Project: FF7 NES Upgrade

[Vanya]

I agree. It would be a great boon to the hacking community in general. ^_^

[Lindblum]

I'm starting to get some basic results with the Sanford C# MIDI Toolkit API.  .NET's XML API will be useful later on.  From now on any efforts of my own make to encode more songs will come through the use and development of this utility.  If this gets off the ground I'll discuss that project on a new thread. 

[tummai]

BTW, if anyone is out there is good at using FamiTracker and wants to help out, feel free to make NSFs and send them my way and I can convert them to FF7's sound format.  I'd do it directly from the Playstation or MIDI versions, but I'm not good at picking the best 8-bit instruments to use for different song parts, and it's a nightmare switching them all around by hand.  If I had a completed 8-bit song, to where I knew which parts were on triangle, which were on the squares, etc, I imagine I could pump songs out pretty quickly. 

Anybody wanna try just one song at least?

[Lindblum]

I figured out how to load a song when mounting/dismounting a chocobo, but in the meantime it'll be the battle fanfare.

I've noticed the music engine patch messes up the music and sound effects.  I understand that you changed the entire scale, but among other things it sounds weird when lightning attacks now sound like birds chirping (Chidori™ (千鳥)???)

When I open a MIDI I pick the best Melody channel as Sq1, Harmony/Accompaniment as Sq2, Bass/"Atmospheric" as Tri, and Percussion as Noise, remove the other channels or move certain notes to the main channels.  Each channel will only hold one note at a time, but MIDI can hold more, so you have to remove all overlaps. 

[Vanya]

tummai, maybe try asking around at the FamiTracker forums? There may even be some ppl there that have already done some of the songs. The NES music archive also has some traffic at their forums too. ^_^

[tummai]

I figured out how to load a song when mounting/dismounting a chocobo, but in the meantime it'll be the battle fanfare.

I've noticed the music engine patch messes up the music and sound effects.  I understand that you changed the entire scale, but among other things it sounds weird when lightning attacks now sound like birds chirping (Chidori™ (千鳥)???)

When I open a MIDI I pick the best Melody channel as Sq1, Harmony/Accompaniment as Sq2, Bass/"Atmospheric" as Tri, and Percussion as Noise, remove the other channels or move certain notes to the main channels.  Each channel will only hold one note at a time, but MIDI can hold more, so you have to remove all overlaps. 

It's possible that one or more of the "unused" opcodes that I overwrote were actually used afterall.  Either that or the sound effects expect the notes to stop in the 6th octave and are getting messed up when they continue beyond.  I'll try to see if I can track down what went wrong and fix it.   Thanks for telling me.

I'll try to finish up the Chocobo song too

EDIT: Fixed.  The sound effects weren't getting truncated.  Now they are .  Thanks a lot!  Let me know if you run into any more bugs with the sound development patch.  I'm still working on the Chocobo Theme.

Sound Patch #3 (Does everything the other two patches do, plus fixes the SFX bug): http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=db15991d3853f45abda4076e811714c8e04e75f6e8ebb871

[Lindblum]

Sorry, I haven't gotten further with music this week.  I've recoded enemy HP loading to be simple, fixed a glitch that forces Cloud to fight DemnGate alone, and I just finished a ton of work on the armor shops.  I expanded their inventory to include every article of defense (there are a LOT though), and best of all, after lots and lots of tweaking/new functions/replaced arrays, the armor shop now sells weapons!  Now getting a new weapon doesn't require an enemy to randomly drop one after battle.  No patch until I've gotten a few more things done.  Killa B might be right, people are going to want to translate it back to Chinese when we're done 

[tummai]

awesome man!  You're kicking ass.  Not to mention that you already kicked some major ass by translating this into English and speeding up the gameplay.  good work!

I've been working a little bit on the music stuff.  Here's my current version of the chocobo song, based on the "Cinco de Chocobo" version from the original game.  Tell me what you think:

Code Select Expand


FF
00 0E00
01 8E00
02 D200
03 0016
FF

CC DA  C7 FF  C4 6B  DB 07000000  DE 08  CD 0302 D8 00

02 69 01 C9 69 66 62 5F 69 66 62
02 66 01 C9 62 02 C9 66 64
   62 01 C9 64 62 60 02 62 60
   62 01 C9 66 69 6B 04 6C
CE 02 20 00

02 6B 01 C9 6B 67 64 61 64 67 6B
02 69 01 C9 03 6E 04 69
DF CE 78 00
02 67 01 C9 67 64 61 5D 61 64 67
02 66 01 C9 03 67 02 69 66
CE 02 49 00
02 64 01 C9 66 64 62 64 66 67 66
03 64 01 66 67 69 02 6B 67 68
D0

CC FE C7 FF C4 08 DB 07000000 CD 0301 DE 08 D8 00

01 C9 60 02 C9 60 5F 5D CE 08 A0 00

01 C9 62 02 C9 62 64 5F
01 C9 62 02 C9 62 66 62
CE 03 AC 00
01 C9 60 02 C9 60 C9 60
01 C9 61 02 C9 61 C9 60 61
D0

CC FE C7 FF C4 6E DB 07001E78 DE 08 D8 00

02 62 01 C9 03 62 02 5D 60
CE 08 E1 00

67 01 C9 03 67 02 69 6B
62 01 C9 03 62 02 66 69
CE 03 EE 00
02 60 01 C9 03 60 02 67 66
02 69 01 C9 03 69 02 5F 60 61
D0

Now I'm working on the main battle song.  Hopefully I can produce something good. 

