This article has a talk page!This page details development materials of Dirty Harry.
Music#
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In 2025, the Video Game History Foundation uncovered a cassette featuring recordings of the original MIDI files made for Dirty Harry. The game's composers Steven Samler and Elliot Delman originally wrote MIDI files in the Macintosh software Performer (now known as DP). Because the game uses Nick Eastridge's sound driver (he is listed under the Special Thanks section of the game's credits), he most likely did the arrangements on the NES side, as he did with the other games that used his driver.
- The music plays at different tempos than the ones found in the game, which plays all songs at 150 BPM.
- The music was originally recorded a perfect fifth sharp than what is heard in the game.
- Some songs such as Dockyards and Alcatraz have extended sections that were omitted in the NES version.
- Mentioned on the main page, but the unused song found in the game's code is announced in the tape as Failure, indicating it was most likely intended as a Game Over theme.
Another fun fact about the game's audio is that the sound driver is the same version as the one used in the unreleased version of Days of Thunder (NES, Mindscape), in which that game's sound designer Chris Oberth removed the unnecessary double-flat notes listed in the sound engine's code.