Chords for How you *COULD* have been playing Ultima IV in 1987...

Hi folks, CloudShots here.
About a year ago I released a video demonstrating the latent MIDI capabilities in the
1986 Atari ST release of Ultima 3 Exodus, and for that I used the
Yamaha FB-01. _
_ Today I'll be demonstrating those same latent MIDI capabilities with the 1987 Atari ST release of Ultima 4.
And in keeping with that same contemporary theme, I've got a 1987 released Roland MT-32 here.
Now one of the differences between these two
releases and their MIDI capabilities is that Ultima 4 actually uses six channels of MIDI
_ data as opposed to just a single channel leveraged by Ultima 3.
And you'd think that would make the job of arranging something for a target device
somewhat easier, but I did not find that to be the case at all.
It's still very complicated _ _
to kind of get something to sound the way
you'd like and not have it affect all the other pieces because we're dealing with just
simple note on note off information.
All the instrumentation is the same across all playback.
Same for the volume.
Just all the tweaking, the panning,
_ the individual
_ timbre
_ tweaks and all that.
It's just a
great big chore I found and so I've spent hours and hours and hours on this and
_ _ I'm mostly happy with the result.
Not entirely happy, but _
after analyzing the MIDI data, I came to the conclusion that
the instrumentation that might work best for this is to try and approach it as
_ how playback might have been accomplished
from a musical troupe from either the
late medieval or early Renaissance periods.
We're dealing with kind of simple instruments, woodwinds and
some stringed guitar type sounds here.
Also with some drum
_ timbres thrown in as well and then
just a single horn that
_ is kind of there in the background, not really at the forefront of the arrangement here. _
So
here's kind of what that's going to sound like and
today this arrangement kind of exists just in SysEx form.
That's how I constructed it.
So I've dumped the SysEx file
to the MT-32 so it's all configured and ready to go here.
_ This certainly would have been possible in 1987, again with just the MT-32 and
Ultima 4 here and your Atari. _
I just don't know that anyone would have had the patience to do it or the initiative, but here you go. _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
So this will start off with just the PSG tones [B] again from the Atari itself, then I'll switch over to the
MT-32 by just [E] switching the internal PSG music off and turning the volume up on the MT-32. _ _ _ _ _
[Ab] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
[B] _ _ _ _ [A] So there's your [B] PSG.
It's not bad. _ _ _
[E] _ _ _ _ _ _
[Ab] _ _ I'm going to switch the PSG off again so we get the sound effects in conjunction with the MIDI [E] music. _
[Gb] So now I get the sound effects. _ _
Oops, too loud. _ _ _
And we'll go ahead and turn the volume up for the MT-32, which is currently receiving the MIDI data.
_ [B] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ [E] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [A] _ _ _
_ [B] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ _ _ _ [Gbm] _ _
_ _ _ _ [D] _ _
_ [A] _ _ _ [Db] _ _
_ [Gbm] _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ [D] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Gbm] _ _ _ _
[Dbm] _ _ _ _ [Ebm] _ _
_ _ [Dbm] _ _ _ _
[B] _ _ _ _ [Dbm] _ _
_ _ [Gb] _ _ _ _
[Abm] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ [Db] _ _ [Eb] _ _ _
_ [Abm] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [Gb] _ _
[Eb] _ [E] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Ebm] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [Ab] _
_ [B] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ [A] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [Em] _ _
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ [Eb] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Ebm] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ _ _
_ [Gbm] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ [Gb] _ _ _ [B] _ _
_ [Bb] _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ [Eb] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [A] _ _
_ [Abm] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [A] _ _ _
[Abm] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [Abm] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
[A] _ _ [Eb] _ _ _ [E] _
_ _ [Abm] _ _ [Gb] _ _
_ [Em] _ _ _ [Bb] _ _
_ [Abm] _ _ _ [Gb] _ _
_ [B] _ _ _ [Bm] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [G] _ _
[Bm] _ _ _ _ [Gb] _ _
_ [B] _ _ _ _ _
[A] _ _ _ _ [Gb] _
So there's just an example.
That wasn't all the pieces in the game, of course, but that represents about half of them.
Most of them actually play during the title sequence and can be listened to that way.
[E] _
_ So I will most likely be recording the sound effects for the game, but I'm not going to do that.
If you're going to be releasing the SysEx file at some point, then you can just use whatever means you'd like to dump it to your own MT-32 or _ even the MT-32 emulator would work for this.
_ And you can experience this for yourself. _ _ _ _
_ I hope that was worth watching.
If not, I'm