Most of the uploaded SoundBlaster versions don't have the quality of this recording, as many of their backing tracks are subdued or lost entirely. I'm very happy for this upload. Thank you!
I only ever heard the soundblaster music, had no idea this game effectively had two and a half soundtracks. I think I may actually prefer the Ultrasound version too.
Oh man, C.C.Catch was definitely one of my most favourite digital music composers. This soundtrack shows why. Renaissance were also killer developers, able to squeeze every bit of performance out of the system, as this game shows. What do expect from guys who code in Assembler?
@@dosnostalgic I see Renaissance as being kinda like the (also demoscene-based) Zyrinx for the Sega Genesis. They didn't do many games, but the ones they did were stellar. _SubTerrainia_ and _Red Zone_ have music by Jesper Kyd, as does the PC/Sega Saturn game _Scorcher_ . . . The _SubTerrainia_ soundtrack is easily on par with this one here by C. C. Catch.
@@dosnostalgicTran also made Xixit and Chain Reaction, and Kenny Chou did other soundtracks, like One Must Fall 2097. Hitchens came from EPIC and worked on a bunch of their other games.
Oh wow, that SB version is cool. Interesting mix of samples and FM sounds. I was digging around for DOS games that had sampled percussion a while ago, but the only example I could find at the time was the opening credits of Protostar. I skipped over Zone 66 because I mistakenly thought you needed both a GUS and an SB installed for the mixed soundtrack. Oops!
Under a Killing Moon had digital drums if you didn't have a MIDI capable card and selected Sound Blaster as your music device. I'm fairly certain there are a few more, but UAKM is the only one that comes to mind at this moment.
Yes, it was rare but there were a few more that combined them: Zyclunt/Blade Warrior Mad News Metaltech: Earthsiege Metaltech: Battledrome Magic Pockets Diggers Subtrade: Return to Irata Cold Dreams Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (FM+6-bit Adlib samples, similar to how you could play samples on PC speaker) Gods (1991) 4D Sports Boxing (1991) WWF Wrestlemania (1992) Wacky Funsters (1992) Blue Force (1993) The Fortress of Dr. Radiaki (1994) Apache/Apache Longbow (1995)
I thought the name "Zone 66" looked familiar when I spotted this video in the list of suggestions. I clicked on it and heard that opening. "Oh, yeah! That game which needed a boot disk and couldn't be installed on the Stacker drives." I think the thing I remember the most about it was how it was unusually picky about what you had loaded. The only other games I needed boot disks for back in the day were Quake and Death Rally, and those didn't object to being on a compressed drive. They just needed as much free memory as I could give them because they both required a minimum of 8MB of RAM just to run.
I never even got to play it, for me it would just get through that awesome intro animation, then kick me out just before loading the first level. Little kid-me tried everything I could think of at the time to get it going on my Compaq Prolinea 486 33SX, but it wasn't having any of it.
Awesome thank you so much. I had a Sound Blaster when I played the game so I’m partial to that version of the music but it’s fun to compare to the GUS and AdLib. The GUS tracks really are different but the AdLib seem to be simple versions of the SB tracks. Fascinating!
Thanks for this video. I also prefer the version SB. GUS Version loses melody I find (flagrand with "ice wind"). This is the problem with the conversions. I had also noticed when I had a GUS. Some games were better GUS, others SB.
Not a wonder you'd get the number mixed up, considering there were other titles from Epic Megagames with weird numbers in their titles, such as One Must Fall 2097 and Traffic Department 2192. :)
Great soundtrack! In this way should be created soundtrack for Doom and Doom 2, it sounds incomparable better than even original soundtrack on SC-55. Epic MegaGames were great games developers back then(in most of their games music had high quality). And by the way this Gravis Ultrasound soundtrack is somehow disappointing, GUS were the best soundcards back then (they had higher sound buffer than most SB cards), they were able to play more complexed tracker modules like .xm (Fast Tracker module), .s3m (Scream Tracker 3 module) or .it (Impulse Tracker module) they had superior sound quality before MS ADPCM (it is basically compressed .wav format), .mp3 and .ogg were introduced. Also Sound Blaster soundtrack could sound much better if author used 4-operator per channel mode in YMF262 OPL3 sound chip (most SB sound cards had them) and higher quality sound samples. Nevertheless, it is still far better than most General MIDI soundtracks. However, AdLib version sounds great, it uses full potential of YM3812 OPL2 sound chip (unlike most General MIDI soundtracks) and FM drums sounds very good (drums are hard to do using frequency modulation).
The Gravis had suck high quality sounds, and it really makes a big improvement on some games. The tracks are so incredibly different between these versions, and the Gravis version is just not as good. It lost all the catchy hooks.
I didn't know this game so big thanks for the heads up. I'm always impressed when I hear music with both digital and FM notes/channels. It's like SID with digi only pretty different.
