Trying to play Sega CD games in a standard CD player

[Dittohead Servbot #24]

I used to have a Sega CD with a few games and on a hunch, I experimented and tried playing them on a regular CD player to see what would happen:

 

Sonic CD: Allows you to play all the music in the game; as if it was a sountrack

Tomcat Alley: Says, "Code Monkeys, Code Monkeys, Code Monkeys..." first really low/slow, then progressively really fast

Other game I don't remember: A woman tells you that this game can only be played on the Sega CD

 

Anyone with a Sega CD collection know any other examples? It is kinda interesting.

[gdement]

Everything I've ever tried just plays the soundtrack. I used to play with it using the system's built-in CD player.

 

Sort of interesting was NHL (94?) - it has separate tracks for every jingle that comes up in the game. I think it was almost 100 tracks.

I also noticed that Sonic CD uses Genesis audio for the Past music, but CD tracks for Present and Future.

[Video]

Scud: th disposable assassin (yeah, I know, Saturn not sacd, but still) has a really awesomesound track. I played a Jaguar game and it said "only compatible with Jaguar" or soehting like that. Most SACD games just play whatever in game music there was.

[STICH666]

I tried Road Rash and was highly disappointed that it wouldn't do anything.

[Lincoln]

all sega cd are mixed mode (don't recall the proper term off hand) so they all have at at least one regular cd audio track after the data track. the fmv games usually have one short track with nothing significant and other games generally use them for game music.

[SoulBlazer]

all sega cd are mixed mode (don't recall the proper term off hand) so they all have at at least one regular cd audio track after the data track. the fmv games usually have one short track with nothing significant and other games generally use them for game music.

 

There's a number of PC games that do that also. I really love Betryal at Krondor cause it's both a game CD and a audio CD, and the music for the game is awsome.

[nonner242]

TG16 CD games had some fun things on the in a audio cd player, esp the jap games...just weird!

[tz101]

all sega cd are mixed mode (don't recall the proper term off hand) so they all have at at least one regular cd audio track after the data track. the fmv games usually have one short track with nothing significant and other games generally use them for game music.

 

I believe the SCD audio tracks are .mp3 file format, not redbook .cda, so you have to have a CD player that plays .mp3 files. Older CD players do not recognize .mp3 files, before about 1998 timeframe IIRC. FYI.

[Lincoln]

all sega cd are mixed mode (don't recall the proper term off hand) so they all have at at least one regular cd audio track after the data track. the fmv games usually have one short track with nothing significant and other games generally use them for game music.

 

I believe the SCD audio tracks are .mp3 file format, not redbook .cda, so you have to have a CD player that plays .mp3 files. Older CD players do not recognize .mp3 files, before about 1998 timeframe IIRC. FYI.

 

nope, they're standard cd audio. although people doing a half ass job dumping their games will encode to mp3 with some piece of shit converter and then litter them around the internets.

[Dittohead Servbot #24]

Any demonstrations on YouTube or elsewhere that show what Sega CD games do on a regular CD player?

[Austin]

Any demonstrations on YouTube or elsewhere that show what Sega CD games do on a regular CD player?

 

*sigh*

[retrorussell]

The games from Digital Pictures (Night Trap, Sewer Shark, Double Switch, etc.) usually just have a track with no music and a second track that has a digital phone ring and a Digital Pictures employee answer, "Good afternoon, Digital Pictures." Then you hear some creepy voices that rumor has it say "Number 9.. number 9.. number 9." backwards. A reference to the Beatles song Revolution 9, in which I believe Paul McCartney is saying "Number 9.. number 9.. number 9..", but not backwards.

 

A TON of tracks from Lunar are playable.. every bit of music from the game, I believe, and every spoken line, including the hilarious bit with the girl trying to sing like Luna, and failing miserably.

 

Damn, now I'm curious to find out all the playable tracks on these games too!

[+thegoldenband]

I've tried the six games I have -- Sewer Shark, Android Assault, Silpheed, AH-3 Thunderstrike, Racing Aces, and Microcosm. Of these, Sewer Shark does exactly what retrorussell says above, while the other five play music from the game, averaging 8-12 tracks per disc. The only one with dialogue was AH-3 Thunderstrike, which says something about "returning to base" at the very end -- I think it repeats three times. Several of the CDs had very short "stinger" tracks as the last audio track on the CD.

 

Each one has a "silent" track #1 of varying length, which is the data track on a mixed-mode CD. I've heard you can damage your speakers by trying to play this back, but I think I've only ever owned one CD player that didn't mute the data track when playing a mixed-mode CD-ROM. Given that CD audio is roughly 10MB/min., I think it can give you a rough idea of how big the game itself is, minus any Redbook audio. Some games were obviously huge, others surprisingly small -- I think the data track for Racing Aces was only 1:30 long, which is tiny!

Edited March 12, 2010 by thegoldenband

[malducci]

I believe the SCD audio tracks are .mp3 file format, not redbook .cda, so you have to have a CD player that plays .mp3 files. Older CD players do not recognize .mp3 files, before about 1998 timeframe IIRC. FYI.

No, those are just the rips... you pirate! MP3 audio back then? Haha - nope It was either CDDA (normal CD audio), streamed 8bit mono PCM, or just standard Genesis chiptune music.

Edited March 15, 2010 by malducci