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Since I had a PAL SMS when I was a kid, I've recently been listening to some VGM packs at 50hz speed, with the idea that they would sound closer to how I remember them.

VGM packs such as Streets Of Rage 2, Golden Axe, Alex Kidd In Miracle World, just sound completely wrong to me at 60hz. Even if that was the intended speed, it's just not what I'm used to. Whereas at 50hz they sound exactly as I remember, which is awesome and I'm so glad the inVGM plugin has the option to choose 50hz or 60hz playback.

Anyway, my question is, do all PAL games run at 50hz on a real PAL SMS?

Because, perhaps I'm just remembering incorrectly, but SOME of the VGM packs I've played at 50hz sound too slow to me - which doesn't make any sense. For example, Robocop Versus Terminator. I loved this soundtrack when I was a kid, so I'm almost positive I remember how it sounded on my real SMS. But if I now play the VGM pack at 50hz, it sounds too slow, whereas if I play it at 60hz I could swear that's how I remember hearing it on my PAL SMS. Am I going crazy or did some PAL games NOT run at 50hz on a real PAL SMS?

Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS. However, some music engines (and some game engines) compensated for the slower speed so they don't play slower.

Years ago, our plan for games like this was to remove the information for rate adjustment, so they always play at the right speed. We could update the packs accordingly. It also stops people being able to play tracks at 200Hz or whatever, but I guess that's not a big deal.

As Maxim was saying, it's set in hardware. Likewise NTSC SMS or any Game Gear will play games at 60hz.

Mega Drive and Saturn behave similar. Foreign games don't change their mode either.

Thanks for the replies so far

Maxim wrote

Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS. However, some music engines (and some game engines) compensated for the slower speed so they don't play slower.

Interesting, is there a way to tell which games had this compensation and didn't play the music slower?

One way to test this thing would be play the game twice, either in a SMS with 50/60 switch or on a emulator supporting both PAL/NTSC (selectable) :)

Maxim wrote

Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS.

Yes. Probably the better phrased question is "Were any PAL games optimised to run at the correct (close to 60Hz) speed on a PAL console?"

I haven't come across any PAL games so far that run too quickly on a PAL console switched to 60Hz, but the sad thing I have noticed is that games I've played so far which only got a European release are still clearly running too slowly in both audio and visuals. This is a shame and also a surprise to me given that publishers must have seen how the market was, with Japan dying off early, America not greatly interested and the large bulk of users in PAL territories. Perhaps there's a sensible explanation, or was it simply a case of hedging their bets that a game would be released in an NTSC territory, so developing for 60Hz?

If talking about later era games, maybe they had prospects of releasing Game Gear versions, which was always 60hz?

KingMike wrote

If talking about later era games, maybe they had prospects of releasing Game Gear versions, which was always 60hz?

Of course! I had forgotten about this.

I also believe they were coded for 60Hz because if it works there it works on 50Hz too (just 17% slower), but not the other way.

It would be good to list which games do this, both for gameplay and music. It's fairly easy to try it both ways in an emulator, just so a hard reset when you change settings. In Meka you have to change the system type and speed independently.

OK I just went into MEKA, set the TV type to PAL and set the rate to 50hz, then did a hard reset and loaded up Robocop Versus Terminator SMS version. The music plays at the same speed I remember it being on my real PAL SMS when I was a kid. So one would assume that the music is also playing at 50hz, same as the game itself.

But if I play the VGM pack at 50hz it sounds too slow. Whereas playing the VGM pack at 60hz sounds right. I don't really understand what's going on here, perhaps other members could clarify. Does this mean that Robocop Versus Terminator has this compensation thing that Maxim mentioned?

Because it seems to me that in-game the music rate and game rate don't match.

Taking another example, Alex Kidd in Miracle World, running this game at 50hz PAL on MEKA, then playing the VGM pack at 50hz, the music sounds the same. So here the in-game music rate does match the game rate.

Repeat your RoboCop experiment set to NTSC/60 and see if the music is the same speed, and also the gameplay.

If so, then it is compensating. Therefore the pack, which was made at 60Hz, should not be artificially slowed down by 20%. We can edit the files to make them block the adjustment.

Maxim wrote

Repeat your RoboCop experiment set to NTSC/60 and see if the music is the same speed, and also the gameplay.

If so, then it is compensating. Therefore the pack, which was made at 60Hz, should not be artificially slowed down by 20%. We can edit the files to make them block the adjustment.

I already did that, and if I run the game on MEKA on NTSC at 60hz, the music sounds faster. Too fast. Faster than playing the VGM pack at 60hz. Not sure about the gameplay.

So I guess the game isn't compensating? But why does the music rate not match the game rate? If the game is running at 50hz PAL the music seems to be playing at 60hz, and if the game is running at 60hz NTSC then the music is playing even faster than that, maybe 70hz or something. Is it possible the discrepency is purely related to a problem with the VGM pack?

