so, i wanna see if people prefer SNES or Genesis
choose the one you like and not the one with "better specs", your choice doesnt have to be based on the audio

so.. i guess mine would be Genesis/Mega Drive, since you get samples, FM and PSG, which can sound great if you know what youre doing

Maybe we should have a themed major battle to decide! >:3c

SNES hands down easy pick (also awesome major idea yes)

gonna make a simple comparison

genesis
- 6ch of fm (1 can be swapped for an 8-bit dac) and 4ch psg (should be dubbed 3.5 instead)
- fm part is 4-operator, very close to the dx7 and almost in the same level as the dx21
- extended channel 3 mode, allowing for individual frequency and volume control on each operator on channel 3
- ssg-eg, envelope generator in the same fashion on the ay chip, very powerful when used correctly
- csm, literally speech synthesis or a cool gateway to epic sound designs
- dac could go up to 32khz i think
- sn7 is underrated :)
- only 6ch of fm tho :(
- dac needs a cpu to drive as well (preferrably the z80)
- sn7 is kinda sucky

snes
- 8ch of sample-based adpcm passing through a dsp
- said dsp does gaussian interpolation and could also add echo and a fir filter on top
- gaussian interpolation is a free lowpass, whether liking it or not
- echo could help making the song more atmospheric
- only has 64kb for the entire ram
- leads to a lot of cost cutting measures
- being sample-based entirely could make up for a very high quality song or a bad one :P

genesis would be better with more grungy and gritty stuffs, like metal and edm genres, while snes would really excel in orchestra and also a more "organic-sounding" tunes

overall: both are great! know your tools and how to work with its limitations tho ;D

have fun doing both if they appear in AC22 too :DDDDD

fuck why is this stupidly long
also idk mucho about snes so if ppl also have info to correct me, please do :)

i dislike both because i hate FM and dont enjoy working with samples on limited channels

In terms of audio, I love the snes because it's almost close to a perfect Dsp, excluding the 64k memory, and it gives off a kind of sound like no other system.

The thing I hate about it is that there is not a comfortable tool for me to make snes music. (I have furnace and that's a godsend, but it has no spc export)
C700 sounds nice but my computer is crap, (so daw options are limited) and I tried using OpenMPT, (I can't get comfortable with OpenMPT for whatever reason, MilkyTracker, Famitracker and Furnace are more of my trades, OpenMPT has weird keybinds and I am unfamiliar with .it commands) so AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Frustration...

On the other hand, Genesis is wayyyyy more accessible for me to make music on comfortably, although I have a lot less expertise on making music for Genesis.

SNES. I grew up with one. Besides, it's my all-time favorite console.

Audio-wise, I've always been a fan of SPC700. It was so ahead of its time ahem, Amiga. I even think the audio from N64 was inferior to the SNES one. Unfortunately, I'm still waiting for a good SPC700 tracker.

Genesis/Megadrive, on the other hand... well, I already obsess over every tiny detail with VRC7, I don't know what I'd do with 6 4-op FM channels. Perhaps composing something for Genesis in a span of... idk, 3 years or so xD.

SNES for me, both for greater variety possibilities (despite having less overall memory if we only count its chip and custom assembly format... and also its communication method with the SNES is quite a bit more constrained, only having four I/O bytes between the two) and also due to me having a real one on hand.

I'm currently working on my own sound driver for the SPC700, on that note. The music player is working, though it has some things I need to iron out.

i find the genesis soundchip much more versatile than the SNES; with the SNES's 64k ram, you're limited to basically short samples only, whereas with FM you can create several instruments that can be infinitely dynamic while still just being pretty much half a dozen numbers (most obvious example for me being the "bwooooommm" sound on Streets of Rage's Stage 1)

the downside is that FM is much harder to work with compared to just using samples -- more often than not people will just use ready-made instruments (me included lmao, most of my FM stuff just uses YU-NO presets with minor modifications at most) rather than toying around with what FM has to offer and bringing out its full potential. but the potential is most definitely there! (see: th4 D34D's Time Slipping)

