Junichi Ueda

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Junichi Ueda
NoPhoto.png
Local 上田 順一 (うえだ じゅんいち)
Born 1970-12-30
Birth Place Unknown
Nationality Japanese   Japan.svg
Aliases J. Ueda

Junichi Ueda is a Japanese composer and sound designer. He started off working for Home Data, his first job there being the difficult task of converting the Marble Madness arcade music as closely as possible on the PC-9801 and Sharp X68000. Most of his works credit him for music arrangement, and it's possible that's all he did. It also appears that during his time at Home Data, he was usually assigned to platforms that used FM synthesis. Around 1991, he left Home Data and started doing music for Thinking Rabbit and Sunsoft as both a composer and arranger during their 16-bit era. It appears he left the game industry in 1993.

While Ueda is no longer in the game industry, he continues to arrange music for the Sharp X68000 using MDX. His arrangements have been acclaimed in Japan by video game music fans, and can be heard on his Nicovideo page.

Music Development

Genesis

For Chiki Chiki Boys, Ueda used Kazuo Okabayashi's sound driver from Dragnet. For Superman, he used Sunsoft's custom sound driver.

For Home Data's games Shougi no Hoshi and Dragon's Eye Plus: Shanghai III, he used the Z80 and 68000 versions of Sega's SMPS music software, respectively. Music was most likely entered in assembly on a PC-9801, according to Sega staff.

X68

Junichi said this about working on the X68000 version of Marble Madness:

“
My name is Junichi Ueda, and I was in charge of the music for Marble Madness.

This was my first work for Home Data on the X68000.

I was determined to make it good! I was really looking forward to it.

But I remember how disappointed I was when I actually heard the music.


It's so hard!　These songs are so elusive.

The tones made me think, "How did this sound come from an FM sound source?

Fortunately, the original songs did not exceed the 8 parts of the OPM, so it was easy for me.

However, it was still a difficult task.


Here are some of the difficulties I had with Marble Madness.

First of all, for the BGM on the first stage, I had to mix simple rhythms that were synchronized to the tape.

It was hard to grasp the rhythm of the music.

In addition, the BGM on the third stage and the BGM on the sixth stage...

There are sound effects in the songs!

These sound effects really annoyed me.


I was in charge of not only the background music but also the sound effects, and there were some sounds that made me wonder if they could really be produced by FM sound sources.

(For example, the sound of hitting the fence, the real sound is more like hitting the fence. I really struggled. It was a real challenge.


This is how the background music and sound effects for Marble Madness were completed.

To put it bluntly, this is the limit of the tape recorded from the board, right?

At any rate, it's finished! (crackle, crackle)

I'll see you again in the next installment.
„

Indeed, the Sharp X68000 and Marble Madness (ARC) both utilized a YM2151 (OPM) chip. Also, the arcade version was the first video game to use the chip.

The game's sound driver was outsourced to Bandit Inc. The game uses the 2.00 version of MUDRV programmed by Yoshihiko Kurata, and it was modified by Home Data employee Ariko Kagamino.

SNES

Ueda used Yoshikazu Yao's variant of Nintendo's Kankichi-kun sound software.

Gameography

Released Title Sample Notes
1991-03-15 Marble Madness (X68) (マーブルマドネス) Arranged the music of Hal Canon and Brad Fuller.
1991-03-30 Marble Madness (PC98) (マーブル・マッドネス) Arranged the music of Hal Canon and Brad Fuller.
1991-04-12 Toshi Tensou Keikaku: Eternal City (PCE) (都市転送計画 エターナルシティ)
1991-10-31 Shougi no Hoshi (SMD) (将棋の星)
Music Program
Arranged Novko Hasebe's music.
Arranged opening theme of Kyojin no Hoshi, Yukeyuke Hiyuuma.
1991-11-02 Dragon's Eye Plus: Shanghai III (SMD) (ドラゴンズアイ プラス 上海Ⅲ)
Music Program
(Arranged Yoshihiko Atarashi's music.)
1992-10-11 Alaskan Malamute G.C. (PC98) (アラスカンマラミュートG.C.) Composer?/Arranger?
1992-10-16 Chiki Chiki Boys (GEN) (チキチキボーイズ) Sound Arrange
1992-12-?? Superman (GEN) With Kenji Yamazaki and Hiroshi Tsukamoto.
1993-01-29 Super Soukoban (SFC) (スーパー倉庫番) Arranged Akira Suda's music with Kineo Inoue and Masahiro Kataoka.
1993-05-26 Superman: The Man of Steel (GG) Music arranged by Jason Page.
1993-05-26 Superman: The Man of Steel (SMS) Music arranged by Jason Page.

Links

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