Utility to rip chiptunes

[roflmao]

Is there a utility to rip chiptunes from tg16/pce roms and convert them to mp3s?  Maybe there's an emulator that does this?  I've heard of TurboRip, but from what I gather that only works with CD based games.  I was playing some Dragon Spirit this morning and was really hoping to listen to the game music while I work. There are a ton of other games I'd like to listen to as well.  I tried searching the forums, as I'm sure this has been discussed in the past, but didn't come up with much.

[nodtveidt]

http://www.zophar.net/music/hes.html

[roflmao]

http://www.zophar.net/music/hes.html

Sweet.  Can you recommend a player that can convert the tracks to mp3 or burn them to an audio CD?  I see they recommend a player, but the developer's website isn't loading up for me.  Ideally, I'd just be able to add these tracks to the rest of my music library so I don't have to open up a separate player just for these tracks.

[nodtveidt]

I always used a winamp .HES plugin and the disk writer. I haven't done it for years though, since I stopped using winamp, so I dunno how well that idea works anymore.

[roflmao]

Ah, groovy.  Yeah, I haven't used winamp in ages.  I'll try to dig into it later this afternoon/evening and report back with my findings.  Thanks!

[spenoza]

It still works. It is what I use. There's a NEZplug variant out there that appears to be pretty accurate with HES files. There are a couple different releases with different levels of accuracy, but there's one that's actually pretty close, and a bit better than the rest. Can't remember the version number.

[roflmao]

Well I've done a bit of tinkering this evening and I've come up with a method to convert HES to MP3 (and WAV in the process), but it's not a very efficient process so I'm going to continue to tinker...  In case I don't update this for awhile, here's what I'm doing in case anyone else wants to do this themselves.

I installed the Lite version of Winamp (currently 5.6): http://www.winamp.com/media-player/en

Then installed the latest version of NEZplug (0.9.4.8, which hasn't been updated since 2002 so I'm guessing it isn't going to see any newer releases): http://nezplug.sourceforge.net/

This configuration allows me to play the HES files The Old Rover linked to here: http://www.zophar.net/music/hes.html

In Winamp, I went to Options > Preferences > Output and set it to save the tracks in the playlist as WAV files.

I already had Exact Audio Copy installed, but you can get it here: http://www.exactaudiocopy.de/
Note: You'll also have to download and install a LAME dll for it to convert wav files to mp3 (link is on the EAC site).

Once the files were converted, I used MP3TAG to tag each of the tracks. http://www.mp3tag.de/en/download.html

So as you can see, the process leaves something to be desired, but it works.  I'm going to see if I can come up with a plugin for Winamp that will allow me to export the HES files directly as mp3s with the metadata intact so I don't have to add it manually.

I now have the Dragon Spirit soundtrack as mp3s. If anyone would like them, shoot me a pm and I'll send it your way.

[spenoza]

Here is a link to a newer modification of NEZPLUG that sounds better with HES files.

http://offgao.no-ip.org/program/nezplug++.html

Well, it's not the DL link, but the DL page. It's Japanese, but you can figure it out. The latest update was December, so it's continuing to get refinement. I'd like to know how folks think it holds up to Mednafen.

[nat]

There used to be a thread here years ago that had a ton of Turbo chiptune soundtracks already in MP3 format. I think ParanoiaDragon was maintaining it, although I could be wrong.

EDIT: Yeah, here it is. Still stickied right at the top of the Chit-Chat area. Looks like you've already found it, though.

[roflmao]

Here is a link to a newer modification of NEZPLUG that sounds better with HES files.

http://offgao.no-ip.org/program/nezplug++.html

Well, it's not the DL link, but the DL page. It's Japanese, but you can figure it out. The latest update was December, so it's continuing to get refinement. I'd like to know how folks think it holds up to Mednafen.

Cool, I'll check that out.

There used to be a thread here years ago that had a ton of Turbo chiptune soundtracks already in MP3 format. I think ParanoiaDragon was maintaining it, although I could be wrong.

EDIT: Yeah, here it is. Still stickied right at the top of the Chit-Chat area.

Yeah, I saw that and posted a request about a month ago and since there wasn't any response I figured I'd try to do it myself.

