Atari 800 - Space Invaders - Sound Effects?

[RobMeade]

Hello all,

My first post, so thank you in advance for a warm welcome to the community and I hope that this is a suitable location for my post

 

As a personal project I challenged myself to recreate Space Invaders from the Atari 800, it was one of the first games I played as a kid and it has fond memories. I managed to find a couple of game play videos online and subsequently the game's manual which was really helpful.

 

One of the forthcoming features is to add the audio, and this is where I find myself a little challenged. I've tried to recreate the game as accurately as possible, but my only avenue for obtaining the audio at this time would be to try to extract it from the YouTube game play videos. This would be less than ideal as a) the quality will be reduced and b) a lot of the sound effects overlap, for example, the space invaders marching whilst the command ship flies across the top of the screen.

 

There are alternatives that I could use but mostly from other versions of Space Invaders and they are just a bit too, well, jazzy compared to this game.

 

I did take a look at the emulators but I was unable to find anything that was just "straight forward", e.g. download, install, run. Even if I had made progress with this, the overlapping sound effects would still be an issue.

 

I was hoping that maybe someone here may be able to help me with this. I've only had a quick scan through the requirements so far, but from what I can see I need the follow effects;

• Player shooting
• Player explosion
• Invader shooting
• Invader explosion
• Invader movement
• Command ship flying
• Command ship player abduction

Any suggestions or help with this would be really appreciated.

Thank you in advance for any help and your time in reading.

Edited May 8, 2019 by RobMeade

[toddtmw]

Hi. And welcome!

 

Are you looking to do this on modern hardware, where a sampled sound could be used? Or are you trying to recreate it on an Atari? Also, are you trying to do Arcade sounds or 8-bit sounds? (Or something else?)

 

Again, welcome, take a look around and kick back. I think you'll find that we (mostly) don't bite.

 

Perhaps you would be willing to submit a post about yourself?

 

-Todd

[RobMeade]

Hi Todd,

Thank you for the welcome and such a prompt response.

 

More than happy to drop a post with a little about myself, just had a quick look through and found the Introductions sub-forum so will post there in due course.

 

To answer your questions;

Yes - modern hardware. I'm recreating the game using Unity/C#. Currently running/testing on my laptop (Windows) but will also be building for the web using a WebGL build and potentially mobile builds also.

 

I'm not sure if I'm qualified enough to answer your question regarding Arcade or 8-bit sounds, I'm going to go with the latter as it was a game from the 8-bit home computer and I'd like the audio effects to be as close as possible to the originals.

As an example, here's a link to one of the game play videos I've been using as reference material;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAJVOFQvsy4

I've just noticed that there are no sound fx when the player shoots, nor when the invaders shoot and the command ship flying effect is the same as the one for the player abduction, so that makes things a little bit easier.

[toddtmw]

I just playd it in Altirra and ther are like 4 sounds. the background killing an alien, having your ship destroyed and the sound of the UFO at the top. Seems like you should be able to synch things up so that the background sound aligns with the sound effect for the other sounds?

[Rybags]

Why would you want to use the 800 effects? IMO most of them are fairly lame compared to both 2600 and arcade versions.

 

The 2600 player ship explosion is a classic - if I was doing a PC remake I'd use the arcade samples and 2600 player explosion.

Edited May 9, 2019 by Rybags

[SoundGammon]

How about checking into Roklan's DELUXE INVADERS?

[sargie]

Hey Rob,

 

Here's a set of samples that was once used in MAME I believe...

 

Let me know when you've got them!

 

Best,

 

Sarge

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/14N3dVDt8ujM0s1fycpTop2X7Mgm9-LEG/view?usp=sharing

[Urchlay]

You're writing in a modern language for modern platforms, so you should

be able to use samples... my approach would be to find an emulator for

whatever system you're "borrowing" sounds from (Atari800 or Altirra

for the 8-bit Atari) that's capable of recording the emulated audio

(or actually writing it to a file).

 

Play the game, get it to make all the sounds you need, exit the

emulator. The result would be a .wav file, which you could load up in

any audio editor (Audacity maybe) and copy/paste the individual sounds

each to their own .wav file.

[+Nezgar]

If you install Altirra, and run the game, you can then turn off certain POKEY channels to get ie the saucer flying without the marching sound...

 

Then use Altirra's Record Audio function to save it as a WAV file.

 

Edit: Woops, I see Urchlay already suggested this method.

[RobMeade]

Thanks all for these replies, I'll response to them all below as there have been lots whilst I was asleep!

I just playd it in Altirra and ther are like 4 sounds. the background killing an alien, having your ship destroyed and the sound of the UFO at the top. Seems like you should be able to synch things up so that the background sound aligns with the sound effect for the other sounds?

 

Hi Todd, I didn't get very far when looking at the emulators, as I mentioned above they didn't seem overly straight forward in there set up, one I saw (I forget its name) required the code to be built first and so on. I had hoped for just a download/install and then grab a rom. Initially I was hoping to do this to check specifics from the game play. Is Altirra straight forward to set up?

 

 

Why would you want to use the 800 effects? IMO most of them are fairly lame compared to both 2600 and arcade versions.

 

The 2600 player ship explosion is a classic - if I was doing a PC remake I'd use the arcade samples and 2600 player explosion.

 

Hi Rybags, I appreciate there are often strong feelings regarding the 8-bit version of Space Invaders, with it being quite different from the original, but for myself there were several reasons;

• nostalgia - it was a game I played a lot when I was a kid, as did other family members
• attention to detail - I'm trying to recreate the game as closely as I possibly can, whilst there are some aspects I am having to "assume" at the moment (speeds/timings and distances) I'd like it to be as close to the original as possible, so this would also include the audio. I do appreciate there are big differences in the audio between versions, I'm not trying to get the "best" sounds, I'm just trying to get as close to the sounds from this version of space invaders as possible

 

How about checking into Roklan's DELUXE INVADERS?

