System Shock 1 custom High Quality Soundfont

[67311af8bc6b0nintendoeats]

I think that if you look hard enough they are all used, except for the few that I left unlabeled. Some of them are very rarely triggered though, like Medbay C as I mentioned in the other thread.

I am a total MIDI noob, my only experience has been from trying to get MUNT 32 versions of these of a specific length. Everything else has been working with WAVs. That being said, it's a coincidence that we are having this conversation today.

I borrowed a Roland PMA-5 last night and have spent the day trying to get the GS module mode to work. It actually needed some repair, but I just got it sorted and recorded a couple things. It is my speculation that this is a compact version of the SD-35 (maybe with a reduced sample rate). If you work it back that would make this effectively identical to the hardware the soundtrack was originally composed on. It does have a little bit of clickiness on the synth that doesn't exist in the SC-55 MkII recording that is up on Youtube, but other than that it sounds awfully similar. Anyway, here are a couple things I quickly recorded through my Focusrite 2i2.
[Medbay A1 PMA-5.mp3 expired]
[Intro Sequence PMA-5.mp3 expired]

[67311af8bc9b4Deu sex]

I made a hotfix for Executive D 1 2 3 :

https://mega.nz/#!vogx3JZS!Wcso8uBeNTRmQXEe3TeVnauupDFZ3TxdbXUD2PiH-Q0

https://mega.nz/#!O1gATIYD!YoxR_cHbMrHyoRWt-AG8_FjYYTygfBbtKJwF4cFhnQA

Is it better ?
Normally both executive and engeenering reactor action should sound much better, especially engeenering reactor.

[67311af8bcb04nintendoeats]

Oh yeah, that's heaps better. Reactor in particular sounds hugely improved to me.

[67311af8bcc1cDeu sex]

I'm happy to hear you're enjoying it ! I think I'm going to take a little break and focus on other personnal projects before starting to work on beta, I made a little thread on Steam so hopefully people will see this

Yep I meant reactor not engeenering sorry !

[67311af8bcd96Deu sex]

Woaw what the heck happened ? since last beta update of SSEE now the game seems to have much better playback for the grooves, it plays like it was intended to and not weirdly anymore, with very large range note bendings and proper effects, did nightdive touched the midi files you think ?

EDIT : damn it seems like I can't rerpoduce it, I was playing an entire game in hardest (3-3-3-3) so I was rushing, during the grooves the music was MUCH better (not the sounds, but the way the game plays with them) I also noticed that during the grooves when it worked this way the dynamic music was not triggering action parts, it was staying calm and creepy, which in the grooves had a much better impact !

Not sure what happened here, it almost looks like the grooves have 2 "master states" and the second one (the one I'm describing) triggers in certain conditions, but I'm really not sure what those conditions are.

I should have fucking recorded man !!

[67311af8bce8dnintendoeats]

I actually haven't touched SSEE so I don't know. IME, even with a true midi device from the original game the transitions can sometimes be amazing, other times a bit weird. I would loved to have heard what you are talking about.

[67311af8bcf8aDeu sex]

I'll try to reproduce it and record upload on youtube

EDIT : I found how to reproduce it !! its VERY tricky but I think I have the pattern ! i'll try to record sound while I play.

[67311af8bd136Deu sex]

And here it is : https://mega.nz/#!S4JQ0K5K!wvY5DECSNFgzmbP4a5cPYuwzrxa74TUQkb4Wqx1m0P0

Sorry this time action parts triggered (it was a bug last time I believe), listen to the music, the way the musical effects are handled are very different, sorry for me shooting on everything I wanted to avoid action music as much as possible ^^

If you want to reproduce this behaviour you have to save in one of the grooves (try to avoid the biohazard one if you can ^^), then quit to main menu and launch a new game, then reload this save. after that it's permanent as long as you don't close the game.

[67311af8bd282nintendoeats]

If that only happens in the groves then I don't know what you are referring to. It just sounds like normal groves to me. Can you describe what you are talking about in more detail?

[67311af8bd393Deu sex]

The sounds are very different, note bends are way bigger and most sounds plays slower, giving them a more natural feel, if you play groves normally you'll notice it doesn't sound the same. I'll make a before after in the same audio file so you'll see.

[67311af8bd548Deu sex]

That's it : https://mega.nz/#!qpx1XZYT!cAD25jYoNljsbAb7MBekYHkezsr0GlYzjcNCQvnseJw

Timestamps :

- 0:01 becomes 1:45
- 0:08 becomes (out of luck, not triggered in the recording, but sounds better you just have to trust me lol)
- 0:15 becomes 1:53
- 0:22 becomes 1:59 (very noticeable change !)
- 0:29 becomes 1:17 (cool one !)
- (not triggered in the recording) becomes 2:20 (again sounds better sorry)
- (not triggered in the recording) becomes 2:41 (like another one but bends goes even lower)
- (not triggered in the recording) becomes 3:02 (god dammit i'm so out of luck, but again, original is almost static, modified starts at same pitch but bends way higher)

[67311af8bd61fnintendoeats]

Ah, yeah I hear it now. Interesting. Is this using your soundfont?

[67311af8bd704Deu sex]

Yep but the shifting also appears without virtual midi synth, and it seems to be happening in both enhanced edition beta and original, looks like we dig up an old DOS bug ^^

[67311af8bd80enintendoeats]

What is the alternative to MIDI?

