:
               | SongShift is what I use. The free version works well
               | enough, and goes either way between Apple Music and
               | Spotify, probably supports other services.
        
             | holoduke wrote:
             | Big tech UIs are never made to satisfy the user. They are
             | made to balance you between annoyance and acceptance. Just
             | enough that you wont leave, but still getting frustrated by
             | the aweful mechanics. In a way its also a good thing. Gives
             | room to create a better variant
        
             | samayylmao wrote:
             | For me switching playback device is quick and reliable if
             | the device is a PC or phone. Whenever I try to select a
             | connected Google speaker... it takes like 3-5 tries. I've
             | found it is more reliable to use voice commands to get the
             | speaker to play Spotify then I can use a phone/PC to select
             | the song/playlist/podcast/etc. but it's kind of frustrating
             | it just doesn't work well to begin with.
        
           | xp84 wrote:
           | Try Apple Music, lol. They're still working on starting
           | tracks quickly and smoothly.
        
           | ungamedplayer wrote:
           | This is not a consistent experience for everyone.
        
           | brk wrote:
           | I think the point is that "all modern software" has all kinds
           | of delays and buffering before playing, in contrast to this
           | site where the audio just plays instantly and reliably.
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | p-e-w wrote:
           | It's just a variation of the standard "all modern software is
           | garbage because Facebook and Twitter are garbage" nonsense
           | complaint.
        
             | zondafan1 wrote:
             | Replace "Facebook and Twitter" with "Electron" and you
             | would be right.
        
               | postalrat wrote:
               | Would these not play instantly in electron too?
        
               | briandear wrote:
               | If you have 5 terabytes of RAM, electron is perfect.
               | 
               | I hate electron and the CTOs that use it almost as much
               | as I had "cross-platform" mobile apps.
               | 
               | That sort of garbage is coding to the lowest common
               | denominator of device rather than optimizing the app for
               | the capabilities of the hardware.
        
               | bob1029 wrote:
               | > and the CTOs that use it
               | 
               | This is why you need to become king. In many places, it
               | is the only way to truly deal with this nonsense. Top-
               | down.
               | 
               | If you want a big org to defenestrate electron, your #1
               | mission is to generate a very scary narrative that
               | electron is a 'legacy' technology and that your
               | competition is already 2 steps ahead. You could spin
               | little lies like "I overheard a member of KPMG discussing
               | our competition's use of SSR and native local apps to
               | deliver leading-edge UX while at lunch last week".
               | 
               | The super shitty thing about electron is that it does,
               | arguably, reduce the overall complexity of delivering an
               | end solution (regardless of the UX). My traditional
               | arguments that complexity is at the heart of all evil do
               | seem to go hard against this idea that I can code an app
               | one time and deploy it everywhere. Clearly, this is not
               | how it works out in practice, but the savings are
               | definitely somewhere in the middle and detectable.
               | 
               | What does HN think about the complexity argument _for_
               | using electron?
        
               | Waterluvian wrote:
               | It's important to be mindful that the engineering is a
               | minority slice of all the decisions that go into a
               | product's development.
               | 
               | The reason why some engineers need to be managed by
               | Product and Project is that they don't think hard about
               | all the constraints, such as the cost of developing
               | multiple native apps vs. the benefit that would provide.
               | 
               | This is often due to a failure of empathy: many engineers
               | envision the common user being like them, when really the
               | common user doesn't know, notice, or care about whatever
               | this "Electron" thing is.
               | 
               | I've seen, time and time again, developers having loud
               | opinions about how choosing X over Y is because people
               | are dumb, or cheap, or inexperienced. Those are all
               | possible, but not nearly as common as they think. They're
               | easy explanations. But I rarely see developers do the
               | _engineering_ part where they quantify the issue and make
               | a case for picking X over Y.
               | 
               | If developers hate Electron so much, the answer is to
               | develop the skill set for making an _informed_ argument
               | that isn't limited to just things like RAM and latency
               | and file size. These often aren't compelling business
               | reasons. They'll either learn more about why Electron
               | gets picked, or they'll have a solid case to make for why
               | not to pick it.
        