Also, since you mentioned the possibility of files blocking rate adjustment, I noticed that some of the files in the Sonic 2 VGM pack seem to ignore the rate setting (they play at the same speed whether the plugin is set to 50hz or 60hz). Were they intentionally set to behave this way? Seemed weird to me that only some of the files in the pack do this.

I suppose there could be games we aren't sure of their intended music or gameplay speed. At worst you'd have to analyze the code for clues, or hope a development team member recalls anything.

Just experimenting with this a bit more, I've discovered that the music from "Land Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse" and "Sonic The Hedgehog 2" also seems to play at 60hz speed when running MEKA at 50hz PAL.

That makes 3 I've found so far, including Robocop Versus The Terminator.

Here are the full results of my experiments, I only checked games I am familiar with though:

-Aladdin - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Alex Kidd In Miracle World - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Asterix And The Secret Mission - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Black Belt - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Castle Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Cosmic Spacehead - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Daffy Duck In Hollywood - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Fantastic Dizzy - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Golden Axe - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-The Jungle Book - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Land Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse - PAL = music speed 60HZ
-Lemmings - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Mortal Kombat II - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Rampage - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Robocop Versus The Terminator - PAL = music speed 60HZ
-The Simpsons: Bart Versus The Space Mutants - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Sonic The Hedgehog 2 - PAL = music speed 60HZ
-Spider-man: Return Of The Sinister Six - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Streets Of Rage - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Streets Of Rage II - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Tom And Jerry: The Movie - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Wonder Boy In Monster Land - PAL = music speed 50HZ
-Wonder Boy In Monster World - PAL = music speed 50HZ

I know this is an old topic but I actually found this topic outside the site on a google search and from reading this post and listening to some of the VGM packs on here I thought i'd comment as I noticed a flaw (or what I consider to be a flaw) with some of the VGM packs. I noticed that who ever is making them is recording them at 60Hz and not 50Hz, for the most part, this is perfectly fine but for some games that use the V3 sound engine from 1990 onwards, this causes noticable issue with the noise channel percussion. Games like Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior, George Forman's KO Boxing, HeavyWeight Champ, Tecmo World Cup 93 and Master Of Darkness have sluggish white noise beatboxing percussion and it has something to do with the optimisation process of the audio in these games. It's hard to explain but all those games I just mentioned have optimised audio for 50Hz, meaning they sound identical in 50Hz when compared to 60Hz, the only difference is that the percussion sounds sluggish in 60Hz and sharp in 50Hz. Not sure what causes this but when an SMS game is NOT optimised in audio for 50Hz and has music slower than 60Hz, that sluggish white noise percussion sound thing is not there and it sounds sharp and normal in 60Hz. For example: Games like Psychic World, Ninja Gaiden, Laser Ghost, Taz-Mania and Dragon Crystal which all use that same sound engine don't have sluggish percussion in 60Hz but the 50Hz and 60Hz speeds don't match, so whatever is causing that effect has to do with the games being optimised for PAL 50Hz.

The problem with the VGM packs is that those games were done in 60Hz so that sluggish percussion track is heard when forcing the packs in 50Hz, yet if they were done the other way around and recorded in 50Hz, the sluggish white noise effect wouldn't be there and instead the noise would be sharp and on point.

If you really want to hear what i'm talking about, just boot up MJ's Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior or George Forman's knockout boxing in 50Hz on an emulator, pay close attention to the noise channel, you'll notice how sharp and vibrant it sounds with all the kicks, snares and hats, then hard reset the game and boot it in 60Hz and despite the tempo being identical, you'll notice something is slightly off with that white noise percussion track, it now has a sluggish sound which to me indicates that it's either a flaw with the optimisation process of this particular sound driver or these games were truly meant for PAL 50Hz after 1990, the software was clearly aimed at PAL regions anyway.

I too find it strange that some of the VGM packs play the music slower than the actual PAL speed, like from an NTSC perspective.

Adrian - my technical knowledge isn't good enough to know whether this is related to what you're saying or not, but I've always thought some of the tracks in the SMS Golden Axe VGM pack aren't playing right when I play it at PAL speed (50hz), seems like theres missed notes, notes that run longer than they're meant to, and the occassional odd sounds that sound like errors. I always notice it most in the first level track, Wilderness.

Maybe it's related to being logged at 60hz, or maybe it's something separate, I don't know. Perhaps you could have a listen sometime Adrian, and see if SMS Golden Axe is another example of what you're talking about.

There’s a few categories to consider here.

1. The music engine compensates for the system speed

A lot of Tiertex games seem to do this, but it was rare on Sega titles. This may partly be because the games were often targeted for both SMS and GG, and the music composer (if not the gameplay programmer) cared about the speed difference. However, the compensation cannot be perfect: some per-frame effects like vibrato and arpeggiation will be at a different speed, and envelopes may not perfectly match.

