Super Audio Boy
The authentic sound of a legendary handheld console from the 1980s.
Suggested Price: US$5
Hear Super Audio Boy In Action
- Korobeiniki Traditional (arr. Andrew Aversa) 0:53
- Never DMGed (100% Super Audio Boy) bLiNd 1:29
- Tangledeep Dungeon (100% Super Audio Boy) Andrew Aversa 1:13
- Shades of Grey (100% Super Audio Boy) bLiNd 1:20
- Etrian Odyssey III - The First Campaign Yuzo Koshiro 2:24
Reviews
Simon Franglen
Titanic, Skyfall, Spectre, Avatar, Avatar: The Way of Water
Impact Soundworks make detailed, emotive instruments. I’ve happily bought over two dozen of their libraries which should say everything. They get used every day.
Mark Portmann
Ariana Grande, Luis Fonsi, Celine Dion, Quincy Jones
"[ISW]'s instruments consistently deliver the sound, feel, and reliability I need to do my best work. Thank you for raising the bar and making tools that inspire."
Neal Acree
World of WarCraft, Diablo III, StarCraft II, Overwatch
"Impact Soundworks has some of the most creative and innovative libraries out there. From world instruments to the insanely deep sampled Shreddage guitar series the Impact catalog is full of must-haves and unexpected and inspiring surprises. Highly recommended!
Stewart Winter
Co-founder, VideoHelper
"I'm a keyboard player -- I can't even make a REAL guitar sound convincing. But Telos and Rosette are my go-to guitars because they sound incredible, sit well in a mix and are so easy to configure to my personal playing habits. I'm constantly discovering new ways to play them and they've saved my ass more times than I can count. And the pedal Steel is still my favorite library of its kind for Country, Folk and organic layering behind synths."
Brian Pickett
PAW Patrol, Lucas the Spider, Daniel Tiger
"I never would have thought that sampled guitars could sound as good as ISW's do. The fact that I can use them to lay down a realistic solo is unprecedented. They’ve pushed the boundaries of realism."
Rosette Mandolin – Sound on Sound
Rosette Mandolin review
"The sound of the library is very pleasing...the more I used the library the more I felt I was learning how to write idiomatically for the instrument." "Rosette Mandolin provides a good sound that could have many applications, with versatile input options that cater to writing realistic mandolin lines, impossible 5+ note chords and everything in between." Thomas Field, September 2024
Richard Jacques
Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, Mass Effect, Overwatch 2, James Bond 007: Blood Stone
"I'm a huge fan of the Ventus Winds series. They feature rare instruments deep-sampled to an incredibly high level of detail. It's so liberating to have such a wide range of articulations & phrases that perfectly capture the nuances and performance style of these instruments... from beautiful to haunting, celebratory to sorrowful. Each is expertly recorded and the sound quality is superb, sitting in the mix with ease. If you want to add authentic world winds to your palette, then look no further."
Kevin Manthei
Angry Birds Mystery Island, Marvel’s Spider-Man, Villainous, Neverwinter, Star Trek Online
"ISW creates some of the most inspiring & realistic guitar sample libraries. I had to write a bunch of really gritty, angry heavy metal & sports action rock cues. I used Shreddage 3 Serpent for leads and was blown away by its onboard processing, programming, and amazing live-sounding leads. I also created a signature sound based on the lead guitar in David Lynch's Twin Peaks series, originally played on baritone guitar. [Serpent] built a convincing replica of that sound just using on-board FX. It was so fun and easy to do!"
Audio Demos
- Korobeiniki Traditional (arr. Andrew Aversa) 0:53
- Never DMGed (100% Super Audio Boy) bLiNd 1:29
- Tangledeep Dungeon (100% Super Audio Boy) Andrew Aversa 1:13
- Shades of Grey (100% Super Audio Boy) bLiNd 1:20
- Etrian Odyssey III - The First Campaign Yuzo Koshiro 2:24
Overview
The sound of the legendary grey handheld video game system captured in a virtual instrument with supreme sound design power! Create authentic retro / chiptune music OR modern sounds with the full 4-layer synth engine from the original Super Audio Cart (recently replaced with the comprehensive Super Audio Cart 2). Super Audio Boy is completely FREE!
Product Info
One legendary grey handheld game system
Recorded using actual hardware and meticulously edited to preserve authenticity and character.
