Yep, yet another CiV music thread. I hope this one isn't wholly a rehashing of previous threads, as it has something specific in mind; I've done some searching for a similar thread, but I haven't found anything pursuing this specific idea. So, here goes.
I enjoy the CiV music. I find it more nicely atmospheric than the music in Civ IV, although less all-around pleasing. The repetitiveness, however, is driving me mad. (In terms of the Middle East civs, at least.) (I also miss the age-by-age maturation of Civ IV's music, but what can you do.) By playing around a bit with the XML files, I have come up with a workaround that allows me to listen to the music from all regions, while playing as a single civ. The method "works," in that I'm hearing all different sorts of music, but I'm not sure it works 100% well. I'm getting lots of repetition, far more than should be encountered in, for instance, a total of 159 Peacetime tracks. I'd appreciate a critique and/or nudges in more a productive direction.
(I am not at all knowledgeable about programming, or about computers in general. I just followed my intuition, and my experience with Civ IV, in coming up with this method. I'm sure it is extremely clumsy and inefficient; hence my plea for help.)
What I have done is basically edit the [civ]Audio2DScripts.xml file, where [civ] is the civilization I wish to play. I'm playing as Egypt at the moment, so I'll use that as the template.
Now, this seems to work. I'm hearing tracks from Europe, Asia, America, etc., scattered in with the expected MiddleEastAfrica tracks. However...I get the nagging feeling that somehow only a small sampling of all the songs are being played. I just can't shake this suspicion, which is why I'm posting this. I could simply be experiencing a version of the classic "my iPod shuffle plays the same songs over and over" syndrome, and it could be all in my head...but I really don't think so. After playing three Marathon-length games, there are dozens of tracks that I have never heard in-game. (The Copland, Dvorak, and others that I would instantly recognize.)
Additionally, as I mentioned before, I'm hearing an awful lot of repetition, much more than I would expect for the number of songs that should be going into the mix. But then again, there is an awful lot of repetition just within each civ's music. Egypt has 29 "Peacetime" tunes, again, but I swear I just hear the same four or five over and over again, which is what prompted this whole workaround. Perhaps there are triggers of which I'm unaware? (But in that case, where are they located on the .XML sheets? Shouldn't they appear there somewhere?)
So, my question for all those who actually know what they're doing with this stuff, unlike me: is there something I'm missing? Or several somethings? Is there something fundamental going on that I'm just not aware of, being mostly clueless about programming? I wouldn't be surprised if there's something really basic and elementary that I've missed, like some other .XML file that governs probabilities of tracks being played, or something, but I haven't been able to find anything like that.
Many thanks in advance!
I enjoy the CiV music. I find it more nicely atmospheric than the music in Civ IV, although less all-around pleasing. The repetitiveness, however, is driving me mad. (In terms of the Middle East civs, at least.) (I also miss the age-by-age maturation of Civ IV's music, but what can you do.) By playing around a bit with the XML files, I have come up with a workaround that allows me to listen to the music from all regions, while playing as a single civ. The method "works," in that I'm hearing all different sorts of music, but I'm not sure it works 100% well. I'm getting lots of repetition, far more than should be encountered in, for instance, a total of 159 Peacetime tracks. I'd appreciate a critique and/or nudges in more a productive direction.
(I am not at all knowledgeable about programming, or about computers in general. I just followed my intuition, and my experience with Civ IV, in coming up with this method. I'm sure it is extremely clumsy and inefficient; hence my plea for help.)
What I have done is basically edit the [civ]Audio2DScripts.xml file, where [civ] is the civilization I wish to play. I'm playing as Egypt at the moment, so I'll use that as the template.
- Under Egypt's Peace Music section, I find the last <Script2DSound> entry. This is where the other entries from other world regions will be pasted in.
- Then I open the Audio2DScripts.xml file for a civ from each of the other three regions of the world. Egypt is in the "MiddleEastAfrica" region, so I need to open up a file for a civ from "AmericaRegions" (say, Aztec), "Asia" (say China), and "Europe" (say England).
- Starting with Aztec, I copy all the <Script2DSound> entries from the Aztec Peace Music section, and then I paste them into the Egypt section, under the last Egypt track.
- Same for the China and England entries.
- Then, I go back and change the <Script ID>s for each new track, renaming them from "Song_Aztec_Peace" (for example) to "Song_Egypt_Peace", and then incrementing the song number in order to follow Egypt's order without missing or repeating any numbers. (The last "Song_Egypt_Peace" track is number 29, so I make the first Aztec song into "Song_Egypt_Peace_30".)
- I figured that I don't need to change the <SoundIDs>, since the references will still follow the same calling scheme. Ditto for actually shuffling the music files around.
- Similarly, it seemed unnecessary to change any of the "RegionsAudioDefines.xml" files, since these seem to link the <SoundIDs> to the actual files, and the playing-around that I'm doing is one level above, changing the <ScriptIDs> without touching the <SoundIDs>.
- Then I repeated this same procedure for the War songs.
Now, this seems to work. I'm hearing tracks from Europe, Asia, America, etc., scattered in with the expected MiddleEastAfrica tracks. However...I get the nagging feeling that somehow only a small sampling of all the songs are being played. I just can't shake this suspicion, which is why I'm posting this. I could simply be experiencing a version of the classic "my iPod shuffle plays the same songs over and over" syndrome, and it could be all in my head...but I really don't think so. After playing three Marathon-length games, there are dozens of tracks that I have never heard in-game. (The Copland, Dvorak, and others that I would instantly recognize.)
Additionally, as I mentioned before, I'm hearing an awful lot of repetition, much more than I would expect for the number of songs that should be going into the mix. But then again, there is an awful lot of repetition just within each civ's music. Egypt has 29 "Peacetime" tunes, again, but I swear I just hear the same four or five over and over again, which is what prompted this whole workaround. Perhaps there are triggers of which I'm unaware? (But in that case, where are they located on the .XML sheets? Shouldn't they appear there somewhere?)
So, my question for all those who actually know what they're doing with this stuff, unlike me: is there something I'm missing? Or several somethings? Is there something fundamental going on that I'm just not aware of, being mostly clueless about programming? I wouldn't be surprised if there's something really basic and elementary that I've missed, like some other .XML file that governs probabilities of tracks being played, or something, but I haven't been able to find anything like that.
Many thanks in advance!