It’s hard to know what’s best to do here. I recently ripped Winter Olympics as SMS/50Hz and GG/60Hz, but I challenge you to hear the difference between them. If it had been released in Japan or USA, it’d make it a more difficult question.

2. The music was written for 50Hz in a 50Hz region

European developed, European releases for SMS likely fall into this category. The composer must have intended 50Hz playback. We try to rip these at 50Hz.

3. The music was written for 60Hz in a 60Hz region

Japanese developers very likely only tested at 60Hz, even for games never released in the US or Japan. We try to rip these at 60Hz.

I guess the perfect solution would be to rip all games released in both 50Hz and 60Hz regions in both forms, but failing that our goal is to rip at the speed the composer/arranger likely listened to them. I’d welcome submissions of new VGM packs like this, it’s not hard to do if the game has a friendly sound test.

I might try ripping Golden Axe both ways and making an A/B test…

Finally, if using Meka, to switch between settings you MUST pick both PAL/SECAM and change the speed to 50Hz, or NTSC and 60Hz. The settings are not linked. In Emulicious they are linked. Anyone using Kega or Dega will have terrible sound no matter what :)

Long reply here:

There's a pattern here where this white noise sluggish, thing appears and doesn't appear that I forgot to mention.

1. All those games I mentioned in my original post don't have a Game Gear equivalent. (Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior, Tecmo World Cup 93 and they're all optimised in audio only for PAL 50Hz playback in other words, compensated.

2. When there's a Game Gear port, there's no Sluggish, struggling white noise percussion sound in 60Hz which is why you don't hear this on a Game Gear game.

3. I believe the two games originally mentioned above (Land of Illusion and Sonic 2) use a different sound engine which is not affected by this issue. I noticed all the Aspect made games use a different sound engine to the one i'm talking about.

Maxim, you're right as usual and you've got far more knowledge than me on the technical side of things, i'm mostly only going by ear and I just felt that I had to comment on this topic as the sluggish 60Hz white noise percussion issue has never been addressed or talked about

and in response i'd say:

1. You're correct about the Tiertex games on the SMS. I'd even add that all the games programmed by Dominic Wood who originally worked for Probe and then left in early 1993 to form Syrox Developments are NOT optimised in audio for 50Hz to match 60Hz in any way (Lemmings, The Jungle Book, The Lion King and The Terminator) all by Dominic Wood. These all play perfectly at the default 50Hz speed and play too fast in 60Hz, yes even on the Game Gear although they tried to fix Lemmings on the Game Gear but some tracks still play too fast in 60Hz and not sure about The Lion King? This game on the Game Gear might have been compensated.

2. Probably true also regarding Japanese devs only testing on 60Hz before shipping software out, although it has been proven in a few cases that Compile's lead programmer/designer designed ''Power Strike II'' to play at the intended 50Hz speed on the SMS, it's been verified, and other games like Sonic 2 and Sonic Chaos we should assume were tested at 50Hz as they have slight artifacting on screen when played in NTSC 60Hz which doesn't appear in 50Hz, yet on the Game Gear, these two games play perfectly fine and they're both optimised in audio for 50Hz.

3. In my opinion Maxim, Golden Axe is not really a strong game to make an A & B test, it's also using an earlier sound engine that doesn't have that white noise bug, so the VGM pack on here is normal. Golden Axe Warrior on the other hand, yes most certainly.

4. Finally when I get some time, i'm gonna listen to ''Winter Olympics''. Just pointing out that most games that are compensated for 50Hz and 60Hz between the Game Gear and Master System are fine. The problem seems to be when it's optimised for 50Hz played back at 60Hz and never got a Game Gear port.

5. I was wrong about Master of Darkness, there's a Game Gear version so there's no white noise percussion issues with that one. Also strangely ''Line of Fire'' is optimised for PAL 50Hz matching it's NTSC 60Hz counterpart and it's the only example I can think of where the sluggish white noise track isn't there when played back at 60Hz as heard in the VGM pack.

