Top 50 Wii U Games

Although the Wii U hasn't been the biggest hit among gamers since the release of the current generatino of consoles, the good people at Nintendo seem to be gearing up for a huge couple of years coming up. There have been over 100 games made for the Wii U since it came to the market and a lot of them are really good. Still I've managed to whittle the list down for you to the absolute 50 best Wii U games (and those are all still entirely worth getting).

Wacom Bamboo Drawing Tablets

Wacom makes three different models of drawing tablets for graphic designers. The entry level model is called the Bamboo. Within this line there are also three different kinds, the Splash, the Create, and the Pen and Touch. Although these are at slightly different price points and have some different features, you really can't go wrong with any of them. If you're just starting out, you might consider going with the simplest one, the Pen and Touch. Find out more about the Bamboo tablets at this article: Wacom Bamboo Tablets: Differences and Reviews. Or if you'd like to know more about the other lines of Wacom tablets and how they stack up against the Bamboo check out the Best Drawing Tablets.

Find the Best Drawing Tablet for You

If you're looking to get into any form of graphic design, you're going to eventually need a good drawing tablet. There are a lot of different kinds out there, but generally Wacom holds the standard. You may be happy currently just using a mouse for your vector work, but trust me, once you try one out and get used to it, your productivity will increase enormously, and you'll never be able to go back.

How to get work online as a composer/musician

There are a ton of ways to find work as a musician online, but that's exactly the problem. The market is over-saturated with composers and musicians trying to get their break. That's why I've taken some time to write up an article providing a few points of useful advice and resources to help all the aspiring composers out there get steady work doing what they love. Check out the full article: 5 Places to Find Work as an Online Musician.

How to Make Chiptunes

The glory days of video games were ripe with game cartridges, two-button controllers, pixel art, and chipped music. What is chipped music? It is when the pitch, velocity, and soundwave (among other things) are created by a microchip inside a computer or game console. We don't have chipped music anymore because everything has been digitalized, but the NES sure had it, and it sounded great! But now that the technology has been left in the dust by all the fancy software we have today, how can we relive the wonder years of game music? 

There are several programs out there that were created for the sole purpose of creating 8-bit tunes. The most popular ones are FamiTracker, Modplug Tracker, and MilkyTracker. You can find both of them for free online, since they are open source. 

If you're more of a serious sound engineer, you probably have your own DAW (Digital Audio Workstation). Depending on what program you already have you can find a number of plugins that will give you the soundfonts and effects that you need to replicate anything 8-bit. With DAWs such as Fruity Loops, Cubase, and Cakewalk, you can easily find a VST plugin. Try YMCK's Magical 8bitor Peach by Tweakbench. If you're going after a specifically Atari sound, you can try ymVST. 

If you're using Pro Tools as you're DAW, unless you have conversion software to wrap VST plugins, you'll need something in RTAS format. Some popular plugins include Plogue Chipsounds and TBK2 by Sonalksis. 

Whatever your pleasure, there's a large variety of solutions for what modern program to use in order to create 8-bit music. 

If you're using one of the plugins mentioned above, you probably already know your way around your DAW, but if you decided to use one of the stand-alone programs like FamiTracker, you might need a guiding hand to help you get acquainted with it. Check out How to Make 8-Bit Music with FamiTracker. It gives lots of good information about getting the hang of FamiTracker, including in-depth guides and screenshots on adding detailed effects like tremolo and delay. It's also got some tasty bits about soundwaves and channels. 

Until next time, happy music making!