Oracle is a tracker styled music program created by Fuzzy Logic.
Hardware support:PSG, MSX-MUSIC, MSX-AUDIO, MoonSound (only FM)
Credits: Shadow (coding, graphics), Wolf (ideas)
First release: 1997
Most recent version: v1.20 (2007)
Introduction
The initial idea was simple, go hackin' yer MB player until it can play 2 individual MB tunes. If you do one tune, optimized for FM-Pac, and one optimized for Music Module, then you would have the ultimate situation. Proper mono and stereo playback. Shadow was like: 'yeah well, gimme a week, let me hack 'n freak, and call me back next weekend'. So far, so good. This was next week's situation: 'Yeah well, uhm, I ditched the MB player and initialized a complete new tracker in f-kernel'. That new tracker was of course Oracle.
This new music editor was released by Sunrise, but never got the standard it deserved to be. Well, partly that's our wrong: a descent driver was never released. The Oracle driver was to complex in loading music data that a non f-kernel version would never see light.
Oracle has some amazing features which would, for example, put MoonBlaster way behind. But MB has been around for a while and ppl got used to it. Further more it was said that Oracle was to 'technical', packed with too much great features it would loose vision. Well, vision was something Shadow had in mind coding his ass off on this piece! well, can't have it all...
In the end, tho Wolf delivered tons of ideas, he never used it :)
features: MSX music, MSX audio and PSG support, max 32. channels, max 64. steps, realtime amplifier (volume), FX like arpeggio, tremolo (volume mod), vibration (frq mod), wah-wah (cut-off mod), repetition, volume slides and all FX the other trackers got, pull-down-menu driven with key-shortcuts for every action, clever instrument libraries and block functions etc. etc. Just check and be amazed.
Manual
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
O R A C L E v1.10 (release B, 01/09/97). (c) Fuzzy Logic 1995-1997
+------------------------------------------------------------------+
Rock 'n 'Roll with Fuzzy Logic's magnificent music package ORACLE- a
terrific, not-to-be-missed utility from the Dutch company. It's
great value for money so low you can't even get drunk on!
ORACLE allows you to compose your own little ditties usin' a
variety of sound samples and instruments. To get you started there
are quite a few included on the disk and they can be altered to
your heart's content by including different special effects.
Any melody that you want to create can be done note by note using a
Step-Time-Editor. If you're a lucky, rather rich, MSX owner you can
even tap out your tunes on your OPL4! (18xFM only).
Some Info...
============
This disk contains all the necessary files to run your ORACLE on
your (or other?) MSX computers. It is possible to print songs, but
we've only included minor printing possibilities. If you make your
own work-disk, remember to format that disk to the DOS 2.xx format
to gain more advantages concerning disk-routines! (notice that
ORACLE is fully DOS 2 compatible!)
This version will probably be full of those nasty bugs (still) that
encountered this planet... So, please contact us to correct all the
crummy gurus.
The re-player:
Excuse me for not releasing the re-player YET! It's to complicated
to load a ORC file in memory without a Memory Management Unit. There
for I will code a simple load routine which can be altered to you
own BIOS/OS or whatever.
The best configuration for ORACLE is:
o A turbo R computer using the great R800
The Z80 version is a bit of a bummer coz' the replayer is using
many many effects and can replay atleast 32(!) channels at one
go!
o Atleast 256 kRam of memory.
Each pattern will request a block of bytes anywhere in the RAM.
So, the more memory, the more patterns you can get! (max.256)
o DOS 2.xx
No need telling this gives plenty advantages.
o A Harddisk is very recomendable! (it always is...)
How to get started:
===================
For detailed information about Oracle read the manual!
We've putted all text files at the on-board-help-desk. To reach the
info files just press:
[graph] + [H]
and you'll be at the HELP desk! (tataa!). Here are several files
(including a file for KEYS) which will provide you with necessary
information.
ORACLE is a new kind of music editor and is a little similar to
Moonblaster (the structure of songs I mean) But the editor it self
takes a lot of time and practice to understand. Not that it's a
difficult program but it's just that Oracle is very NEW compared to
other programs I could mention. The main functions are stored at
the Pull-Down-Menus which you can access by pressing [graph] in
combination with the FAT-characters in the Topics at the top of the
screen. (e.d [graph]+[F] for File menu [graph]+[I] for Instruments
etc.)
Disk window:
============
This window deserves special attention. At this window there are a
few keys to access all files:
[F1] Set path (can include: Drive, Path and file/dirmask)
[F2] Set filename (can include: Drive and filename(+ext))
[F3] Select Filetype
[F4] Set Disk options
To select a file you can either use the cursor keys or just type in
the name of the file and ORACLE will automatically search for the
first file that is similar to the "search" string. (this is a very
useful option!!)