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Writer's pictureandreahywong

Mega Man 2 - Password/Stage Select

Alright, so these two are pretty short loops lasting < 10 seconds. How fast can we do this?


Password Screen

Original Duration: ~8 seconds

Time Taken To Transcribe: 1 (Melody) + 1 (Harmony) + 3 (Bass-line) = #TTTT 5 minutes.


I couldn't really hear the last few notes in the bass-line - sounds like there's just 2 percussive hits? So they're currently just 2 eighth rests. ><"


So, I started with the melody and figured I could just swing some eighth notes for that rhythm. I did listen far enough because there are some very even triplets at the end of the phrase that I somehow ended incorrectly transcribing as 16th and 8th notes:


Initial swung eighth notes of Mega Man 2 - Password Select
Initial swung eighth notes of Mega Man 2 - Password Select

This became SO obvious when I started transcribing the bass-line. There are clearly groups of 3:

More obviously incorrect swung eighth notes of Mega Man 2 - Password Select
More obviously incorrect swung eighth notes of Mega Man 2 - Password Select

So I did what I could to copy-paste and re-transcribe some parts. During this process, it was very apparent that inputting notes using a MIDI keyboard for regular note durations is wayyyyy quicker.


I was also quickly reminded I have some register issues with my ears - not being able to easily hear what octave the note is. Turns out, the bass-line is an octave higher than I originally thought. Also: I was also incorrect with the notes at the end of bars 2 and 4. The first 2 notes of the triplet are the same, not sure why I thought the G# came in any early than the next down beat. Hmm, more to work on.


I'm starting to wonder if there's a limited range of pitches in #8bit as the voices are very "compressed" it registral range and sometimes overlap. So far, all of these transcriptions I've had 3 voices/channels excluding the percussion. But that's a post for next time!



Stage Select

Original Duration: ~6 seconds

Time Taken To Transcribe: #TTTT 5(?) minutes. I forgot to time myself for this. #whoops


This one was relatively simple. The top voices being delayed an eighth note part like in the Title Screen. I considered perhaps the notes should instead be 16th notes in common time. Perhaps I should've changed this to a 4/2 time signature. I'm not entirely sure which is better but this did the job for now. If I were to change it, it seems Musescore unfortunately does not have the feature to augment/diminish note values yet.



Finally getting to a character next time! :D

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