MegaRace 2 (1996) [FLAC/MP3]

Hello, FFShrine community!

I’ve shared a few isolated files previously, on other people’s threads, but this is my first big upload: the music from 1996’s MegaRace 2, the FMV racing game by Cryo Interactive that, of course, features Christian Erickson as annoying Virtual Reality presenter Lance Boyle! From what I can gather, the music has never been uploaded on this site before, and there has been only one (unsuccessful) request for it. I suppose it’s not very popular, but in my opinion, it’s some damn good stuff: catchy and energetic. Hopefully you’ll agree! My favorite theme is the Tibet one.

The tracklist:

01. Intro and Credits (1:51)
02. Foundry (2:44)
03. Tibet (2:45)
04. Extraterrestrial (2:27)
05. Moonbase 9 (3:38)
06. Bayou (3:25)
07. Bronx (2:45)
08. Wait #1 (Track Loading) (1:27)
09. Wait #2 (Game Installing) (1:51)

The technical stuff:

The game includes the racing music (tracks 02-07) in WAV format, in both 8 and 16 bits mono, in a modular approach: every theme is split into brief, numbered sections, just a few seconds long. These are played seamlessly during gameplay, in a specific order, before starting all over again. It was a bit tedious, but I took the 16 bit files for every track, and pasted them together in the right order, using in-game recorded audio as a reference. It’s worth pointing out that while online stores GOG and Zoom Platform –which offer the game these days– do provide the music as downloadable bonus content, whoever put that content together took the track sections of each theme and pasted them one after the other, in numerical order, and only once, whereas the game doesn’t always follow numerical order when introducing each section, and of course, each section is played several times, in different places. So I hope this album will serve as an improved (hopefully ideal) presentation for the soundtrack. Each theme is allowed to play in its entirety before looping and fading out. Beyond that, there has been no tampering whatsoever: it’s in mono, straight from the game. (I don’t have any advanced music editing skills, anyway.)

I forgot to mention: from the folder names in the game, it’s fairly obvious the Moonbase 9 theme was originally intended for the Bronx race, and the Bronx theme for the Moonbase 9 race. However, it’s not clear if they were switched by mistake or intentionally. Therefore, this album follows the game, and the Moonbase 9 track features the Bronx-sounding music, while the Bronx track features the Moonbase-sounding music.

The "Wait" themes, heard while the game is being loaded or installed (tracks 08-09), are also included. Each has been edited to play two consecutive times, and the ending slightly adjusted to be less abrupt.

Also included is a "suite" with the intro and credits themes (track 01), taken from composer Eric Los’ website. They are fused together one after the other, whereas in the game they are separate, but using the "suite" was a no-brainer, since it’s in much higher quality, albeit lossy.

The music is offered in 16-bit FLAC, at its natural 22 KHz sample rate (except for track 01, at 44 KHz). For a smaller size alternative, it’s also offered in MP3 at 192 kbps/44 KHz (once again, track 01 is the exception, with a bitrate of 128 kbps). In this case, there isn’t that much difference between FLAC and MP3 in terms of file size, but the choice is yours. [The MP3 128 kbps version that was formerly uploaded has been removed for low quality].

Oh, and I put together the cover art you see above (hope you like it). It’s included in higher res in the download.

The links:

FLAC:
https://mega.nz/#!RpkjwRTT!5qugPEKuMuxruZTAUdQwo1QHfrcJJEkObxcB2A_jBQY

MP3 192 kbps:
https://mega.nz/#!lkUTgJSR!tWF-_1aBxTbU3Zv1AuVDsNSMSfn1mJY_wYYdXWzd5Co

That’s about it. I welcome your feedback. Please let me know if I screwed something up, and I’ll try to fix it.