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Synthesizers used in the Adventure series

Discussion in 'General Sonic Discussion' started by witapepsi, Jun 3, 2017.

  1. witapepsi

    witapepsi

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    I saw there was a thread about synthesizers used in Sonic CD about 7 years ago, so I want to see if anybody knows about the synthesizers used in the Sonic Adventure series!
    I got a KORG TR-Rack as a birthday gift last year, originally because Hideaki Kobayashi said he heavily used it in Phantasy Star Online, and I heard tons of patches used in both Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. I'm a bigger SA2 fan so I know that soundtrack better than SA1.

    Here's a sample of some the KORG TR-Rack patches, you can take a listen for yourself!
    Digital Polysix, most notable in the Dark Garden theme.
    That Heaven Vibe, used in Lost Colony theme.
    Pan Flute, not sure if this is the exact patch used in the Mystic Ruin theme, though.
    Scanners, you can kind of hear this patch in Crazy Gadget theme.

    There's actually 1024 patches in total, so the audio samples I can get from here aren't even all that I've found, all of them are program patches, not combinations. If anybody else can find patches used in the audio samples, list them!
    B40 Psycho Kit is used in Chaos ver. 0, 2, 4 and Radical Highway theme and any song with a tape deck stop sound effect... I'm not near the synth right now, but these are the ones I can remember by looking at the patch list.

    Hopefully we can find what other synths were used, including patch names and some audio samples!
     
  2. Blades

    Blades

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    Very cool. There was an interview with Jun about this, and he mentioned using Korg synthesizers for SA2 there as well.

    I would be very interested to find the source of the "At Dawn" patch from Sonic Adventure.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=az6eEJi1-pE

    Sounds a little like a Roland MKS-50, but unlikely because it would have already been 11 years old at SA1's Japan launch.
     
  3. witapepsi

    witapepsi

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    I found this 2002 interview with Fumie Kumatani.
    Her main synthesizers for Sonic Adventure 2 were 2 samplers, NordLead2, and Korg Trinity (TR-Rack is the same thing, but with more patches).
    I took a quick look at some NordLead demos and it's basically a make-your-own-waveform deal. Super easy to modify sounds to your liking with all the knobs. I know you can do the same with other samplers, but, like myself, I think most people would rather mess with tons of knobs then have to save over factory preset patches using limited buttons.
    I have a good belief she used the NordLead in SA1, too. I can totally hear Letz Get This Party Started being her experimental track with a NordLead and samplers.

    I've heard Jun liked specifically using a Korg Triton, the successor to the Trinity, but it was released in 1999. Maybe he used it in SA2, definitely for Heroes and Sonic 4, but I don't think for SA1.
    Logic Pro is a really great sequencer, it even comes with some of it's own patches. Tons of other video game composers like using Logic, too.
    Doing some digging, I found some people have found some samples Jun used in SA1 in the Korg M1.
    Here's some samples you can listen to from the M1. Hopefully we can find something, but this isn't every patch on the actual M1 we can listen to. I wanna find the At Dawn patch, too!

    The extra life sound effect uses a Roland Sound Canvas General MIDI music box. You can find it on tons of Roland synths. Other SEGA/Sonic Team composers used a Roland JV-2080, maybe Jun Senoue, Kenichi Tokoi, Fumie Kumatani, Tomoya Ohtani, or Masaru Setsumaru got their hands on one, too.
    Here's some samples for the JV-2080.
     
  4. JaredAFX

    JaredAFX

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    Wow, this is awesome. I know the soundtracks to the Adventures well, but I'm not sure how well I can pick out individual instruments. Still, I'm going to take a listen to some of these and see if I can come up with anything.
     
  5. Cube, who worked with Sonic Team on sound design in Sonic 3, has a list of studio synth hardware on their website, including vintage pieces from the 1990s.

    Additionally, Iwadare of Cube also disclosed his sample sources for Sega CD, Saturn, and PSX versions of Lunar in a recent interview.

    I'm not sure if any of these were used in SA series, but may be a good place to start looking beyond what you've already identified! Especially for any legacy sounds in the new synths carried over from vintage hardware.

    This is a fascinating topic. I look forward to learning anything you find out!
     
  6. Have you seen this post by Otani from Sonic Team? He discusses the uses of Akai MPC in Sonic Adventures 2. Akai also released "Sound Library" CD-ROMs in the 1990s, so you might find some samples in one of the disc volumes.

    I thought I would add this link to a free E-MU Proteus VX plugin. Like the Roland Sound Canvas, the Proteus was a common rack mount in the 1990s.
     
  7. darkshadow

    darkshadow

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    Wow that is very interesting. I used to own that exact MPC because I was and still am into hip hop production. I bought it broken for 100$ then sold it for 300 10 years ago. That is so cool!
     
  8. Woofmute

    Woofmute

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    The Egg Carrier transformation sound is a patch in the Korg Wavestation VST, or at least it uses sounds that were used for it, probably others there too.

    Its patch 46, "20Sec. Invasion". Audio here.
     
  9. witapepsi

    witapepsi

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    Wow this is great! I'll definitely try to find a couple sound packs in the next couple of days. I'll also check in the Wavestation library too. Thank you all! I'll gather whatever I can find into a speadsheet sometime soon.