Nov 162011
 

What begins as a celebration of PlayStation launch titles becomes a full-on gushfest for Jumping Flash and its late composer, Takeo Miratsu. Also covered are Tohshinden and Air Combat.

Download episode 4 if you please

Episode 4 notes:

00:00 – Duke (Battle Arena Tohshinden)
08:06 – Rungo (Battle Arena Tohshinden)
10:30 – Sofia (Battle Arena Tohshinden)
16:32 – Air Combat (Level Theme)
18:20 – Air Combat (Intro Movie)
22:35 – Level 4-1 (Jumping Flash!)
24:40 – Level 1-1 (Jumping Flash!)
27:55 – Level Select (Jumping Flash!)
33:32 – Level 5-2 (Jumping Flash!)
35:12 – Level 3-2 (Jumping Flash!)
38:45 – Final Boss (Jumping Flash!)
41:51 – Ending (Jumping Flash!)
46:08 – Ending (Air Combat)

One thing I realized after editing the episode (and didn’t mention in the audio) is how Tohshinden was the first game that I recall having “real” guitar playing in it. Both Duke and Rungo’s theme have a very gritty “garage band” guitar in them that sounds like some dude at Takara plugged in his instrument and jammed out a low-fi solo over the existing music. While I’m sure other games had real, i.e. non-sampled guitar playing, this was the first game I came across that featured it. Interesting!

  34 Responses to “VGMpire episode 04 – The Genius of Jumping Flash”

  1. Keep up the great work dude, love the podcast!

  2. this will be most awesome

  3. Never actually played Jumping Flash, but its music is great.
    Great episode as well.

  4. YEA!! Thank you Brett.

  5. I owned a CD of Tommy Tallarico’s music, with Cool Spot and Terminator. and such. I don’t remember a second one, the first was mid-nineties, I think, and very good stuff. I hope we get a show dedicated to Tommy.

  6. Never played any of those games since I’ve only ever really had Nintendo stuff, but I always thought there should be more things like Jumping Flash…

  7. Very cool. As far as rabbit-specific VGM goes, though, I’m more of a Jazz Jackrabbit man: http://goo.gl/TXQYh

  8. Thats was decidley classic old school action-y music

    Another cool episode! you have nailed the length and format.

  9. This is greatly improving the quality of my life.

  10. […] this shit.) Occasionally, Brett will also be joined by fellow game music enthusiasts. Like say, THIS WEEK, when Hank and myself join Brett for a discussion on the music of Battle Arena Toshinden and […]

  11. CD quality music seems like the biggest thing PSX had going for it. Brett mentioned that Goldeneye was one of the last games (FPSes at least) featuring that kind of music; non-atmospheric, just the strong melodies of the “level theme”. I really miss that… energy? I wonder if the higher production needed for higher quality music (CDs) as well as lengthier games contributed to the simpler, atmospheric tracks in games during and after that generation. Or maybe they were just pushing for more realism, having achieved super-realistic 3D graphics…

    I’ve made a huge mistake.

  12. Listened to this five or six times already while playing league. I got a playstation around twisted metal 2 time so most of this early stuff is really completely new to me. I remember reading about jumping flash back in the day and as a fan of mecha I was already sold by an article in egm but never ended up getting it. Cant believe how good these songs are.

  13. I’m really enjoying the show so far, I do like chiptunes but I’m hoping to hear some more orchestral scores in later episodes.

  14. reeeaallly like the inclusion of the episode notes to keep track of the names of and the time that the tracks appear. Keep up the great work Brett ! 🙂

  15. twitter: @naosabesnao

    I liked these tunes you should check these ones aswell : Super Fantazy zone for genesis: The thing with old tunes is that usually they constantly loop aswell as in any video game

    When I do play video games I never notice if there is guitares or any other instruments etc I just do appear to like the tune from now on I will do that to start diferentiating songs against other songs

  16. Loving my dose of VGM. Keep it up Elston.

  17. Yes.

  18. Brett just wanted you to know I finally subscribed to this and fugggin dig it. I think Duke’s theme changed my life. The drive to work is now so much better. I enjoy your discussion too so feel free do have more. Thanks for doing this hope it lasts longer than game music of the day lol.

  19. Sorry if I sound like a polite spambot I’m typing from my phone haha

  20. cool blow me

    does that help?

  21. cool podcast bro

  22. Wooooooooow

  23. I am just saying The World ends with you soundtrack that is all

  24. And I could finally download this on iTunes and give you a sweet review. Fragments!

  25. Blow me. :3

  26. Love the podcast Brett, the mix of game music and dialog is perfect. The only contructive critisism I could give is maybe make each episode longer. As one of your game music of the day fanboys keep up the good work!

  27. Hey just wanted to say I appreciate your work Brett and I am so glad I finally found another person that is so enthused about VGM, you’re an inspiration, keep it up, love ya!

    (Wonder if you have anything to say about Comix Zone, I remember hearing those tunes on Talkradar a lot and I love that soundtrack)

  28. Excellent. Love these Brett, they are awesome for vegging at work. Such great music.

    Also, blow me.

  29. I’ve never played these games, but the music is FANTASTIC.
    Thanks for this!!

  30. This was awesome never heard of any of these games. Loving VGMpire!

  31. JUMPING FLASH REIGNS SUPREME

  32. Getting caught up, good episode. Never played any of these games, but the music is great.

  33. Games for the PC-Engine-CD, PCE Duo (TurboDuo in the US), PCE Duo R and PCE Duo RX had CD quality music (as it was one of the first systems/series of systems that used CDs, and the music was in redbook audio format) and real voice acting back in ’89-’93. There were several tracks which had live acoustic and electric guitar in the games on that system.

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