Fun fact: Regarding the VGM packs, when I made my Alex Kidd ROM hack a few years ago and then finished it up this year, when I started porting music tracks from the VGM packs to the PSGLibrary sound engine for Kidded, I noticed an option to optimise the audio for PAL, but when I was checking out the VGM packs, I noticed some tracks played very slow, slower than the actual PAL speed, like Tom & Jerry and Taz-Mania, unless I chose to tick the optimisation box in the editor, the music tracks would sound too slow, slower than in the actual original games played in PAL, yet the original un-optimised PAL speed was moved to the NTSC 60Hz choice. What i'm getting at here is that I had already planned to add tracks from un-optimised game soundtracks in PAL 50Hz like Lemmings but mixing a playlist from optimised game soundtracks in 50Hz and un-optimised game soundtracks in 50Hz would have resulted in some tracks sounding slower than they were ever meant to sound and others sounding like they would normally, or if I went with ticking the optimisation box, some tracks should have sounded normal and others too fast. That's why if you notice that the playlist I chose for that hack is completely made up of non optimised music tracks for 50Hz which also avoids that sluggish, white noise percussion track I keep mentioning. In the end, I decided that I wanted all music tracks to sound the way they originally sounded in 50Hz and 60Hz and let players hear the tracks the way they have always known them for whatever preference they chose (50Hz/60Hz).

TheAssassin wrote

Adrian - my technical knowledge isn't good enough to know whether this is related to what you're saying or not, but I've always thought some of the tracks in the SMS Golden Axe VGM pack aren't playing right when I play it at PAL speed (50hz), seems like theres missed notes, notes that run longer than they're meant to, and the occassional odd sounds that sound like errors. I always notice it most in the first level track, Wilderness.

Maybe it's related to being logged at 60hz, or maybe it's something separate, I don't know. Perhaps you could have a listen sometime Adrian, and see if SMS Golden Axe is another example of what you're talking about.

Yeah well you're probably onto something, gonna have to listen to it to verify.

Forgot to mention, anyone using emulators, have to agree with Maxim yet again, Kega Fusion is horrible for 8-bit music! The noise channel is almost muted. I personally recommend Regen or Emulicious by Calindro.

Okay I went and checked out the Winter Olympics 94 ost on both Master System and Game Gear, tested and heard the soundtrack in 50Hz and then 60Hz on my Analogue Mega SG on headphones. I also checked out the VGM packs of them here on the site.

This is subjective and everyone is gonna hear something different and give their own opinion so to be respectful, my findings are based on my own ears and nobody elses's for this.

Okay according to me and i'm putting my bias to one side of the room: Winter Olympics by Tiertex and U.S. Gold sounded slightly better in 50Hz, the square wave drum track was sharp and not sluggish, yes, square drums this time not noise drums. When I went to listen to it in 60Hz, everything was identical except for whatever reason, the square wave drums had a tiny bit of sluggishness to them in some tracks, not all, and that same slightly almost non-noticable slugglish drum track was also present on the Game Gear port in 60Hz. Keep in mind we're talking about a different sound engine this time and this one, despite the 50Hz optimisation/compensation and having a Game Gear port this time round' the problem still remained, but it's no where near as noticable as the SMPS V3 1990 sound engine that used the noise for drums.

I also checked out the Golden Axe VGM pack and can confirm that there are no wrong notes being played especially in ''The Wilderness'' in 50Hz and 60Hz. The drum track is sluggish sounding but it does this in default 50Hz as well as 60Hz, if the problem exists in both refresh rates then there's nothing to worry about, plus this game uses an earlier sound engine SMPS V2 1987- 1990, it's not the one i'm concerned about.

Another interesting discovery I found is that ''Alex Kidd In Shinobi World'' is optimised for PAL 50Hz, I think this was the first game to get the 50Hz compensation treatment on the system, can't find any other games before this one that were optimised in audio. Anyway the white noise percussion this time sounds better in NTSC 60Hz, it's clear with no soft patches of audio. In 50Hz even though it runs at the same speed, the noise percussion has soft audio patches which means the volume level of the noise has slight volume level changes that can be heard for split seconds here and there. This was the only game I found with this from the earlier V2 sound engine. You need a really good, trained ear to know what i'm talking about.

Author	Message
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Do all PAL games run at 50hz on a real PAL SMS? Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 5:14 am
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Since I had a PAL SMS when I was a kid, I've recently been listening to some VGM packs at 50hz speed, with the idea that they would sound closer to how I remember them. VGM packs such as Streets Of Rage 2, Golden Axe, Alex Kidd In Miracle World, just sound completely wrong to me at 60hz. Even if that was the intended speed, it's just not what I'm used to. Whereas at 50hz they sound exactly as I remember, which is awesome and I'm so glad the inVGM plugin has the option to choose 50hz or 60hz playback. Anyway, my question is, do all PAL games run at 50hz on a real PAL SMS? Because, perhaps I'm just remembering incorrectly, but SOME of the VGM packs I've played at 50hz sound too slow to me - which doesn't make any sense. For example, Robocop Versus Terminator. I loved this soundtrack when I was a kid, so I'm almost positive I remember how it sounded on my real SMS. But if I now play the VGM pack at 50hz, it sounds too slow, whereas if I play it at 60hz I could swear that's how I remember hearing it on my PAL SMS. Am I going crazy or did some PAL games NOT run at 50hz on a real PAL SMS?

