MSU1 Volume Fix, The Second Wave

I'm pretending I'm not lazy and finally decided to make life easier for everybody.

Instead of spreading a link to the music packs I fixed in every corner around, I will center them over here.

Main Folder - https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0WXV5NGx2dWpkVTg

Donkey Kong Country 2 - Diddy's Kong Quest:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1E1Y7H4l6sdIQsMXURwFllTD678eTYhDS

F-Zero:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0QkpTUGlQS2tNZEU

Megaman X3:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0eUN4RFlLcEJiM28

Super Mario World:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0NlVsOVBRTFh0dWc

Super Turrican:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0UVNyZHl4MUxQUGs

Street Fighter II Turbo: (gyaragax)

Code:

https://mega.nz/#!VeYW1TyK!ey1QUrzId6cREyS3YOpEXec5bC71oIi3kOyFwncobuA

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV - Turtles In Time: (DatSwissGuy)

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1EdJS_ZPBBk_amnzgyyACJXtKiAiUk_uZ

Top Gear:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0RVVyZUt6ZXdKcms

Top Gear 2:

Code:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0cG16eUhCNXhzX3M

Do note that unlike just grabbing the music packs across the web and normalizing them, my main focus will be lossless audio files. That means I won't be normalizing audio packs composed of tracks painfully ripped off of youtube. Though exceptions will of course exist.

That said, I had a bit of struggle working on a new set of music packs for Top Gear and Top Gear 2, specifically for the former.

I never really tried out the Top Gear MSU-1 patch, so when the opportunity came up, the circumstances put me in very excitement. Since Top Gear's music is totally made up of remixes from its older brothers, the Lotus series for Amiga, half of my work which would be looking for a lossless source was done.

However, upon testing the tracks in game, I had the unpleasure of facing a few problems caused by the simplistic, but overall poor coding of the patch.

Those were a just few problems, nothing really serious, but really nitpicking.

So I went into another journey of improving the MSU-1 code and also extended the emulator support, seriously, the files bundled in the download are sadly disappointing, and don't offer any kind of insight or instruction whatsoever x|

I actually haven't improved the code logic itself, just made it readable, fixed a few oddities and optimized the syntax. I just didn't created a Top Gear plus because living as a leech of other people's work isn't a cool thing

Following the matter, it also bothered me that Super Turrican lacked every kind of support for the current MSU-1 hacking scene, even worst being split into 4 diferent IPS patches, as the average user can't tell the difference between an unheadered and a FuSoYa headered rom, many people had and have difficulties in setting up the patch.

To solve the problem once and for all, I've built for both Top Gear and Super Turrican a new download link for the files, using BPS patches - since IPS is shitty - and all the necessary assets, so that it works right out of the box, making pretty much copy-paste the only tough action required from the end user.

And finally, regarding Top Gear 2, I used the original Amiga rendition version for the music pack, while the Amiga CD32 allows music and sfx simultaneously, yeah, all these niche features, I must say: the soundtrack just plains suck.

The original Amiga is much more friendly, although the SNES still wins at miles of distance, the songs are catchy, due to the fact they are remixes renditions from the console.

Yeah, well, here it's direct links for new patch builds:

http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/Super%2BTurrican%2BMSU-1.zip
http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/topgear_msu1.zip
http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/tmnt4_msu1.zip

I will be in touch with Slamy to propose him to update his files, so they can provide the best for the users.
Oh, one observation, the patch and primary files defaults to the PAL region, if you wanna play the US American version, just retrieve the files inside the "NTSC" folder. =)

If I shall update
https://www.zeldix.net/f46-msu-1-hacks-database

with any of your files let me know. I do not know whether the patch has been updated as well, so just post a list if I shall take any action;)

Conn wrote:I do not know whether the patch has been updated as well

Yes

Update Top Gear with these links:
Patch: http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/topgear_msu1.zip
Music Pack: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0RVVyZUt6ZXdKcms

And Super Turrican with these ones:
Patch: http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/Super%2BTurrican%2BMSU-1.zip
Music Pack: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0UVNyZHl4MUxQUGs

Feel free to add the music pack for Top Gear 2 too

Alright, I left the original as (old, original outdated) for Super Turricane and TG1. Dunno if I shall delete the old files, or whether they can be still valuable.