My wild guess is that changes are being made to the channels, but under certain circumstances the game doesn't send the message to reset those channels.

[67311af8bd959Deu sex]

I'm not sure I've understood your question, if virtual midi synth is not installed, then the default microsoft gs wavetable synth will be triggered, its still midi, but it sounds like absolute shit.

Yep for the channels, maybe starting a new game after loading a save completes the midi initialization process, which is incomplete by just launching the game.
Really can't tell.
But one thing is sure, it's in the data, because if after doing that you exit the grooves and wander in executive, and then get back to the groves, the new effects are still present, they only disappear if you completely quit the game.

[67311af8bdacaDeu sex]

I had the very questionnable idea to become an embeeded systems developer in one of the biggest electronics manufacturers in my country, I'm not even sure I'll be able to keep the job because it's spectacularly hard ! Anyways, that means there's going to be a pretty huge pause on my mod, hopefully it's quite enjoyable as it is, I'll try to find some time to get to beta stage, maybe end of october / november, I heard people were able to inject their own compositions into the game for the re-wired custom story / mod, that's pretty cool !

[67311af8bdc55icemann]

Any chance of putting up a sample on Youtube, Soundcloud etc?

[67311af8bdd7fDeu sex]

Later but yes, I do have a youtube channel and video capture softwares, I'll look at this in the end of october

[67311af8bdf4bKenny Bremer]

This is great, thanks so much.
Here's a bad spot with the dynamic music.
It's supposed to be an ominous rumbling, but sounds like a hodgepodge of instruments and symbols that's pretty disorienting.
I'm attaching a gamesav file as an example.  It's a legacy gamesav so it will work with either the dosbox version or Nightdive.  (You can hear what it's supposed to sound like in DosBox).
Once it loads DON"T MOVE!  It's based on the position.  This is a very common effect: there are a lot of areas where this kicks in, but this little wall just happened to be a place where I'm close enough to trigger it and where I was able to save it.  Wait about 10 seconds and the background music will fade leaving only the effect.  Did you ever start a thread on Steam?  I hope your new job is going well!

Here's the attachment again in case it expires before anyone looks at it:
http://www.paula2.com/SAVGAM04.DAT
[SAVGAM04.DAT expired]

[67311af8be060Deu sex]

I'll look at it when I can, I had to change job because I moved ! It was a huge trouble.. but thankfully it's over now, I'll be able to look at SS1 again soon
I'll download your file and archive it before it expires

[67311af8be1ccKenny Bremer]

Great! I'm glad you're still interested in improving it.  What you did is really amazing.  With good headphones the game is so much better: night and day difference.  Music really can make or break a game.  SS1 did some amazing stuff with MIDI and with your update, it really brings it back to life and sounds awesome.  Thanks again!

[67311af8be36cDeu sex]

Thanks a lot for the feedback, and yep I'm still very much interested into continuing this, there is a lot to be done !
Sadly my thread on steam is no longer valid because steam removes MEGA links unless it's a guide, and I won't do a guide before at least reaching beta

For more convenience I repost the lattest WIP version here :
https://mega.nz/#!O1gATIYD!YoxR_cHbMrHyoRWt-AG8_FjYYTygfBbtKJwF4cFhnQA

EDIT : I'm slowly getting back to it, this is my twitch channel : https://www.twitch.tv/deus_rsf
If the stream has [Modding] in the title, and the category is System Shock, then it means what it means

[67311af8be59bDeu sex]

I have almost finished beta, huge improvements on some instruments and spatialisation for most of them
(for example Medical should sound much better now) :

https://mega.nz/#!jkohTIZI!CYdLIJ3o0WTn3gJqE7G54gA-sNHhhOB_fD2hTS29KeI

Instruments are "final" (beta stage at least) only the drumkit (drums and special effects) hasn't been touched yet,
it will be done this sunday normally, I'll take the whole day to do it I think because that's going to take time... Drumkits are the worst to deal with ^^

EDIT : afterall, I couldn't refrain myself to improve the already existing instruments too even further haha, but i'll wait to publish beta aka "faithful" release for that ^^ The drumkit is much more work than I anticipated though, I finished the title screen and started medical, hopefully the hardest have been done since there were a lot of bugs to fix in the drumkits (duplicated instruments for no reason, etc...)

EDIT 2 : In the end I made massive changes to some instruments, while still improving drums ! the beta (faithful) version will be a massive upgrade compared to alpha !

[67311af8be857Deu sex]

Pfiew, faithful version finished...

It was really exhausting to be honest, +- 300 hours of work in total on something I had previously almost 0 experience on, doing reverse engineering.
I put the link here to have fan feedback, if nothing is going particularly wrong in the upcoming days from testers, I'll create a real mod thread in "SS1 General", for now, here is the soundfont :

https://mega.nz/#!ztoSzATQ!V4_8rXCx3ncV8xYkKV7f4k3c6mnUoKWcHvm--hEZ_hc

Have a great time ! Normally every single part of the game should sound great as I reviewed every possible corner of Citadel Station !

Videos to show how it sounds :

https://youtu.be/PGQLG0VIVRA
https://youtu.be/8I56U1kQkqg
https://youtu.be/CdTjCZYKEeA


-> Kenny Bremer : I still haven't tried the specific spot though, as I couldn't temper with savefiles that much (very few saves for SS1 !) but I'll take a look at it I have the file somewhere on my computer !