Download Episode 33: Cygnus Destroyer’s Picks here!
Mike and Ed are huge fans of YouTuber Matt Ezero, also known as “Cygnus Destroyer” or “The LJN Defender.” He’s been creating amazing retro game reviews for the past few years, and he specializes in finding the good qualities in games that have been given a bad rap by other reviewers. In this episode, Matt joins the PTR guys and brings along his own music, too! We hope you enjoy this strictly retro episode of PixelTunes Radio!
Check out Matt’s awesome game reviews here
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The Tracklist:
1 – WWF Wrestlemania Challenge (NES) – Player 1 Theme – David Wise
2 – Bloody Wolf (TG16) – Stage 1 – Shogo Sakai, Yuji Suzuki, Yusuke Takahama
3 – Bubsy (SNES) – War of the Woolies – Matt Berardo
4 – Déjà vu (NES) – Peoria Streets – Hiroyuki Masuno
5 – The Bugs Bunny Birthday Blowout (NES) – World 4 – Hiroyuki Masuno
6 – Solstice (NES) – Title Theme – Tim Follin
7 – Incredible Crash Dummies (GB) – Roof Jump Theme – Matt Furniss, Arranged by Geoff & Tim Follin
8 – Terminator (Genesis) – Holocaust – Matt Furniss
9 – Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse (SNES) – Dark Forest – Mari Yamaguchi, Tatsuya Nishimura
10 – Treasure Land Adventure (Genesis) – Magical Moon Theme 1 – Katsuhiko Suzuki, Satoshi Murata
11 – Streets of Rage 2 (Genesis) – Alien Power – Yuzo Koshiro
12 – Bucky O’Hare (NES) – Ending Theme 1 – Tomoko Sumiyama
PixelTunes Radio VGM Podcast 
Hey guys, really liked the episode. I’m going to have to check out more of the LJN Defender’s stuff; I like his positivity. I just listened to this episode today(2-12-16), and a few weeks ago The VGM Jukebox did an episode called “Over the Rainbow” where listeners, by chance, wrote in consecutively to talk about games they hated as a child that happened to be made by LJN.
A note about the YM2612: I originally thought as Ed did, that the Genesis also had a PSG chip and it was included for SMS compatibility of some sort. It’s not true. The family of Yamaha FM chips that the 2612 belongs to(commonly called “OPNx”, where “x” denotes the model) largely included PSG capabilities. Bryan from Pixelated Audio set me straight on that one. If you look at the PC-88 and 98, they both use different iterations of the OPN chip, have no real connection to 8-bit PSG-based chipsets, but both include PSG capabilities.
The Genesis also uses it quite a bit more than you indicated on the show. I found it ironic that you mentioned how impressive it was that McDonald’s Treasure Land used it in conjunction with the FM, and how rare that was, and then immediately played a Streets of Rage 2 track, which used the heck out of the PSG chip. In fact, All of Koshiro’s Genesis music uses a lot of PSG. I’m just sayin’.
…..and I’m a liar. I did a bit of further research and found out about the TI SN76489 chip, which is exactly what Ed said it was. But there are a lot of Genesis games that use it.
Admittedly yes, we did underestimate the usage of PSG in many Genesis games. Some used it heavily, and others only for percussive sounds. Some didn’t use it at all. In any case, it was a great addition to the Mega Drive/ Genesis sound hardware and most of the amazing soundtracks on that system wouldn’t have sounded nearly as good as they did without it.