Btw, there was a little bug in the last music development patch.  Here's a new one that fixes a bug related to the BCBD branching:
http://www.mediafire.com/?sharekey=db15991d3853f45abda4076e811714c8e04e75f6e8ebb871

[Lindblum]

I was never crazy about the Cinco de Chocobo version.  All the staccato stops take away from the playful pace of the original classic versions.  Impressive work and faithfully done, but, not to be an artistic diva, I preferred the continuous style of my unfinished version from page 6.  You only ride the bird for about 5 seconds in the whole game anyway.  Can't wait for the battle music though.

Edit: Why do you use "00 16" for the noise channel pointer? Isn't that outside of the song block?

I gave "Yakusoku No Chi" my best.  I plan to use it for the ending

Spoiler

which is the prologue of Advent Children.

[close]

Code Select Expand


FF
00 0E 00
01 76 00
02 EB 00
03 53 01
FF
CC C8 C7 FF C4 6E DB 07 00 1E 78 CD 03 01 D8 00 DE 07
06 64 02 63 61 63 64 66 04 68 69 61 02 C9 64 06 66 02
66 04 63 5F 0C 61 04 C9 06 64 02 63 61 63 64 66 04 68
69 06 61 02 64 C9 06 66 02 66 04 63 5F 0C 61 14 C9 04
63 61 66 68 10 66 0C 68 04 C9 06 68 02 68 04 69 68 0C
6B 02 68 6B 0C 6D 02 6F 6B 0C 6D 04 C9 D0
C7 FF C4 0E DB 07 00 1E 78 CD 03 01 D8 00 DE 07
06 5D 02 5D 04 58 02 58 5D 04 61 61 58 02 C9 58
06 5F 02 5F 04 5C 5A 0C 59 08 C9 02 5C 5C 04 5D
02 5D 5F 04 61 61 06 58 02 58 C9 06 5F 02 5D 04
5C 5A 0C 58 04 C9 06 57 02 57 04 58 57 08 55 04
57 58 06 57 02 57 04 57 58 08 5A 04 58 C9 06 55
02 55 04 55 55 0C 5C 04 5C 06 5D 02 5D 04 5D 57
0C 5C 04 C9 D0
C7 FF C4 6E DB 07 00 1E 78 D8 0C DE 07
06 61 02 5F 5D 5D 61 63 04 64 66 5D 02
C9 5D 06 63 02 63 04 5F 14 C9 06 61 02
5F 5D 5F 61 63 04 64 66 06 5D 02 5D C9
06 63 02 61 04 5F C9 0C 5D 18 C9 04 5D
5F 61 06 5F 02 5F 04 61 5F 08 63 04 61
C9 06 64 02 64 04 66 64 0C 63 04 63 06
66 02 66 04 66 63 08 66 04 65 04 C9 D0
C7 FF C4 4E CD 45 00 D8 00 DE 07
43 C9 C9 C9 C9 C9 C9 D0


Say, how do you test your sound?  FCEU/Nestopia?  NTSC/PAL?

[Zeemis]

I don't mean to bumb this topic, but I was always a lurker in this topic. Is it dead now or still in progress?

[Vanya]

I may come back to it at a later time, but for right now it seems everyone is leaving be for now.

[Nerd42]

I'm still around! I think part of this "pause" may have been due to the difficulties the whole site has had lately, and also the whole Crimson Echoes drama.

The lesson we should take from this is: Don't spam/hype our project on any other forums until it's DONE and RELEASED

[Vanya]

Let's get to work then.
If we do a little bit at a time, it should at least get somewhere.
I suggest concentrating on the Train Station area first.
What about you, Nerd42?

[Zeemis]

I'm glad I bumped this topic, er ...

[nonme345]

Thanks Zeemis, for reviving the project!

[Nerd42]

What about you, Nerd42?

My almost total ignorance of how to help with this project and my busy lifestyle / lack of time to focus on learning how at the present has not changed, but neither has my being a fan of the project ... I could help with beta testing on the PSP some I guess

[Vanya]

OK, then.
I'll work on doing some graphical changes to the train station tile set this week.
I'll use Lindblum's last patch of course.

[Nerd42]

OK, then.
I'll work on doing some graphical changes to the train station tile set this week.
I'll use Lindblum's last patch of course.

Any news??

I'm still totally interested in this project

[Zeemis]

As am I, you guys have come along way and have a small fan base to back it.

[Gilgamesh]

I'm also quite interested.