Castlevania Dungeon Forums

Off Topic => Off Topic => Topic started by: OmegaDL50 on October 15, 2010, 02:15:15 PM

Title: Castlevania III and the VRC6 Mapper that was used in Famicom version.
Post by: OmegaDL50 on October 15, 2010, 02:15:15 PM

Have there ever been any US released NES games that ever took advantage of the VRC6? Or was this something that was exclusive to the Famicom hardware that was not present in the NES (which is sort of misnomer since both consoles are technically the same)

To those unfamiliar with what I'm talking about the VRC6 was a special Mapper present in very few games that offered 2 extra audio channels in the form of some extra drum channels over the standard 6 audio channels for a total 8.

the Japanese release of Castlevania III was one of the few games that took advantage of the VRC6 and the extra sound channels for overall improved sound quality for it's music.

Castlevania 3 Japanese Famicom Version (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SJaF8no9t0#) - Japanese Akumajou Densetsu (Demon Castle Legend)
Castlevania 3 American NES Version (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGXEPt852IY#) - American Castlevania III - Dracula's Curse

You can hear the audio differences in the videos.

Title: Re: Castlevania III and the VRC6 Mapper that was used in Famicom version.
Post by: Juno106 on October 15, 2010, 04:09:48 PM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_Management_Controller (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_Management_Controller)

Title: Re: Castlevania III and the VRC6 Mapper that was used in Famicom version.
Post by: Richter on October 31, 2010, 07:44:41 AM

Quote

  The VRC6 (Virtual Rom Controller) was an advanced MMC chip from Konami, supporting bank switching for both program code and graphics as well as a scanline-based IRQ counter. The chip also contained support for 3 extra sound channels (two square waves and one sawtooth wave). It was used in Akumajou Densetsu (the Japanese version of Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse), while the western version used the MMC5 from Nintendo. Since the NES, unlike the Famicom, did not allow cartridges to add additional sound channels, the soundtrack on the western versions could only access the original five sound channels built into the NES.

Hey that is interesting. Strange they would have alternate versions just for a couple of extra channels. I'm digging this Famicon version of the Dracula's Curse act 1  ;D

Title: Re: Castlevania III and the VRC6 Mapper that was used in Famicom version.
Post by: Gunlord on October 31, 2010, 06:16:29 PM

How come the NES was worse? T_T

Title: Re: Castlevania III and the VRC6 Mapper that was used in Famicom version.
Post by: X on October 31, 2010, 10:17:36 PM

Cause america was CHEAP! It was also the same with the cartrage interface connector. While the famicom was flawless with it's start-ups, the NES suffered from issues that would crop up when ever the power button was pushed in. Sometimes the game screen would come up with no problems what-so-ever, other times we'd be fighting with the damn button until the game screen came on. The only way I found to eleviate that problem was to always hook up the game genie. The problem was eventually fixed when the NES was re-released looking kinda like the SNES in design.

-X