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Different revisions of Phantasy Star II are blatantly scratchy at times. It's
hard
to reproduce.
Vectorman was scratchy at least once.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 9:25
This issue appeared with the recent sound revisions.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 10:12
the recent changes should not affect this, but yes scratchy sound happen
sometime
when loading a new game, resetting or reloading the game should fix it, this
happens
in earlier revision as well.
that's why it's hard to reproduce, because it's not related to a specific game
and
it's not constantly happening.
you can try to disable High-Quality FM and see if it still happens.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 10:34
Issue 57 has been merged into this issue.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 10:37
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 10:38
The version before the audio changes has much more consistent (and not
scratchy)
audio. I really think Zombies Ate My Neighbors mucking up other games is a
separate
issue.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 11:16
I still need more infos:
1/ does it still happen when "High Quality FM" is disabled ?
2/ is it indeed solved by returning to the menu ? reseting ? reloading the game
?
3/ be more precise: what do you mean by "more consistent audio" ? Don't get
fooled by
the revision changelog, the changes I made only brings a very tiny adjustment
for
accuracy purpose and for later changes, there is no way it could be noticeable
by
human ears :-)
To me, the bug still happens with the same randomness in this version as in
previous
versions, some games have scratchy sound when being loaded after some other
games and
sometime they don't (ie I could not reproduce this bug two times in a row).
And it's the same scratchy sound when you load Castlevania after Zombies (which
is
ALSO a random issue and depends how much time you exacly wait before loading the
other game), hence why I'm pretty sure it's the same and one issue: it's very
likely
that it's not a specific game issue or an issue in the emulation cores but
rather
something wrong in the mixing or resampling audio engine.
It might also be caused by how Wii Audio DMA playback is configured: to keep
video &
audio perfectly synchronized (i.e to avoid any sound hicup or video
frameskipping), I
don't render the same amount of audio samples per video frame but rather output
an
average number of samples. Maybe this cause some issues when changing games, I
need
to investigate.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 4 Jan 2010 at 2:24
Test results from version before audio changes (to avoid Issue 1):
Issue 1:
The constant static (hiss?) of the audio that sometimes happens using the new
version of the emulator with Phantasy Star II or other games doesn't occur. I
think
the audio change is noticeable.
Issue 2:
The "Zombies bug" isn't limited to that game or even Konami games. Golden Axe
exhibited the same buggy behavior. Some games, including Konami games Rocket
Knight
Adventures and Contra Hard Corps, are always fine when played alone. High
Quality
FM: Off still produces the issue.
Reproducing Issue 2:
The first game that is played always sounds fine. Loading the same exact game
again
will produce the bug if it is one of the problem games.
ex) Zombies Ate My Neighbors, Castlevania Bloodlines, Golden Axe, etc.
Once the bug has occurred, Hard Reset will fix the audio. If the bug occurs
and a
non-problem game (Ecco the Dolphin) is loaded without a Hard Reset, that game
will
also produce the bug.
I agree that Issue 2 likely has to do with the Wii audio system.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 4 Jan 2010 at 8:56
I did not notice anything wrong or different in Phantasy Star 2 (just started a
new
game and played a while), maybe you have a savestate to share where it is more
obvious ? Or a detailled description of where it happens ?
Thanks for the details about the "scratchy sound" bug: the fact it does not
seems
related to "High Quality FM" also helps. Could you try the same tests with
Region
forced to "EUR" (PAL) ? Some games will obviously refuse to boot because of
region
protection but you can try to change the region after the game is started and
see if
it changes something.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 5 Jan 2010 at 8:47
Only a certain revision of Phantasy Star II (English, NTSC) exhibited the
static
(1989, ROM doesn't have revision number or any tags at all). It happens right
at
the title screen with r398.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 6 Jan 2010 at 2:09
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 6 Jan 2010 at 9:22
I tried again with all known revisions of PSII but did not notice any issue or
scratchy sound at title screen. I tested against Kega and the output is
identical.
I also figured the "scratchy audio" bug does not happen when the TV Mode is
forced to
50Hz (or the game forced to run in PAL mode), so it definitively has something
to do
with the audio sync method used in NTSC/60Hz mode.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 6 Jan 2010 at 8:35
Reproducing Issue1: (r398)
1. Load Ecco the Dolphin (NTSC)
2. Listen to the scratchy audio. Note that it is different than the crackly
audio
from Issue2. Perhaps Issue1 compounds Issue2.
