Ultima III Exodus - disable music?

[Ocelo]

Hello,

I have been a longtime fan of the Ultima Series on the Atari. Primarily Ultima III and Ultima IV. I recently setup my old Atari 130XE and fired up Ultima III and got tired of the constant music very quickly. The reference card for the game only lists "V" for "Volume" to disable the sounds in the game. How does one turn off just the music? I didn't see anything on the reference card. I seem to recall being able to disable the score during gameplay. Any ideas?

 

Thanks.

[_The Doctor__]

If I remember correctly, volume on, volume off , nothing in between

sure make me dig it up....

Edited June 22, 2018 by _The Doctor__

[pedalpowered]

I know this is an old thread, but I wanted to give the information requested and more, for all those who find this thread in the future.

 

Ctrl-S will turn on/off the music.

 

I wanted to note that if one plays Ultima III on an Atari 800 or 400 w/ 48KB upgrade, the music is output to your monitor/TV and the sound effects is output from the GTIA via the internal speaker. Since it was an Apple II port, they just kept the sound effects code nearly identical, just porting it to use the GTIA sound. This has the pleasant (to me) result of adding a proximity-based "stereo" effect between the sound effects and combat music versus the background music. I remember being shocked by the sound effects coming from underneath my hands the first time I replayed it on my 800, after only having played it on my Atari ST in the interim. To me this is the ultimate way to play, and more authentic to the original Apple II w/ Mockingboard version. Of course, on the XL/XE machines, the GTIA sound is output via the RF and monitor ports, and there is no internal speaker, so this effect is lost.

Edited March 13, 2020 by pedalpowered

[AtariAntic]

CTRL-S also works to turn the music off while on the intro scene.  When you'd hit CTRL-S again, the song that had been playing would start over from the beginning.   Though I liked the music and seldom turned it off.  Back in the day, it was astoundingly good, for a computer.

 

I played U3 for hours and hours on my original Atari 800 back when I was young (it was my favorite game) and I distinctly remember the combat sounds coming from the TV.  I'd play it late at night and would turn the TV volume way down so as to not disturb the parents.  I will agree they are definitely not your regular POKEY sounds.  I think it used POKEY's "volume only" mode to create the sounds the same way the Apple II would (by directly pulsing the output on/off)

 

Yet I saw another post in another forum someone saying the combat sounds on U3 come from the internal speaker on the Atari 800.  Very strange.

[AndyR]

You got... tired of the music?  (Edit: just realized this was a necro'd thread, so comment aimed generally and not at the OP) This game's soundtrack[1] is absolutely groundbreaking, it's one of, like, the top five or six most important defining moments in home computer audio.  I will occasionally boot the game and let the demo run behind me (it cycles between all the tracks) as background music.  Though I guess we should be grateful the Atari even has the music, Origin dropped it (!) for Ultima IV.

 

[1] FWIW: originally written and best expressed on a Mockingboard, though the Atari variant is pretty good translation.  Oddly despite the SID's capabilities, the C64 port is sort of a pingy mess.

Edited February 26, 2023 by AndyR
checked dates

[zzip]

22 hours ago, AndyR said:

You got... tired of the music?  (Edit: just realized this was a necro'd thread, so comment aimed generally and not at the OP) This game's soundtrack[1] is absolutely groundbreaking,

groundbreaking sure..   but still if you hear the same piece of music over and over and over you will want to pull your hair out after awhile.   

[_The Doctor__]

that's why they had multiple tunes that change, so you wouldn't just here the same song till you lose cohesion.

Listening to the radio or watching TV is kind of the same thing today. It's the same tired themes over and over, Dad's are silly stupid things, old pale guys are worse, ladies are smartest thing on planet, deviant / mutant are even better, only everything fluid creatures are supreme.

Music is very algorithmic using many of the same chords beats themes et al, only the lyrics seem to be changed but all seem to follow the same tired tropes as well now, what would be outlandish is the norm, in and attempt to be outrageous, since everything is doing it, is all the same as well.

Music and shows used to tell many varied stories and emotions, now on overload, neither happens or is accomplished.

 

Maybe an 'incidental' trigger of music would have helped in some instances for games, periods of silence until an event sets the music in motion. Then the music fades away until the next event or threshold is met to start the next one.

 

I would not do it to the first ports, but definitely on the enhanced or future elite versions of said Games/Programs.

Edited February 27, 2023 by _The Doctor__

[Ocelo]

Thank you for the answers on this! While I like the music, I mostly just want to hear the game sound effects. I'll give Ctrl-S a try!