Music box

A music box or musical box is an automatic musical instrument that produces sounds by the use of a set of pins placed on a revolving cylinder or disc so as to pluck the tuned teeth (or lamellae) of a steel comb. They were developed from musical snuff boxes of the 18th century and called carillons à musique. Some of the more complex boxes also have a tiny drum and/or small bells, in addition to the metal comb.

History

The original snuff boxes were tiny containers which could fit into a gentleman's waistcoat pocket. The music boxes could have any size from that of a hat box to a large piece of furniture, but most were tabletop specimens. They were usually powered by clockwork and originally produced by artisan watchmakers. For most of the 19th century, the bulk of music box production was concentrated in Switzerland, building upon a strong watchmaking tradition. The first music box factory was opened there in 1815 by Jérémie Recordon and Samuel Junod. There were also a few manufacturers in Bohemia and Germany. By the end of the 19th century, some of the European makers had opened factories in the United States.

Color

Color (American English) or colour (Commonwealth English) is the visual perceptual property corresponding in humans to the categories called red, blue, yellow, etc. Color derives from the spectrum of light (distribution of light power versus wavelength) interacting in the eye with the spectral sensitivities of the light receptors. Color categories and physical specifications of color are also associated with objects or materials based on their physical properties such as light absorption, reflection, or emission spectra. By defining a color space colors can be identified numerically by their coordinates.

Because perception of color stems from the varying spectral sensitivity of different types of cone cells in the retina to different parts of the spectrum, colors may be defined and quantified by the degree to which they stimulate these cells. These physical or physiological quantifications of color, however, do not fully explain the psychophysical perception of color appearance.

The science of color is sometimes called chromatics, colorimetry, or simply color science. It includes the perception of color by the human eye and brain, the origin of color in materials, color theory in art, and the physics of electromagnetic radiation in the visible range (that is, what we commonly refer to simply as light).

After Burner

After Burner (アフターバーナー, Afutā Bānā) is a 1987 combat flight simulator arcade game by Sega AM2. It is one of the first games designed by Yu Suzuki. The player flew an F-14 using a specialized joystick (with moving seat, in some installations), and the game spawned several sequels.

Gameplay

The game allows the player to control a F-14 Tomcat jet, which must destroy a series of enemy jets throughout 18 stages. At the start of the game, the player takes off from an aircraft carrier called the SEGA Enterprise, which shares a similar name to the one used in the 1986 film Top Gun.

In the arcade version, the jet itself employs a machine gun and a limited set of heat-seeking missiles, in the Mastersystem version there is an unlimted amount of missiles. These weapons are replenished by another aircraft after beating a few stages. The aircraft, cannon and missile buttons are all controlled from an integrated flight stick.

The game itself was released in two variations: a standard upright cabinet and a rotating cockpit version. In the cockpit version, the seat rotated horizontally, and the cockpit rotated vertically. The rotating cockpit version also featured two speakers inside the cockpit at head-level, which produced excellent stereo sound that significantly added to the gameplay experience. Both cabinets contained a grey monitor frame with flashing lights at the top that indicated an enemy's "lock" on your craft.

Music

Music is an art form and cultural activity whose medium is sound and silence. The common elements of music are pitch (which governs melody and harmony), rhythm (and its associated concepts tempo, meter, and articulation), dynamics (loudness and softness), and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture (which are sometimes termed the "color" of a musical sound). Different styles or types of music may emphasize, de-emphasize or omit some of these elements. Music is performed with a vast range of instruments and with vocal techniques ranging from singing to rapping, and there are solely instrumental pieces, solely vocal pieces and pieces that combine singing and instruments. The word derives from Greek μουσική (mousike; "art of the Muses"). In its most general form, the activities describing music as an art form include the production of works of music (songs, tunes, symphonies, and so on), the criticism of music, the study of the history of music, and the aesthetic examination of music. Ancient Greek and Indian philosophers defined music as tones ordered horizontally as melodies and vertically as harmonies. Common sayings such as "the harmony of the spheres" and "it is music to my ears" point to the notion that music is often ordered and pleasant to listen to. However, 20th-century composer John Cage thought that any sound can be music, saying, for example, "There is no noise, only sound."

After Burner II

After Burner II is an arcade-style flight game released by Sega in 1987. It is the second game in the After Burner series. In the game, players fly a F-14 Tomcat jet fighter, gunning down enemies while avoiding incoming fire. Like OutRun, another Sega arcade game, After Burner II came in several versions, the most famous being a large, servo actuated, sit-down cabinet which resembled a cockpit and moved according to the motion of the plane onscreen. The cockpit would bank in the same direction the on-screen aircraft was banking. There was also a more basic upright cabinet version.

Translations and ports

After Burner II has been translated and ported to numerous home computers, consoles and mobile phones; including versions for the PC Engine, Sharp X68000, Sega Mega Drive, Famicom, FM Towns Marty, Atari ST, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64 and Sega Saturn. In Japan, it was released on the PlayStation 2 as part of the Sega Ages classic series. Mega placed the Mega Drive version at #38 in their Top Mega Drive Games of All Time.MegaTech magazine praised the smooth and fast gameplay, as well as the sound.