I need some help with FMOD in terms of file pathing and audio quality

[lakhnish]

I had made a mod to remap the new "QOL" sounds to be their old sounds.

What I did was this:

RemapSoundEvent( "aqol/new_test/wood",  "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource")

It works and probably will continue to work in the long run, but I had many questions afterwards as I want to future proof the mod as Klei has indicated that they are going to add even more "QOL" sounds to the game that I don't want.

1) How does one determine the original file path?

I got the "aqol/new_test/wood" path from looking at the changes to the code, but how would you go about actually finding the original file path for sounds?

In the example above, I understand "aqol" since that's the new fsb file where the sounds are stored. What I don't understand is where did "new_test" come from, since in the file itself, I see a few different versions of the wood sound.

That also goes for "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource", since I don't even see a "dontstarve" fsb file as well.

2) How to figure out where the original sound file is located in the first place (namely in the sound folder)?

This is mainly in regards to "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource". 

I was told it was in the sfx.fsb and although it's there, I'm not entirely sure if it's the same sound or the same file that the game is truly referencing, as Klei tends to have the same sound duplicated across multiple fsb files.

3) How to tune the audio to match the original?

Assuming that the sound referenced above is the actual file, when I tried using it in my mod, the game does not sound the same at all. Instead it's both very loud, and in the caves, very echoey. I'm not entirely sure why this is occurring either. Either it's not the actual sound file or there's something I'm doing wrong in FMOD.

Here's the sound file I extracted and in the spoiler, an in-game example in the caves.

Spoiler

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Any help would be appreciated!

[Cagealicous]

On 6/19/2023 at 7:27 AM, lakhnish said:

I had made a mod to remap the new "QOL" sounds to be their old sounds.

What I did was this:

RemapSoundEvent( "aqol/new_test/wood",  "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource")

It works and probably will continue to work in the long run, but I had many questions afterwards as I want to future proof the mod as Klei has indicated that they are going to add even more "QOL" sounds to the game that I don't want.

1) How does one determine the original file path?

I got the "aqol/new_test/wood" path from looking at the changes to the code, but how would you go about actually finding the original file path for sounds?

In the example above, I understand "aqol" since that's the new fsb file where the sounds are stored. What I don't understand is where did "new_test" come from, since in the file itself, I see a few different versions of the wood sound.

That also goes for "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource", since I don't even see a "dontstarve" fsb file as well.

2) How to figure out where the original sound file is located in the first place (namely in the sound folder)?

This is mainly in regards to "dontstarve/HUD/collect_resource". 

I was told it was in the sfx.fsb and although it's there, I'm not entirely sure if it's the same sound or the same file that the game is truly referencing, as Klei tends to have the same sound duplicated across multiple fsb files.

3) How to tune the audio to match the original?

Assuming that the sound referenced above is the actual file, when I tried using it in my mod, the game does not sound the same at all. Instead it's both very loud, and in the caves, very echoey. I'm not entirely sure why this is occurring either. Either it's not the actual sound file or there's something I'm doing wrong in FMOD.

Here's the sound file I extracted and in the spoiler, an in-game example in the caves.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Any help would be appreciated!

So I'm gonna try to answer your questions to the best of my ability using my investigative skills through the files (since also I'm not a developer so these are just assumptions.) 

1) How does one determine the original path?
As far as "new_test" as name wise goes, I think they did that just because for name sake. That or because this might've been part of the beta client and they just decided to roll with it.
Now for the alleged "dontstarve.fsb", it doesn't exist because if you were to open "dontstarve.fev" with "fmod_eventplayer.exe" in the FMOD_Designer folder located in the Don't Starve Mod Tools folder, it includes all the .fsb files instead of them having separate .fev files. (I'd assume this is to make it compact and easy to deal with.)



2) How to figure out where the original sound file is located in the first place (namely in the sound folder)?
Going back to what I said in question one, to determine where this sound is under, you can see in the picture above a tab called Properties in the middle. If you expand the Wavebanks Referenced tab, you can find the specific .fsb referenced. As far as we know, this confirms it's in "sfx.fsb". 