               | post-it wrote:
               | > as I had "cross-platform" mobile apps
               | 
               | I'm on a four-person team building a React Native app. RN
               | is awful, I'll admit, but it would be impossible to work
               | at the pace we do if we were maintaining fully parallel
               | Android and iOS codebases.
               | 
               | Besides, it's the hardware's job to optimize for the
               | capabilities of the SDK.
        
               | tredre3 wrote:
               | I was with you for the first paragraph. But that's just
               | despicable thinking:
               | 
               | > Besides, it's the hardware's job to optimize for the
               | capabilities of the SDK.
               | 
               | You can't possibly blame the hardware manufacturers for
               | how poorly React Native runs. Even if the CPU engineers
               | wanted to target React specifically and make it run
               | better somehow (and you seem to think they should), where
               | would they begin? React sits on top of 35 layers of
               | software abstraction and runs in 2-3 virtual machines,
               | how could they target RN?
               | 
               | Assuming they could add magical instructions that benefit
               | React somehow, who's going to patch the 34 lower layers
               | for React to benefit from it? The manufacturers? The
               | React team? You?
        
               | [deleted]
        
         | mdp2021 wrote:
         | > _when you click_
         | 
         | When you click, you download packages between 30kb and 300kb
         | (roughly speaking); the player is surely already in memory -
         | that is your latency. For systems that run immediately on
         | machines with a fraction of power.
        
         | 1letterunixname wrote:
         | The relative compression is much, much higher for the
         | equivalent of "vector" music over high bit rate "raster"
         | digital audio codecs.
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | tarcon wrote:
       | Awesome. I didn't know my browser can play midi files. Firefox
       | Developer 116 on macOS 13.4.1
        
         | epcoa wrote:
         | The browser can play any sound so why not MIDI files. To be
         | clear, the default implementation here is that this uses a soft
         | synth (FluidSynth) compiled to wasm to render MIDI to waveform
         | data - this is not how browsers classically played MIDI through
         | the OS sequencer. It does also support sending out MIDI data to
         | external devices though.
        
       | TomatoTomato wrote:
       | canyon.mid never disappoints
        
       | lavventura wrote:
       | It brought me back to childhould memories, I remember the songs
       | of the games I played. I wish there were links to all the games's
       | info.
        
       | zeta0134 wrote:
       | Jake Kaufman was kind enough to release the entire Shovel Knight
       | OST as an NSF under creative commons, meaning we're allowed to
       | host it and do cool stuff with it. So I'll take this opportunity
       | to plug an NES visualizer I've been working on. Did you know the
       | Shovel Knight OST can and will run on a real FamiCom, using
       | Konami's VRC6 mapper? Knowing that, I can look at the register
       | writes as they're being made, work out the appropriate frequency
       | on the keyboard, and show a piano roll in realtime:
       | 
       | https://rusticnes.reploid.cafe/wasm/?tab=jam&cartridge=Shove...
       | 
       | But I don't have a slick interface or a way to browse chiptunes,
       | so...
       | 
       | chiptune.app: 1
       | 
       | zeta: 0
       | 
       | Clearly I need to get to work :) (At the very least, you can load
       | up most NSF files and even NES games, and the visualizer will
       | still run. If you want to know what notes the "coin" sound in SMB
       | makes, now you can.)
        
         | kibwen wrote:
         | The piano/waveform visualizer is great, and there's a ton of
         | fun to be had here by turning on and off different instruments.
         | It would be nice if the interface were more
         | discoverable/documented though. :)
         | 
         | (EDIT: also, it looks like chiptune.app does have a sort of
         | piano-like visualizer available from the top-right corner, but
         | it doesn't look quite as nice as yours.)
        
         | sonjaqql wrote:
         | This is a really cool visualizer. Neat work!
        
         | TulliusCicero wrote:
         | Wow, this visualizer is awesome!
        
