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Author Topic: Sub hunter conversion (Read 33950 times)

Offline markerror

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Sub hunter conversion
« on: 2011.April.26. 23:11:34 »
Hello,

I have just discovered the "Enterprise side" of the 8bits scene. That's a real surprise for me to see
that this nice but uncommon computer has fans and a strong activity.

I decided to register on this forum and to post this message to talk about Sub Hunter. I am the author
of the AY music of the CPC release of this game. I have downloaded it, and I must admit that I have been
disappointed by the "sound side" of the game. Most of the music are not well converted, drums and
hardware waves don't sounds correctly. I don't know if that's just a emulator problem (not sure).
If it is not so, I would like to understand why (Dave seems to have similar capabilities as AY) and maybe help
to correct the music, as I get the "original" tunes. All music have been done under Starkos, a cpc soundtracker.

I have tested other CPC ports, and I have been surprised to find hackers' name (Mc Spe) in the Exolon
loading screen ! If you need clean releases of CPC games for your ports, you can go to :

http://www.cpc-power.com

Sorry for my bad english...

Yours

T&J/GPA

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #1 on: 2011.April.27. 10:02:21 »
Hello and wlcome in the forum :)

I converted the game :) Unfortunately the music could not be well converted, because Dave does not have envelope feature, and the program converted to 50Hz interrupt which is not enough for software emulation for envelopes, the AY music is using using very short envelopes.
Dave have similar capabilities, in some point it is better, in some point it is worse than AY.
Dave have
3 tone generator (frequency: 125,000 / (n+1) Hz. ), it has polynomial counter distortion, high pass filter, ring modulator option

1 noise channel which frequency can be 32.25 kHz, frequency of tone channel 0,1,2, some polynomial counter option can be set, and high/low pass filter, and ring modulator can be set to specific tone channels.

Register 7: enable/disable tone channel 0,1,2, turn on/off 2 6 bit D/A output channel, DAVE generated interrupt rate: 1kHz, 50Hz, tone generator 0/1 frequency.

3 volume control (6bit) for left side, and 3 volume control for right side ( if D/A is enabled 2 of them are D/A output)

And Envelope is not implemented :(

Thank you very much for the link, I used http://www.cpcgamereviews.com/

Offline szipucsu

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #2 on: 2011.April.27. 11:57:53 »
Welcome to the forum!

3 volume control (6bit) for left side, and 3 volume control for right side ( if D/A is enabled 2 of them are D/A output)

You mean 4-4 volume controls? There are 1-1 ones for the noise channel too, aren't there? (Though I tried only IS-BASIC sound so I might not be right.)
100 SOUND SOURCE 2,STYLE 128,PITCH 25.2,SYNC 1
110 SOUND PITCH 25,SYNC 1
120 ! Videos

Offline markerror

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #3 on: 2011.April.27. 21:04:34 »
Hello,

If the problem is only the enveloppe, the right solution is to remove them in the tunes :-). I have done that quicky this evening. You will find there updated SKS music of Sub Hunter. I have replaced the instrument 3 by another one (that uses a very simple scheme to sound not too badly). I don't know if the volume of this instrument is ok in every tune, as I have done the job under a CPC emulator, Winape.

To obtain binary files from the SKS files, just launch the GS program from the Starkos archive. The files can be found there :

http://tj.gpa.free.fr/temp/subhunt.zip

That would be nice if "Sub hunter Enterprise" could have decent music :-).

T&J/GPA

Offline Zozosoft

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #4 on: 2011.April.27. 21:16:48 »
Is a another possible problem: on the AY is can be used a sound+noise on each channel. On the Dave 3 sound channel and separate noise channel. If the AY music is only use one noise effect, then easy can be converted to Dave. But if the AY music use many noise effect in same time, then hard to convert.

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #5 on: 2011.April.28. 08:43:41 »
To obtain binary files from the SKS files, just launch the GS program from the Starkos archive. The files can be found there :

http://tj.gpa.free.fr/temp/subhunt.zip

That would be nice if "Sub hunter Enterprise" could have decent music :-).

