Mega Anser Mystery

[skully111]

Hello, I am new to this forum but my question is related to the soundtrack of the Sega Mega Anser, a banking cartridge released in 1990 that was to be used with the Mega Drive. It flopped, and was never brought over to the west. However, one thing that I keep on getting attached to is the soundtrack. It is oddly complex and inspired for a simple banking cartridge from the early 1990's . One song from the soundtrack that gets to me is the Bank Menu music.

However, the composer goes uncredited. It is odd that an application/cartridge has a soundtrack like this.

It seems I'm not the only one to have searched for the composer, as I found another man named Zach Newcastle, who created an article for it here:
https://unwinnable.com/2018/05/09/ho...-lost-to-time/

I am just wondering if anyone on this forum notices any stylistic simularities to composers at the time? It's one thing I've been determined to look for.

[Jedi QuestMaster]

It'd help if you link the music: https://youtu.be/BcXIJACcr7o

[Nicolaas Hamman]

It sounds like it'll be someone no one knows how to contact, right? And probably someone who might be assigned to work on something like a banking cartridge. The top 3 I guess that come to my mind are:
Haruyo "LOTTY" Oguro (earliest work is 16t in 1991, so check that out for similarities to confirm if it's her, it was my first thought)
XOR (Spotlight in just 1990 and 1991, only known work of theirs with entirely original music is MegaMind which is very complex)
PSYCHEDELIC CHUNG (works where all the music would have been theirs are Ax Battler: A Legend of Golden Axe and Ikasuze! Koi no Doki Doki Penguin Land MD, they seem to prefer fast-paced music)
They're probably very bad guesses on my part, I'm OK with identifying consistent specific sounds, but with recurring composition I'm very bad. EDIT 2: Other guesses that popped into my head as obscure enough, but I dunno if there's any similar sound, are Sachio Ogawa, Keisuke Tsukahara, Chikako "TARNYA" Kamatani, Masafumi Ogata, maybe even Tokuhiko Uwabo? Basically just some people of the time you wouldn't be able to contact.
I do feel as if I've heard some music near-identical to that Mega Answer BGM before, but it could just be that I've heard so much today that I'm feeling like I've heard it all my life, haha. (EDIT 1: Apparently it was played on an episode of Pick N' Mix over on RadioSEGA, maybe I heard it then)
Maybe spotting the sound effects could help? Sometimes creators reuse sound effects across different games.

EDIT 3:
A big tell that XOR was involved with Mega Anser that my friend electricboogaloo pointed out is that there's a track from it that's reused from Alex Kidd in Shinobi World. Or was reused in Alex Kidd in Shinobi World, both products released the same year. Now my question is if there might be just the one sound creator or multiple.
Mega Anser - 02
Alex Kidd in Shinobi World - ROUND 4

[skully111]

Originally Posted by Jedi QuestMaster

It'd help if you link the music: https://youtu.be/BcXIJACcr7o

Apologies, no clue if linking the music was allowed.

[skully111]

Originally Posted by Nicolaas Hamman

It sounds like it'll be someone no one knows how to contact, right? And probably someone who might be assigned to work on something like a banking cartridge. The top 3 I guess that come to my mind are:
Haruyo "LOTTY" Oguro (earliest work is 16t in 1991, so check that out for similarities to confirm if it's her, it was my first thought)
XOR (Spotlight in just 1990 and 1991, only known work of theirs with entirely original music is MegaMind which is very complex)
PSYCHEDELIC CHUNG (works where all the music would have been theirs are Ax Battler: A Legend of Golden Axe and Ikasuze! Koi no Doki Doki Penguin Land MD, they seem to prefer fast-paced music)
They're probably very bad guesses on my part, I'm OK with identifying consistent specific sounds, but with recurring composition I'm very bad. EDIT 2: Other guesses that popped into my head as obscure enough, but I dunno if there's any similar sound, are Sachio Ogawa, Keisuke Tsukahara, Chikako "TARNYA" Kamatani, Masafumi Ogata, maybe even Tokuhiko Uwabo? Basically just some people of the time you wouldn't be able to contact.
I do feel as if I've heard some music near-identical to that Mega Answer BGM before, but it could just be that I've heard so much today that I'm feeling like I've heard it all my life, haha. (EDIT 1: Apparently it was played on an episode of Pick N' Mix over on RadioSEGA, maybe I heard it then)
Maybe spotting the sound effects could help? Sometimes creators reuse sound effects across different games.

EDIT 3:
A big tell that XOR was involved with Mega Anser that my friend electricboogaloo pointed out is that there's a track from it that's reused from Alex Kidd in Shinobi World. Or was reused in Alex Kidd in Shinobi World, both products released the same year. Now my question is if there might be just the one sound creator or multiple.
Mega Anser - 02
Alex Kidd in Shinobi World - ROUND 4

Thank you, this was really helpful. Super unfortunate that composers used sudonyms back then. Why was that?