         | Pathogen-David wrote:
         | I hadn't realized (or maybe just forgot) your visualization was
         | publicly available, super cool to see the Shovel Knight OST in
         | it! I love seeing your music come up on YouTube/Twitter, the
         | retro piano roll and the waveforms are so satisfying to watch.
        
         | emmanueloga_ wrote:
         | FX3 [0] is one of my fav albums from Virt, but I don't think he
         | ever released the source? If I get it right it was composed as
         | .nsf files too.
         | 
         | I saw there was a MIDI file for at least one of the songs
         | (Choppastyle [1][2]), so maybe there's a chance to get the rest
         | of them from somewhere? I'd love to hear a version with modern
         | synth instruments to compare and contrast (although my dream is
         | for a cover of the whole album by www.paulgilbert.com and
         | friends hahah).
         | 
         | NOTE: the redirect from links like [2] is a bit jarring, it
         | would feel more natural if the URL remained (instead of the
         | redirect to [3]). It would also make it easier to share a
         | specific song by just copying the URL.
         | 
         | --
         | 
         | 0: https://virt.bandcamp.com/album/fx3-remastered
         | 
         | 1: https://virt.bandcamp.com/track/choppastyle
         | 
         | 2: https://chiptune.app/?play=Contemporary%2FVirt%2Fv-
         | choppasty...
         | 
         | 3: https://chiptune.app/browse/Contemporary/Virt
        
           | montag wrote:
           | I had a rationale for this redirect behavior, but not sure it
           | matches user expectations. The URL will reflect the browse
           | location, but not the playing track...otherwise the URL gets
           | too clunky. You can always copy the playing track from the
           | link icon.
        
       | dimator wrote:
       | https://chiptune.app/?play=Nintendo%20SNES%2FDonkey%20Kong%2...
       | 
       | :')
       | 
       | by david wise. what a gem. and here is the obligatory, very well
       | done mini-doc about this track, and the incredible technical
       | achievement it took to make it:
       | 
       | https://youtu.be/jvIzIAgRWV0
        
       | CapTinKneeMow wrote:
       | Love the retro UI
        
       | move-on-by wrote:
       | Very fun! I wish I could send a link for a song and have it play
       | when it is opened. I have a friend group I would share that with.
        
       | tarellel wrote:
       | These tunes bring back some incredible memories form my teens.
       | 
       | https://chiptune.app/?q=ultima+online
        
       | makach wrote:
       | Labor of love, excellent!
        
       | gv83 wrote:
       | castlevania all the way baby!
        
       | honeybadger1 wrote:
       | This, this is so good.
        
       | epcoa wrote:
       | The MOD player seems to have some problems with the sequencing
       | and tempo in a number of files on multiple browsers/devices.
        
       | chaosprint wrote:
       | is this open sourced? the audio is clicking on my phone
        
       | moritzwarhier wrote:
       | What a neat project, kudos! Wish I'd had the idea to do something
       | similar as a React fun / spare time project, this sparks joy and
       | new interest in doing something with web audio.
       | 
       | Also very polished, the UI really looks like Norton Commander or
       | something similar and is still perfectly usable on a phone.
        
       | ilaksh wrote:
       | Love this but unfortunately the sound has significant issues on a
       | cheap Android phone. I'm sure it will work the the laptop though.
        
       | sporadicallyjoe wrote:
       | Great app. Though the files for 'The Elder Scrolls - Arena' seem
       | to be missing.
        
       | smodo wrote:
       | For people trying to play this in Safari: reload the page if you
       | get no sound. I've some experience with safari on mobile and
       | wasm. Audio is unfortunately quite wonky.
        
         | ErneX wrote:
         | Safari specially on mobile usually wants audio to be user
         | initiated (e.g. triggered by a click/tap), to prevent autoplay
         | surprises I guess?
        
       | Synaesthesia wrote:
       | The Piano e-competition MIDI files are great!
        
       | lepetitchef wrote:
       | I am looking for Japanese Tokyo train melody tunes. It would be
       | great if this library includes them
        
       | Paul_S wrote:
       | The folder structure is such a mess that I thought it only does
       | midi but I used the search bar and was amazed by the crisp SID
       | rendition. Should add a filter toggle to remove all the midi
       | spam.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | drsopp wrote:
         | I cannot find any SID music.
        
