The real voices, bandlimited so they stay clean at any pitch: five hardware channels plus the VRC6 expansion, a 16-voice modern engine, a step sequencer on every channel, and a built-in FX rack.
Six of the 113 factory presets, straight out of the box, no post-processing.
Short original tracks, every sound made with Warpzone, each in a different genre. The player follows you down the page.
One email per release. That's the whole list.
A faithful 2A03: two pulse channels, triangle, noise, and DPCM sample playback, plus the optional VRC6 expansion for two more pulses and a sawtooth. Bandlimited so it stays clean at any pitch, with the nonlinear DAC curve that gives the chip its bite. This is the real 8-bit voice, not a sample of it. Chiptune artists and game designers writing to hardware limits: this is your engine, channel for channel.
When you want to step outside the hardware, flip to a full polyphonic synth built from the same waveforms: dual oscillators, ADSR, unison with detune, portamento, and per-voice MPE pitch bend. Chiptune timbre with modern playability: pads, leads and stacks the original chip could never hold. Producers and songwriters who want the color without the constraints: start here.
A tracker-style step sequencer on every channel: 16 steps across volume, pitch and duty lanes. Hold one note and Warpzone plays the whole riff: basslines, arps, wobbles, the works. Draw straight into the grid, lock it to your host tempo, and it's captured in your project.
A full effects chain sits one click below the channels: BitCrush for extra grit, a multimode filter, chorus, a tempo-synced delay, and reverb. Sound design and mix polish in the same box, so a Warpzone part drops into a produced track without a rack of third-party plugins behind it.
Drop in a .vgm or .vgz file and Warpzone pulls each instrument out as a preset, with volume, pitch and duty envelopes intact. Tracker exports and decades of freely released chip music, playable from your keyboard.
An LFO for vibrato and tremolo, an arpeggiator that locks to your host tempo, and portamento for slides. The movement that makes a chip line feel alive, no automation lanes required.
Four MIDI modes: Split for one channel per voice, Auto for round-robin polyphony, Mono, and Layer for thick stacks where every channel fires on each key.
Four temperaments, an NTSC/PAL region switch that shifts the timing like the real consoles, transpose on every melodic channel, and master fine-tune. Authentic down to the clock.
Arcade leads, sub bass, a sampled drum kit, step-sequenced grooves, lush modern pads. 113 patches to start from, and full save/share for your own.
Hover any knob for a plain-English description, or open the manual built into the plugin: thirteen searchable chapters covering both engines, the sequencer, MIDI and effects. No tab-switching to figure out what a knob does.
No, and that's the point. 8-bit pulses, triangles and noise have been turning up in pop, electronic, hip-hop and indie records for decades; Warpzone makes the chip behind that sound a normal instrument, so you can write with it anywhere you'd reach for a synth. Bass that cuts, leads with real character, 16-voice pads from the Modern engine, and a built-in FX rack to finish the sound in place. And if you're a chiptune artist or a game designer scoring to hardware limits, the Classic engine is the real chip, channel for channel.
The real thing. Warpzone synthesises the 2A03's voices in real time, bandlimited so the top of the keyboard stays as clean as the bottom, with the nonlinear DAC curve that gives the chip its bite. Nothing is sampled off a console, which is why a lead keeps its character up in the high octaves, where sample-based chip instruments start to alias and fall apart.
The Classic engine is the full 2A03: two pulse channels, a triangle, a noise channel, and DPCM sample playback, plus the optional VRC6 expansion for two more pulses and a sawtooth. Eight channels, each monophonic like the hardware, each with its own volume, pan, duty, and step sequence. The Modern engine is the other half: a polyphonic synth with up to 16 voices, for chords and stacks the chip could never hold.
Yes: BitCrush, a multimode filter (low-pass, band-pass or high-pass), chorus, a delay that locks to your host tempo, and a reverb, all one click below the channels. Modulation too: an LFO for vibrato and tremolo, a host-synced arpeggiator, and portamento. The whole chain saves with your preset.
No. Start from a preset, play your keyboard, and you're making 8-bit music. Every control explains itself when you hover it, and the built-in Help screen covers the chip, the jargon, and the shortcuts. Go as deep as you want.
Yes. Drop in a .vgm or .vgz file and Warpzone pulls each instrument out as a preset, with its volume, pitch and duty envelopes intact. Tracker software exports VGM, and plenty of chip musicians release their files freely, so your own compositions and theirs are the natural sources. Play the extracted instruments from your keyboard, or drop them straight into the step sequencer.
Yes. Every channel has its own tracker-style sequencer: 16 steps across volume, pitch and duty lanes, synced to your host tempo and loopable. Hold a single note and Warpzone plays the whole line, basslines and arps and wobbles included. The sequence rides with the preset and saves into your project.
Four ways, switchable. Split puts one channel on each MIDI channel, so you can sequence the parts independently. Auto spreads notes across the enabled channels round-robin for instant polyphony. Mono stacks everything on one voice, and Layer fires every channel on each key for thick unisons. The Modern engine also reads per-note MPE pitch bend.
Yes. Warpzone ships with 113 factory presets to start from, and you can save, name and share your own as small files, embedded step sequences included. Send a patch to someone and it loads back exactly as you made it.
macOS 11 or later (Apple Silicon or Intel, universal binary), Windows 10 or later (64-bit), or Linux (x86-64). Load it as VST3, AU, or CLAP in Logic, Ableton Live, Reaper, Bitwig, FL Studio, Cubase, and the rest, or run the standalone app with no DAW at all. macOS and Windows have installers; the setup guide covers all three platforms, including uninstalling.
Yes, the demo is the full instrument. One purchase unlocks it on macOS, Windows and Linux, with all 1.x updates included. The license covers three machines at a time, and you can free a seat yourself when you move to a new computer. Anything you make with it is yours to release and sell, with no royalties. 14-day refund if it isn't for you. Full terms in the license agreement.
One-time purchase. Activate once online; the license covers three machines and runs offline from then on.
A one-time purchase covering macOS, Windows and Linux. Anything you make with Warpzone is yours to release, sell, and license however you like, with no royalties and no attribution.
The license covers three machines at a time. Moving to a new computer takes one click on the old one to free the seat.
All 1.x updates are included. Not for you? Email inside 14 days and we'll refund it. Full terms in the license agreement.