Final Fantasy 5

I already promised to convert a different PCM set for Conn when I finished on FFV, but after that I'm gonna work on relooping darthvaderx's PCM set for him.

Mathew Valente FF4 set was already done a week ago by Brett :
https://www.zeldix.net/t1952-final-fantasy-iv-j-final-fantasy-ii-us
So no need anymore for you to pcm this work

- Mathew Valente's Synthetic Origins presented by Brett_d92:

Code:
   https://drive.google.com/open?id=1G89ey947l_ww1OQ2diCg7OqF_-JlJ34U

Conn wrote:

I already promised to convert a different PCM set for Conn when I finished on FFV, but after that I'm gonna work on relooping darthvaderx's PCM set for him.

Mathew Valente FF4 set was already done a week ago by Brett :
https://www.zeldix.net/t1952-final-fantasy-iv-j-final-fantasy-ii-us
So no need anymore for you to pcm this work

- Mathew Valente's Synthetic Origins presented by Brett_d92:

Code:
   https://drive.google.com/open?id=1G89ey947l_ww1OQ2diCg7OqF_-JlJ34U

Whelp..... It has been over a month since you asked me to do it...



Oh, Track 2 (the intro sequence) in darthvaderx's PCM edits had a lot of work done on it, apparently most/all of the other tracks were just volume adjustments...

No worries, brett's work came out of the blue... less work for you
However, I'm not sure whether the volume levels are correctly adjusted for every theme in Mathew set as well... If you once have the time and will to look into it I'm sure Brett will provide the json.

https://mega.nz/#!HdB1BIZY!tb9MC2Egk-ULgI8czy4gG39ke2R--TesnPHpLYUBtS4

Save slot 1.
Go south 2 rooms to trigger events with Cid.
towards the end of the events, the music is supposed to fade out, and Cid is supposed to give some lines in silence. This doesn't happen.

Expected scene behavior:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l82ZrvheZIk&t=8806

Not sure if this can be tackled without fade, but I'm hoping, the silence adds quite a bit of emotional impact to the scene.

Conn wrote:No worries, brett's work came out of the blue... less work for you
However, I'm not sure whether the volume levels are correctly adjusted for every theme in Mathew set as well... If you once have the time and will to look into it I'm sure Brett will provide the json.

I have a handy little script that lets me batch-renormalize PCM sets. All I need to do is know what dB level it needs to be normalized to, and I can have it done in like a minute.

Find v17 in first post. Since I do not dare to make a nmi hacking, I simply set it to mute at this place.

The fade should be command 81 (while total mute is command 80). I made it however a local exception, so it will only mute with theme $30 played and this fade command 81 occurs - means there shouldn't be any side effects (and thus no re-testing all other stuff needed). We are at a point where we should not tinker too much anymore. Endless playtesting... These RPG are really a nightmare, we work on it for 4 months now and are at milestone v17

I have a handy little script that lets me batch-renormalize PCM sets. All I need to do is know what dB level it needs to be normalized to, and I can have it done in like a minute.

Sounds awesome! Brett normalized all themes with -18 except one theme I think... the whole discussion is here:
https://www.zeldix.net/t1952p100-final-fantasy-iv-j-final-fantasy-ii-us
I only tested one theme $40 and found it a bit too loud in comparison to the SFX (-21 might have been better), but this was only my taste. I think you'd need to check each theme if you go into that...

It's not as smooth a transition without the fadeout (purely from how jarring having it cut out mid-note can be), but still works nicely to preserve the emotional impact of the scene.

Funnily enough, I only noticed that one because I was checking something else in that scene that turned out to not be a bug, lol.

A fade-out in msu1 is not that hard to achieve, but requires to check the nmi (60 fps ntsc =60 nmi:s, so a volume of $FF=dec256, has a fadeout of 256/60 = 4.2 seconds until mute).

However the implementation requires some additional playtesting. This is more or less the only place where command 81 is used and i am unsure if this command is globally valid, should be -> but playtest needed). I hardly noticed fadings in the game anyways when playing spc... so if this is a rare event I'd tend to not implement it, except you want additional 4 months playtesting )

Eh, I only noticed one or two scenes where not having fading was any type of issue, but they were minor enough to not really need comment, and worked as they were. (the only one that really jumps to mind atm is the musicbox flashback in Bartz hometown)

This scene, however, was really suffering from the lack of fading; and your fix corrected that.

What little is left is, just like the other instances, minor enough to not really need comment. In a way, the jarring transition to silence almost helps to show the sudden and drastic tone-shift in conversation, and lends even more weight to the following lines.

Oh, and for my testing, I've now gotten 3 of the tablets, and my save has me right outside Ixtory Falls to grab the last one. I think after that I just have Phoenix Tower to tackle before I'm ready to head into the Cleft of Dimensions.

Sounds great, if you find other places where a fading is supposed to occur let me know... if there are, I consider making this $81 globally a mute command. I made already  $80 to a globally mute (this has effect e.g. right at the beginning when you meet the girl: https://youtu.be/Z0RtcAi94bQ?t=439 )
but this also troubled the meteor music stop we had a while ago if you remember.

