This lets you play multiple BGMs at once stacked on top of each other. It is another way to do dynamic music changes. In Soundtrack Manager, you can do dynamic music changes only by swapping between completely different tracks.
I wanted to put up a demo on YouTube to show how it would work, but the tracks are in need of a bit of refinement. What I'd intend to do with that demo is a feature I'm implementing into Jay's Journey: each playable character, when in the active party, adds an instrument to the "Ready to Rock" battle theme.
Let's say I was trying to do that with Soundtrack Manager alone. And let's say there are exactly 10 playable characters (Jay's Journey and Jay's Journey 2 combined have more than that.) This would require no fewer than:
* 10 different tracks for just one character present * 45 different tracks for two characters present (10 * 9 / 2) * 120 different tracks for three characters present (10 * 9 * 8 / (3 * 2)) * 210 different tracks for four characters present (10 * 9 * 8 * 7 / (4 * 3 * 2))
So 385 different versions of the battle theme - and that number only goes up quickly with each additional character! Clearly not worthwhile.
How many tracks would that take with Soundtrack Layering? 11. One base track and one track for each playable character. Adding another character adds one more track.
I guess you could do that. There may be a function or two that exists in both plugins. It's not really a scenario I support.
And yeah, there's no way to adjust the volume of the layers without my plugin, because base RPG Maker wasn't designed around having layers. (Except the Fade Out command, which I did overwrite to fade out all layers at once.) And... I actually realize there's a scenario involving adjusting layer volume I never tested. I'll... just check that real quick.
EDIT: Tested it. Found a small issue. Updated Soundtrack Manager to fix it. Thanks for somewhat indirectly making me realize it might be an issue. *ahem*
If you try to play the current base track at a different volume, either through Soundtrack Manager or the built-in PlayBGM command, it will change the volume only of the base track. If you use PlayBGMLayer with a layer that's already playing at a different volume, then it will adjust the volume only of that one layer.
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OK so I am confused, what does this do that the soundtrack manager does not?
This lets you play multiple BGMs at once stacked on top of each other. It is another way to do dynamic music changes. In Soundtrack Manager, you can do dynamic music changes only by swapping between completely different tracks.
I wanted to put up a demo on YouTube to show how it would work, but the tracks are in need of a bit of refinement. What I'd intend to do with that demo is a feature I'm implementing into Jay's Journey: each playable character, when in the active party, adds an instrument to the "Ready to Rock" battle theme.
Let's say I was trying to do that with Soundtrack Manager alone. And let's say there are exactly 10 playable characters (Jay's Journey and Jay's Journey 2 combined have more than that.) This would require no fewer than:
* 10 different tracks for just one character present
* 45 different tracks for two characters present (10 * 9 / 2)
* 120 different tracks for three characters present (10 * 9 * 8 / (3 * 2))
* 210 different tracks for four characters present (10 * 9 * 8 * 7 / (4 * 3 * 2))
So 385 different versions of the battle theme - and that number only goes up quickly with each additional character! Clearly not worthwhile.
How many tracks would that take with Soundtrack Layering? 11. One base track and one track for each playable character. Adding another character adds one more track.
I see. thank you. Can you add recommndations on how to merge this into the main plugin, or it can simply be loaded after that?
I don't know what you mean by "merge", but you should place this after Soundtrack Manager in your plugin list if you use it.
Merge = literally copy and paste part of the code in the main one so not to have two plugins loaded.
Controlling the volume of the layered BGM can only be done with your plugin commands, yes?
I guess you could do that. There may be a function or two that exists in both plugins. It's not really a scenario I support.
And yeah, there's no way to adjust the volume of the layers without my plugin, because base RPG Maker wasn't designed around having layers. (Except the Fade Out command, which I did overwrite to fade out all layers at once.) And... I actually realize there's a scenario involving adjusting layer volume I never tested. I'll... just check that real quick.
EDIT: Tested it. Found a small issue. Updated Soundtrack Manager to fix it. Thanks for somewhat indirectly making me realize it might be an issue. *ahem*
If you try to play the current base track at a different volume, either through Soundtrack Manager or the built-in PlayBGM command, it will change the volume only of the base track. If you use PlayBGMLayer with a layer that's already playing at a different volume, then it will adjust the volume only of that one layer.
Thanks for the effort mate. More audio control in MV is amazing to have.