Golden Sun TLA MIDI instruments

[Pkmn-Master]

Hey Charon, Is there a way to get the instruments to loop exactly how they did in GS?
And how's the engine coming along?

[Rolina]

I've had my own script for extracting them as .wav files for a while now, Charon... >_<;   They're not exactly natively wav format either, a small amount of conversion is necessary.

This makes me wonder... do you have a script for the reverse?  I'd be nice if we had something that could convert wav, mid, or mp3 files back into GS's format...

[Charon]

Wav - Atrius has a converter. Inserting actual SFX requires a bit of manual work though, especially with tweaking the pitch and repeat.
Mid - You can do this either manually or if Sappy's compiler works on your computer, you can do that too.
MP3 - er... you can't import that :x

Unless you mean from GS to those files, then

Wav - Use VBA's recorder.
Mid - Use sappy to extract a midi.
MP3 - Er... you could convert a wav made from VBA I guess...

iirc Sappy 2006 can extract the MP3's and samples (and I think even the beepy boopy sounds), but since quite a few instruments aren't samples (namely Lead 1, Lead 2 and Ocarina but there's a few others) you won't hear anything for those instruments. Unfortunately Lead 1 is used in a lot of the game's soundtrack, as well as Ocarina, so I wouldn't recommend it.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

I don't think I ever really publicly released it, but here's my WAV to GBA sound sample converter.  It only does the basic converting from .wav to the data format the GBA uses for audio samples, you'll still have to do all the importing and a little bit of tweaking yourself.

.mid I eventually want the editor to be able to import.

.mp3 just isn't compatible with GBA's audio format.  Sure you could convert it to a .wav and insert it as a sample, but about 3-4 songs would fill up your entire ROM with no room left for any actual game data.


Midi songs are just instructions how to play a song, essentially just like sheet music.  It tells the computer what notes to play, how long, and when.  There's no actual audio stored in it at all, it uses instrument samples to replay the song using the instructions provided.  This is the same way that GBA music works.  MP3 actually stores the audio data itself as a compressed waveform.

[Rolina]

Ah, I see.  Thanks, this will come in handy later on.  Now if only we can find a way to get some of the tracks I want in there...  Sadly, I'm having problems finding wav and midis of the songs I'm looking for...

[dwkjohn]

Unless you mean from GS to those files, then

Wav - Use VBA's recorder.
Mid - Use sappy to extract a midi.
MP3 - Er... you could convert a wav made from VBA I guess...

iirc Sappy 2006 can extract the MP3's and samples (and I think even the beepy boopy sounds), but since quite a few instruments aren't samples (namely Lead 1, Lead 2 and Ocarina but there's a few others) you won't hear anything for those instruments. Unfortunately Lead 1 is used in a lot of the game's soundtrack, as well as Ocarina, so I wouldn't recommend it.

I am wanting to extract some of the songs as midi. (From there I can turn it into sheet music and tweek the notes for me and my friend to play as a duet in band.) My questions are: What is Sappy? How do I use it? And where do I get it?
Much thanx!

[Tetsuya the Azure Blade]

I don't really know how it works, but you use it to do stuff with GBA music. Where to get it? Do a google search for Sappy 1.6. You'll find it.

[dwkjohn]

Thanx man! I downloaded it and no problems so far.  Do you know a specific place where I can go to get help if I need it or should I just google it.