Lost Classics: MTV Music Generator (PS1)

Little known fact to everyone who dreamed about being a producer: you don’t need hundreds of dollars worth of studio equipment to make hits. All you need is a Playstation, a little patience, and some skill. This week’s lost classic is one of my favorite games that isn’t really a game. Probably one of the earliest and most thorough music composition tools available on a video gaming system, Codemaster’s MTV Music Generator allows you to make some nice compositions. You simply pick a few of the hundreds of sound samples included, lay them down on the track, adjust the pitch, length, and timing, and there you go. You can even sample tunes off a compact disc, although it takes up a lot of memory. After you are done, you can add a light show to go along with your music. Just take some time to learn the ins and outs of this disc, and you can crank out some nice tunes in minutes. It was way ahead of its time, and its only limitation is the Playstation 1 itself. As stated before, sampling off a cd can easily take up a lot of space on a memory card, and there is no way of exporting an MP3 of your music (which is strange, as the manual states that you are granted royalty-free commercial releases of your creations). Also the collection is geared more toward techno and R&B, so users interested in making hip-hop tunes will have to improvise a little. Even so, this is a nice start for aspiring producers who don’t have a lot of money to spend on expensive equipment. There are two sequels that have been released, and there are several other games (such as the recently released Traxxpad for PSP) that expand on the functionality offered here. With a little more work and functionality on future products (such as say, an MP3 exporter), it could be possible for our Playstations and Xboxes to become vital equipment for up and coming musicians and producers.