3. Reloading/Hard Reset does not fix the scratchiness.
4. Load some version of Phantasy Star II (NTSC) immediately afterwards
5. Loading Ecco and then Phantasy Star II may take some tries to reproduce the
bug,
but when it happens it's very loud hiss/static.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 7 Jan 2010 at 3:04
[deleted comment]
I didn't notice any scratchy audio after loading these 2 games, tried to
reload them a bunch of time in this order to reproduce your issue but nothing.
Are
you sure you just didn't set the volume too loud in order to listen to possible
audio
"imperfections" and your TV setup can not handle it ? Because nothing is wrong
here
on my side, music is just fine :/
Anyway, I'm not sure to understand the difference between "crackly" and
"scratchy" audio
here, seems to me there is still one and single bug that affects some games,
that's all.
Maybe you could try to do some kind of video capture so that I can notice the
issue,
but otherwise, there is nothing I can do about "Issue 1" and I will concentrate
myself fixing "Issue 2".
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 7 Jan 2010 at 1:23
[deleted comment]
2: (crackle, separated)
http://www.mediafire.com/?4wdidygjn4w
Notice the little one right at the beginning of Ecco. Castlevania's title
screen
after Zombies is the worst.
1: (scratchy hiss/static/etc., constant)
http://www.mediafire.com/?zuh322vjntm
Got about three different variants of the audio issue. Ecco was hairy. A
couple of
the short Phantasy Star II segments were perfect (and thus short.) Phantasy
Star II
at the end is the real show.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 8 Jan 2010 at 1:22
Oh, and sorry about the noise. It must be the integrated sound card, because
the
headphone jack on the stereo does not sound that bad. I didn't want to alter
the
results.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 8 Jan 2010 at 1:24
Can you point me the exact time where Ecco sounds wrong ? I don't notice
anything
here. I can hear the weird stuff at the end on Phantasy Star 2 but it seems to
me it
VERY random as you reloaded it a bunch of time before it would happen. Did not
notice
anything wrong in the sound before that other than usual noise that are probably
releated to your TV output . Care to point me the exact times where it sounds
wrong
according to you ?
The other issue is the usual one that I can reproduce myself so nothing new
about
that one. The crackling noise on Ecco is from your TV, I don't have this on my
setup.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 8 Jan 2010 at 11:39
I should also note that I tried the same sequence (2nd recording) on my side
and did
not notice ANY of this sound artefact.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 8 Jan 2010 at 11:45
I assure you it's not my TV (well, because the audio doesn't pass through the
TV) or
my audio setup (Sony stereo receiver). This only happens in Genesis Plus GX
while
playing games.
This is the r398 OGG layout:
E1 -- P1 -- E2 -- P2 -- P3 -- P4 -- P5 -- P6
E1: very quiet, constant scratching; same little pop at beginning (from Issue 2)
P1: high-pitched hum
E2: very quiet, constant scratching
P2: perfect
P3: perfect
P4: quiet hiss that contains changing pitches
P5: perfect
P6: loud hiss
I hope your headphones/speakers can reproduce these subtleties. Listen very
carefully. :)
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 9 Jan 2010 at 5:40
Ok, I can hear the sound defects you are mentionning. The problem is that I
could not
reproduce this on my console, no matter how many time I try the exact same
sequence.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 9 Jan 2010 at 3:42
Now that I have returned to college, I won't be able to test for a few months.
Original comment by westonl...@gmail.com
on 9 Jan 2010 at 5:20
Ecco's crackly sound in the intro is definitively there, guess I did not wait
enough
on title screen before. It is indeed a constant issue and should be fixed in
future
revisions. Note that it does not happen when setting TV Mode to 50Hz or
forcing game
region to EUR so it's definitively something in the audio backend, even if it's
not
similar than the "Castlevania" sound bug which is random and not game specific.
I could not reproduce the other issue with PSII, tried to load both revisions
more
than 10 times and always got perfect sound. It could be related to the
'Castlevania"
bug for its randomness and effect or maybe I accidentally fixed it in my current
revision (not commited yet).
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 12 Jan 2010 at 10:10
I've completely rewrote the sound processing and mixing part which should be
now more
accurate and avoid any sample skipping or lag. All scratching issues seem fiwed
so
far, at least I could not reproduce them anymore.
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 24 Jan 2010 at 11:43
Original comment by ekeeke31@gmail.com
on 29 May 2010 at 7:57
Original issue reported on code.google.com by
westonl...@gmail.com
on 3 Jan 2010 at 8:48