Best Might and Magic

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The Sound Canvas version does sound great and I would love to play it with that. The problem is: I don't own one (and don't really want to spend money on it), I use Win 7 and the soundfont I found that was based on the Sound Canvas had the telephone ring as well. So that leaves me with either the SoundBlaster or the MT32. You're going to hate me for this: I still prefer the SoundBlaster. Not by much. But even though some of the instruments sound rather cheap in the SB version, it has much more warmth to its sound and I like that. The MT version just sounds so... cold and analytical. Difficult to describe, but in this case the blips and blops sound much more charming. Some of the Darkside stuff sounded better, though, so I might switch it at some point.
I do think that the Roland thingies generally are an enormous improvement and some of the stuff on Jaesun's YT channel sounds fantastic. The intro music of Pagan really impressed me. It's just such a shame that versions that work don't really meet my strange expectations and the ones that I do like don't work for various reasons.

Oh, and a short question: Should I finish the CoX part of the game first and then switch over to DoX? Or can I mix it up a bit without having to worry about balancing issues?

Depends what you do in DoX. If you go into towns and do some pretty easy puzzle quests you can get fairly unbalanced amounts of exp. Personally, I generally stuck to CoX, but went around DoX every once in a while for something a bit different.

Okay, that was pretty much what I had in mind.

Go to Darkside after killing Xeen/before trying the Dragon Cave.

here are some World of Xeen sound/music tests between different soundcards so you can compare.

Don't know if this has been mentioned elsewhere, but all of the Might and Magic games (and HoMM) are 50% off this weekend on GoG. So, the first 6 games for $5.

I got mine for $90, and that was because it was an mkII. The regular SC-55 goes for around $50, which is the price of one game. Just keep that in mind if you change your mind.

Regarding the soundfont, as I said there is no such thing as a Sound Canvas soundfont. Those that claim to be are lying. It's why I find the SC to be an essential component of my retro gaming, even moreso than the MT-32: it can't be emulated in ANY way. You could argue (well, Jaesun does ) that Munt doesn't sound as good as a real MT-32, but at least it's somewhat comparable. And if you're on Win7 then Virtual SC won't work (believe me, I tried!). And... well, I don't hate you, but personal preference is what it is I guess. After hearing Roland sounds I can never go back to any OPL music unless the game doesn't support anything else. But in general I don't like the Cloudside music that much anyway. Darkside is awesome though.

Preferably don't mix and match. You can leave the entire NE part of Cloudside (with lava and everything) for later on, but preferably finish everything else, and definitely deal with Xeen. It also makes more sense storywise.

What's with this obsession about MM music? I heard two seconds of the MM3 music before I couldn't stand it anymore and turned it off.

But you didn't hear it through a CM-32L!!

Yes, that was much more comfortable. The default music in MM3 is like hearing a tone deaf 3 year old going berserk on a xylofone.
Still, I prefer to turn music off in games as long as there are sound effects. And for old game with no sound at all I instead listen to some "real" music.

It's awesome?

I mean didn't you hear that sweet wilderness theme I posted? Or the atmospheric as hell dungeon themes? Are you going to make me go back and record even more themes to be convinced?

And let's not even go into MM6-8 music...

(I do put my own music for games that have none, and will turn off music entirely if it sucks, but then very few good games have sucky music, and with sucky games with sucky music you'd want to skip them anyway so that's not an issue)

How're those buggy vibrato and noise floor working for you?

(do you even hear either?

Here's a post I made a while back that'll make your game sound almost exactly like that video Jaesun linked.

Basically, if you refuse to spend money on the hardware then this is your best bet for a lot of old games, especially old Sierra adventure games.