All key waveforms multisampled
Four pulses, two saws, two triangles, and two additive waves.
Extra PCM drum samples + waveforms
Percussive sounds created both using noise and PCM samples. Multiple sound menus plus 6 premade drumkits available.
Over 50 authentic & modern presets
Plucks, leads, basses, sequences, and more.
Power FX racks
Five independent FX racks with eight modules each for extra processing and sound mangling.
Features
Four independent sound source layers
Integrated sound source browser
Per-layer synthesis and playback engines
Poly arpeggiator, gate & sequencer
64-slot modulation matrix
Requirements
100MB disk space
7200 RPM hard drive or solid state drive recommended.
4GB of RAM
Higher amounts of memory let you load more instruments.
Kontakt 5.5.2+ Full Version
This library is NOT compatible with the free Kontakt Player.
Kontakt Requirements - Mac OS
Intel Macs (i5 or higher): macOS 10.14, 10.15, 11 or 12 (latest update).
Apple Silicon Macs (via Rosetta 2 & natively on ARM in Standalone or in hosts that support it): macOS 11 or 12 (latest update)
Kontakt Requirements - Windows
Windows 7, Windows 8, or Windows 10 (latest Service Pack, 32/64-bit). Intel Core i5 or equivalent CPU. Graphics hardware support for OpenGL 2.1 or higher. Windows 10 strongly recommended.
Tutorials
Instrument Trailer
(SAC) Advanced Editing, Arpeggiator and Sequencer
(SAC) Effects Rack and Modulation Matrix
Featured Artists & Composers
Mike Gonsolin
(Snoop Dogg, T-Pain, Playboi Carti, Migos)
“Impact Soundworks’ libraries are truly in a league of their own. I’ve been a long time user for as long as I can remember and it would take me a whole other producing lifetime to build the depths of these libraries on my own. As a Kontakt enthusiast who owns just about every library out there I can confidently say that Impact Soundworks’ libraries stand in the top 1%, and that’s saying something! No snake oil here. Just meticulously assembled libraries that are overflowing with creative sound design options and inspiration igniting presets.”
Mike Gonsolin (Mike G)
Matthew Carl Earl
Overwatch 2, Rainbow Six Siege, Call of Duty Mobile, PUBG Mobile, Arknights
“Impact Soundworks creates easy-to-use, great-sounding virtual instruments right out of the box. Highland Harps, Emotional Mallets, and Shreddage 3 are in my daily toolkit.”
Lena Raine
Celeste, Chicory, Minecraft, Guild Wars 2, Deltarune
Instruments from ISW are a staple of my soundtrack work for games. Vocalisa has been a mainstay vocal aesthetic of nearly every game I’ve worked on including Celeste & Chicory: A Colorful Tale. Shreddage 3 has also given me the confidence to write some really fun guitar riffs & solos despite not being able to play a real one. I’ve started incorporating Tokyo Scoring Strings into the acoustic side of my scoring work, and can’t wait to try out more from ISW in the future!
Super Audio Boy is a loving tribute to a certain grey handheld video game system that has become a legend in its own right. With well over 100 million units sold, the “GB” needs no further introduction, other than to mention that its sound chip has survived well-after the regular life span of the handheld and spawned multiple entire genres of music!
For this reason, when we wanted to make a free version of our original Super Audio Cart, we decided that the GB was the ideal system to use. Super Audio Boy uses the same incredible 4-layer synth, arp, FX, and mod engine from Super Audio Cart, but exclusively features the GB sound sources. Every waveform has been meticulously sampled from the actual hardware — no emulation here — and then carefully edited for use in Kontakt.
With Super Audio Boy, you can easily create authentic GB-style music, modern chiptunes, OR take the sounds in a modern direction with the extensive feature set from the first Super Audio Cart. We can’t wait to hear what you do with this FREE instrument!
Reviews
Super Audio Cart – ANR
“Super Audio Cart is a Kontakt-based virtual instrument that is a tribute to the golden age of video gaming. If your next sound design project requires some 8-bit treatments, now you know where to find a quality source.” (Audio News Room)
Testimonial – Danny Baranowsky (Crypt of the NecroDancer, Binding of Isaac, Super Meat Boy)
“Super Audio Cart fills a niche in my chiptune arsenal that has been sorely lacking. The SNES-style patches sound so authentic, and the multi-chip patches bring usability and versatility I haven’t seen in a chiptune instrument before.”