Ahhhh ok. Then I wouldn't say that it's the 'z80' that is more flexible than the SCP700. It would be the YM2612+PSG that your are referring to as more flexible than the DSP (you could write a 68k FM driver and still be flexible). More flexible and yet more limited at the same time. It's not just realistic instruments. There are other synthetic created/sounding instruments the SPC unit can produce that the 2612 can not.sheath wrote:Koshiro's view of flexibility is referring to being able to write his own engine to make whatever sounds the MD could generate. The Z80, PSG YM2612 and DAC allowed composers of Genesis music to invent musical instruments. The Genesis was also capable of more simultaneous instruments than the SNES was capable of.
While the PSG is a nice complement for the FM chip, it's by no means a comparison addition for the 'VS DSP'. The PSG unit is pretty limited - 3 square tones with no changeable duty cycle and 1 limited noise channel. The channel's period system doesn't have a fine grade either. You're more than likely combining the two or three square channels to make a single 'instrument channel' or pairing the channels to a corresponding FM channel and thereby decreasing the number of channels. Like I said, it's nice addition for the Genesis but the 10 VS 8 thing is really misleading.
While I used to get really annoyed by the over use of the reverb on the SNES, it's still a nice option to have. The individual channels themselves are polyvoice in that respect.
Probably more to do with outputting samples themselves than mixing. Mixing multiple samples into a single DAC is easy. I think the samples played on the DAC were mostly drumkits because they are less forgiving for errors in sample playback and when played back at lower rate in general. Something more complex sounding would have shown signs of error artifacts and aliasing.Very few Genesis titles attempt to use simultaneous samples for musical instruments
Which critics are those? To be honest, I don't think 'arcade' FM was that great to begin with. Looks at CPS1, UN Squadron sounded much better on the SNES than the arcade. Even the Genesis music adaptations of the arcade versions sounded better (Vapor Trail, Mercs, etc) and that was on a 'lesser' FM chip. Matter of fact, a lot of CPS1 games had terrible sharp/thin/high frequency instruments - yuck.These critics also assume that sampled audio was intrinsically superior to FM sound for all purposes. Both Genesis and Arcade titles prove this assumption false.