Where Does RBI Baseball's Music Come From?

[@tomabbott9653]

I spent a long time playing these games as well. One cool story, one time I was playing Ninteno RBI Baseball while listening to Ernie Harwell call a Detroit Tiger game. I hit a homerun during my game while a homerun was hit in the real Tiger game at the same time. So I litrally had Ernie Harwell calling a homerun while my computer ball was sailing past the computer wall. "It's LOOONNGG GONE!" I was going around trying to tell everyone, but no one really had the same excitement over what had just happened. LOL!

[@baseballreplayjournal]

That's awesome!

[@mikematson6323]

RBI Baseball has one of those tunes that, even without hearing it, can get stuck in your head.. Just randomly remembering the game, the music pops into my head and it's there for the day..

[@USDefenseHawk]

When I played APBA Baseball for Windows, I always enjoyed listening to the national anthem that the software played before the start of the game. The style of the organ music was very similar to that of Fenway Park organist John Kiley. It's been a while but, if I recall correctly, "O Canada" was played for games in Montréal and Toronto. The screen interface was also quite appealing, with the position players' name (and any baserunners) displayed quite nicely superimposed on the backdrop of beautiful photos of the ballpark of the home team. (This can be done with Diamond Mind Baseball, too, but it's up to the user to upload the photos, get the player's names placed correctly, etc. With APBA BBW, that wasn't necessary.)

[@Doommaster1994]

My favorite NES baseball soundtrack is Bases Loaded 3 and 4 (both have the same music). RBI Baseball 1 was composed by Norio Nakagata, who also did the great tunes in Burai Fighter as well as Zombie Nation.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

Thank you!

[@Doommaster1994]

@@baseballreplayjournal No worries. Though RBI Baseball doesn't credit a composer in particular, I got verification from Nakagata himself after seeing several Japanese sources list him as the composer.

[@mitchelvalentino1569]

@Baseball Replay Journal Maybe I missed something obvious, but aren’t these songs all just variations of the ‘Dash Keio’ cheering theme from Japan?

[@baseballreplayjournal]

Wow, you're right... just listened to this: kzbin.info/www/bejne/b4G4n5x9rs2Vm6M

[@mitchelvalentino1569]

@@baseballreplayjournal yep. It’s a catchy song, and those old NES games are great!

[@skeletonhaver]

You covered the similarity between this tune and the one in Jaleco's Bases Loaded, but it gets deeper yet. There is also a 1984 Taito arcade game called Victorious Nine that uses this same tune, but which is even closer to the one in Family Stadium/RBI Baseball. I can't seem to find any clean rips of the arcade version of the music, but the PC-88 port's music is on KZbin if you wish to hear the similarity. Given that there are three Japanese-developed baseball games from around the same time period all using this tune, I would guess that it's got to be more than coincidence, but I don't quite have the knowledge to shine any more light on it than that.

[@baseballreplayjournal]

I'll have to fire up Mame and give Victorious Nine a try. I've never even heard of that game. Great find!

[@skeletonhaver]

@@baseballreplayjournal oh yeah it's not very good at all, but it's got some interesting ideas for a game of the time at least. Worth it to check out the similar tune, for sure. I'd like to figure out where it comes from!