Hey Hi Iain!
Great work so far I must say. I'm still in search for a "perfect" solution for bringing more atmosphere to RPG sessions and Softrope looks very promising to me. (So far I've been using RPG Sound Mixer, but due to it's incompatibility to Windows 7 I can't continue with it till it gets an update ... which will be next year or so.)
I'm using Windows 7 x64 which is kind of the mom of "NOT COMPATIBLE" to most smaller software projects, but so far Softrope works quite well, apart from some crashes when using the export zip function and random crashes.
Nevertheless I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents of what I think should or could be integrated in future versions.
First of, OGG support: Somehow a big heap of my sound collection is made of ogg vorbis files, and due to the fact that it's a free codec it shouldn't be much of a hassle to implement it into Softrope. Of course I could convert my files, but doing that to a few hundred files is a pain and many PC games nowadays use ogg as a sound effect format, so it'd be easy to just snatch those into Softrope and be happy. ;)
Free configurable Hotkeys: They're much easier to use than clicking buttons, especially when in the heat of a game where you prolly only want a keyboard at your table or at least don't want to look at the screen every time you hit a sound into life. Not that some wouldn't prefer the clicking way, but both options would be nice to have.
Topic related default save/load paths: At the moment it seems there is one save/load path cached inside Softrope. The last one used for any save or load command. I don't know if it would be a huuge hassle to implement this but it would be cool to have seperated saved paths for each section. Like the export path is saved apart from the save module path apart from the load sound files path and so on. Most people I guess will have their soundfiles and saved projects files in different locations and having to browse for your sound files again after you made a security save off of your project is just annoying. Not a biggie, but I thought I'd mention it.
Sounds triggering sounds: This is just a suggestion and by no means "neccessary" but it'd be a nice addition. Sounds that trigger each other. For example you create a battle scene with clinging swords, hit flesh sounds and howls of stricken enemies. On a random based effect you'd have to rely on pure luck to have a swing followed by a hit followed by an "ouch". So my idea would be that certain sound sets could trigger other sound sets that are linked. That way realistic causality could be maintained without loosing the organic appeal of randomness.
Nesting: A further addition would be nesting sound effects sets into new sound effects. You'd create a sound effect that is often used filled with a few sounds and would be able to integrate that as a new "file" into another soundeffect. That'd declutter the single effects as not dozens of files would have to be shown, instead just effect sets. Also it would make reoccuring sounds reusable without recreating them manually. An export option for sound effects would come in handy here too. (Especially one integrating the used soundfiles in a zip+config file for easy sharing between users)
Environmental Effects: I admit this one is "stolen" directly from RPG Sound Mixer, but the option is simply too great and opens totally new dimensions. Each sound file or even whole sound effect set could be linked to a certain environmental preset like "Cave" "underwater" "bathroom" etc. the usual suspects. It'd add more atmophere and depth to the whole thing without the need to create special sound files for that. Also an option to change the pitch and or playing time of a sound would be just perfect for exactly the same purpose, as you'd only need a screaming man sound and easily could modify it to be an orc, ogre or goblin. Finally the option to determine the speaker where the sound should be played on would further enlarge the immersion effect in an organic environment. (Doesn't need to be 7.1 or something ... normal stereo would suffice but heck if possible why not? A randomize option here would be mandatory too of course, OH and a randomizer for volume would just be awesome so sounds again gain more dynamics.)
Such options of course make for a more complicated interface that might scare off newbies, so I'd hide those via an option, only to be revealed if an "Advanced" marker has been activated.
Anyways, that's just what came to my mind first and by no means bears any claim for completeness or any "demanding" nature. ^^
If some of those features would see the day of light some time I'd dance a little happy dance of joy, but I won't hold any grudge if they can't.
Anyways great work, and please keep it up! There're so few people developing such goodies, anyone bold enough to try should get a few hundred extra XP !
Greets,
Dukey
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