OPL4 - Should I use it in the next game?

The big issue here, and I actually wonder how many people have this in the back of their heads, is that sample-based music opens doors to sounds that are not conventional instruments. E.g. if you play a C-5 with any FM-chip you'll be getting some instrument that plays that note. But with samples this sound can be anything. For example a harp glissando, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2PLZp8aujg Now this isn't really easy to do with conventional notes for you'd need a channel for each string on the harp. With samples you only need one sample and one channel. And how about samples that are a chord? Or a drum loop? Or a choir cluster? Or a powerchord on guitars? Or some ambient'ish loop o' atmospherical things?

These kind of non-instrumental sounds actually do a lot when it comes to atmosphere, e.g. they would be at place in a good moody RPG, just to name an example. See e.g. this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgdkkG2Jl5w

If you make such music for OPL4, it's more or less impossible to bring that back to FM-PAC, let alone PSG. Maybe a theme can be salvaged and reused in another form, but you loose the atmosphere.

Now, I can already hear the army yelling: 'well, if you want that kind of atmo-music just make a PC-game then, not an MSX-game'. However, an MSX with OPL4 is quite capable of making such music. So why not use it like that? The problem here is not that an MSX may or may not be able to do this kind of thing, the problem here is accepting that such an OPL4 becomes a requirement with no support for other/smaller audio chips.

It's the same discussion we've seen for years surrounding contests when someone dares to make an MSX2 game using screen 4. "Oh, it could have been an MSX1 game, booohooo!"

Sounds like a nice idea... Like some tickboxes where one can select which hardware one owns

Nice idea!

And report on all those statistics of course.