Replacing audio in Sega Saturn

[velcrowe]

I'm currently attempting to replace audio files for the Sega Saturn, this is my first time even attempting to mod and I have never coded before. The conclusion I have come to us to extract the bin and manually replace the audio files already in the game. I then compile the files into an iso and then back into a bin/cue file(s). I am aware that the game won't run if I don't replace the ip.bin file, but I'm unsure if I am doing anything right at all.

I know there are methods to using mkisofs in linux, but I'm unsure how to do it that way.

 

[mgfcortez]

I would also like to do this, but have done a lot of searching and it seems it can't be done with the game I want to do this with. Dracula X NITM. I would like to replace the voice files. but I read even just playing them they come out messed up, much less replacing them. has anything change with this game? most posts are very old on this, here and on other websites. since two people are asking maybe someone will help.

Edit I did this for DXC on PSP here is a copy and paste of my post of it. so as people can see this would be very cool to do for the Saturn.


Castlevania Symphony of the Night voice mod psx Dub English for PSP Dracula X Chronicles
these are the voice files only in PSP format, just open up UMDGen and load your ISO you ripped from your game of Dracula X Chronicles or gotten by other means....
rip the whole game to your hard drive . close UMDGen, copy these voice files to the matching folder on your hard drive to replace the AT3 PSP files in XA folder. then open UMDGen again drag the whole modified directory in to UMDGen, all the folders inside PSP_GAME you ripped earlier and replaced with new voice files. now save as, uncompressed ISO.
and you are ready to play Castlevania Symphony of the Night the way it should be played with the best Dub

hope you enjoy, I've only tested uncompressed ISO but you maybe able to save it as other formats, been playing it and enjoying it again.

now sadly I can not edit the sound effects so you will have to hear Alucard say what with the PSP voice. far as unrecord voices I cloned voice files for the fight with Maria. so this is pretty much the full Dub maybe a few files I can't mess with like sound effects but, I even cloned the demon and fairy to give the new demon and fairy voices and since I don't have much audio it sounds different giving them their own voice lol anyway please reply after playing it and let me know how you like the few new voices.

Edit* just had the fight with Maria, everything been working like it should

I record the talking.


25.49 MB file on MEGA


EDIT*
BTW I forgot one of the biggest parts for the psx Dub. I am the wind. so here is the AT3. just put this in the same 2 folders PS_BGM as you found PS_OP_NA.at3 in, and you will have I am the wind. enjoy.
4.24 MB file on MEGA

 

[velcrowe]

I would also like to do this, but have done a lot of searching and it seems it can't be done with the game I want to do this with. Dracula X NITM. I would like to replace the voice files. but I read even just playing them they come out messed up, much less replacing them. has anything change with this game? most posts are very old on this, here and on other websites. since two people are asking maybe someone will help.

Edit I did this for DXC on PSP here is a copy and paste of my post of it. so as people can see this would be very cool to do for the Saturn.


Castlevania Symphony of the Night voice mod psx Dub English for PSP Dracula X Chronicles
these are the voice files only in PSP format, just open up UMDGen and load your ISO you ripped from your game of Dracula X Chronicles or gotten by other means....
rip the whole game to your hard drive . close UMDGen, copy these voice files to the matching folder on your hard drive to replace the AT3 PSP files in XA folder. then open UMDGen again drag the whole modified directory in to UMDGen, all the folders inside PSP_GAME you ripped earlier and replaced with new voice files. now save as, uncompressed ISO.
and you are ready to play Castlevania Symphony of the Night the way it should be played with the best Dub

hope you enjoy, I've only tested uncompressed ISO but you maybe able to save it as other formats, been playing it and enjoying it again.

now sadly I can not edit the sound effects so you will have to hear Alucard say what with the PSP voice. far as unrecord voices I cloned voice files for the fight with Maria. so this is pretty much the full Dub maybe a few files I can't mess with like sound effects but, I even cloned the demon and fairy to give the new demon and fairy voices and since I don't have much audio it sounds different giving them their own voice lol anyway please reply after playing it and let me know how you like the few new voices.

Edit* just had the fight with Maria, everything been working like it should

I record the talking.


25.49 MB file on MEGA


EDIT*
BTW I forgot one of the biggest parts for the psx Dub. I am the wind. so here is the AT3. just put this in the same 2 folders PS_BGM as you found PS_OP_NA.at3 in, and you will have I am the wind. enjoy.
4.24 MB file on MEGA

Good work on it! I'm actually trying to the the exact same thing, replacing the voice files, but in the Revolutionary Girl Utena game. I think it's more than just a file replacement, because every time I've done it with cdmage it either has no voices or the japanese audio is still there.