I noticed that TG2, didn't have a music pack so I added yours

I have sometimes problems with reading long texts and filter crucial information, so a short list with clear instructions what I should do is always best

Added normalized tracks for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV along with a new patch submission

TMNT IV:
Patch: http://bin.smwcentral.net/u/26932/tmnt4_msu1.zip
Music Pack: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B-G62GDNCoK0WUM4ZFIydWRkN3c

Conn wrote:I have sometimes problems with reading long texts and filter crucial information, so a short list with clear instructions what I should do is always best

Sorry about that, I like to show context for the things I eventually do xp
Gonna start to make tl;dr section for my posts \o/

Alright, I also updated TMNT as well in the database

Incredible, thanks Colines!

Edit: I got TG2 patched.

I redid from scratch the PSX/Saturn music pack for Megaman X3, for better or worst, it's still an official soundtrack, so to speak

Great one, Colines. Your new set seems to work perfectly for the MMX3 Zero Project as well.

Hmm why a second thread to do the same thing as qwerty, all was unified in his thread, it made things simpler!

For instance there are now 2 sources for MegaMan X3 fixed files, in his thread and this one, what's the difference, are they supposed to be the same? :confusion:

Wrong!

qwertymodo does general fixes like normalizing, repaired loop points, etc. Though he also builds packs himself.

My work while consisting at normalizing packs too, my focus is redbook CD music, lossless song files.

Also, I have other goals, like creating new downloads link for MSU-1 patches with more intuitive ways to set up roms, user-friendly.

And it's definately not that simple, I have links to my folders spread all over in that thread's pages, and I won't live forever to keep doing so =P

For MMX3, as said above, mine is made up from lossless audio files, and there is some minor differences between the packs, mine being based on the PSX soundtrack and GinBunBum's on the Saturn. (a selection of songs play a little different, see Sigma battle)

Sounds look you're in the same boat I'm in. At first it was just "I'll run these files through an automated script" then it was "this pack has permanent clipping, I'll just go grab the original source files and redo them", then "my conversion tools could be easier to use with a bit of work" then "oh this pack has bad loop points, guess I'll have to REALLY do it from scratch" and "this patch needs fixing"


Then somewhere along the line came Chrono Trigger FMV's and Snes9x support and a foobar plugin, and now I'm rewriting my tools in C++ with libsox because it doesn't look like DarkShock got very far with his.

...and I still need to finish Parallel Worlds 1.3...

So...if you were wondering why my conversion project kinda stalled out... I'm glad to have other people on board with it. Before now, any time I tried to bring it up all I got was a bunch of dragging feet. We're getting there

...and I still need to finish Parallel Worlds 1.3...

Yes, I hope you will.

qwertymodo wrote:Sounds look you're in the same boat I'm in. At first it was just "I'll run these files through an automated script" then it was "this pack has permanent clipping, I'll just go grab the original source files and redo them", then "my conversion tools could be easier to use with a bit of work" then "oh this pack has bad loop points, guess I'll have to REALLY do it from scratch" and "this patch needs fixing"


Then somewhere along the line came Chrono Trigger FMV's and Snes9x support and a foobar plugin, and now I'm rewriting my tools in C++ with libsox because it doesn't look like DarkShock got very far with his.

...and I still need to finish Parallel Worlds 1.3...

So...if you were wondering why my conversion project kinda stalled out... I'm glad to have other people on board with it. Before now, any time I tried to bring it up all I got was a bunch of dragging feet.  We're getting there

Actually it already works for simple cases:

https://github.com/mlarouche/msu1-audio-tool

See the example with Mega Man 7: https://github.com/mlarouche/msu1-audio-tool/blob/master/examples/MegaMan7.json

I will be really glad if you could me help me instead of writing the same thing on your own

I actually did try yours, which is what prompted me to try and work on it. I couldn't get yours to build with FLAC support, and in the course of fighting with that (libsox is a real pain to get set up...) one thing led to another and I just ended up starting clean.  So, at this point it's probably a little bit of a sunk cost and a little bit of just enjoying doing my own thing, so I'll probably stick with what I have. However, since we're both using libsox, at least that part of the code could be usefully shared. From my experience with the batch script version, I've found that 99% of our needs are covered by just 4 effects, in various combinations

-trim
-fade
-mix
-pad

Once those 4 are implemented, more advanced effects are just a matter of combining them. For instance, a cross-fade involves all 4, creating 2 trimmed temp files, fading them each respectively, padding the fade-in to overlap the fade out, then mix them together.