           | vidarh wrote:
           | Same. Found a number of mods covers of C64 tracks, but not
           | found a single sid.
        
             | Paul_S wrote:
             | I had a look again and you are right. What I was listening
             | to was a mod remix of a sid tune. Do I feel silly now.
        
       | ceroxylon wrote:
       | The settings to turn on/off voices and adjust the effects is
       | amazing for sampling parts of legendary songs.
        
       | mogoh wrote:
       | https://github.com/mmontag/chip-player-js
        
       | fire wrote:
       | this is extremely cool when it works well!
       | 
       | my poor pixel 3 can't play back almost anything on the site
       | without constant popping ( resembling artifacts, I think? ),
       | which is sad
        
       | lindtobias wrote:
       | Web-based music player for a variety of video game and chiptune
       | music formats.
        
       | vardump wrote:
       | Searched for any chiptunes (in the _original_ meaning) on that
       | site, the only ones I could find are here:
       | https://chiptune.app/browse/ModArchives/Dreamfish. Perhaps there
       | are more?
       | 
       | In the 1990s chiptunes meant *tracker (Protracker, etc.) tunes
       | with short loops used as instruments.
        
         | nxpnsv wrote:
         | For me it meant sid, and a bunch of ym trackers on atari st.
         | The mods where just chip style. That said i really loved those
         | old chip mods
        
           | vardump wrote:
           | Absolutely no one referred to SID, YM etc. tunes as chiptunes
           | in the nineties.
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiptune
           | 
           | "The term is commonly used to refer to tracker format music
           | using extremely basic and small samples that an old computer
           | or console could produce (this is the original meaning of the
           | term)"
        
             | peoplefromibiza wrote:
             | emphasis on _that an old computer or console could produce
             | (this is the original meaning of the term)_
             | 
             | chiptunes on Amiga (mod, xm) where reproducing samples of
             | the sounds created with HW synthesizers (CHIPs), like, for
             | example, the C64 SID, one of the most popular ever.
             | 
             | For example the intro of "Cannon Fodder"[1] on the Amiga is
             | not considered a chiptune, because it used samples from
             | real instruments and a human singer
             | 
             | For some original _true_ chiptune, see the amazing work of
             | the amazing Rob Hubbard[2]
             | 
             | The 8bit electric guitar of Skate or die still gives me
             | goosebumps almost 40 years later[3]
             | 
             | [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiYuq6Ac3a0
             | 
             | [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Hubbard
             | 
             | [3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqRXxPl6bXA
        
               | vardump wrote:
               | "emphasis on that an old computer or console could
               | produce (this is the original meaning of the term)"
               | 
               | Yes, old computers and consoles with sampling
               | capabilities. Chiptune means to "emulate" older sound
               | chips with sampling hardware.
               | 
               | In the nineties SID music was just SIDs.
               | 
               | "For example the intro of "Cannon Fodder"[1] on the Amiga
               | is not considered a chiptune, because it used samples
               | from real instruments and a human singer"
               | 
               | Agreed.
               | 
               | "For some original true chiptune, see the amazing work of
               | the amazing Rob Hubbard[2]"
               | 
               | Rob's work is amazing, but I really don't think he'd
               | refer them as chiptunes.
               | 
               | In the early nineties, as a demo (intro) coder you wanted
               | a chiptune when you had space constraints. 40 kB total
               | for code / gfx / music, which was a pretty common size
               | limit for Amiga intros that time, so you had maybe 4-15
               | kB for the chiptune.
               | 
               | How do I know? I was there.
        