 

Hi SoundGammon, I never played that version, but having just watched some game play of it, the audio is definitely different.

 

 

Hey Rob,

 

Here's a set of samples that was once used in MAME I believe...

 

Let me know when you've got them!

 

Best,

 

Sarge

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/14N3dVDt8ujM0s1fycpTop2X7Mgm9-LEG/view?usp=sharing

 

Hi Sargie, thank you so much for these, I've played each one but unfortunately they sound "too good", as in they aren't the ones from this specific version of space invaders. I appreciate you offering them though, thank you.

 

 

You're writing in a modern language for modern platforms, so you should
be able to use samples... my approach would be to find an emulator for
whatever system you're "borrowing" sounds from (Atari800 or Altirra
for the 8-bit Atari) that's capable of recording the emulated audio
(or actually writing it to a file).

Play the game, get it to make all the sounds you need, exit the
emulator. The result would be a .wav file, which you could load up in
any audio editor (Audacity maybe) and copy/paste the individual sounds
each to their own .wav file.

 

Hi Urchlay, that was also my original thinking, but the stumbling block was the difficulty in getting an emulator set up. As mentioned above I'll take a look at Altirra in a moment and see if its any different from those I've already seen, but I was hoping to find something almost just click-and-go, rather than having to spend too much time on trying to get the emulator to work in the first place - I don't have a lot of experience in this area. The second issue was going to be one of the overlapping sound fx, e.g. just getting the command ship flying sound without the invaders marching and so on. It's possible playing it enough I may get a break and have a situation where I've destroyed all of the invaders and then a command ship flies across I suppose.

 

 

If you install Altirra, and run the game, you can then turn off certain POKEY channels to get ie the saucer flying without the marching sound...

Then use Altirra's Record Audio function to save it as a WAV file.

Edit: Woops, I see Urchlay already suggested this method.

 

Hi Nezgar, there's definitely a theme here with regards to Altirra, I will have a look in a moment. Turning of POKEY channels, whilst I don't full know what this means, sounds like it would be an ideal way to get the specific sounds more clearly.

 

 

-------------------------------

So, I'll go an check out Altirra then and hope it's fairly straight forward. If anyone has any additional links to getting it setup/configured or anything else with regards to these POKEY channels I would be most grateful.

Thanks all for the replies so far!

Edited May 9, 2019 by RobMeade

[RobMeade]

Just a quick follow-up...

 

I have no idea how I missed Altirra previously, or perhaps I assumed when it said "binaries" in the download it wasn't just going to be an executable.

 

In any case, I have Altirra downloaded, set up, and I just started running Space Invaders - took me a while to find which button to actually start the game but I think I can make some progress from here.

 

Just those POKEY things to find out about now - this is really useful, so thank you all so much - fab community

[Mclaneinc]

Hi Rob,

 

In Altirra there's a tab called SYSTEM, go to that and then you will see CONFIGURE SYSTEM and then look down the list and you will see AUDIO...

 

In that you can enable or disable the 4 pokey audio channels (Pokey is the audio chip)....Test to see what one makes the noise you want and then record it via the RECORD tab at the top...

 

Paul..

[ivop]

Perhaps you could include several different sample packs (Arcade, 2600, 800) and have people select which one they want to use.

[RobMeade]

Hi Rob,

 

In Altirra there's a tab called SYSTEM, go to that and then you will see CONFIGURE SYSTEM and then look down the list and you will see AUDIO...

 

In that you can enable or disable the 4 pokey audio channels (Pokey is the audio chip)....Test to see what one makes the noise you want and then record it via the RECORD tab at the top...

 

Paul..

 

Hi Paul, thank you so much for that, I assumed it was going to be something really complicated where I'd be trying to find specific values and memory addresses or something!

 

Just in case anyone else is ever interested, those channels map as follows;

 

1. Invaders marching fx

2. Invaders destroyed fx

3. Command ship flight (including player abduction) fx

4. Player destroyed fx

 

Thank you again, this will allow me to extract the exact sounds perfectly

 

 

Perhaps you could include several different sample packs (Arcade, 2600, 800) and have people select which one they want to use.

 

Hi ivop, that's a nice idea, I'll make a note on my features list now, but core/original game first

 

 

Edited May 9, 2019 by RobMeade

[Mclaneinc]

A pleasure to help Rob, its a real nice crowd in here, sometimes we trip over each other to help

 

Paul...

 

Its worth checking to see if more than one channel has been used, normally it would be spread by individual channels so to allow for more effects music etc but on rare occasions you might find a second channel used...

 

Can't say I remember any at the moment but its always worth a listen..

Edited May 9, 2019 by Mclaneinc

[RobMeade]

Its worth checking to see if more than one channel has been used, normally it would be spread by individual channels so to allow for more effects music etc but on rare occasions you might find a second channel used...

 

Can't say I remember any at the moment but its always worth a listen..

 

Hey Paul,

Thanks again, I'll check out a few combinations then to see if that is the case. With the game running in the emulator now it gives me the opportunity to research exactly when the sound fx are played but also when they are not, e.g. when there should be no sound. Again, this is all so very useful!

 

Rob

[_The Doctor__]

Not sure how I feel about it being moved to modern day machines, part of me feels our work is best served on the original machines and getting folks to journey back in time using all the original software and equipment with updates on those. Keeps the retro game going so to speak.

 

Remember also most older games play best on a CRT, using emulation and flat panels adds lag that didn't exist back then. If you proceed you might make sure to get the timings from CRT play and compensate in your software to make it feel as responsive and on time as the Tube play was.