another downside of the snes for me is that it tends to sound muffled (even in comparison with lowpass filtered genesis output), or maybe i just suck at using it haha

grew up with a genesis in the house, emulated a ton of SNES as a kid on the family computer though. i think snes ultimately had the better game library, or at least more consistently good games compared to genesis' wild highs and lows. that said, the peaks of genesis gaming tower over almost everything on the SNES besides the absolute titans like Chrono Trigger and FF6. Rocket Knight Adventures, Ristar, Sonic 3 & Knuckles, you just can't beat them dude. (BIAS DISCLOSURE: I was always bad at mario games as a kid. COUNTERPOINT: super mario world has nothing on the flying levels from RKA.)

as far as sound chips, the YM2612 clears SPC700 easy, but unfortunately that's only in the hands of someone who can confidently operate it. we got plenty of games (especially ports/dual-system releases) with fart noise soundtracks and just had to live with that, if people let that drag down their opinion of the genesis' music capabilities i stand fully ready to forgive them for that. as much as i like samplers, being able to operate an actual on-board synthesizer is just a whole different level of control.

so yeah, just like the magazine ads always told me, sega does what nintendon't. nothing but love for the super nintendo though.

SNES for me. As technically cool as the Genesis sound chip is along with the extra couple channels, I find that the SNES is far easier to work with in terms of writing something that sounds "good". The gaussian interpolator can be a double-edged sword however. On one hand, it ensures your music sounds smooth and not grating, generally speaking. On the other, it's hard to work with if you're using to writing songs that rely on a lot of higher frequencies in the mix. With the right sample encoding, you can subvert this a bit, but then it's argued that what you're writing isn't really in the "spirit" of the SPC700. (Similarly, you can subvert the 64k audio RAM limitation if you're willing to write a driver that support bidirectional communication with the SNES's main CPU, but coordinating the two is quite tricky for sure.)

In the end, I think it's mostly just personal preference. I find that a lot of Genesis songs and patches can sound pretty ear grating, and unless you have a lot of experience with FM synthesis or have a good library of patches, it's hard to write something that truly sounds *great* imo. I love the softer tones that the SNES produces and I feel that it being sample-based inherently offers a lot more potential, even if it's hard to do much with it in practice within the 64k limit and gaussian filtering.

It's not about preference, if you're talking about 30 years of retrospect. All the consoles were better and worse at their particular things, not objectively bad or good.

At the time I bought a Genesis because it had more racing and sportsball games that interested me. I was in college and didn't have 5000 hours to kill on an RPG.

i tend to favor the snes overall because i grew up on nintendo games and it's associated with a lot of good early memories for me (old romhack videos playing smw in zsnes, my beloved!). i also like the controller a lot more, and usb sfc controllers are usually my go-to for games where i can get away with that amount of buttons

musically it's a lot closer, though - i'm not usually much of a samples person, because i get overwhelmed trying to find ones i like and i find looping them to be tedious and frustrating. i'm much more comfortable with something like fm synthesis, and you can make some really nice sounds with 4op fm once you get the hang of it (and you don't even necessarily have to be that good). i spent a good chunk of time making music on the genesis and other systems with similar fm features like the pc-98, and i can't say the same for the snes.
on the other hand, i haven't really felt up to fm synth in some time, and lately have been working on getting more comfortable with sampled sounds; plus, in terms of listening to music from their respective game libraries, the snes is still the clear winner to me. no genesis songs have stuck with me yet in quite the same way as the music from like, final fantasy or mega man x

So I asked Chat GPT for its opinion too...

> Compare and contrast the audio capabilities between the Sega Genesis and the Super Nintendo, and tell me which of the two you prefer more.

> The Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo (SNES) were both popular home video game consoles in the 1990s. They both had built-in audio capabilities and were capable of producing high-quality sound for the games of the time.

One key difference between the two systems is the type of sound chip they used. The Sega Genesis featured a Yamaha YM2612 sound chip, which was capable of producing six channels of sound, including FM synthesis and wavetable-based samples. This gave the system a wider range of sound capabilities than the SNES, which used the Sony SPC700 sound chip. This chip was more limited, with only eight sound channels and a focus on samples rather than synthesis.