For those wondering, the SoundBlaster soundtrack uses the CDFM tracker that was developed for the Amnesia demo. The songs here should have stereo PCM sound though. "Zim" has excellent panning effects!
Growing up I played this with Adlib. I have to say in my opinion, Sound Blaster wins at this overall, but I do prefer Highway Fury, Plantation Crash, Hell, and Final Frontier with Adlib.
OPL2 is mono, so if you don't hear any difference between left and right speaker, that's OPL2. However maybe the game can play stereo music on cards that features OPL3 chip, depends if they created another variation for these or not.
I never played or even heard of this game before now.. but the great melodies combined with this perfect mix of midi devices... this video is peak 90's midi gaming, hands down.
Got the shareware version running in D-fend (Dosbox+GUI like Virtual box). After patching with the Ultrasound patch and downloading the Ultrasound 4.11 drivers I have the Gus soundtrack working! It replaces the normal Title music with the Gus version of Zim!
AdLib is AdLib. A PC sound device that is essentially just a simple interface for a OPL2 (Yamaha YM3812) FM synthesizer chip. Since the chip was a Yamaha product, and not something that AdLib invented, when Sound Blaster came around Creative (& other companies) put the same chip on their cards in order to provide backwards compatibility.
@@dosnostalgic aha I knew it that is the first one they started of with that soundcard and later the opl3 was improved with one chip. for later soundcards such as soundblaster pro 2.0 or soundblaster 16 series for example.
@@dosnostalgic Imagine what might have been had Adlib went with the OPN instead of the OPL series. That would have opened the door for the YM2610B to be used in later PC sound cards (six 4 operator FM channels six ADPCM channels three PSG channels). Also the OPN was four operator only, no two operator mode so we would not have the situation with the OPL3 where developers used it in 2 operator mode and ignored the 4 op mode.
uh I think its confirmed that soundblaster is the improved version of the adlib but gravis ultra sound just speed up and change the key pitch for a reason. I don't know why it was supposed to be either a wave synth chip but its almost an fm synth chip but its a modchip anyway.
![Cody Johnson - I'm Gonna Love You (with Carrie Underwood) [Official Music Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/yy9PuYMU29g/mqdefault.jpg)
That intro animation and music remain one of my favorites of any game from that era.
Most of the uploaded SoundBlaster versions don't have the quality of this recording, as many of their backing tracks are subdued or lost entirely. I'm very happy for this upload. Thank you!
The effort they put into those early Epic games was, well, epic. The length of this soundtrack for what was really required is amazing.
Epic was just the publisher for this one. Renaissance, the developer, was a demogroup.
@@hobbified and Tran aka Tomasz Pytel went on to create PayPal later.
Adlib is the version etched in my mind and hearing the soundblaster version is like a remaster
This OST is fucking sick, never heard of this game.
It's a hidden gem for sure.
I only ever heard the soundblaster music, had no idea this game effectively had two and a half soundtracks. I think I may actually prefer the Ultrasound version too.
Oh man, C.C.Catch was definitely one of my most favourite digital music composers. This soundtrack shows why. Renaissance were also killer developers, able to squeeze every bit of performance out of the system, as this game shows. What do expect from guys who code in Assembler?
Not to play down their skills, but I'd be more impressed if they'd made more than one game.
@@dosnostalgic I see Renaissance as being kinda like the (also demoscene-based) Zyrinx for the Sega Genesis. They didn't do many games, but the ones they did were stellar. _SubTerrainia_ and _Red Zone_ have music by Jesper Kyd, as does the PC/Sega Saturn game _Scorcher_ . . . The _SubTerrainia_ soundtrack is easily on par with this one here by C. C. Catch.
@@dosnostalgicTran also made Xixit and Chain Reaction, and Kenny Chou did other soundtracks, like One Must Fall 2097.
Hitchens came from EPIC and worked on a bunch of their other games.
Oh wow, that SB version is cool. Interesting mix of samples and FM sounds.
I was digging around for DOS games that had sampled percussion a while ago, but the only example I could find at the time was the opening credits of Protostar. I skipped over Zone 66 because I mistakenly thought you needed both a GUS and an SB installed for the mixed soundtrack. Oops!
Under a Killing Moon had digital drums if you didn't have a MIDI capable card and selected Sound Blaster as your music device. I'm fairly certain there are a few more, but UAKM is the only one that comes to mind at this moment.