 

[mgfcortez]

well, when I replace the music on SOTN on the PSP. if you don't change both the music track in the English folder and the Japanese folder, if you only replace one location then the Music track will not change in game. it needs both files to be replaced to change the audio for the music. also, some of the voices have its double in the same folder. of course, PSP is not Sega Saturn. but it could be a file placement in Sega as well. so might want to find the other place the voices maybe at. and try to replace them both. like I said this is only my experience with PSP. I don't know about Sega Saturn. but might be the same copy file storing system kind of thing going on.

 

[velcrowe]

I did some digging and there is a file like that, though it just seems to be a container to tell the music when to play. The issue I'm running into is that the extention is .DA and I can't find anything that will open such a file

 

[mgfcortez]

yeah I don't know myself. so little info out there. and sadly no one wants to help looks like sadly. I'll post if I find anything out down the road.

 

[ShadowMask]

I found the PCM audio in the SD folder on disc. You would import it into audacity as raw audio data with these settings:

I'm not sure how you would go about exporting as .PCM again. It should be lossless audio but saving as .wav and renaming it to .pcm is totally different in hex.

 

[mgfcortez]

I found the PCM audio in the SD folder on disc. You would import it into audacity as raw audio data with these settings:

I'm not sure how you would go about exporting as .PCM again. It should be lossless audio but saving as .wav and renaming it to .pcm is totally different in hex.

View attachment 8693

thank you for the Info, at least that is part of the picture, now to find out how to convert the English Dub into the right PCM file with the right settings. at least with this I can explore what line of dialog is in what file. like the one you highlighted in the image is Maria using her animals to power Richter. thank you again, if you find out anymore it will be helpful. at least now I got something to work on making a text file with each PCM with what is inside. for reference when I find out how to convert the psx English Dub to PCM and burn it in a iso or bin and cue. also I don't know much about cue files but will learn, I heard even if you replace a file the cue can mess it up if you don't make a new cue. could be an issue to be careful about, maybe even what happen with Velcrowe?

​

 

[mgfcortez]

I was able to rip the Sega Saturn voices from SDF0.PCM with audacity but they have such bad static it's hard to play them all the music rips like that, and only the sound effects rip at 8 bit 11050 or 8000 hz, and sound clean. but the main voice file might have data mix into it as well as the music files from what I can tell. I need a tool to be able to rip and separate the data, and to convert wav back to the PCM file. I'm guessing. still researching it all.


anyway like I said I can open the voice file but it still has static in it. so I'm looking for something new to use to open them. has anyone been able to use this program.
RB_SaturnPCM.EXE
or better yet know how to use it?? it seems like it can do it all. still trying to mess with it.

Saturn PCM <-> Windows WAV

RB_SaturnPCM.EXE Saturn PCM Windows WAV sound file conversion tool for windows PC by The Rockin'-B, www.Rockin-B.de version 05/04/29 purpose: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Converting...

segaxtreme.net

 

[ShadowMask]

One big piece that you're missing is extracting the bin/cue or iso disc image using something like CD Mage. I prefer using the SSP for Saturn Discs myself. But, the only way to find the files you need is to get inside the image itself.

 

[ShadowMask]

I was able to rip the Sega Saturn voices from SDF0.PCM with audacity but they have such bad static it's hard to play them all the music rips like that, and only the sound effects rip at 8 bit 11050 or 8000 hz, and sound clean. but the main voice file might have data mix into it as well as the music files from what I can tell. I need a tool to be able to rip and separate the data, and to convert wav back to the PCM file. I'm guessing. still researching it all.


anyway like I said I can open the voice file but it still has static in it. so I'm looking for something new to use to open them. has anyone been able to use this program.
RB_SaturnPCM.EXE
or better yet know how to use it?? it seems like it can do it all. still trying to mess with it.

Saturn PCM <-> Windows WAV

RB_SaturnPCM.EXE Saturn PCM Windows WAV sound file conversion tool for windows PC by The Rockin'-B, www.Rockin-B.de version 05/04/29 purpose: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Converting...

segaxtreme.net

That seems like the tool to try for sure, thanks for bringing it to my attention.

 

[mgfcortez]

One big piece that you're missing is extracting the bin/cue or iso disc image using something like CD Mage. I prefer using the SSP for Saturn Discs myself. But, the only way to find the files you need is to get inside the image itself.

I'm using DAEMON Tools Lite to get inside the image. so of course I already been u8sing something like that. otherwise I could never had got the file to convert it. unless I'm missing something? anyway I converted it with RB_SaturnPCM.EXE as well but still got the same bad file with static. but been reading up on it on this guide.