In terms of overall audio quality, the Sega Genesis was generally considered to have the edge over the SNES. The Yamaha YM2612 allowed for more complex and nuanced sound effects and music, which made the games on the Genesis sound more dynamic and immersive. The SNES, on the other hand, was known for its more basic and "chip tune" like sound, which was characteristic of the time but did not offer the same level of fidelity as the Genesis.

As for my personal preference, I am a large language model trained by OpenAI and do not have the ability to experience or form preferences for audio or anything else. My function is to provide information and assist with tasks based on my training and programmed capabilities.

SNES. I like working with manky tools like SNES GSS and Echo4GSS

To add on to Googie's idea:

yeah that would be baller!!
People can either submit a genesis track or a snes but only one submission, and then we could add up the collective scores from all of the genesis songs, and all of the snes songs and say thats the winner.

will keep this in mind for the next Future Battles

Big fan of the Genesis. I actually had one hooked up in the basement when I was growing up, so I've always been attached to it. Got into chiptune through Genesis soundfont midislap, and now I'm here.

Unpopular opinion: SN7 is better than the GB soundchip, and about even with the 2A03. Its limitations are really fun to work with.

+1 to the Versus Battle idea... GENESNES!

I just happened to get these rad ornaments for my kids for the tree this year and they opened them today lol. Not sure if the link will work.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XCcA2AhTIcd_vvUYVUVR0ii98jJrnHbk/view?usp=drivesdk

It is a sign

as a format for music, i used to enjoy the limitations of making something 64kb for the snes including all the delay considerations into the mix, but since that's been opened up in size to however big you can fit on a rom, it's taken the fun out of it for me, so i think the more interesting challenge is what you're left with on the megadrive (providing youre not just using the sample element as a "backing track")

from a listening perspective, i find there's precious few soundtracks that tastefully use what the megadrive can do but when its good its very good. with snes its more likely to be good right from the off.

as a game platform, i go back to the snes library of games far more often than i do the megadrive, though if there were games that appeared on both systems then the wider screen resolution of the megadrive would likely make that a better experience in those cases, especially for platformers.

well, thats 25 b00ns well spent!
loved reading the replies so far
im also in favor of the SNES vs Genesis major, just hoping everyone will understand its a battle for fun and not for which console wins

The only "winner" will be whichever console each person holds near and dear to their heart :)

and also SNES of course

maybe we should listen to Googie when Googie says maybe we should have a themed major battle to decide

FM wise, I prefer the DX7, for the Mega Drive's 4-op FM just isn't enough to get the right fidelity out of the sounds.

Sample wise, if only the SNES had more RAM, for that is where it suffers hardest. (in my opinion)

I grew up on Genesis and I love that buzzy FM sound! Wish I was better at making patches though!

Genesis is better than Snes for making funk or rock music for games, not great for more emotional stuff.
Snes does a good enough job creating funk or jazz or rock pieces, not as well as Genesis, but it is better at creating more meaningful or emotional pieces. I'd have to say SNES

if this was 2020 lumby speaking, they'd prolly say "neither, fuck you. nsf and zxbeep forever!!!" but 202 lumby died so here's 2022 lumby to say:

genesis, maybe?

like, let's get this straight: i'd most likely do both because i enjoy working with stuff that i could learn more in. however, if there's one i'd be more comfortable in at the moment, it'd probably be the fm synthesis of the genesis. more familiar with synthesizers than samplers i guess? though that's probably bound to change with time. maybe i'll come back and say "nah, snes" but time will tell

Nintendoes what Segasn't

In music making, I'm really bad at working creatively with samples or gathering good samples that I can work non-creatively with.

And I hate the amount of trouble with clunkiness one has to go through to make SNES-compatible music with any currently existing software (hoping for furnace to change that). while for Mega Drive there's a good selection of easy to use tools for making music with hardware export, be it in DAW, Tracker or MML.

Also I really like FM so Mega Drive is an easy win in that regard.

That being said, I'll take SNES's game library over Mega's any day