               | peoplefromibiza wrote:
               | I was there too.
               | 
               | Not disagreeing with what you wrote, I was replying to _"
               | Absolutely no one referred to SID, YM etc. tunes as
               | chiptunes in the *nineties*"_
               | 
               | They absolutely did in the 90s.
               | 
               | I was organizing chiptunes nights in my city in Italy in
               | the late 90s early 2000s and we were calling it either
               | 8bit music, chip music or chiptunes.
               | 
               | I did not invent the format, I discovered it in Berlin at
               | the times.
               | 
               | The guys in Berlin told me that they imported it from
               | Tokyo -\\_(tsu)_/-
        
               | squarefoot wrote:
               | > For some original true chiptune, see the amazing work
               | of the amazing Rob Hubbard
               | 
               | His Commando tune is pure gold, I still love it after
               | about 40 years since the 1st listen. A real song that I
               | plan to make a rock cover one day, hopefully before I die
               | (did I say I'm quite lazy?:) Others already did metal
               | covers, sometimes with good results [0]. My idea is to
               | keep it funky like the original and use mostly real
               | instruments.
               | 
               | 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2rws8l4Kiw
        
             | nxpnsv wrote:
             | You may be correct about wording, it was a life time ago
             | and I only spoke about this in Swedish. I think one of the
             | trackers I used called itself a chip composor, there's a
             | nice archive of these things things (some of them quite
             | recent) here https://dhs.nu/files.php?t=chipeditor
        
         | mdp2021 wrote:
         | "Chiptunes" means that some microprocessor was used as a sound
         | synthesizer. In the initial years, you coded the tune. Then a
         | standardization happened, as music code could be generalized in
         | "sound patterns" definition and organization: hence, e.g.,
         | Chris Huelsbeck's Soundmonitor (1986). That is one of the first
         | public "trackers". The name comes from the Ultimate
         | Soundtracker on the Amiga (1987) - but the Paula was more
         | typically used as a sampler, not as a synth. Speaking of
         | "chiptunes" implies a style - that may or may not be the output
         | of a tracker (it depends on how it is used).
        
         | el_nahual wrote:
         | I'm old enough to remember playing games with chiptunes, but
         | young enough to not have known what a tracker was. This YouTube
         | video (from the amazing Ahoy channel) is an incredible, in-
         | depth overview of trackers, their sound and history:
         | 
         | https://youtu.be/roBkg-iPrbw
        
       | teddyh wrote:
       | For those who want MP3 files to use locally, there's the Stone
       | Oakvalley collections, recorded from real Amiga and Commodore 64
       | computers:
       | 
       | * Amiga Music Collection (SOAMC=) <https://www.paula8364.com/>
       | 
       | * Authentic SID Collection (SOASC=) <https://www.6581-8580.com/>
        
       | Dig1t wrote:
       | https://chiptune.app/browse/Nintendo%2064/Bomberman%20Hero%2...
       | 
       | "Redial" in this folder is one of the best and most underrated
       | video game songs of all time.
       | 
       | Very nice.
        
         | Yhippa wrote:
         | Thanks for pointing this out! Actually a bunch of other songs
         | on there are really great.
        
         | sogen wrote:
         | 18-Ooze has voice??
         | 
         | Always had thought there only were chiptune sounds
        
           | Jasper_ wrote:
           | The N64 has no native sound processor -- just PCM sample
           | output. Game developers often integrated some form of custom
           | sequence or MIDI format, combined with PCM samples, and some
           | playback code running on the N64 CPU. The miniusf file format
           | is a bit of a hack, it basically packages a copy of the ROM
           | together (sometimes stripped to just the audio code / data,
           | but not often), a savestate of registers/RAM, and runs a full
           | N64 emulator with the graphics code stripped out. [0]
           | 
           | So what you're hearing is just the playback code shipped in
           | the game, plus all the samples it came with.
           | 
           | [0] http://hcs64.com/usf/
        
         | montag wrote:
         | Also check out the Soundfont conversion - not perfectly
         | accurate, but sounds nice
         | https://chiptune.app/?play=Nintendo%2064%20(SoundFont%20MIDI...
         | 
         | (I spent entirely too much time on these conversions...)
        
         | jakemauer wrote:
         | Wow this is really great, thanks for sharing.
        
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       (page generated 2023-07-15 23:01 UTC)