Music Let's write a POLITE letter to Sega about Origins' music

Boy I tell you if that Data Discs idea for a Sonic 3 vinyl gets approved, you can rest assured I’ll be the first one to preorder it.

My only concern though is SEGA (obviously): because even though Sonic 3 has been brought back and the respective music has been replaced, they may still be a bit iffy about a separate OST release. And even if they approve the concept, they might still be too lazy and stubborn to replace the tracks in Origins.

But considering the fact that they’ve worked with SEGA in the past and as long as the fan support is there (which I’m sure it is since Sonic 3’s OST has been kept in the dark for years), I expect Data Discs to present the concept in the best way possible to ensure a high quality product and that no challenges will be presented.

It’s on SEGA now to give it the green light. And I’ve seen crazier things happen so this isn’t too far-fetched. Fingers crossed!!

 

An update on this.

Jun Senoue came to Brazil to perform in Brasil Game Show (BGS) and there was a Meet & Greet. When I arrived, the M&G session had ended and he was already leaving. So I asked a japanese staff member if she could deliver a gift from me to him. She said yes and he actually came back to take a picture with me. The gift was a nice plastic cup with Sonic on it and a letter inside talking about the music situation.

But instead of just saying there were better songs available I actually recorded multitracks from Sonic 1, Sonic 2, Sonic 3 (incl. 1103 versions) and Sonic & Knuckles. He speaks very good english so I told him there was a letter inside the cup for him to read and we took a picture together.

Lets hope he likes the multitracks enough to consider patching the newer versions in.

 

You assume he has the ability to make that call; Sega might simply not see it being worth the effort to throw another Origins patch out. Not to be pessimistic, but I don't see those tracks making it through.

 

Nicely done, but now I really wish he got this before Superstars.

I still like his actual melodies, just not his instrumentation choices. Everything else about his music I'm generally fine with, whether or not he's my favorite modern composer.

 

Origins' SteamDB is still having work done if I recall correctly, probably because the last patch introduced some problems. Doesn't mean they'll think implementing those audio files is worth it on its own anyway, but I don't think it's impossible.

 

Good on you to get that in his possession.. I personally think it might be too little too late with Origins, but it will most certainly come in handy for any future re-releases of Sonic 3 that require the use of the beta tracks.. I hope Jun actually takes the time to listen to them and even save them in his library for future use.

 

If this doesn't do it, nothing will. Your commitment to this is staggering.

 

SoJ is pretty inconsistent sometimes. They went through the effort or rerecording every SFX from every game from the original hardware for Origins. They were trying their best. Maybe they didn't know the other proto had leaked, communication inside corporations, especially one with so many different teams across different countries, can be pretty difficult. We can't rule out anything.

Also, I'm sure SEGA didn't have multitrack archives from the Mega Drive era as all SEGA remixes that used original FM instruments, like the ones in Sonic Generations or SEGA Earth UFO catcher are simply recordings with new things on top. This also gives them access to all Sonic 3&K samples as the DAC channel is presented in isolation as one of the many stems.

Even if these don't get patched in Origins we can still benefit from them having these instruments and alternate versions in isolation later on.

I'm not delusional about this though. Jun is doing a world tour. He might have lost the cup somewhere, and even if he didn't he may simply not have enough time to read or download anything while traveling abroad. I just did what I though would be the right thing.

 

It's a lot to ask of someone you don't know to download something, especially if you're sending them more than one thing.

I am appreciative of your effort, and it's an interesting story for sure. But I personally do not expect anything to come of it. It may even come off as slightly off-putting considering what I am sure was a lot of hard work to get the tracks recorded to then be told, in so many words, it wasn't good enough.

Hope this doesn't come off as a criticism of you, because that's not my aim. But I think there are different ways to look at the situation.

The upside is, if I'm wrong and we get new tracks, perhaps it is directly to you that credit is to be given for raising awareness!

 

Actually, I agree with you. I only did what was in my power to make it more likely he'd check out the songs, hence a Multitrack Collection of Sonic 1, 2, 3 & K.

1. Instead of making it a big ZIP with unknown contents, I made it a public Google Drive folder with plain FLACs inside.

2. Jun is a music collector so in the letter I didn't focus on Origins or the alternate replacement tracks, I just detailed the rip, and how they were separated etc. How I had 8 channels for each song (FM1, FM2, FM3, FM4, FM5, PCM, PSG123, and PSG4/NOISE). I also mentioned the NukedOPN2 emulator etc and other details of how I used settings to emulate the quantization noise more easily heard in the Model 1 Mega Drive etc.

3. The QR Code was hand drawn using a bic pen. It's a bit unorthodox to see one presented that way, so I bet he'd even show it to somebody "look at what these crazy fans do! haha"

4. I also put a custom bit.ly shortened link in handwriting next to the QR code just in case.

Even if we get nothing out of it, It was our best shot, imo (even if its not a good one haha).

Let's wait and see.

 

If Jun is at the Paris show next June I’ll probably end up asking him he approaches classic Sonic music the way he does instead of going with his usual instrumentation. Would be interesting to hear the philosophy from the horse’s mouth, and maybe some cheeky gushing about my love of his guitars and rock organs will give him some food for thought.

 

I’m sorry, can you clarify these points? They seem to contradict each other. Did you or did you not talk about Origins’ music situation?

Thank you for doing this by the way!

 

Here's what I wrote, word by word. It's a letter talking about the Origins music situation that tries to focus on the technical aspects of the multitrack set in order to get him interested in downloading it in the first place. It's a bit paradoxical but it's what I could come up with in the time I had to prepare it:

 

Was it OK for the message to mention "Hidden Palace" directly?
Won't that put them under close attention from SEGA from now on?

 

You think Sega isn't already aware of Hidden Palace?

 

Yeah, there is no way in hell SEGA isn’t aware of them at this point; esp. considering the other Sonic remakes - which actually use assets that were only accessible through Hidden Palace prototype releases (Sonic CD’s music loops, the LRZ2 Knuckles laugh placement). They’re probably just letting them do their own thing.

 

A kinda symbiotic relationship, then xD
(not exactly 50:50, of course...)

 

Makes me wonder if Taxman and Stealth ever casually brought up Hidden Palace and the numerous Sonic protos at any point in their meetings with Iizuka-san, Hoshino-san or any of the Sonic Team during Sonic Mania's (or Sonic CD 2011 or the 2013 remasters of Sonic 1 and Sonic 2) development. I especially can't imagine the subject being inescapable during Origins' development with Stealth involved either because those tracks were probably the most looked-out-for thing about that collection.

I imagine if they do something about HP now after all this, then I'm pretty sure there would be hell to pay after the social media pandemonium the Sonic community would inflict upon them. This isn't Nintendo we're talking here.

 

I actually think that topic was never brought up during development. Although they probably mentioned it during Origins Plus development.

I say this because the loop points inside the Retro Engine Sonic 3 use a soundtrack consistent with the lengths of the vanilla (with MJ) Sonic 3 OST.

That means that when HC submitted Sonic 3, the soundtrack was intact at that point. Later, when the audio implementation was remade by SEGA, the tracks were replaced.

That's why Stealth called the versions we got in Origins "FM Makeovers". Because they sounded different from the Sonic 3 proto we had and he didn't know they came from an earlier prototype in Sega Japan. He thought Jun made them.

 

Say, not to get side-tracked, but what noise are you referring to here exactly? I keep thinking of a metronome for some reason.