Emulator Questions

[Maj]

If you need help with emulators, ask here. Don't ask for roms.

I'm trying to use blip's modified FBA and i've got a few questions.

1) Is there a way to turn off background music? Kawaks has an option to turn off certain sound channels in CPS1 or to turn off QMusic in CPS2.

2) Is there any support for macros? Most emulators have macro features which allow you to map entire button sequences to one key. Some emulators support both rerecording and macros.

[Xenozip.]

What game(s) are you trying to disable music in?

There's usually cheat codes that you can use to disable BGM for a lot of games.

I can ask Blip about it.

[Maj]

You know, the typical stuff - entire SF2 series, entire SFA series, entire Marvel series. Maybe some random SNK games like Garou, Samurai Shodown, and SvC Chaos. Also SFTM if it's even supported in FBA. Thanks for the help.

[Xenozip.]

Blip says:

In the Alpha series there's a separate CPU that handles the music, which is why the cheat codes aren't able to touch it. For the Alpha series a hack would have to be created to disable the music for each game, since each is different.

What you could do is record the music (just the music) and then record the combo, then use audio editing software to subtract the music. You can literally just subtract/delete the music with some of the more advanced audio editing software.

___

So, Blip would have to make a hack for each game, it sounds like. IIRC there's cheat codes for the SNK games though. You can also try checking the dipswitches but I doubt anything's in there. I don't really have any better ideas unfortunately. Maybe some one with enough programming knowledge could implement a function to disable music the same way Kawaks does. I don't really have any better ideas, but I suppose you could use hacked FBA to create the combos, then transcribe them to kawaks for the sake of recording.

Hmm.. Blip's busy working and playing Zelda 1

[Maj]

What you could do is record the music (just the music) and then record the combo, then use audio editing software to subtract the music. You can literally just subtract/delete the music with some of the more advanced audio editing software.

Okay. Now that. Is outright crazy! I need to give that a try. Thanks yo.

Out of curiosity, why is there a period at the end of your name?

[Xenozip.]

It went from Xeno to Xenozip. with a period to avoid mistaken identity, "Xeno" had become far too common back in the day (oh so many years ago). I know, it's extraneous, whatever.

EG: I'm a big retard.

[Maj]

What you could do is record the music (just the music) and then record the combo, then use audio editing software to subtract the music. You can literally just subtract/delete the music with some of the more advanced audio editing software.

Can you recommend me a program like that? I don't even know where to begin looking, but once i have a name or two, i'll figure it out.

[ZenFire]

Audacity = free software editor.
take your two recordings (music only and music + sfx)
import them into an Audacity project.
align them PERFECTLY
Invert the music track (effects > invert) and play, yous should only hear the sfx.

[Maj]

Thanks dude. I'll try it out, hopefully tonight.

[Maj]

Finally got the chance to experiment, and turns out it doesn't work. Maybe there are (unsurprising) subtle desyncs, but the result doesn't come out clean at all. Here are two samples that i tried. One is from SNES WW, which is almost there but not quite. The other one is from arcade ST, which didn't work at all so i didn't even bother including the non-result.

I'm over it. For games that won't let me turn off BGM, i'll just mute the clips or not use an external soundtrack. Whatever, i'll make the final product look decent.

Thanks for the suggestions. It was worth a shot.

[ZenFire]

I took a look at the clips and yeah, the recordings are too imperfect to make this work. The sources need to be identically recorded in every possible way for it to work using the invert thing. Sorry man, I really hoped it would work for you, I guess the way the sound works doesn't let you get as clean a recording as you'd want.

EDIT: I think it's probably extra hard to do this with synthesistype music like Midi files of yore, cus of all the imperfections in timing making slightly different results everytime.

EDIT2: there are more advanced ways of doing what you're trying to do, but I dunno their names or anything.

[Maj]

It's alright, i've got other solutions. It'll cover it up with editing and it'll work out fine. If you ever run into the same problem and happen to figure out a good way to do this, please share. For now, i'm moving on.

[Maj]

What's the best GBA emulator for combo making/capturing purposes? The option to turn off BGM is a definite plus.

Edit: Nevermind, i guess the answer is the modified VBA posted on the TAS forums. There's no way to turn off BGM but i can find a way around that.

[Xenozip.]

Hmmm. I wonder...

Theoretically, anything that you have the CD for you might be able to pop the lid and then close the lid. Anything for the DC/PS1/PS2 you could probably create custom mixes, but with silent BGM.

[Maj]

Problem is, most DC/PSX/PS2 games let you turn down BGM in some option menu. It's the arcade games and cartridge games that are the troublemakers.

[Maj]

According to the Using Emulator Tools page on TASvideos, you can watch the commands used in a GBA recording by pressing the , key. Does anyone know if there's a way to compile an automated list of commands used in a movie? Cuz trying to open the VBM movie file in Notepad produces lots of jumbled symbols.

[desk]

I have a question, is it possible to turn off the energy bars in ST but still have the characters sprites visible? I only use kawaks and I've tried every possible combination and can't get them to switch of independently of each other. Even if I have to switch to another emu, just wondered if it's possible.

thanks

[felineki]

I have a question, is it possible to turn off the energy bars in ST but still have the characters sprites visible? I only use kawaks and I've tried every possible combination and can't get them to switch of independently of each other. Even if I have to switch to another emu, just wondered if it's possible.

thanks

ST's screen drawing routine seems to be pretty unpredictable from what I've seen. Like, if I go into the "shot factory" thing in Kawaks and disable the adresses that are for a ground shadow in one frame, the next frame they might be disabling a chunk of the character, or something. Other games don't seem to be quite as bad about this.

[desk]

lol I just read a post of yours on SRK and it made me think 'I wonder if felineki had seen my emulator question', lol.

So do you know if I can possibly remove the energy bars or would some hacking be required?

[felineki]

No way that I know of at the moment. However, I might look into it. SSF2 has bonus stages in which the lifebars are disabled, and most of SSF2T's code is the same as SSF2's. Maybe I can find a value that disables them and make it into a Kawaks cheat.

[Maj]

Does anyone know how to find MAME cheats?

Of course i'm talking about an older version of MAME (0.105) which i use for recording clips to make combo videos. I've figured out how to avoid or disable background music for a lot of games but i've had no luck with these three romsets: svc, sf, sftm

If there was a cheat to select background music in the middle of a match, i'm hoping it would be possible to choose something short like the "Game Over" music. That way it would run out ten seconds into the round and then there would be silence for the rest of the round. Obviously this would be tremendously helpful for video editing purposes.

Unfortunately i have zero experience with this kinda stuff so any amount of help would be greatly appreciated.

[felineki]

I haven't used MAME's built-in cheat finder much. It seems like it would be similar to Art Money or whatever but I can't member ever getting it to work.

[Maj]

Does that mean there's hope? I'm gonna take that to mean there's hope.

Okay, i have $29.64 in my paypal account. For every game you get this done, i'm down to send you $9.88!!

My fingers are crossed starting ...... now!

[felineki]

Ha, no need to pay anything, I'll see what I can do. However, I can't guarantee it'll be done quickly, because I've got a big project for school to finish up this weekend (which actually involves using MAME, ironically enough...).

[Maj]

No worries sir. Honestly i'm anxious to get answer but i can still afford to do a little waiting. Good luck with your project.

[Maj]

It took forever but a couple of guys on the MAME Cheats forum helped me out with SvCC so that case is solved. SFTM is still a mystery and SF1 is no longer a major concern but i'm hopeful that both of those will get figured out eventually. At the moment i'm more than happy with the SvCC success.