The only way you'll ever shut me up about this is by getting an SC-8850 before I do

I'm not sure. There's definitely something odd about the CMs in general compared to the MT-32 in some games. In fact I suspect it's there in the CM-32L even; there are some... REALLY ANNOYING distortions with the CM-32L Rise of the Dragon intro music that are not there in the MT-32 rev0 recording that some guy made on youtube. The kind of REALLY ANNOYING that you only hear after you do sound comparisons and can then NEVER UNHEAR AGAIN
(so my advice: don't do it)

All music and (non-speech) sound effects for both 4 and 5 are specifically Sound Canvas, of that I'm certain. But I don't think any of the buggy stuff shows in SC mode with the CM-500, only in MT-32 mode. You could try to see how the main menu music for WOX/Darkside sounds with the CM-500 and compare to the one I uploaded. Hell with a CM-500 you could probably do it for both modes. Let me know if there's a specific tune you want to record.

Also, in case you hear anything different: be advised that I do not record a MIDI file in DOSBox like you do, I record the sound from the line-in DIRECTLY as it's playing in-game. Shouldn't make any difference, but just something to keep in mind.

Munt HAS improved tremendously in the past couple of years, I'll give it that. It sounds mostly like the real thing most of the time to me. No such luck if you're going for 1992-1996 games, most of which relied on the Sound Canvas instead. Judging by the complete lack of interest anyone has in emulating the SC like they did for Munt that's probably never gonna change either.

I've been using the mt32emu-qt branch for a while and it's pretty great. You can switch between ROMs through a menu, which is super convenient, and it displays the LCD text (*INSERT BUCKAZOID*, etc.). It's never going to sound exactly like the original hardware, though.

i still hum the MM3 town music when im thinking deep, so i guess growing up listening to it through a lowly Sound Blaster and not some overpriced sound machine wasnt so bad after all.

Darkside Of Xeen music is awesome. Especially the intro and the blacksmith theme. I like staying there for a while just to listen to the music.

I've been making making progress lately. Bought a castle and could build a dungeon, but I need the king's permit. Whenever I talk to him, he wants me to bring him the sixth mirror. I guess I'll have to find that stupid mirror then.
My problem right now is: My cleric is now 36 at level 14, through some jew magery by a bunch of spirits in Winterkill and presumably that damn Sphinx. How do I reverse this? I've read something about a fountain of youth in Darkside, but surely there must be a way to do it in Clouds. I'm starting to meet more enemies that can age my party and if curing it includes a lenghty quest, I'd rather start now.

Yes. Yes it is.

Or you missed something in the castle...

There's an outdoors sidequest that allows you to do this. Explore thoroughly.

In mine or the king's? I hope it doesn't have to do with the dragon.

Fuck. I was just about to do the last part of that quest anyway. I've just finished it because I was passing by and now feel pretty stupid.

Edit: Nevermind. I now have my very own dungeon and seem to be getting to the endgame of Clouds.

Yep, if you've got your dungeon then you're entering the final stages. There's the golem dungeon that you probably haven't done and that is optional if you got enough medgacredits from the others.

well you could visit the Tomb of Thousand Terrors too, for more megacredits, but i think you'll need only 5 of them to finish the castle dungeons and get the blade, which you should be able to find in the golem dungeon or the tomb.

My guys are around lvl 30 in MM3 now. I'm getting a bit tired of the popamole combat (if you hit the S key twice quickly you get two missile attacks), though.
The only enemy that has caused serious trouble was a minotaur; nothing worked against him.
I miss those epic, nail biting fights from MM2.

One thing that bugs me a bit is that many actions take a day to resolve, like any action in a Temple takes one day, and activating some wells take a whole day.
I usually set my self a goal of completing a game as fast as possible in-game time, but I was rather annoyed when I discovered that going to a temple to heal would take 8 days when I could have gotten the same effect - for free - by resting for 8 hours.

This game really requires meticilous note keeping. First time I played I missed out on how to de-activate the force field in the Cathedral of Carnage, and I never found the Fountain of Youth on the island in Piranha Bay.


I was wondering two things:

1. The Wishing Well - a red herring?

2. The illusionary chests on the Isles of Illusion: do they ever turn real? I though they would do so on da 50, 60 or 99, but no luck.