Why do certain events in the original Super Mario Bros. cause the music to distort?
In the original Super Mario Bros. NES game from 1985, certain short-term events, and the sounds associated with them, often seem to cause fluctuations and distortions in whatever background music is playing at the time. For example, when one picks up a coin at the same time as a note in the background music begins, the note often modulates to a different pitch or is absent altogether after the coin pickup sound ends. Jumping on or defeating an enemy also often produces distortions in the music. Why is this? Is there an explanation related to the sound or hardware limitations of the NES console?
(Admittedly this question may be misguided, as my NES broke several years ago and I've only been playing the Wii Virtual Console version of Super Mario Bros. ever since. But I do seem to recall the glitch happening on the original game, and it's not like they couldn't remove these distortions in the modern version if they wanted to.)
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Community members were able to track down contemporaneous pictures of famed Nintendo composer Koji Kondo sitting in a studio with a Kawai K1 synthesizer, which turned out to be the source of many iconic samples from Super Mario World.What synth was used for Mario?
Of the six tracks of the Super Mario Bros. soundtrack, this theme took the most time to develop, according to its composer Koji Kondo. He stated that he would write one piece, and the team would put it in the game.Does Music Change the Feel of a Video Game? Super Mario Bros. NES
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