3) How to tune the audio to match the original?
So, this one is a bit tricky since the Event Player doesn't quite point us in the correct direction. For the volume, your issue may be contributed to not putting it under the Category. Now, I had this issue for a while when I made music mods; where it would just be extremely loud and turning down would not work. So, I looked all over my project and then realized they were not in the correct category since they were outside of the category.

In FMOD Designer, there is a tab on the left called Categories, if you click on it it shows you the categories you need for your audio:


In this case, it's from one of my updated music mods. I'm thinking this structure is needed for all the sounds to work properly. If they are outside this structure, then they won't function correctly. (Audio being 10x louder, unable to turn it down, etc.) This may be causing the reverb as well, but I haven't a clue since I don't do many mods that change UI or HUD audio. Maybe try to put it under HUD in the set_sfx section in Categories. I know this because if you look back the FMOD Event Player, you can see the sound effect under that category structure:



Hopefully, this helped in some way. I never knew about this program until recently, but it has made my understanding of the way audio works in this game better. 

Best wishes!

[Cagealicous]

2 hours ago, Cagealicous said:

So I'm gonna try to answer your questions to the best of my ability using my investigative skills through the files (since also I'm not a developer so these are just assumptions.) 

1) How does one determine the original path?
As far as "new_test" as name wise goes, I think they did that just because for name sake. That or because this might've been part of the beta client and they just decided to roll with it.
Now for the alleged "dontstarve.fsb", it doesn't exist because if you were to open "dontstarve.fev" with "fmod_eventplayer.exe" in the FMOD_Designer folder located in the Don't Starve Mod Tools folder, it includes all the .fsb files instead of them having separate .fev files. (I'd assume this is to make it compact and easy to deal with.)



2) How to figure out where the original sound file is located in the first place (namely in the sound folder)?
Going back to what I said in question one, to determine where this sound is under, you can see in the picture above a tab called Properties in the middle. If you expand the Wavebanks Referenced tab, you can find the specific .fsb referenced. As far as we know, this confirms it's in "sfx.fsb". 



3) How to tune the audio to match the original?
So, this one is a bit tricky since the Event Player doesn't quite point us in the correct direction. For the volume, your issue may be contributed to not putting it under the Category. Now, I had this issue for a while when I made music mods; where it would just be extremely loud and turning down would not work. So, I looked all over my project and then realized they were not in the correct category since they were outside of the category.

In FMOD Designer, there is a tab on the left called Categories, if you click on it it shows you the categories you need for your audio:


In this case, it's from one of my updated music mods. I'm thinking this structure is needed for all the sounds to work properly. If they are outside this structure, then they won't function correctly. (Audio being 10x louder, unable to turn it down, etc.) This may be causing the reverb as well, but I haven't a clue since I don't do many mods that change UI or HUD audio. Maybe try to put it under HUD in the set_sfx section in Categories. I know this because if you look back the FMOD Event Player, you can see the sound effect under that category structure:



Hopefully, this helped in some way. I never knew about this program until recently, but it has made my understanding of the way audio works in this game better. 

Best wishes!

@lakhnishSo, I just realized the whole paragraph I left above was completely pointless; at least for this scenario. 

I just remapped the sounds as well and it seems to be working as intended. (No reverb or spike in audio.) The only thing is I didn't create a project for the audio. I just used the currently existing audio. Like take this bit of code from player_common.lua (Located in the scripts/prefabs folder):


it actually has a fallback for the OG audio. So technically you could do code like this without making a new project in FMOD Designer:


I remapped every piece of pick-up audio. I'm not sure if this is what you did or not, but it's working 100% fine on my end. Tested it in the caves too!

Spoiler

 

So, yeah. In short, this can be done with no issues. Although, if you decide to make custom audio for the game, I'd recommend referring to my previous comment. Could help in some regard. (Maybe.) 

Anyway, if they do add any new audio for picking up, always check player_common.lua for changes, etc. 

Hope this helps as well!

[lakhnish]

@Cagealicous Thanks for the response!

Yeah, what I did originally was just path the new audio sounds to the old path, but I got curious how I would do it if I needed to do my own custom sound and to resolve the echoing issue I had.

I'll look into the categories, so again thanks for the response!