Implementing active music in Spring

PauloMorfeo · Post by **PauloMorfeo** » 21 Jun 2005, 22:21

Gurkha wrote:keeping in theme with the GPL-ness of spring, I propose the use of .ogg ...

UT 2003 and UT 2004 (probably the 2 best games of it's gender of all times) both use .ogg files. To me, that brings alot of confidence about that music format.

Noruas · Post by **Noruas** » 22 Jun 2005, 06:12

.ogg format is very unpopular or not known, i would suggest that if we do use music in spring, it would be somthing in options to upload songs to play in different times, a defeat in spring should be last fire in the timeperiod of 30 seconds since the last shot, and then it plays victory or defeat for whoever killed more units, then it should go back to normal music for building after a song is over

[K.B.] Napalm Cobra · Post by **[K.B.] Napalm Cobra** » 22 Jun 2005, 08:11

Who cares if its not known? Does that somehow make it a worse audio format?

Nemo · Post by **Nemo** » 22 Jun 2005, 08:37

.ogg is fine...as stated above, if its good enough for a multi-million doller game like unreal tournament 2k4, then i'm sure its good enough for Spring.

I *do* own ut2k4, and the music/effects are good and crisp.

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 22 Jun 2005, 13:21

As long as there are readily available (free) programs to convert .mp3 and .wav to .ogg, then there are no problems with the issue.

shnorb · Post by **shnorb** » 22 Jun 2005, 13:57

as much as i love the idea of sticking to open source (audio formats) we shouldnt limit spring to just one file type. i really, really, think that we should have support for at least mp3 and wma, which are two very common files used. im fine with all developers (myself included) using ogg for mods and such, but we shouldnt restrict everything to that.
i want people to be able to merely throw a few songs that they know and love into the song directory without having to worry about converting it to ogg first.

AF · Post by AF » 22 Jun 2005, 14:00

yuk, wma, wont play on my mp3 players, doesnt like my linux setup, microsoft endorsed... ew....

How about support for mp3 surround?

shnorb · Post by **shnorb** » 22 Jun 2005, 14:16

i was just using it as an example of a commonly used format... i think we should provide support for as many formats as is possible (within reason)...

EDIT: this just means there are fewer limits for developers

AF · Post by AF » 22 Jun 2005, 14:21

I'm not aware of any linux programs that can play wma formats. Those of you dealing with the linux port? What is your opinion? Is there a wma library for linux/*nix?

BlackLiger · Post by **BlackLiger** » 22 Jun 2005, 16:03

Find a way to make it play as many different file types as possible. WMA, MP3, OGG, WAV etc......

I might look into that, always been an interest of mine....

Post by SJ » 22 Jun 2005, 19:19

Why doesnt someone just go and implement their favourite format. Then someone not liking it could add in theirs.

Buggi · Post by **Buggi** » 22 Jun 2005, 19:34

Because it's a group of people who request features, not impliment them.

-Buggi

aTTacK · Post by **aTTacK** » 22 Jun 2005, 23:41

Warlord Zsinj wrote:What do you think OTA's music is?

And if you listen to Jeremy Soule's pieces for OTA with a bit of knowledge of other classical pieces, you can hear that they are rather cliche, with bits taken from a number of different pieces (most being mentioned in this thread!). Which is not to say that is bad (I like the OTA music. It isn't Bach, but it's good fun), it just shows that classical music certainly does fit within Spring's frame.

hmpf...
i KNOW much about classical music.. im playing it since 10years -.-
i mean normal classical music, like the componists mentioned
i dont think it will fit because of the different styles and the "ah i know this track" effect
thats like taking the starwars soundtrack for a new action movie for example

the ota soundtrack is made with similar instruments/stylistic elements and so it fits very well to ota

music IS taking different stylistics elements together and mix them up in a way that it sounds individual... nowadays

aGorm · Post by **aGorm** » 23 Jun 2005, 00:39

UT music rocks... and ogg is actully very well knowen if you don't live in a microsoft world, and it has ammazing sound quality... far better than mp3 and wma. However, Playing all the formats would be better.

aGorm

Noruas · Post by **Noruas** » 23 Jun 2005, 05:52

can you hook me up with an ogg player, and some ogg formated songs, then ill know what your talking about!!

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 23 Jun 2005, 06:06

Buggi, I suggest, not request

The reason I don't actually go and do it myself is because I have no idea how.
Just because I have very little training in programming shouldn't preclude me from suggesting things which people who do have those skills are performing?

I am contributing to Spring in my own way - I am reworking and remodelling SWTA to make it work better in Spring. It wouldn't bother me if you came into the SWTA thread and gave me suggestions as to how I could model units or add to SWTA. Its the whole point of a group effort: everyone does what they can.

shnorb · Post by **shnorb** » 23 Jun 2005, 12:58

learn to program! thats what im doing... bloody schools hogging all the spare time i have though, so its a pretty slow process

el_muchacho · Post by **el_muchacho** » 23 Jun 2005, 13:07

Vorbis (alias ogg) is very fine, and Musepack (mpc) is another worthwhile choice imho. Both are definitely superior to mp3. mpc has the best quality for the same compression ratio of all lossy audio compression formats, it compresses fast (but that's not really our problem here). 180 kb/s mpc is sonically equivalent to 320 kb/s mp3.

Another important plus of both these formats over mp3 is that they are gapless : they allow continuous play of tracks without noticeable interruption, which mp3 does not AFAIK.

I don't know which, from ogg and mpc, uses the most CPU for decompression though, as this should be the number one criteria for a choice of music format for Spring.

BlackLiger wrote:Find a way to make it play as many different file types as possible. WMA, MP3, OGG, WAV etc......

I might look into that, always been an interest of mine....

No. I think this is useless code bloat. One good format is enough, no need to add in inferior formats like WMA (which is not even open) and WAV (which is ok for sounds but not for background music as it is likely to eat up memory unnecessarily). If the user is too lazy to download an ogg or mpc encoder to encode 5-10 music files, there is no reason we should waste our time for him.

I vote for Musepack or Ogg Vorbis.

el_muchacho · Post by **el_muchacho** » 23 Jun 2005, 13:13

doublon to delete

shnorb · Post by **shnorb** » 24 Jun 2005, 07:18

lame encoded mp3s are awesome...

i dont think providing compatibility for multiple formats is useless code bloating. i dont see any reason to confine both users, and developers to a certain format, especially when most people have different opinions and personal favourites. i dont like wma, in fact i really despise it. but i mentioned it because it is a popular format, as are mp3s. in the case of music, we should make it easy for people to simply dump their music into the spring music directory. why make things difficult for people?

Spring RTS Engine

Implementing active music in Spring