David O'Riva (NES Driver)

David O'Riva (NES Driver)

Programmers David O'Riva Language 6502 Assembly Formats Unknown (ASM?)

David O'Riva is an unofficial name of the sound driver for the Nintendo Entertainment System invented, designed and programmed by David O'Riva, initially for Tengen and later at his start-up company Bitmasters with his partner Franz Lanzinger.

It is unknown what David did to create the music, but it is assumed to be written either in assembly, Music Macro Language or MIDI files, which was implemented into his sound driver.

Release History

The first game to use the driver was Klax, which is most likely meant that David O'Riva was programming the driver, while he was at Tengen. Most of the games were from their company Bitmasters. Most of these were North American-exclusive games. Klax is the only game in Japan to use the driver, while Rampart was released in Europe. Most of these are unlicensed games, although Rampart and Championship Pool are the only two licensed games to use the driver. The last game to use this sound driver is Championship Pool. The unreleased Hard Drivin', developed by UK-based Domark also used the driver.

Output

The driver outputs to the RP2A03 for North American/Japanese releases of games and the RP2A07 on European/Australian releases. In some cases, the DPCM channel was used, for games like Klax and Rampart.

Games

Released	Title	Sample
1990-??-??	Klax (NES) (クラックス)
1990-??-??	Krazy Kreatures (NES)
1990-??-??	Ms. Pac-Man: Tengen (NES)
1992-01-??	Rampart: Jaleco (NES)
1993-10-??	Championship Pool (NES)
Unreleased	Hard Drivin' (NES)

Technical

Frequency Registers

C-7 = 1B
B-6 = 1C
A#6 = 1E
A-6 = 20
G#6 = 22
G-6 = 24
F#6 = 26
F-6 = 28
E-6 = 2A
D#6 = 2D
D-6 = 30
C#6 = 32
C-6 = 35
B-5 = 39
A#5 = 3C
A-5 = 40
G#5 = 43
G-5 = 47
F#5 = 4C
F-5 = 50
E-5 = 55
D#5 = 5A
D-5 = 5F
C#5 = 65
C-5 = 6B
B-4 = 71
A#4 = 78
A-4 = 7F
G#4 = 87
G-4 = 8F
F#4 = 97
F-4 = A0
E-4 = AA
D#4 = B4
D-4 = BE
C#4 = CA
C-4 = D6
B-3 = E2
A#3 = F0
A-3 = FE
G#3 = 10D
G-3 = 11D
F#3 = 12E
F-3 = 140
E-3 = 153
D#3 = 168
D-3 = 17D
C#3 = 194
C-3 = 1AC
B-2 = 1C5
A#2 = 1E0
A-2 = 1FC
G#2 = 21B
G-2 = 23B
F#2 = 25D
F-2 = 281
E-2 = 2A7
D#2 = 2CF
D-2 = 2FA
C#2 = 327
C-2 = 357
B-1 = 38A
A#1 = 3C0
A-1 = 3F9
G#1 = 435
G-1 = 475
F#1 = 4B9
F-1 = 501
E-1 = 54D
D#1 = 59E
D-1 = 5F4
C#1 = 64E
C-1 = 6AE
B-0 = 714
A#0 = 780
A-0 = 7F6

Addresses

Championship Pool: $1B6B7-$1B74E
Hard Drivin': $0B65-$0BFC
Klax: $A32E-$A3C5 (U) $A31E-$A3B5
Krazy Kreatures: $0010-$00A1
Ms. Pac-Man: $74BE-$754F
Rampart: $446B-$4502