Enable MSU streaming music for Alttp

TheRetromancer wrote:@mwreichelt - you misunderstand - there are two separate 'flickering' issues I discuss.  The 'flash of black' across the whole screen when a new track begins is endemic to the SNES itself, and apparently cannot be corrected at a software level (I would LOVE to be proven wrong, though).  The 'top-of-the-screen' flickering occurs in a very few situations:  On the inventory screen, after pressing 'SELECT' to "Save and Quit" or "Continue", and a very few rare instances aside from that.

Ah! I did misunderstand. However, I still suspect that there might be a way around it if only because when my patch does work, it doesn't flicker when a .pcm file plays. Though, I suppose it's possible that I forgot about that ticket if you submitted it.

It's issue #10 on your site. However, your version doesn't flicker nearly as much. This one covers the whole screen, while yours covers the upper-left sixth. It's definitely minimized on yours.

I am a bit short of time, but stumbled a few minutes ago over the blind sound problem, too. ^^ Well, seems like it's fixed already. Rest is fine up to now. I start to not even see the flicker anymore ^^

Something I have just noticed: Going through the Castle Sewers into Sanctuary...when you finally enter Sanctuary and the new .pcm file plays, the screen should flicker black.

Here's the thing: IT NEVER DOES. Not ever! And come to think of it, there are some times and places where the same thing happens. I'll try to catalog every instance where this occurs, because there is clearly something fundamentally different about these areas. Maybe the flickering ISN'T insurmountable, after all.

Yeah, depending on the scenery there are some which do not flicker...

Using the map found here for identification:

http://ian-albert.com/games/legend_of_zelda_a_link_to_the_past_maps/light_world-1.png

Areas where .pcm playback does not cause screen flicker:

From: To:
Hyrule Sewers <-> Sanctuary
Sanctuary <-> Hyrule Field
Hyrule Field <-> Cave 19 (Wall Entrance only)
Hyrule Field <-> Cave 03 (Wall Entrance)

...it was at this point that I gave up. I'm honestly surprised HOW MANY locations don't 'flicker' when you enter them. This is doable, I really believe it!

The code for every theme Play is the same, so this cannot be the reason. I can only think of 3 possibilities why some flickers, other not:
- the theme is small and fast loaded
- the load happens when the Screen is black anyway (Transition e.g.)
- since msu load happens during vblank it might be that where no flickering is more vblanks are executed. Dunno.

As said, this appears to be a Hardware Problem. The code to load each theme is rather small and it actually hangs in this Loop
lda $2000
bvs $FB
waiting for msu to be ready. While it is in this Loop waiting for vblank and such the Screen flickers. Bsnes doesn't have this Problem, but since sd2snes is rh, this loop is necessary.
My first Version didn't have this loop and thus was incompatible with sd2snes.

This is also the Explanation why mwreichelt's Version doesn't flicker that much. He has a global code covering all tracks at one place; maybe at this place there are more vblanks or such. But my code has for every track ist own hook. Possibly there are code regions where the msu Transfer is faster. But, it seems that multiple hooks are necessary to Play msu flawlessly.
I surely have neither the time nor energy to rebuild my code to have a global hook with uncertain outcome. The only possibility I see is to minimize the Problem from the sd2snes side (either hard-or Software). In case Ikaris says not possible, I guess you have to live with it

I also think this appears in Drakon Version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aMipGg9TcU&list=UU9G7zkSqL0nMI5eNk0uN65A
e.g. at 3:04

Any News about the master sword?

I think I will post the patch now

Did not retest it yet, I fell asleep shortly after my last post yesterday. I think the patch is ready for V1.0 Fixes can happen for a 1.1 later ^^

Right now, I am 1/2 of the way through creating perfectly looped .msu files for this game. Once I understood how powerful wav2msu.exe was, I was astonished. I just finished looping Track 12 (Guard Summoned). Certain tracks, of course, are not having loop points created for them - ie, tracks 01, 06, 08 (though I'm not including this, as the .pcm/.spc hack makes this redundant), 10, 15 (also not included), 19, 29, 33, and 34.

Here's a zip file from DoctorDan1986.

I think this is the best orchestrated Music collection. What I would like to have would be this Music in perfect pcm Loop and the latest patch Version (that patch inside this zip is without blind bug fix).
Would you be able to provide this? I can make a link to this to the first Topic then.

I'm working on that right now, Conn. Just finished the 'minigame' music - alttp_msu-14.pcm. Naturally, I'll go through the game and check each loop after, but I'm pretty confident it'll all be correct. A side benefit of the looping is that I can cut most of the music files down, as there's rarely going to be any repetition, which will help with saving space.

Oh, and I am DoctorDan1986 on the other site. That's my file. 8)

Oh ok... ^^
That's just awesome!

I believe I've got it. I'll post the archive as soon as I finish compressing it and uploading it. I'll test the game through, but I'd appreciate everyone else doing the same and letting me know if you find anything wrong.

EDIT: Hah - looks like being able to cut out extraneous audio dropped the total file size to about half! Nice.

Okay, everything looks good so far! I'm compressing it right now. I did find a small thing in the code that's not a bug, per se, but could be changed.

When you're in Kakariko at the beginning and one of the townspeople calls the guard, would it be possible to have the "Guard" music fade-out after killing thee guard instead of just stopping abruptly? Hardly critical, I know, but it would sound a lot better.

Here's the entire soundtrack, with looping where appropriate!  Let me know if there are any problems!

Thanks I added the link to the first post. Has it an effect on the flickering?

I have to decline the fade-out effect request, sorry. If there is no native fade-out (theme f3) it is not possible. I would not know how to code a delay of the overworld Music to start after you killed the guards.