Yes, it was rare but there were a few more that combined them:
Zyclunt/Blade Warrior
Mad News
Metaltech: Earthsiege
Metaltech: Battledrome
Magic Pockets
Diggers
Subtrade: Return to Irata
Cold Dreams
Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (FM+6-bit Adlib samples, similar to how you could play samples on PC speaker)
Gods (1991)
4D Sports Boxing (1991)
WWF Wrestlemania (1992)
Wacky Funsters (1992)
Blue Force (1993)
The Fortress of Dr. Radiaki (1994)
Apache/Apache Longbow (1995)
I thought the name "Zone 66" looked familiar when I spotted this video in the list of suggestions. I clicked on it and heard that opening. "Oh, yeah! That game which needed a boot disk and couldn't be installed on the Stacker drives." I think the thing I remember the most about it was how it was unusually picky about what you had loaded. The only other games I needed boot disks for back in the day were Quake and Death Rally, and those didn't object to being on a compressed drive. They just needed as much free memory as I could give them because they both required a minimum of 8MB of RAM just to run.
I never even got to play it, for me it would just get through that awesome intro animation, then kick me out just before loading the first level. Little kid-me tried everything I could think of at the time to get it going on my Compaq Prolinea 486 33SX, but it wasn't having any of it.
DOS: C:
un zone66.exe
Awesome thank you so much. I had a Sound Blaster when I played the game so I’m partial to that version of the music but it’s fun to compare to the GUS and AdLib.
The GUS tracks really are different but the AdLib seem to be simple versions of the SB tracks.
Fascinating!
Thank you for this high quality upload! The "rips" I knew only featured SB and Gravis, yours also had the AdLib version.
Thanks for this video. I also prefer the version SB. GUS Version loses melody I find (flagrand with "ice wind"). This is the problem with the conversions. I had also noticed when I had a GUS. Some games were better GUS, others SB.
Soundblaster FTW
Just the game I was looking for, for a long time, but I could not exactly recall it's name! Thought it was Zone 2066. Thanks!
Not a wonder you'd get the number mixed up, considering there were other titles from Epic Megagames with weird numbers in their titles, such as One Must Fall 2097 and Traffic Department 2192. :)
@@E5rael And both of which were most excellent games themselves. :3
Oh my gosh I remember this game. One of my DOS favorites
KENNY CHOU, EVERYONE 👏🙏👏
Great soundtrack. It rocks! 🎉
wow that Desert Heat on Gravis UltraSound sounds so cooler than other versions.
Great soundtrack! In this way should be created soundtrack for Doom and Doom 2, it sounds incomparable better than even original soundtrack on SC-55. Epic MegaGames were great games developers back then(in most of their games music had high quality).
And by the way this Gravis Ultrasound soundtrack is somehow disappointing, GUS were the best soundcards back then (they had higher sound buffer than most SB cards), they were able to play more complexed tracker modules like .xm (Fast Tracker module), .s3m (Scream Tracker 3 module) or .it (Impulse Tracker module) they had superior sound quality before MS ADPCM (it is basically compressed .wav format), .mp3 and .ogg were introduced.
Also Sound Blaster soundtrack could sound much better if author used 4-operator per channel mode in YMF262 OPL3 sound chip (most SB sound cards had them) and higher quality sound samples. Nevertheless, it is still far better than most General MIDI soundtracks.
However, AdLib version sounds great, it uses full potential of YM3812 OPL2 sound chip (unlike most General MIDI soundtracks) and FM drums sounds very good (drums are hard to do using frequency modulation).
The Gravis had suck high quality sounds, and it really makes a big improvement on some games. The tracks are so incredibly different between these versions, and the Gravis version is just not as good. It lost all the catchy hooks.
I didn't know this game so big thanks for the heads up. I'm always impressed when I hear music with both digital and FM notes/channels. It's like SID with digi only pretty different.
this music is so rrad!!!
