Several Commodore 64 games players, and indeed, fans of the SID sound chip in particular, will have had some conversations over the years beginning with “I only bought this game because of the music.” This potentially was more emphasised on some games which you may not have found to your liking, but the music was excellent and you would load the game up just so you could hear it again. In the times before emulation and having the likes of the High Voltage SID Collection (HVSC) to hand, and unless you were technically proficient to extract the music and its code from the game, code a player for it and save it to disk, loading up the game was often the easiest way to listen to that soundtrack again.
In the first part of this series, we will look at the original Mastertronic releases where the sound ratings in Zzap! 64 scored higher than the overall game rating, with the biggest differences between the sound and overall ratings for the game mentioned here.
Some Notes about the Ratings
It is important to note that there are some caveats around the Zzap! 64 reviews and indeed the sound ratings, which we will be concentrating on.
- No adventure game got a sound rating, and no strategy game got a sound rating either.
- Not every single original game got a Zzap! 64 review, so there may be some games that may be missing – simply because they were not reviewed.
- Sound ratings also dealt with sound effects as well as the music, so if the game has superb sound effects or speech that would up the rating considerably too.
- Only games that had separate sound ratings will feature – later budget reviews just had an overall score and so a chunk of reviews between 1987 and 1991 were in that category.
So, without further do, and in reverse order, here are the top 10 of Nice Music, Shame about the Game, for the original Mastertronic Commodore 64 releases as reviewed by Zzap! 64:
=9 – Formula 1 Simulator (Mastertronic, Rob Hubbard, Sound 82%, Overall 54%, Difference 28%)
Listen to Formula 1 Simulator via DeepSID
The Rob Hubbard title theme to Formula 1 Simulator certainly showed the early promise of his work here, with a catchy three and half minute number at a fast pace and some iconic drums that became part of the Hubbard staple – and all that certainly drew you in to the game. There is not necessarily that much depth to Shaun Southern’s different conversion here, with the game being a mix of Pole Position and Enduro, with a timer to battle against and so many cars to get past to score the maximum bonus, but at least it is a playable game, which we summarised in our review.
=9 – Vectorball (MAD, Wally Beben, Sound 39%, Overall 11%, Difference 28%)
Listen to Vectorball via DeepSID
Vectorball (also spelled as Vector Ball on the title screen) had its origins in trying to be a future sports sort of game, with you controlling robots battling over a puck which you attempt to get into an opponent’s goal. The vector graphics may have looked attractive, but being flick screen was confusing. Then there were the controls – oh my, almost as broken as The Last V8, with the inertia just all over the place. Zzap! 64 quite rightly slated it in its review, and although they did not like the music massively, for me it reminds me of some of Wally Beben’s other work at the time, such as Summer Olympiad, with the title theme certainly belonging to an event there just as well as a future sports one – short and reasonably sweet. I would have rated the music higher than what it got, but featuring in such a poor game did not help matters.
=7 – Milk Race (Mastertronic, David Whittaker, Sound 64%, Overall 34%, Difference 30%)
Listen to Milk Race via DeepSID
A cycling game based on the 1987 Tour of Britain (aka the Milk Race) was a reasonably cheap tie in. Unfortunately, that also stemmed for the game too, which really was a case of getting into the Deep SID right gear, drinking your milk as you get it to keep the energy levels up, and then repeat until you complete the game. We thought the same in our review, and did mention the David Whittaker music as at least being reasonably catchy and that plays at a fast pace to suit the game, even if it may be a little short – although none of the stages are long enough to hear the tune in full anyway, unless you listen to it during loading the game.
Did You Know?
Milk Race was released in the USA as Ten Speed. In addition, in the UK, there was a rival cycling tour of Britain called the Kellogg’s Tour, due to the cereal company’s sponsorship and more for professional riders. That tour got its own game via CRL in 1988, and – well, that was not very good either, scoring 23% in Computer and Video Games for the Commodore 64 version (there was no Zzap! 64 review.)
=7 – Strike (MAD, Jason Brooke, Sound 38%, Overall 8%, Difference 30%)
For ten pin bowling games on the Commodore 64, the de facto standard was 10th Frame, from the folks who brought you Leaderboard, so that was the game you compared. Unfortunately, whilst Strike tried a 3D isometric perspective, it clearly was not play tested at all – with you either finding it impossible to get a strike or do so every time. Zzap! 64 correctly slated it in its review. Jason Brooke when looking back at the music mentioned he tried to get the feel of the ball rolling down and hitting the pins, with a later part of the tune sounding like the machine re-assembling the skittles for the next go (and hopefully without those strings every bowling alley seems to have with the pins these days.)
=5 – Hunter Patrol (Mastertronic, Rob Hubbard, Sound 87%, Overall 51%, Difference 36%)
Listen to Hunter Patrol via DeepSID
The reviews of this game did remind you of the old Buck Rogers game in terms of its style, where you would effectively be in a 3D environment, flying into enemy territory in an older aeroplane and shooting targets. In fact, the programmer Steve Lee had already released Falcon Patrol (and its sequel) all featuring planes too. The Rob Hubbard soundtrack at least sounded quite military on the whole, although personally for me it was one that Zzap! 64 over-rated in terms of its sound, but got the game about right for what it was at the time.
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