[zierts]

Basically, it was companies positioning themselves in a relatively young industry and avoiding talent drains. Disgruntled employees would leave a video game developer to join its competitors or found their own company, or head hunters from other companies would seek competitors' staff out and convince them to switch employers. There were a few cases were this happened on a large scale, such as Irem -> Capcom, Nihon Falcom -> Quintet, Capcom <-> SNK, Capcom -> Square, Square -> Mistwalker if I'm not mistaken. There may be more prominent examples, these are only off the top of my head.

Now, how to avoid a rival company stealing your employees? Keep your staff members' names secret by forcing them to use pseudonyms in credits or by removing credits altogether. Some rival company would go: "Hey, that music in Zelda is great, let's get that guy/gal to join our company!" Then they'd beat the game and only find the pseudonym KONCHAN instead of Koji Kondo. No lead as to the name meant no means of contacting that person and making them an offer. Changing a single developer's pseudonym between games had the added benefit of making it even harder to track down the person responsible for a specific aspect of a game. If you can find a pseudonym in only one game, it's much harder to tell whether the person does consistently good work in their area.

This reason is often assumed to be just a rumor but I think some NES/SNES era have confirmed this to be the case. I'm not sure as to the source, but I think I've seen the Super Castlevania IV director say this in a RetroGamer magazine making-of, unless I'm mixing something up.

[MegaAnserComposer]

Hello!
I'm Japanese (sorry for my poor english).
I had been in SEGA as sound designer and composer about 30 years ago.

My name was "XOR" on game credit title in SEGA .
And I compose music of "Mega Answer" in SEGA.

I thank skully111 for your interest!
coincidentally, I found this forum and Zach Newcastle's article.

https://unwinnable.com/2018/05/09/ho...-lost-to-time/

2 weeks ago, I send mail to him. But no reply.
I hope he is alive.


In those days, I was interested in concept of erik satie's furniture music.
I had thought game music should be functional soundscape.

These are music I made at that time in SEGA.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFsm2siD7Ag
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CPlx-BgU6o

[Nicolaas Hamman]

A wild encounter! Thank you for appearing XOR! SEGA Game Library is also your work? I suppose then MEGA DRIVE 25th Anniversary Album Vol.1 is a rare CD appearance of your SEGA works.

[MegaAnserComposer]

I think my work is not in "MEGA DRIVE 25th Anniversary Album".
I did only sound works related to Mega Modem on MEGA DRIVE(16Bit) like these.

https://segaretro.org/Osaka_Ginkou_n...ervice_My_Line
https://segaretro.org/Sumisei_Home_Tanmatsu
https://segaretro.org/Naisu-kun_Mini


My Sega Master System(8bit) works are these.

https://soundcloud.com/vgmplanet/set...nobi-world-ost
https://soundcloud.com/user-21789425...-master-system

EDIT: I found SEGA Game Library BGM in "MEGA DRIVE 25th Anniversary Album".
EDIT2: I remembered the game programmer of SEGA Game Library was Mark Cerny.

[Nicolaas Hamman]

Interesting selection!
Many people have said Chikako "Tarnya" Kamatani worked on Danan: The Jungle Fighter because of there being a song which is also in Master System G-LOC (I think it's one of the only that wasn't in the GAME GEAR version).
Did you work on the game together, or was it maybe incorrect that Tarnya was involved?

[MegaAnserComposer]

Wow, I didn't know G-LOC Air Battle use same song in Danan !
Danan The Jungle Fighter was mostly developed by Sanritsu( I'm not sure about name of company), only sound part was developed by SEGA.
So, I guess Sanritsu has copyright of the game. and they could use same song in another game.
Chikako Kamatani was SEGA employee. She is my senpai.
We worked in same room, but didn't work same game together.

[Nicolaas Hamman]

Ah, I wonder then if the other music that's different in SMS G-LOC was also copied from other games. Thanks very much for the info. I hope some new fans will learn to love Danan, Alex Kidd and Mega Modem soundtracks.

[MegaAnserComposer]

Thank you for your kind words!
I still make a few music(not often).
My recent works are animation "KAIJU DECODE"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLkCURJeGQI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-OyNqwAnlI

[Nicolaas Hamman]

It sounds lovely, still an atmospheric soundscape, but of course not restricted to 8-bit or 16-bit sound.
Has KAIJU DECODE already come out? I guess you won't be credited as XOR in it, haha.

EDIT: Oh, CHz showed me the credit 音楽 : 井上 忠彦 on this video. Are you really Tadahiko Inoue? I love OLIO and RING OUT 4x4! (RING OUT's sound test was very kind to me)

[MegaAnserComposer]

Yes, i am.
Except some film festivals, "KAIJU DECODE" has not come out worldwide.
Only japanese version in TUBURAYA site.

You know OLIO ! I think these are very rare CD. Last song of OLIO1 is basically same as this.
And I forgot I did Ring Out 4X4.

[Nicolaas Hamman]

I was in shock when I saw your name in RING OUT 4X4. You've put me in shock many times recently, haha!
NightsB (who owns all OLIO CDs) also talked about that song from OLIO1 being similar, I couldn't believe it.