// CUE-file
REM GENRE Soundtrack
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
TITLE "Zone 66"
FILE "Zone 66 full soundtrack (Sound Blaster + Gravis UltraSound + AdLib) [JnbrosPkq_M].webm" WAVE
TRACK 01 AUDIO
TITLE "Title (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 00:00:00
TRACK 02 AUDIO
TITLE "Foreign Shores (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 01:53:00
TRACK 03 AUDIO
TITLE "Ice Wind (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 04:56:00
TRACK 04 AUDIO
TITLE "Desert Heat (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 08:48:00
TRACK 05 AUDIO
TITLE "War Plains (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 12:34:00
TRACK 06 AUDIO
TITLE "Highway Fury (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 16:30:00
TRACK 07 AUDIO
TITLE "Plantation Crash (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 18:31:00
TRACK 08 AUDIO
TITLE "Hell (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 22:05:00
TRACK 09 AUDIO
TITLE "Final Frontier (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 26:10:00
TRACK 10 AUDIO
TITLE "Zim (Sound Blaster)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 28:47:00
TRACK 11 AUDIO
TITLE "Title (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 31:29:00
TRACK 12 AUDIO
TITLE "Foreign Shores (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 35:11:00
TRACK 13 AUDIO
TITLE "Ice Wind (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 37:45:00
TRACK 14 AUDIO
TITLE "Desert Heat (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 39:54:00
TRACK 15 AUDIO
TITLE "War Plains (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 42:46:00
TRACK 16 AUDIO
TITLE "Highway Fury (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 44:51:00
TRACK 17 AUDIO
TITLE "Plantation Crash (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 47:54:00
TRACK 18 AUDIO
TITLE "Hell (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 50:44:00
TRACK 19 AUDIO
TITLE "Final Frontier (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 54:52:00
TRACK 20 AUDIO
TITLE "Zim (Gravis UltraSound)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 57:20:00
TRACK 21 AUDIO
TITLE "Title (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 59:50:00
TRACK 22 AUDIO
TITLE "Foreign Shores (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 61:39:00
TRACK 23 AUDIO
TITLE "Ice Wind (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 64:42:00
TRACK 24 AUDIO
TITLE "Desert Heat (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 68:34:00
TRACK 25 AUDIO
TITLE "War Plains (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 72:19:00
TRACK 26 AUDIO
TITLE "Highway Fury (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 76:16:00
TRACK 27 AUDIO
TITLE "Plantation Crash (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 78:12:00
TRACK 28 AUDIO
TITLE "Hell (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 81:47:00
TRACK 29 AUDIO
TITLE "Final Frontier (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 85:51:00
TRACK 30 AUDIO
TITLE "Zim (AdLib)"
PERFORMER "Zone 66"
INDEX 01 88:34:00
For those wondering, the SoundBlaster soundtrack uses the CDFM tracker that was developed for the Amnesia demo. The songs here should have stereo PCM sound though. "Zim" has excellent panning effects!
MMMM love those FM tones.
Can you put this up for download somewhere? Mp3 or flac or something? This is great.
Link in the video description
Growing up I played this with Adlib. I have to say in my opinion, Sound Blaster wins at this overall, but I do prefer Highway Fury, Plantation Crash, Hell, and Final Frontier with Adlib.
Does the SB version use OPL2 or OPL3 FM synth?
OPL2
How do you know? Can anyone find that out for himself?
OPL2 is mono, so if you don't hear any difference between left and right speaker, that's OPL2.
However maybe the game can play stereo music on cards that features OPL3 chip, depends if they created another variation for these or not.
"Hell" samples "DJs Take Control" by SL2. Good beat.
Great soundtrack, thanks for the upload :)
great video dude !
I never played or even heard of this game before now.. but the great melodies combined with this perfect mix of midi devices... this video is peak 90's midi gaming, hands down.
Got the shareware version running in D-fend (Dosbox+GUI like Virtual box). After patching with the Ultrasound patch and downloading the Ultrasound 4.11 drivers I have the Gus soundtrack working! It replaces the normal Title music with the Gus version of Zim!
why does a Zound Bruster sound better than a Goose here?
Part of the SB soundtrack is generated in real time, but GUS is purely samples, and those samples are recorded at a fairly low rate.
Desert Heat wow
Love the sb version but isnt adlib like the “old“ sb
AdLib is AdLib. A PC sound device that is essentially just a simple interface for a OPL2 (Yamaha YM3812) FM synthesizer chip. Since the chip was a Yamaha product, and not something that AdLib invented, when Sound Blaster came around Creative (& other companies) put the same chip on their cards in order to provide backwards compatibility.
oh ok thanks
This game also mixes digitized sound (most noticeably drums) to fm instruments in soundblaster mode. GUS mode is fully digitized
@@dosnostalgic aha I knew it that is the first one they started of with that soundcard and later the opl3 was improved with one chip. for later soundcards such as soundblaster pro 2.0 or soundblaster 16 series for example.
@@dosnostalgic Imagine what might have been had Adlib went with the OPN instead of the OPL series. That would have opened the door for the YM2610B to be used in later PC sound cards (six 4 operator FM channels six ADPCM channels three PSG channels). Also the OPN was four operator only, no two operator mode so we would not have the situation with the OPL3 where developers used it in 2 operator mode and ignored the 4 op mode.
The GUS variant has one of the stages track for a "Title", which is incorrect, I suppose?
+Ori Klein GUS title tune is different, yes, but it's not one of the stage tracks.
alright just in time for comparison and this release of Zone 66 from 1993 for pc.
uh I think its confirmed that soundblaster is the improved version of the adlib but gravis ultra sound just speed up and change the key pitch for a reason. I don't know why it was supposed to be either a wave synth chip but its almost an fm synth chip but its a modchip anyway.
What is the timestamp for when the GUS version starts?
31:29
I miss this game
Does anyone know what scale foreign shores is written in ? for sb ?
I believe it's D minor.
D minor 7.
@@GreatMewtwo Thanks. I have been waiting for a reply for years.
@@E5rael I hve been waiting for a reply for years
Desert Heat, especially on GUS at 75% speed. *chef’s kiss*