Nick Adams Games Blog

Perhaps its something to do with games becoming more complicated and professional, but the sound test is a feature which has not weathered the progress of game development.

It was never something as practical as adjusting brightness, or screen resolution but it certainly had its own charm. I can’t think of any practical situation where a sound test would be required to solve a problem.

And yet, there was something incredibly liberating about playing any sound or theme from a video game at will. With an audience the sound test became a very valuable tool in providing some extra enjoyment from a game. Naturally, it lent itself to comical miming of badly sampled speech or perhaps some other sound effects for an impromptu performance inspired by the bunch of chimes, cracks, and bleeps.

For the more committed sound testers out there, it was entirely possible to make a drum loop out of explosions, impacts and other violent noises. This was something that I took immense pleasure in, and there was a live, almost acoustic quality in making these from just using a menu.

There’s also something to be said about the type of games which offered a sound test. The ones which I fondly remember are a pedigree of the hardcore games on my youth: Contra, Streetfighter, Castlevania, R-Type, etc.

As the quality of sound in games improved, the novelty of the sound test waned. Something as simple as laughing at a Mega Drive’s murky attempts at recreated sampled speech (even the groans of some poor enemy getting punched in the face) would be confined to the 16-bit consoles.

My most recent experience of playing with the sound test was with Super Smash Bros Melee. The sound test for this game was only offered as a reward for unlocking everything else in the game, and this was a welcome reward. The type of gamer who would complete the game inside out is probably someone who would appreciate having a wealth of Nintendo samples and music available to play with.

The novelty of a sound test will always be something I’ll appreciate. Its something which is not included in the new games on the market, but I will always have fond memories of playing about with random sounds for fun from the 16-bit era.