Game audio comparison

Back in the day hit video games were being ported to every console in the market. However way back when all the consoles had very different hardware leading to a lot of differences between the ports. Probably the most noticable difference in ports was the music, and since a lot of consoles way back when had limited audio hardware each console would sound "unique". The first game I want to take a look at is the original hit 3d game Doom.



Since Doom was released before all consoles had cd quality audio there was quite a difference in how the music sounded between consoles. In my opinion the best music in a doom port was on a cd quality port which was doom for the 3do.



This audio far surpassed the audio found in the original pc version of the game. I've been told that the 3do port of doom is a bit lacking in terms of smoothness or graphics or screensize or...something. But still the music from this port is in my opinion the best job ever done at taking a midi song and recording it in cd quality. Doom is an extremely atmospheric game (that's pretty much the reason why it became such a HUGE success) so playing it with the best quality music really enhances the experience.

Next up we have castlevania:



Many popular songs in castlevania have been ported between a lot of different consoles using different audio hardware, so I'm interested in seeing what everyone's personal favourite version is of the ported music.

Being a huge Doom fan, i played most of ports out there so here is my opinion about the sound/music of each port.

PC - It depends on the audio card really...
Jaguar - No music so nothing to say here.
32 X - Pretty bad quality overall.
SNES - I was surprised with the music quality on this one. Although there are tons of missing effects due to lag that bring the audio experience down.
GBA - Bad quality, only a little better than 32X i guess. The problem is that they messed with the compositions, most of them don't sound right, they have missing parts etc.
PS1/N64 - Quite different approach. They changed the music with some atmospheric ambiance which is quite good. Although i admit that i'm very nostalgic about the music so i prefer it.
Saturn - Haven't played it.
3DO - Definitely the worst port. Really BAD frame rate here. Its the only port, however, that sounds like they used real instruments for the music. Its basically the same compositions with some great instrumentation. In redbook audio quality.

About Castlevania.
Its very difficult to rate the music in this series because almost every game has amazing compositions. Its not about the quality of the sound as some of the best tunes come from the weaker audio hardware versions. My personal favorites are Michiru Yamane's compositions in Portrait of Ruin, Order of Ecclesia and of course SOTN which has classic compositions but i don't really like the audio quality, some great tunes sound weak, like Tragic Prince for instance. I'd love to hear a remastered version.

Yeah for castlevania I was thinking of something like songs that have been re-used on different hardware. It's really hard to define what the "best" castlevania song is there's so much amazing music in the castlevania games.