It’s The Hardware That Got Small

After divesting myself of my Atari 2600, the next console in my life was the NES. Eight bits of joyous and unstoppably cruel gaming. That was almost twenty years ago and five years into the system's release date. And yet, new developments for the console are sprouting up more than ever. This retro-innovation is abetted by the growing chiptunes scene. Here's a couple of chiptune-related NES projects:

Neil Baldwin, a composer for NES games during the system's downward trajectory in the 90s, is actively working on the NTRQ, a tracker (sequencer) that runs on the NES. This is, potentially, a chiptune instrument which runs on the native hardware (it currently only exists in code/ROM form.) It may not be as expansive as the sequencers for PCs, it is fully-functional and even controlled via D-pad. Tracks are saved on an internal battery, like a Legend of Zelda save game. Below is a video of Baldwin playing 'live' with a loaded backing song. You can read all about the UI here.

Brief Aside: I am miserable at rhythm games. Have you ever watched someone practiced play Guitar Hero? How impressively flawless it looks? That is as good as I am bad. I flail at the thing like it's an electric eel. I lose all hand, eye and ear coordination. Plainly, I suck. That being said, I'm still excited over Kent Hansen and Andreas Pedersen's NES ROM-based D-Pad Hero. Using button, arrow and simultaneous button-arrow combinations, you thumb out one of the six included hit songs tolerably translated to the medium. The cover of Daft Punk's “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” is especially good.