![]() ![]() Cyber Shadow was presented as a retro-inspired, fast-paced 2D platformer with a dark/techie ambience and serious tone. “My first task was to understand what I was making music for. ![]() This poses an interesting conundrum for composer Enrique Martin who needed to match the style and time period that Cyber Shadow is emulating whilst also creating a soundtrack that is unique in its own right. The game hearkens back to classic NES platformers like Ninja Gaiden, and the whole aesthetic, tool set, and mechanics are that of the punishingly difficult but gloriously gratifying genre of old. This is what makes Enrique Martin’s Cyber Shadow soundtrack so captivating.Ĭyber Shadow is a 2021 action platformer from developer Aarne Hunziker, published by Yacht Club Games. Sure, tracks like “Atari” use chiptune as a flavor, but to actually innovate on chiptune in its purest form offers up a gauntlet of different challenges, balancing authentic tonal form whilst pushing the limits. Chiptune can be seen influencing genres across the globe now, from the City Pop movement of 1980s Japan through to modern tracks like “wondercore” band Hiatus Kaiyote’s “Atari” (later sampled on Kendrick Lamar’s Pulitzer Prize-winning album DAMN).Ĭhiptune has such an entrenched sense of style that it can be hard to innovate. ![]() As technology has improved, digital PSG plug-ins such as the Tweakbench peach have made chiptune as viable a stylistic choice as any other musical format. Creating Chiptune music, like any early synthesized music, used to be an arduous creative process that typically involved ripping the PSG from an old machine and wiring that through a series of auxiliary modules. This has led to the enduring appeal of Chiptune music.Ĭhiptune, otherwise known as Chip Music or 8-bit music, is a synthesized genre that uses the old programmable sound generators (PSGs for short) found in arcade machines, home consoles, and handhelds of yore as the soundboard for their musical creations. For every AAA single-player experience with groundbreaking graphics and Spielberg-worthy scores, there will always be the 8-bit indie darlings that steal the hearts and imaginations of gamers. The incredibly limited technology that programmers and composers had to work with paved the way for true innovation that has carved a permanent place in the hearts of gamers old and new. The early years of video games were a challenging, strange, and often wonderful Wild West of genre splicing, mechanics inventing, and musical fusion madness. ![]()
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