T&J/GPA

Bonjour Hervé

I will change the music in Sub Hunter. We will see if noises are ok :)
Thank you very much :)

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #6 on: 2011.April.28. 08:46:58 »
You mean 4-4 volume controls? There are 1-1 ones for the noise channel too, aren't there? (Though I tried only IS-BASIC sound so I might not be right.)
Yes, you are right, there are 3 volume control left for tune, 1 for noise, and 3 volume control right for tune, and 1 for noise.

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #7 on: 2011.April.29. 20:19:22 »
I created binary from the songs, unfortunately GS creates ST10 format, and the game contains songs in AT10 format, I could not test it. Could you help me please, which program should be used to generate binary in AT10 format?
Another reason could be why the drums are not perfect: for emulating more noise channels the tone generators are used with 7­bit polynomial counter distortion.
I created another version, the difference is only that CPC noise value multipled by 8 not by 4, I hear that it is not the same as on CPC, but it seems to be better, but I do not have white ears :D

Offline markerror

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #8 on: 2011.April.29. 23:28:44 »
Hello,

Well, it seems that Axelay has not used Starkos but a PC program, "Arkos tracker" to compilate the tunes. It's a tool done by Targhan/Arkos that needs .NET. It can import Starkos files and export them as binary files for many computers (Amstrad CPC, Msx, Spectrum if I remember well).

I will check tomorrow the music to verify that "noises" are only used at a time on one channel.

Yours

Hervé

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #9 on: 2011.April.30. 11:53:19 »
Hello,

Well, it seems that Axelay has not used Starkos but a PC program, "Arkos tracker" to compilate the tunes. It's a tool done by Targhan/Arkos that needs .NET. It can import Starkos files and export them as binary files for many computers (Amstrad CPC, Msx, Spectrum if I remember well).

I will check tomorrow the music to verify that "noises" are only used at a time on one channel.

Yours

Hervé
Merci beaucoup

I checked menu music only, there sometimes 2 noise channel are active for a short time, but if the game uses only one noise channel, then we can use noise channel of EP :) Other thing, is it possible to create a good drum effect without using noise channel?
I will check Arkos tracker.

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #10 on: 2011.April.30. 17:32:43 »
I downloaded Arkos Tracker, it is a very good tool, I checked the samples, and I found that when the drum is played it uses tone and noise on the same channel, we are not able to emulate it with DAVE, because if we want to set a specific noise frequency we have to use one tone channel to set the frequency, if we do not set any frequency for noise at any tone channel, then noise generator plays 30 kHz white noise.

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #11 on: 2011.April.30. 21:29:41 »
I created two new versions for music (short musics are not ok yet, but if you like this solution, I will correct them), EP128emu 2.0.9 snaphots were placed into the zip file, could you please check it?
Both version works in the same way, the difference is only that noise volume is half of the other. In these versions the noise generator frequency is fix 30kHz, and value of AY noise register is loaded into DAVE noise volume controls.

Offline markerror

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #12 on: 2011.April.30. 22:42:12 »
Hello Geco

I will check this :-). I have just finished to "clean" the music, so now, only one voice uses the noise generator. I have too corrected some faultly notes in the menu tune. I hope like that, it would be easier to convert.

New files can be found there :

http://tj.gpa.free.fr/temp/subhunt_v2.zip

Hervé

Offline markerror

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #13 on: 2011.April.30. 23:30:23 »
Hi again...

I have listened to your test, that's better than original Enterprise sounds but does not sound like loud drums. I have made some updates to the music (except for the Bonus stage) that may help to have a better result (all drums in a music use the same note).

http://tj.gpa.free.fr/temp/subhunt_v3.zip

Hervé

Offline geco

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Re: Sub hunter conversion
« Reply #14 on: 2011.May.01. 14:04:30 »
Hi again...

I have listened to your test, that's better than original Enterprise sounds but does not sound like loud drums. I have made some updates to the music (except for the Bonus stage) that may help to have a better result (all drums in a music use the same note).

http://tj.gpa.free.fr/temp/subhunt_v3.zip

Hervé
Hello Hervé

Yes :(, I think the loud drum effect can solve if we interrupt the sound on another channel to set the noise for drums.
Which version is better versiona.ep128s or versionb.128s?
Thank you very much for your help, and work, I will try to insert the modified music into SH next week.