8-bit chiptune music — pure square waves, no real instruments. Two square-wave channels carry the lead melody and harmony. A triangle-wave channel plays the bass line. White-noise channel handles percussion — snare, hi-hat and kick all from filtered noise. Tempos sit at 110–160 BPM in major and minor keys, with classic NES-style arpeggios standing in for chords and tight loopable phrases of 8 or 16 bars sized for retro-game level music.
Indie game developers loop it through retro pixel-art platformers and roguelikes. Pixel-art animators bed it under timelapse and finished-piece reveal videos. Twitch streamers run it as background for retro-gaming and speedrun streams. YouTubers cut it into arcade-style channel intros and nostalgic gaming-history essays. Also fits game-jam submission reels and chiptune cover music videos. See also retro or video-games.