[NightsB]

Originally Posted by MegaAnserComposer

Yes, i am.
Except some film festivals, "KAIJU DECODE" has not come out worldwide.
Only japanese version in TUBURAYA site.

You know OLIO ! I think these are very rare CD. Last song of OLIO1 is basically same as this.
And I forgot I did Ring Out 4X4.

Hi Inoue-san,

I'm very happy to know that it was you who did Sega Game Toshokan. It's one of my favorite Mega Drive works, especially this song. I also love this song: https://youtu.be/ey2Qww0DRpw. Thank you very much for your compositions!

[CHz]

I really like the MegaMind soundtrack. I find the minimalist compositions beautiful, and the sound programming in "BGM 2" is also quite interesting. The influence of Satie's furniture music makes a lot of sense!

Thank you for sharing more information about your works

[Electricboogaloo]

Greetings Inoue-san,

Thank you for coming in and responding to us. One of my favorite compositons from 'Mega Anser' is the one referred to as "Data Transfer", such a beautiful and heartwarming composition that I listen to often!

I'm glad to hear you are still composing music and to see that other folks really do appreciate your work during your time at SEGA.

[MegaAnserComposer]

After I read Zach Newcastle's article,I thank his warm and kind eyes for unnoticed, uncared, unheared chiptune music.
And I really thank all of you!

[znewcastle]

Hi everyone, this is Zach Newcastle. I wrote the article in unwinnable about the Anser's soundtrack. I never thought a story I wrote 4 years ago would still be kicking up discussion. I'm glad to hear all of you love the soundtrack as much as I do! And thank you Inoue-san for sharing with us. I can't believe the mystery has been solved!

[marklincadet]

Thank you Zach and XOR for sharing about this previously unexplored part of SEGA music!

I have a question regarding Danan, Inoue-san: it was only released in Europe, where games run at a slower speed than in Japan. Did you write the music with the slower speed of European consoles in mind, or from the perspective of what the game would have sounded like if it was released in Japan?

[MegaAnserComposer]

I think that is NTSC/PAL problem. As you know, game(include its music) clock is related to scanning speed of TV. There are NTSC standard(USA, Japan) and PAL standard(Europe).
In Europe, PAL version Danan software was sold.
NTSC version software in NTSC country, PAL version software in PAL country, the music speed is same. So, game sound composer don't care about it. Just changing NTSC/PAL flag is enough.

[MegaAnserComposer]

To Nicolaas Hamman:
I found your tweets (and RadioSEGA), Thank you! I noticed my approval desire. I will make my SoundCloud page someday.

To CHz:
I found your page.
Your criticism is interesting and accurate!
I was suprised that you noticed time stretching phrase of this music. Same sequence of notes played by time length x1(sixteenth note), x2(eighth note), x4(quarter note) within one song.
I knew i was not good at making "video game music" like video game music. I was not so keen on fighting spirit uplifting VGM. I wanted to take randomness, asynchronization, melting pot like things in VGM.

[CHz]

I like minimalist and experimental music, so I enjoyed listening to you exploring those ideas in your music. Your Genesis soundtracks especially have an interesting feeling to them that set them apart from a lot of other music for the system. And other people here feel the same way!

A friend showed me the MegaMind soundtrack last year. After you mentioned you the wrote music for KAIJU DECODE, I showed him the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLkCURJeGQI. He said that, in a way, it still felt like MegaMind, which I agree with. In particular, the synth loop at 0:17 has a complex rhythm that reminded us of the rhythmic writing in MegaMind. It was fun to see an element of what you were exploring 30 years ago still present in your music today.

If you make a SoundCloud, I'll definitely look forward to listening to the music you post there

[Nicolaas Hamman]

Oh, RadioSEGA has been spotted! Thanks very much for that, as well as maybe making a Soundcloud page.

I didn't know CHz was on Cohost! He's much better at writing about music than me, but then again, I'm very young, with almost 2 years of experience. He's been doing it almost 20 years, haven't you? I remember a chronicle of Koichi Namiki's history that is very outdated.

[Nicolaas Hamman]

EDIT2: I remembered the game programmer of SEGA Game Library was Mark Cerny.

Marklincadet is keeping a very close eye on this thread then.
https://segaretro.org/Sega_Game_Toshokan

[Nicolaas Hamman]

Mr. Inoue, I hope it's not a bothersome question all of a sudden, but today I was reading through Hiroshi Kubota's history pages on his website, and saw your name mentioned for the 1998 SEGA New Year's Party.
http://jimita.com/profile/history1998.html#0107

It was also exciting to see mentions Kazuhiko Nagai, Chikako Kamatani, Sachio Ogawa, Keisuke Tsukahara, Masaru Setsumaru and Tatsuyuki Maeda (+ Yutaka Minobe, Taihei Sato and Shigeharu Isoda), but I was curious about the mention of 山本さん. I assumed it was Naomi Yamamoto, who you worked with on SEGA RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP. Can you remember anything about them?