PR8
PR8: NES DRUM MACHINE Guide!
PR8
PR8
->
Great
Demo
Of
PR8
First things first:
1. PR8 itself
I recommend downloading PR8 from my archive link first, because you can get newer, fixed 1.02 version of PR8, whereas reupload of old OG website made by Neil Baldwin wasn’t updated recently
2a. Emulator
Support for PR8 is bit limited, Nestopia, FCEUX(dev version), Mesen and Nintendulator are confirmed to be working
I personally choose Mesen: it sounds good, built-in recording, and customisability around audio, and it does no extra noise when alt-tabbing (something I did a lot during live performances)
2b. Actual NES
Due to using a custom mapper (calling itself NES 2.0), it might not work straight away on your flashcart: package includes powerpak mapper file, I know it works out of the box on Analogue NES console.. and that's where my knowledge ends, I'm not a hardware guy myself, and due to some quirks of PR8, you might benefit from using rewinding or savestates
3a. Keeping ROMs and SAVes together
Due to using plenty custom ROMs and projects saves around them, it does get bit chaotic, and solution I found is to keep ROMs in "Saves" folder hahah
4. VIDEO GUIDE!
On my Youtube channel I made ~20min video showing how to make a song in PR8, from the very basics, with controls shown on the screen so you can easily follow - please check this out!
Here’s just the link without embed if above doesn’t work or has ads or just because you want the link to video itself →
5. Additional notes
- Since PR8 doesn't allow much points of reference (no song naming, you got only 3 letters for instrument name) I highly recommend you to keep some notes, like which song is what number, or maybe draw a map of your song in spreadsheet if that would help you (I did so, with different square colours to mark exactly which song is which) , I made an FCEUX lua script that takes a screenshot of every pattern in PR8, and another script that crops all the images and puts them together in one big map!
(will publish it soon I promise)
(right click on the image and see its in full glory instead of this zoomed out mess!)
- I repeat this point in the video, but READ THE PR8 MANUAL, it’s extremely useful!
- I recommend to set up some comfortable keybindings, PR8 often requires you to hold few buttons at once, making one-handed setup bit tricker than for example with LSDj
6. Do you want more?
In case my video, links and the manual is not enough for you, here’s (for now bit crude) version of few advanced tips and tricks I wrote about PR8, for now it probably is bit basic, is text only but should do the job!
Last but not least, I did write about PR8 in 2020 on Chipmusic.org, here’s the link for it! I included many other interesting details, tips, views and history archives! Have a look if you’re curious!