I also wanted to try out an interesting idea I had, where file mixing and file concatenating were recursively nestable in the config to handle some of the various file combination scenarios I've encountered in my pack, and that required a rather different ground-up approach to the data structures.

FLAC support was your only issue ? You could just ask me to add it. I know my time is limited but adding FLAC to the build process is a matter of an afternoon.

Well, not just FLAC, .ogg and .mp3 as well, which then pulls in other dependencies, which then starts running into all kinds of build errors because the versions that they say to build against don't actually quite match up, and then I was using VS2015 which adds a whole new set of build problems because MS made some breaking changes to their STL. It might be "just an afternoon" but it's a rather painful one...

My plan was to add a local copy of FLAC and others, since it would be easier to build on all platforms.

My point is not there, I'm kinda pissed off that my project that I worked on on several weekend is now worthless.

It's not worthless by any means, right now, mine doesn't do any more than yours does.

For me, this is nothing more than a continuation of my own toolset, I'm not trying to render yours obsolete or anything like that. Having more options never hurts.

Colines wrote:
Following the matter, it also bothered me that Super Turrican lacked every kind of support for the current MSU-1 hacking scene, even worst being split into 4 diferent IPS patches, as the average user can't tell the difference between an unheadered and a FuSoYa headered rom, many people had and have difficulties in setting up the patch.

....

I will be in touch with Slamy to propose him to update his files, so they can provide the best for the users.
Oh, one observation, the patch and primary files defaults to the PAL region, if you wanna play the US American version, just retrieve the files inside the "NTSC" folder. =)

Thank you for inviting me onto this forum and sorry for the late response.
First of all for my defense, I'm not an active member of the SNES hacking community nor do I have knowledge about how MSU hacking should be done right. My MSU hack for Super Turrican was the first thing I've ever developed for the SNES.
I was kinda sorta inspired by how it was done once for Super Mario World where an IPS patch was delivered but was then confronted by volume differences of sd2snes and higan and of course multiple versions of my game to support. While I did the patch in august 2015 (without releasing it) I was unable to find much on this topic of volumes.

I'm still confused about normalizing tracks. Why should that be done? I've adapted the volume of Super Turrican to multiple targets by changing the SPC and the MSU volumes to fit. This is why 4 IPS files exists. For the sd2snes version with a usually very quite MSU1 I've decreased the SPC volume while for the higan I also decreased the MSU volume as well.

So how is it done?
By increasing the volume of the sd2snes with the menu? That actually seems to kill the sound quality because as I guess the volume is increased by digitally scaling the amplitude inside the sd2snes.

If you could give me an example how it should be done right i could adapt to that.

Hey Slamy, here's some background info on the volume issue I wrote up a little while back: https://www.zeldix.net/t1265p100-fixing-all-of-the-too-loud-audio-packs-for-good#19720 long story short, the situation is fixed so that everything can play the same volume level and we only need one patch. Old versions of the SD2SNES can boost the volume in the firmware, newer revisions actually fix the underlying hardware issue and play back at the correct level natively without any boost.

As for how to do it, the most popular tool right now is nongnu-normalize http://normalize.nongnu.org I typically start at -15dB and play around from there in steps of 3dB. You can test by having two higan windows open, one with the original and one with the MSU hack. Set it to pause when focus is lost, then switch back and forth listening for volume jumps. You need at least v101 for this to work, older versions did "guarded mixing" which would cause the MSU version to sound half as loud in a side by side comparison (but this is completely different from the SD2SNES issue, and wasn't actually incorrect, it just turned EVERYTHING down to avoid clipping). Once you find a good value, typically you can use the same value for the entire soundtrack for that game, though sometimes a track here or there might need a little adjusting. Super Metroid was the only game I've seen so far that really needed every track set individually.

Hey people. In case someone experiments the same, the Top Gear MSU-1 patch causes a little music skip at the beginning of the game, but only on Snes9x. This seems to ameliorate with the latest qwertymodo experimental MSU-1 builds, but you need to load the game twice.

Pretty sure that was just a bug in Snes9x, nothing to do with the hack. I had a similar skip occurring in Chrono Trigger. Should be fixed now.