Doom 64's soundtrack is 3 hours and 25 minutes long

[MeetyourUnmaker]

How were they able to put so much music on a normal N64 catridge? A few of the songs are over 15 minutes in length and most are over 5 minutes. Compare it to other N64 soundtracks where the music usually consists of 1-2 minute long loops.

[Gez]

It's the miracle of MIDI.

 

If you just listen to all the samples one after each other, you'll probably get less than five minutes of audio.

[Nevander]

That's why I love MIDIs. Tiny file size for tons of playtime. You could have a 20 minute MIDI and it would still be less than 500 KB.

[40oz]

 

please excuse my naivety but I don't recall hearing any recognizable instruments across many of the tracks. I suppose it uses its own instrument set but almost all of the tracks sound pretty distinct from one another.

 

not trying to refute any points here, I just don't know and would like hear someone explain further.

[Deleted_Account]

I am sure Aubrey Hodges will gladly answer the question next time he stops by this forum. The Doom 64 20th Anniversary Extended Edition Soundtrack should be released pretty soon.

[Gez]

Doom64 EX's wadgen tool converts Doom 64's samples into a soundfont and the sound effects and music into MIDI files. Aubrey Hodges said he could export raw MIDI and raw samples.

 

 

So basically, Doom 64 doesn't use MIDI directly, but it uses something that works in the same way (to the point that you can easily find SSEQ <--> MIDI converters), and Doom64 EX does use MIDI directly.

[Koko Ricky]

Yeah I think it was kinda like using a sampler to create a MIDI-like music piece. Really saves on space. I think it was an interesting restriction because a lot of creativity came out of it.