Better Music for GM ScummVM (and DOSBox) games

[Raziel]

@cwadge

That looks and sounds so cool.

I'm no hardware guy at all, never soldered any electronics, but could probably activate someone to do it.

Thank you for that idea

[slx]

Hello, please help me! I can use it in SCUMMVM but how can I use this soundfont with DOSBox?

[sev]

Hello, please help me! I can use it in SCUMMVM but how can I use this soundfont with DOSBox?

This is offtopic here, you'd better ask dosbox folks about their software.

[slx]

Hello, please help me! I can use it in SCUMMVM but how can I use this soundfont with DOSBox?

This is offtopic here, you'd better ask dosbox folks about their software.

OK!

[Kirtai]

A friend and I had kicked around the idea of building a Raspberry Pi based solution that runs both the latest FluidSynth + FatBoy and MUNT as daemons. Setup a button/switch to the GPIO to toggle which receives the MIDI input, maybe even an MT-32 style LCD and a 3D printed case to look like an old-school desktop MIDI module. Unfortunately I haven't had the time to pursue this at all, but it might be a fun weekend DIY project for somebody.

It already exists. https://github.com/dwhinham/mt32-pi/. There's even hats for it with DACs and controls.

[cwadge]

It already exists. https://github.com/dwhinham/mt32-pi/. There's even hats for it with DACs and controls.

That's really awesome

[Raziel]

@Kirtai
@cwadge

Is anyone using that solution together with ScummVM already?
I'd like to know how hard ist may be to set up.

Also, what i don't really understand right now, can that Pi distinguish between MT-32 and GM/GS or will everything be fed into either one or the other?
Playing MT-32 games with MT-32 emu and GM/GS with fatboy on the same hardware would be heaven...

[Kirtai]

Also, what i don't really understand right now, can that Pi distinguish between MT-32 and GM/GS or will everything be fed into either one or the other?
Playing MT-32 games with MT-32 emu and GM/GS with fatboy on the same hardware would be heaven...

You can switch it between MT-32 & GM mode and there's also a way to switch soundfonts in GM mode.

There are hardware interfaces (see here for details and here for ones already designed).

There's also sysex support for changing the setup too. https://github.com/gmcn42/mt32-pi-control is a tool to do this but any sysex tool should be able to work with the commands here.

As for setting it up, it should appear as a standard MIDI device, like any other external synth.


Aside, this thread on Vogons shows some that people have made. The one in the second post is particularly nice.

[Raziel]

@Kirtai

Sweet, I already found the vogons thread and the mini mt-32 looks awfully cute...wanna have

Yes, I know about the manual switch, but is there any way to tell the pi hardware to use mt-32 emu on mt-32 games and fluidsynth/fatboy on GM/GS games on the fly?
Because I won't know which game uses which when I start it (launcher)

I dont think scummvm could do it since it simply sends the stuff to the hardware.

Anyway, many thanks for the answer.

Now I gotta find someone who can solder

[Kirtai]

Yes, I know about the manual switch, but is there any way to tell the pi hardware to use mt-32 emu on mt-32 games and fluidsynth/fatboy on GM/GS games on the fly?
Because I won't know which game uses which when I start it (launcher)

I dont think scummvm could do it since it simply sends the stuff to the hardware.

The sysex commands let it be controlled by software. The tool I linked could set it to MT-32 mode with something like

Code: Select all

mt32-pi-ctl -p <midi port> -m

and to GM mode with this

Code: Select all

mt32-pi-ctl -p <midi port> -g

There's options to select which soundfont or MT-32 model to use too.

I don't know how to integrate that into ScummVM though. Maybe an option to send custom MIDI messages when a game is loaded? (Since that's what sysex messages are). Or a per-game script?

And yes, the mini MT-32 is very cute

[Raziel]

@Kirtai

Thank you, yes i found the commands, there's even a build for Amiga

But that would only work for, as you wrote, per-app/game scripts, but unfortunately not for ScummVM.
The special SYSEX sounds intruiging...probably need to give away one of those Pis to a dev, so that it could be integrated...

[almeath]

My web browser is not letting me visit the FatBoy website because of an expired certificate. Hope everything is alright and it will be back online soon?

[Muyfa666]

I tried to load UHD3 in ScummVM, but I don't hear any difference. Probably doing it wrong. How to use it properly?

[jasonstubbs]

Hi @cwadge

I really like this sound font, and signed up to this forum just to say so. Definitely one of the most well balanced I've ever heard.

If you're still working on it, I'd love to provide some samples to improve the trumpet sound. It's not too bad for some pieces, but the attack is a little slow so faster moving phrases sound a little odd.

If you're interested, what sort of samples would you need? I dabbled with sounds fonts over 20 years ago when I had an AWE32 with a whopping 8MB of memory, but I imagine you don't need to be as frugal with the samples now. Full trumpet range is E3 to Bb5, professionals going up to Eb6 is not uncommon. I'm definitely not a professional, but I can hit Bb5 and have a studio mic...

Happy to do some test runs myself first, so as to not waste your time too. Back in the day, I used Vienna SF Studio. Is that still the best or is there something else to use? Any other pointers?

Note, I'm pretty much satisfied with your SF as is, but would just love to give back too!

[Subbi]

Catched-on this thread a bit late, but I've been using FluidR3 soundfont which always sound well to me.

Any experience with this one vs what is now recommended?