I've updated my process slightly - I figured out how to export directly to mp3 from Winamp, so I don't have to convert WAV to MP3 (it was just a checkbox in Winamp's Options > Preferences > Output > Disk Writer settings), but I still need to go in and add the tag info.  I'll still look for a better way to do this.

Is there a way to create my own HES files using an emulator?  There are some games that I didn't see on zophar.net that I'd like to have the music for.

Also, I now have Aero Blasters converted, which I'd be happy to share.

[roflmao]

Update: More will be on the way, but these are the ones I've converted tonight to MP3:

Dragon Spirit
Aero Blasters
Alien Crush
Batman
Cyber Core

I'm happy to share the love, so if anyone's interested, please let me know.

[Bonknuts]

Is there a way to create my own HES files using an emulator?

You need a debugger and assembly experience to rip them into HES format. Because the format is basically a hacked up rom (it runs the cpu code and music engine of the original game - with some modification).

 There's the VGM format that's now spec'd for PCE, but I don't know of any emulator that supports it (outputs to it). If it did, you rip game music yourself with ASM and such knowledge.

[NightWolve]

This subject came up in the MagicEngine forums not too long ago. The only idea I thought of was the use of the YAME emulator (as soon as you start this up, goto Settings -> Language and select English) - it has the ability to record whatever music is playing during your gameplay in either RAW or WAVE format. Selecting RAW while the PSG music that you want is playing will dump the PSG bytes to whatever file name you entered. The unknown question is, given the byte stream of audio data that is now in that file, will these HES or whatever Winamp plugins play it ?? I guess based on what Bonknuts is saying, probably not... but there ya go, it's an option to explore.

Of course, if you have only a few games in mind, are willing to take the time, and want the audio in MP3 anyway, then just play the game while recording what you want in WAVE format and convert to MP3! To start recording, select 'File' -> 'Record Sound' -> 'WAV Format', enter file name... Then to stop recording, repeat (go back to the same menu) and select the last 'Stop' menu item, etc. Case closed! If the ROM doesn't load, try all versions. E.g. "Blazing Lazers (U).pce" doesn't load, but "Blazing Lazers (U) [h1].pce" DOES! If no version of the ROM loads, well, you're out of luck; YAME's compatibility is not that of say MagicEngine and I don't think it's ever been updated beyond the version I just linked for you.

EDIT: Oh, you mentioned my TurboRip utility. No, that is for ripping CD-Rom games into ISO/WAV/CUE image file sets (you'd only get redbook audio tracks out with that). That can't help you here.

EDITx2: I searched for the Ootake PCE emulator's website (it was an emulator David Shadoff told me about ages ago I recall) and I found it! Version 2.65 was released not more than a couple of weeks ago and it's Windows7 tested! Anyway, it too has sound recording features, far more advanced but because it's a Japanese emulator, there's a little language barrier, but the Menu bar is in English at least... Links:

http://www.ouma.jp/ootake/
http://www.ouma.jp/cgi-bin/downOotake/downsue.cgi?Ootake265.exe

[grahf]

I found the spec sheet for the VGM format which details HuC6280 support, but haven't been able to find any tracks in that format. Do you guys happen to know where I could get a sample? I'd like to take a look at the file.

[roflmao]

This subject came up in the MagicEngine forums not too long ago. The only idea I thought of was the use of the YAME emulator (as soon as you start this up, goto Settings -> Language and select English) - it has the ability to record whatever music is playing during your gameplay in either RAW or WAVE format. Selecting RAW while the PSG music that you want is playing will dump the PSG bytes to whatever file name you entered. The unknown question is, given the byte stream of audio data that is now in that file, will these HES or whatever Winamp plugins play it ?? I guess based on what Bonknuts is saying, probably not... but there ya go, it's an option to explore. Of course, if you have only a few games in mind, are willing to take the time, and want the audio in MP3 anyway, then just play the game while recording what you want in WAVE format (you just close the emulator to stop recording or go back to the same selection in the File menu and it'll now say stop instead of start, etc.) and convert to MP3! Case closed.

EDIT: Oh, you mentioned my TurboRip utility. No, that is for ripping CD-Rom games into ISO/WAV/CUE image file sets (only redbook audio tracks). That can't help you here.

Thanks, this'll help out with the games that I couldn't find .hes files for.  I've converted about 30 Turbo/PCE hucards' soundtracks to mp3, but there are still a bunch I couldn't find so this should work well.  Thanks!