Anyways, knowing the game not at all, everything you tell me about the savestates doesn't tell anything to me... how far are we in total progress (maybe percentage) and how long maybe until we can release?

I'm pretty sure the Cleft of Dimensions is the last area of the game, which means 2 dungeons followed by the final area. So yea, I'm close to done with the playthrough.

I'm thinking I'll want to do one more quick runthrough up to the end of World 1, just to make sure no new bugs have been introduced, but that one will consist of me spending 20 min or so on a modded ROM to max out all my levels and get end-game equipment, and then using a no random encounters game genie code, and just blasting through everything as fast as possible.

OK, finished the playthrough, no more bugs encountered. I wanna do another quick runthrough of World 1 before declaring the patch done, just to be sure no new bugs were introduced.

I did see a bug in the ending, where the scroll text was acting weird, but this weird behavior is present in the unmodded translated ROM, which means it's a problem with the translation patch, not the MSU patch.

https://mega.nz/#!TEJm1a6C!s89W7PMEqY8hsg4GmeGmMNK32ffNFjv7xZBaSAapWdc

Save slot 1.
Enter Karnak.
Go to the weapon/armor shop.
Try to buy something (you'll be arrested).

When waking up in the dungeon, a short section of track 51 (the normal music for the area) plays when there should be silence, before track 15 plays as it should.

Expected behavior:
https://youtu.be/Z0RtcAi94bQ?t=8751

Pretty sure that didn't happen on my first playthrough, so probably related to one of the bugfixes.

That was a tough one.
I found that next to $80, also a $F0 is a mute command
I promise, this is the last RPG I will ever msu1 patch.

Find v18 in first post... there is no guarantee that this doesn't bug elsewhere, but I tested quite a bit (exchanging 01 for play command with F0 will mute anywhere, and when going to prison, excahnging f0 with 01 will play that track 33 (reproduces your found bug)...

... so it should be safe!

edale wrote:I have a handy little script that lets me batch-renormalize PCM sets. All I need to do is know what dB level it needs to be normalized to, and I can have it done in like a minute.

Can you share that script with us? In the last time there were many complains about some pcm sets being too loud (zelda, metroid, starfox). Would it work to make these (any) pcm sets more silent as well?

Conn wrote:Can you share that script with us? In the last time there were many complains about some pcm sets being too loud (zelda, metroid, starfox). Would it work to make these (any) pcm sets more silent as well?

Here's the script: https://mega.nz/#!TA4z0AzD!Bf4u6C78JVn_vPy4UAKp69bZ9_OwFIK7AyNYKAyTMRY

To use it, you need Python installed:
https://www.python.org/downloads/
When running the installer, there's an option to "Install to PATH", make sure that's checked (this will let you run python scripts directly in Windows, without having to open a Python interface and working in a CMD prompt).

There are 2 scripts, "Run_Me.py" and "msu_normalize.py" The only one you should ever touch is "Run_Me.py".

It's default dB level is -18 dBFS, the line to change the normalization level is near the top in "Run_Me.py", and clearly marked.

Place the MSU PCM files to be renormalized in the "In" folder, run "Run_Me.py", and the renormalized files will be in the "Out" folder when it finishes.

Much thanks edale, I think this is a really handy tool! Can you post this in the tools section as well with a new topic?
https://www.zeldix.net/f5-msu-1-tools

Better you open this thread so you can edit it if needed one day. It would be great if anybody can also make an exe file out using your scripts.

Conn wrote:Much thanks edale, I think this is a really handy tool! Can you post this in the tools section as well with a new topic?
https://www.zeldix.net/f5-msu-1-tools

Better you open this thread so you can edit it if needed one day. It would be great if anybody can also make an exe file out using your scripts.

It's actually not my script.

Insidious611, the guy that did the ASM coding for the FFVI Dancing Mad MSU mod, made a version of it, then later improved it after looking over the code for a similar tool Qwertymodo had made when he was renormalizing all the old PCM sets.

I just got a copy of it from him when I was helping someone fix their PCM set, and didn't feel like relooping or manually hex-editing the loop points back in after renormalizing the music for the guy (would have taken hours, and be prone to human error).

OK, I posted it here now:
https://www.zeldix.net/t2068-msu-1-re-normalization-script#33663

Much thanks for sharing

How is this FF5 going, is it a release soon?

Because you were worried about possible new bugs with v18, I decided to check the whole game again, rather than just World 1. I've currently finished Worlds 1 and 2 with no bugs.

Honestly, the only reason I'm not done already, with all the cheats I'm using this playthrough, is because atm it's usually a few days between each round of playing...

whoops, I should really be less worried. But it sounds great that it is so far bug free... Take your time

OK, one full playthrough completed, start to finish, with no bugs encountered. I'd say I have achieved the gold standard of alpha testing before releasing a piece of software into the wilds.  

Awesome, here's the patch v18 package with readme and so:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1o2XQfHcLWnFp6c8KJsa6HOKgLL51tQO5

Please feel free to release this project into the database. If anything buggy will be encountered other people surely will post it

This look good?
https://www.zeldix.net/t2070-final-fantasy-v#33706

Nice, I only added a video (spc) instead of the image, until a msu1 video is done