No effect on the flickering whatsoever. It doesn't make it better...but it also doesn't make it worse.

The Guard music was more of an "if you can and feel the inclination". I'm perfectly okay with it not being possible.

Just played up to the East Palace LW Dungeon, and aside from the tracks being a little too quiet (something I'll fix gradually), I didn't hear a single problem with the looping.

This is bloody brilliant.

I'm trying to use this patch, and I can't seem to get it to work in higan v94.  I have successfully gotten converted over to the v94 manifest format, so I know that I have a working game folder, I just can't get it to work using your .ips.  I followed the instructions on the .ips and expanded the ROM to 12Mbit before applying the patch, but when I attempt to load the game, all I see is a brief flash and the sound of one of the Hyrule guards taking damage, then nothing.  I also tried patching a headered ROM, and that at least got me to the title screen, but the MSU-1 audio didn't play, and then it froze before getting to the file select screen.  Any ideas?

Use BSNES v075, not higan.

nothing against byuu brillant programming skills, but his attitude changing his minds how things Need to be emulated is hard to take!

First he changed wav to pcm after bsnes v.69, which is a good Thing as themes can be looped. But also the XML needed to be changed somehow. Now he switched with higan to bml, which however isn't supported by sd2snes.

You can try to make a bml out of the xml if you desperately like to Play on higan, but there are also other Problems with this Emulator like this bml must be stored in a library in a quite well hidden Folder (where also the srm will be). I tried that once but failed... he's only making easy things unnecessarily much more complicated in my Point of view.

My advice is to use bsnes 0.75. You find it also inside the zelda3_msu.zip file.

As I said, I already got the bml converted properly, and it works great with the other msu-1 patch. However, that one has issues like not handling fading, so the sound goes out any time you try to open the map or walk into a building in Kakariko Village, among other things. Any chance you could post a hash (MD5 or SHA-1) of your patched ROM so I can see whether or not I patched it properly? I'll give it a try in the older version of bsnes, but really, it should work in higan (and I'm not blaming you for the fact that it doesn't right now, chances are it's something simple and I'll figure it out eventually).

mh, you definitively patched correct if your game works in bsnes .75 so try this first. For legal reasons we cannot provide roms here and I do not know what md5 or sha-1 is.

Since the patch also works in sd2snes which is Closest to rh, the coding should be alright.

I think I cannot help you out further, if it works with bsnes 0.75 but not higan, contact byuu. What is the reason you Need higan?

Herp derp, it was the bml.  I remembered to change the file size, but forgot to update the mapping in the ROM section to reflect the address range of the larger ROM.  If anybody's interested, here's my working .bml that works in higan v94 (using the latest version of the patch as of this post, if you use a different version, you should update the sha-256 field)

Code:

cartridge region=NTSC
  board type=1A3B revision=11,12,13
  rom name=program.rom size=0x180000
  ram name=save.ram size=0x2000
  map id=rom address=00-6f,80-ff:8000-ffff mask=0x8000
  map id=ram address=70-7d,f0-ff:0000-ffff

  msu1
    rom name=msu1.msu size=0x0000
    track number=1 name="01 Title - Link to the Past.pcm"
    track number=2 name="02 Hyrule Field Main Theme.pcm"
    track number=3 name=""
    track number=4 name=""
    track number=5 name="05 Forest of Mystery.pcm"
    track number=6 name=""
    track number=7 name="07 Kakariko Village.pcm"
    track number=8 name=""
    track number=9 name="09 Dark Golden Land.pcm"
    track number=10 name="10 Unsealing the Master Sword.pcm"
    track number=11 name="11 Beginning of the Journey.pcm"
    track number=12 name=""
    track number=13 name=""
    track number=14 name="14 Guessing Game House.pcm"
    track number=15 name=""
    track number=16 name="16 Majestic Castle.pcm"
    track number=17 name=""
    track number=18 name="18 Dank Dungeons.pcm"
    track number=19 name=""
    track number=20 name="20 Safety in the Sanctuary.pcm"
    track number=21 name=""
    track number=22 name=""
    track number=23 name="23 Fortune Teller.pcm"
    track number=24 name="24 Dank Dungeons.pcm"
    track number=25 name=""
    track number=26 name=""
    track number=27 name="27 The Goddess Appears.pcm"
    track number=28 name=""
    track number=29 name=""
    track number=30 name=""
    track number=31 name=""
    track number=32 name=""
    track number=33 name=""
    track number=34 name=""
    track number=35 name=""
    map id=io address=00-3f,80-bf:2000-2007

information
  title:    The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (MSU-1)
  name:     Legend of Zelda - A Link to the Past (MSU-1), The
  region:   NA
  revision: 1.0
  board:    SHVC-1A3B-12
  serial:   SNS-ZL-USA
  sha256:   fba061e26e228125bae0462cf71a03e1888fa7ee3f938e9330e57fe9b2c604ea
  configuration
    rom name=program.rom size=0x180000
    ram name=save.ram size=0x2000

Note that I haven't finished filling in all of the track names yet, because I'm still working on acquiring and converting files for them.  Those lines can be omitted entirely if you want and it will revert to track-#.pcm for the naming.

Awesome, thank you for sharing, I will post the code below the patch dl at the end of the first post! If there are other People wanting to use higan they can use this bml

@TheRetromancer
I just checked your Music, great work, man! Only, can you also store a track 8 (warp)? A 1:1 copy of the original spc would be sufficient (in case you don't have anything better). Didn't emuandco lately posted this theme?

My code to Switch to native spc only works with sd2snes but won't work with bsnes/higan since for some reason the error bit is only set in sd2snes.