If there are better versions out there (Amiga or Apple) just play those!

E.g. the early Space and Kings Quest game have an amazing sound track on the Apple 2 versions!

the soundblaster has 2 ways:
output samples
and generating FM sounds.

For FM sounds you could play with a music tracker to see if you get something for your liking.

Sadly, the gameplay in the ST and Amiga versions wasn't as crisp as on the PC as we/Rainbird were in too much of a rush to get it out of the door before the wheels fell off the whole project. For the PC, we had some breathing space, and more income for hitting more milestones, so we had time to improve the game in addition to porting to x86.

There is also a hint that this original PC version might see the light of day again, but I don't want this to happen with the nasty sound it has currently.

Ian

Yes, I was thinking of using something that lets me bash the registers and hear the result straight away - this is close to what I had on the Sega Genesis and it worked well.

Any recommendations? I want something designed for creating the instrument banks rather than playing tunes.

Ian

Have you tried Tandy mode? Maybe it supports the 3 voice speaker?

Interesting you mention that. It supports Tandy graphics, and there is some code in there for allowing Tandy to be selected as an audio option, but it's all IF'd out and the actual audio code isn't there. I have no memory of why we didn't actually add support for the Tandy audio, but it will have been some combination of marketing, contractual issues and lethargy. 😀

I guess I could add Tandy support instead of SB16, but is that going to be easier/better?

Ian

Hmmm, Gravis Ultrasound is another option. It's probably easier for me to grab some samples for most of the noises and use the SB16 alongside for constant stuff.

Talk of "ultradir" in dosbox confuses me. I can see I'd need it if I was using drivers or existing sample, but I'm planning to metal-bash.

Ian

If you don't have time to code from scratch, why don't you try some of the old sound libraries that are now available for free (even for commercial use) like AIL 2 (aka Miles Sound System v2)? It was used in many games at the time and is available from John Miles's website:http://www.thegleam.com/ke5fx/.

Thanks, that's useful.

I've also been playing some SFX in dosbox and capturing the DRO files, and working through them.

I don't think it will take me long to bash out some code based partly on what I've done before and partly on some stuff in AIL. What will take time is creating the timbres in the first place. I've played with sbtimbre and adtracks (wild GUI!) and neither was exactly intuitive, but I guess they could do the job.

However, I think I'll probably be better off using the DRO capturing technique with some python to parse it to my own format. I was pointed at some music/audio players by Vibrants, and can use their sounds as a starting point, but it's mostly twee noises rather than the whooshes and bangs that I'm after. The Genesis was pretty good at whooshes and bangs, so I expect the OPL3 can also do it if setup correctly.

Ian

gadgetmind wrote:

I recently resurrected the source code for an old DOS game called "Carrier Command", and it's now building cleanly from source a […]
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I recently resurrected the source code for an old DOS game called "Carrier Command", and it's now building cleanly from source and running nicely in doxbox.

When it was released in 1988, sound cards hadn't really arrived, so it just used the PC speaker. I'd like to add Sound Blaster 16 support (or anything else!), but would like to talk thought the ins and outs of samples versus FM first.

My current thinking is to use the FM synth for background (engine etc.) noises, and as it's similar to the chip in the Sega Genesis, I can use a fair few ideas from the port of Abrams I did for that platform. (I got a bit carried away there and even did depth cued and doppler shifted helicopter effects!) Basically, I need the ability to kick a sound off and then tweak settings for volume, pitch, etc., on the fly. I might do explosions etc. the same way, or these could be samples; it's the singleton nature of samples that bothers me.

I'm happy to start from scratch (but using previous 68k code in Abrams and the ST/Amiga versions of carrier as inspiration), recode everything in x86 assembler, bodge the old variable (and high!) interrupt system for zere crossing sound, and create my own FM "instruments" from scratch.

However, I don't have a lot of free time, so I'm more than happy to make use of anything that already exists.

All suggestions welcome.

Ian (ex Realtime Games)

Hi, Ian. Sorry, this is not related to your request but I'm very interested in getting the source code for any version of Carrier Command. That game is my favourite by a long way and I would love to understand it's inner workings from a purely academic viewpoint. My particular favourite is the Amiga version but I've spent many, many hours playing the DOS version.

I understand there may be copyright issues but it would be amazing to be able to see the code behind such an iconic game.

Thanks

Robin