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14876 Location: London	Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 8:34 am
	Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS. However, some music engines (and some game engines) compensated for the slower speed so they don't play slower. Years ago, our plan for games like this was to remove the information for rate adjustment, so they always play at the right speed. We could update the packs accordingly. It also stops people being able to play tracks at 200Hz or whatever, but I guess that's not a big deal.

lumclaw Joined: 13 Aug 2010 Posts: 117	Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 2:46 pm
lumclaw Joined: 13 Aug 2010 Posts: 117	As Maxim was saying, it's set in hardware. Likewise NTSC SMS or any Game Gear will play games at 60hz. Mega Drive and Saturn behave similar. Foreign games don't change their mode either.

TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 6:08 pm Last edited by TheAssassin on Mon Feb 09, 2015 5:14 am; edited 2 times in total
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Thanks for the replies so far Maxim wrote Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS. However, some music engines (and some game engines) compensated for the slower speed so they don't play slower. Interesting, is there a way to tell which games had this compensation and didn't play the music slower?

sverx Joined: 05 Sep 2013 Posts: 3926 Location: Stockholm, Sweden	Posted: Mon Feb 02, 2015 6:18 pm
	One way to test this thing would be play the game twice, either in a SMS with 50/60 switch or on a emulator supporting both PAL/NTSC (selectable) :)

TinpotGamer Joined: 07 Jul 2014 Posts: 38	Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 12:59 pm
TinpotGamer Joined: 07 Jul 2014 Posts: 38	Maxim wrote Everything ran at 50Hz on a PAL SMS. Yes. Probably the better phrased question is "Were any PAL games optimised to run at the correct (close to 60Hz) speed on a PAL console?" I haven't come across any PAL games so far that run too quickly on a PAL console switched to 60Hz, but the sad thing I have noticed is that games I've played so far which only got a European release are still clearly running too slowly in both audio and visuals. This is a shame and also a surprise to me given that publishers must have seen how the market was, with Japan dying off early, America not greatly interested and the large bulk of users in PAL territories. Perhaps there's a sensible explanation, or was it simply a case of hedging their bets that a game would be released in an NTSC territory, so developing for 60Hz?

KingMike Joined: 14 Oct 2008 Posts: 525	Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 2:59 pm
KingMike Joined: 14 Oct 2008 Posts: 525	If talking about later era games, maybe they had prospects of releasing Game Gear versions, which was always 60hz?

TinpotGamer Joined: 07 Jul 2014 Posts: 38	Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 4:36 pm
TinpotGamer Joined: 07 Jul 2014 Posts: 38	KingMike wrote If talking about later era games, maybe they had prospects of releasing Game Gear versions, which was always 60hz? Of course! I had forgotten about this.

sverx Joined: 05 Sep 2013 Posts: 3926 Location: Stockholm, Sweden	Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 6:17 pm
	I also believe they were coded for 60Hz because if it works there it works on 50Hz too (just 17% slower), but not the other way.

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14876 Location: London	Posted: Wed Feb 04, 2015 8:30 pm
	It would be good to list which games do this, both for gameplay and music. It's fairly easy to try it both ways in an emulator, just so a hard reset when you change settings. In Meka you have to change the system type and speed independently.

TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Posted: Thu Feb 05, 2015 2:33 am
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	OK I just went into MEKA, set the TV type to PAL and set the rate to 50hz, then did a hard reset and loaded up Robocop Versus Terminator SMS version. The music plays at the same speed I remember it being on my real PAL SMS when I was a kid. So one would assume that the music is also playing at 50hz, same as the game itself. But if I play the VGM pack at 50hz it sounds too slow. Whereas playing the VGM pack at 60hz sounds right. I don't really understand what's going on here, perhaps other members could clarify. Does this mean that Robocop Versus Terminator has this compensation thing that Maxim mentioned? Because it seems to me that in-game the music rate and game rate don't match. Taking another example, Alex Kidd in Miracle World, running this game at 50hz PAL on MEKA, then playing the VGM pack at 50hz, the music sounds the same. So here the in-game music rate does match the game rate.

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14876 Location: London	Posted: Thu Feb 05, 2015 8:27 am
	Repeat your RoboCop experiment set to NTSC/60 and see if the music is the same speed, and also the gameplay. If so, then it is compensating. Therefore the pack, which was made at 60Hz, should not be artificially slowed down by 20%. We can edit the files to make them block the adjustment.

TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Posted: Thu Feb 05, 2015 9:26 am
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Maxim wrote Repeat your RoboCop experiment set to NTSC/60 and see if the music is the same speed, and also the gameplay. If so, then it is compensating. Therefore the pack, which was made at 60Hz, should not be artificially slowed down by 20%. We can edit the files to make them block the adjustment. I already did that, and if I run the game on MEKA on NTSC at 60hz, the music sounds faster. Too fast. Faster than playing the VGM pack at 60hz. Not sure about the gameplay. So I guess the game isn't compensating? But why does the music rate not match the game rate? If the game is running at 50hz PAL the music seems to be playing at 60hz, and if the game is running at 60hz NTSC then the music is playing even faster than that, maybe 70hz or something. Is it possible the discrepency is purely related to a problem with the VGM pack? Also, since you mentioned the possibility of files blocking rate adjustment, I noticed that some of the files in the Sonic 2 VGM pack seem to ignore the rate setting (they play at the same speed whether the plugin is set to 50hz or 60hz). Were they intentionally set to behave this way? Seemed weird to me that only some of the files in the pack do this.

lumclaw Joined: 13 Aug 2010 Posts: 117	Posted: Sun Feb 08, 2015 3:14 am
lumclaw Joined: 13 Aug 2010 Posts: 117	I suppose there could be games we aren't sure of their intended music or gameplay speed. At worst you'd have to analyze the code for clues, or hope a development team member recalls anything.

TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2015 4:07 am
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Just experimenting with this a bit more, I've discovered that the music from "Land Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse" and "Sonic The Hedgehog 2" also seems to play at 60hz speed when running MEKA at 50hz PAL. That makes 3 I've found so far, including Robocop Versus The Terminator. Here are the full results of my experiments, I only checked games I am familiar with though: -Aladdin - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Alex Kidd In Miracle World - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Asterix And The Secret Mission - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Black Belt - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Castle Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Cosmic Spacehead - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Daffy Duck In Hollywood - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Fantastic Dizzy - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Golden Axe - PAL = music speed 50HZ -The Jungle Book - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Land Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse - PAL = music speed 60HZ -Lemmings - PAL = music speed 50HZ -The Lucky Dime Caper Starring Donald Duck - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Mortal Kombat II - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Rampage - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Robocop Versus The Terminator - PAL = music speed 60HZ -The Simpsons: Bart Versus The Space Mutants - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Sonic The Hedgehog 2 - PAL = music speed 60HZ -Spider-man: Return Of The Sinister Six - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Streets Of Rage - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Streets Of Rage II - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Tom And Jerry: The Movie - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Wonder Boy In Monster Land - PAL = music speed 50HZ -Wonder Boy In Monster World - PAL = music speed 50HZ

Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2024 9:35 am
Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	I know this is an old topic but I actually found this topic outside the site on a google search and from reading this post and listening to some of the VGM packs on here I thought i'd comment as I noticed a flaw (or what I consider to be a flaw) with some of the VGM packs. I noticed that who ever is making them is recording them at 60Hz and not 50Hz, for the most part, this is perfectly fine but for some games that use the V3 sound engine from 1990 onwards, this causes noticable issue with the noise channel percussion. Games like Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior, George Forman's KO Boxing, HeavyWeight Champ, Tecmo World Cup 93 and Master Of Darkness have sluggish white noise beatboxing percussion and it has something to do with the optimisation process of the audio in these games. It's hard to explain but all those games I just mentioned have optimised audio for 50Hz, meaning they sound identical in 50Hz when compared to 60Hz, the only difference is that the percussion sounds sluggish in 60Hz and sharp in 50Hz. Not sure what causes this but when an SMS game is NOT optimised in audio for 50Hz and has music slower than 60Hz, that sluggish white noise percussion sound thing is not there and it sounds sharp and normal in 60Hz. For example: Games like Psychic World, Ninja Gaiden, Laser Ghost, Taz-Mania and Dragon Crystal which all use that same sound engine don't have sluggish percussion in 60Hz but the 50Hz and 60Hz speeds don't match, so whatever is causing that effect has to do with the games being optimised for PAL 50Hz. The problem with the VGM packs is that those games were done in 60Hz so that sluggish percussion track is heard when forcing the packs in 50Hz, yet if they were done the other way around and recorded in 50Hz, the sluggish white noise effect wouldn't be there and instead the noise would be sharp and on point. If you really want to hear what i'm talking about, just boot up MJ's Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior or George Forman's knockout boxing in 50Hz on an emulator, pay close attention to the noise channel, you'll notice how sharp and vibrant it sounds with all the kicks, snares and hats, then hard reset the game and boot it in 60Hz and despite the tempo being identical, you'll notice something is slightly off with that white noise percussion track, it now has a sluggish sound which to me indicates that it's either a flaw with the optimisation process of this particular sound driver or these games were truly meant for PAL 50Hz after 1990, the software was clearly aimed at PAL regions anyway. I too find it strange that some of the VGM packs play the music slower than the actual PAL speed, like from an NTSC perspective.

TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2024 1:34 pm
TheAssassin Joined: 06 Jan 2005 Posts: 178	Adrian - my technical knowledge isn't good enough to know whether this is related to what you're saying or not, but I've always thought some of the tracks in the SMS Golden Axe VGM pack aren't playing right when I play it at PAL speed (50hz), seems like theres missed notes, notes that run longer than they're meant to, and the occassional odd sounds that sound like errors. I always notice it most in the first level track, Wilderness. Maybe it's related to being logged at 60hz, or maybe it's something separate, I don't know. Perhaps you could have a listen sometime Adrian, and see if SMS Golden Axe is another example of what you're talking about.

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14876 Location: London	Posted: Wed Sep 18, 2024 8:50 pm
	There’s a few categories to consider here. 1. The music engine compensates for the system speed A lot of Tiertex games seem to do this, but it was rare on Sega titles. This may partly be because the games were often targeted for both SMS and GG, and the music composer (if not the gameplay programmer) cared about the speed difference. However, the compensation cannot be perfect: some per-frame effects like vibrato and arpeggiation will be at a different speed, and envelopes may not perfectly match. It’s hard to know what’s best to do here. I recently ripped Winter Olympics as SMS/50Hz and GG/60Hz, but I challenge you to hear the difference between them. If it had been released in Japan or USA, it’d make it a more difficult question. 2. The music was written for 50Hz in a 50Hz region European developed, European releases for SMS likely fall into this category. The composer must have intended 50Hz playback. We try to rip these at 50Hz. 3. The music was written for 60Hz in a 60Hz region Japanese developers very likely only tested at 60Hz, even for games never released in the US or Japan. We try to rip these at 60Hz. I guess the perfect solution would be to rip all games released in both 50Hz and 60Hz regions in both forms, but failing that our goal is to rip at the speed the composer/arranger likely listened to them. I’d welcome submissions of new VGM packs like this, it’s not hard to do if the game has a friendly sound test. I might try ripping Golden Axe both ways and making an A/B test… Finally, if using Meka, to switch between settings you MUST pick both PAL/SECAM and change the speed to 50Hz, or NTSC and 60Hz. The settings are not linked. In Emulicious they are linked. Anyone using Kega or Dega will have terrible sound no matter what :)

Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Posted: Thu Sep 19, 2024 7:49 am Last edited by Adrian on Thu Sep 19, 2024 8:14 am; edited 3 times in total
Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Long reply here: There's a pattern here where this white noise sluggish, thing appears and doesn't appear that I forgot to mention. 1. All those games I mentioned in my original post don't have a Game Gear equivalent. (Moonwalker, Shadow Dancer, Golden Axe Warrior, Tecmo World Cup 93 and they're all optimised in audio only for PAL 50Hz playback in other words, compensated. 2. When there's a Game Gear port, there's no Sluggish, struggling white noise percussion sound in 60Hz which is why you don't hear this on a Game Gear game. 3. I believe the two games originally mentioned above (Land of Illusion and Sonic 2) use a different sound engine which is not affected by this issue. I noticed all the Aspect made games use a different sound engine to the one i'm talking about. Maxim, you're right as usual and you've got far more knowledge than me on the technical side of things, i'm mostly only going by ear and I just felt that I had to comment on this topic as the sluggish 60Hz white noise percussion issue has never been addressed or talked about and in response i'd say: 1. You're correct about the Tiertex games on the SMS. I'd even add that all the games programmed by Dominic Wood who originally worked for Probe and then left in early 1993 to form Syrox Developments are NOT optimised in audio for 50Hz to match 60Hz in any way (Lemmings, The Jungle Book, The Lion King and The Terminator) all by Dominic Wood. These all play perfectly at the default 50Hz speed and play too fast in 60Hz, yes even on the Game Gear although they tried to fix Lemmings on the Game Gear but some tracks still play too fast in 60Hz and not sure about The Lion King? This game on the Game Gear might have been compensated. 2. Probably true also regarding Japanese devs only testing on 60Hz before shipping software out, although it has been proven in a few cases that Compile's lead programmer/designer designed ''Power Strike II'' to play at the intended 50Hz speed on the SMS, it's been verified, and other games like Sonic 2 and Sonic Chaos we should assume were tested at 50Hz as they have slight artifacting on screen when played in NTSC 60Hz which doesn't appear in 50Hz, yet on the Game Gear, these two games play perfectly fine and they're both optimised in audio for 50Hz. 3. In my opinion Maxim, Golden Axe is not really a strong game to make an A & B test, it's also using an earlier sound engine that doesn't have that white noise bug, so the VGM pack on here is normal. Golden Axe Warrior on the other hand, yes most certainly. 4. Finally when I get some time, i'm gonna listen to ''Winter Olympics''. Just pointing out that most games that are compensated for 50Hz and 60Hz between the Game Gear and Master System are fine. The problem seems to be when it's optimised for 50Hz played back at 60Hz and never got a Game Gear port. 5. I was wrong about Master of Darkness, there's a Game Gear version so there's no white noise percussion issues with that one. Also strangely ''Line of Fire'' is optimised for PAL 50Hz matching it's NTSC 60Hz counterpart and it's the only example I can think of where the sluggish white noise track isn't there when played back at 60Hz as heard in the VGM pack. Fun fact: Regarding the VGM packs, when I made my Alex Kidd ROM hack a few years ago and then finished it up this year, when I started porting music tracks from the VGM packs to the PSGLibrary sound engine for Kidded, I noticed an option to optimise the audio for PAL, but when I was checking out the VGM packs, I noticed some tracks played very slow, slower than the actual PAL speed, like Tom & Jerry and Taz-Mania, unless I chose to tick the optimisation box in the editor, the music tracks would sound too slow, slower than in the actual original games played in PAL, yet the original un-optimised PAL speed was moved to the NTSC 60Hz choice. What i'm getting at here is that I had already planned to add tracks from un-optimised game soundtracks in PAL 50Hz like Lemmings but mixing a playlist from optimised game soundtracks in 50Hz and un-optimised game soundtracks in 50Hz would have resulted in some tracks sounding slower than they were ever meant to sound and others sounding like they would normally, or if I went with ticking the optimisation box, some tracks should have sounded normal and others too fast. That's why if you notice that the playlist I chose for that hack is completely made up of non optimised music tracks for 50Hz which also avoids that sluggish, white noise percussion track I keep mentioning. In the end, I decided that I wanted all music tracks to sound the way they originally sounded in 50Hz and 60Hz and let players hear the tracks the way they have always known them for whatever preference they chose (50Hz/60Hz).

Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Posted: Thu Sep 19, 2024 8:04 am
Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	TheAssassin wrote Adrian - my technical knowledge isn't good enough to know whether this is related to what you're saying or not, but I've always thought some of the tracks in the SMS Golden Axe VGM pack aren't playing right when I play it at PAL speed (50hz), seems like theres missed notes, notes that run longer than they're meant to, and the occassional odd sounds that sound like errors. I always notice it most in the first level track, Wilderness. Maybe it's related to being logged at 60hz, or maybe it's something separate, I don't know. Perhaps you could have a listen sometime Adrian, and see if SMS Golden Axe is another example of what you're talking about. Yeah well you're probably onto something, gonna have to listen to it to verify. Forgot to mention, anyone using emulators, have to agree with Maxim yet again, Kega Fusion is horrible for 8-bit music! The noise channel is almost muted. I personally recommend Regen or Emulicious by Calindro.

Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Posted: Fri Sep 20, 2024 4:17 am
Adrian Joined: 30 Jul 2021 Posts: 71 Location: Australia	Okay I went and checked out the Winter Olympics 94 ost on both Master System and Game Gear, tested and heard the soundtrack in 50Hz and then 60Hz on my Analogue Mega SG on headphones. I also checked out the VGM packs of them here on the site. This is subjective and everyone is gonna hear something different and give their own opinion so to be respectful, my findings are based on my own ears and nobody elses's for this. Okay according to me and i'm putting my bias to one side of the room: Winter Olympics by Tiertex and U.S. Gold sounded slightly better in 50Hz, the square wave drum track was sharp and not sluggish, yes, square drums this time not noise drums. When I went to listen to it in 60Hz, everything was identical except for whatever reason, the square wave drums had a tiny bit of sluggishness to them in some tracks, not all, and that same slightly almost non-noticable slugglish drum track was also present on the Game Gear port in 60Hz. Keep in mind we're talking about a different sound engine this time and this one, despite the 50Hz optimisation/compensation and having a Game Gear port this time round' the problem still remained, but it's no where near as noticable as the SMPS V3 1990 sound engine that used the noise for drums. I also checked out the Golden Axe VGM pack and can confirm that there are no wrong notes being played especially in ''The Wilderness'' in 50Hz and 60Hz. The drum track is sluggish sounding but it does this in default 50Hz as well as 60Hz, if the problem exists in both refresh rates then there's nothing to worry about, plus this game uses an earlier sound engine SMPS V2 1987- 1990, it's not the one i'm concerned about. Another interesting discovery I found is that ''Alex Kidd In Shinobi World'' is optimised for PAL 50Hz, I think this was the first game to get the 50Hz compensation treatment on the system, can't find any other games before this one that were optimised in audio. Anyway the white noise percussion this time sounds better in NTSC 60Hz, it's clear with no soft patches of audio. In 50Hz even though it runs at the same speed, the noise percussion has soft audio patches which means the volume level of the noise has slight volume level changes that can be heard for split seconds here and there. This was the only game I found with this from the earlier V2 sound engine. You need a really good, trained ear to know what i'm talking about.

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