   Opinions on how to handle background music?
  Hi.  I havn''t in the past had the opurtunity to work with a musician for any of my games until recently, and I''ve been wondering how background music is usually handled by programmers.  Currently I use DirectSound for my sound fx, but there are a number of ways to approach background music.I was wondering if someone could give me the pro''s and cons of different audio formats and how well supported they are by DirectX?  For example, I''ve hear that DirectMusic doesn''t play MP3''s.  How would you approach using that format? 
  mp3''s can be played through DirectShow. Personally, I would go with mid files. They are small, so you can have long pieces for little space plus they can be interactive.   Why do Suicide Bombers think they''re going to a better place?Don''t they know their going all over the place? ;Since this is on this forum, I say go with midi. Midi isn''t bad, and takes up minimal disk space. .bas   [sPiKie] mmorpg isnt hard in vb;  I can''t believe you guys are actually suggesting midi! It''s sound quality is non-existant, and with a PC Game you have pretty much unlimited disk space these days, take advantage of that. MP3s or OGGs for background music, period. ;  Well, hard disk space is cheap, but bandwidth isn''t. Ogg and MP3s do a great job of compressing sound (Ogg does it better, higher quality and is actually FREE), but when you zip up a 2MB .ogg file, it compresses all the way down to 2MB. Same with .mp3 files (or heck, even wave files). Since sound/music files are basically un-compressible, you ought to think about making the smallest possible files to save bandwidth costs (and download times...lots of people still use 56k!). ;  I don't think that's an issue anymore. I downloaded plenty of 200-300 MB demos, full games weighing in at 600-700 MBs. Half the new files over at fileplanet.com are over 200 megabytes. Pro developers don't really seem to care all that much about disk space, and NO commercial game uses .mid for crying out loud!   [edited by - Enokh on January 28, 2004 1:05:28 PM];  FF7, Ultima Online both used .mid files. ;  Using mp3''s in games is limited by licensing restrictions. I believe even free games are limited.MP3 is still very popular, but to be honest ogg, aac, wma etc. produce better quality and sound good on lower bitrates. A 128 kbit/s mp3 is the lowest acceptable quality-wise and then it cuts off high frequencies above 16 KHz. A 64 kbit/s WMA file sounds better or at least equal to a 128 kbit/s MP3. Plus using wma files in games, applications etc. is unrestricted. ;quote:Original post by Enokh  I don''t think that''s an issue anymore. I downloaded plenty of 200-300 MB demos, full games weighing in at 600-700 MBs. Half the new files over at fileplanet.com are over 200 megabytes. Pro developers don''t really seem to care all that much about disk space  , and NO commercial game uses .mid for crying out loud!   [edited by - Enokh on January 28, 2004 1:05:28 PM]Well, there is one area you can beat the pros in.Serious, if you have the option of taking up less space, or taking up more space, go for the less space option.  Especially if its not much work. ;quote:Original post by Enokh  I can''t believe you guys are actually suggesting midi! It''s sound quality is non-existant, and with a PC Game you have pretty much unlimited disk space these days, take advantage of that. MP3s or OGGs for background music, period.   O_o Ok, you''re teh 1337, but this is ''for beginners''. I''m not sure he has the ''skillz'' you have when it comes to sound uncompression.quote:I don''t think that''s an issue anymore. I downloaded plenty of 200-300 MB demos, full games weighing in at 600-700 MBs. Half the new files over at fileplanet.com are over 200 megabytes.Good for you.. but then again:a) Those weren''t amateur games. You wouldn''t spend long downloading one.b) I have 56k, so please kill yourself..bas   [sPiKie] mmorpg isnt hard in vb