The Rockin'-B's Saturn Game Tutorial & Demo

Easily start developing homebrew games for SEGA Saturn with the Saturn Game Tutorial & Demo!

www.rockin-b.de

but sadly, I only see how to convert wavs to PCM. of course, that is the most important thing for sure. lol I'm trying to find out how to enter in the right settings to convert the PCM file to wav, but maybe it does it automatically so I may have done it right already. if so that means the tool won't be good enough to rip the audio. but IDK if it will convert wav to PCM and work right after rebuilding the ISO. ( I mean sound right within the game. ) after all I need the original SDF0.PCM file to find out at what minute and second each Japanese line is at. so, I can paste the English at the same location in the new PCM file. so, when it looks for the line in the 45 minutes of audio. it gets the right line. I need to be able to hear it clear enough so I can match it up on a YouTube from a Saturn NITM play through. because I don't know Japanese lol anyway, I'd like a better voice file from the Saturn, but I can hear the voices a little bit. I will keep looking into it. before I try to make a new PCM, testing might be easier to go ahead and just change a music track, and see if it plays right, but they use different settings. I'm sure it needs to be the same amount of time; I've read if it goes over the original time limit, it won't work. anyway, I'll look at it more when I get time. I'll post if I find out anything new. hope you all will do the same if you find out something new, maybe we can find the way to pull it off. would make the Saturn NITM a lot more fun with English. get the English Dub and use that patch for English text by KnightOfDragon and I think it can't get any better than that.

 

[velcrowe]

Thank you both for the new information, Ill try these methods with the ACX/ADX/DA files as well. Because what I'm working with is an audio container, I don't know much about the PCM files or how to determine how to recreate one. I do believe that if they are single audio files, it may be possible to convert to wav and it will play from there.

What I have been struggling with is if the audio files have to be the exact length as the original files in order to work?

 

[mgfcortez]

Thank you both for the new information, Ill try these methods with the ACX/ADX/DA files as well. Because what I'm working with is an audio container, I don't know much about the PCM files or how to determine how to recreate one. I do believe that if they are single audio files, it may be possible to convert to wav and it will play from there.

What I have been struggling with is if the audio files have to be the exact length as the original files in order to work.

from what I've read. yes I do believe they need to be the same length, and I would try to replace the PCM file. because that's where the audio is IMHO. SDF0.PCM is the name of the file with all the game Dialog. it is 38.48 in length right at 39 minutes long. but has bad static in it. the psx did this as well with all the game Dialog in a big file. I had to rip it and cut it up into 256 mp3's and then convert them over to AT3 files to use them on the PSP. so I'm thinking only the PSP does this. and both the psx and Saturn have all the voices in one file in one big track. SDF0.PCM. I have ripped it and have a wav and can play it and hear the Japanese voices even though the static makes it hard to listen to. the other PCM files are music files until SDD0.PCM this file is the beginning of sound effects. until you get to the last file that is SDF0.PCM with all the talking in it. the sound effects do not have this static in them. just the music files and the audio Japanese talking voices.

to edit it we would have to find out what each line is, and place the English Dub line at the same place in the track, so the Saturn can locate it to be played. and if the English is longer it could throw off the whole file. but I have some exp with stretching audio, so basically might have to comprises the audio by speeding it up. to make it fit in the same amount of seconds. here watch these two video's of mine to see an example of this.

this one I made without stretching the audio.


then this one I made before when I thought I was working within a set number of seconds as the original audio.


in these two videos you can see how the audio could suffer if the Japanese is too short VS the English Dub. also you can see the benefits of the PSP using a file for each line of audio. think they did this so they could make it as long as they wanted, and lucky I can do the same for the PSP. pretty cool really. but can't do that with a big track of audio where the game has been programed to reach into a preset position for each track, if we go over or start the line of audio at the wrong place. you could have Alucard speaking in Maria's line and starting in the middle of his line on his turn with Richter LOL at the end of Maria and Alucard's conversation lol so yes not doubt about it. we will have to get the length perfect. or at least start at the exact place as the Japanese line and can be a bit shorter but never longer, sadly.

and this is even if we can get the wav to convert into PCM without sounding like trash like the ripped Japanese file. but I'm hoping the conversion might be better. may test it out when I get time.
also if all this doesn't work, they are a few tools for converting Saturn audio on Macintosh pc. so might be worth it to buy a cheap pos used Macintosh just to see if it allows the right audio conversion. just thinking out loud lol
but here are the programs I'm talking about.

Audio Tools

take care, if you do try a text, let me know how it works out. but I say it again, I'm pretty sure the only voice file is SDF0.PCM from just what I have seen.

 

[velcrowe]

I appreciate the advice and I will look out for this PCM file if it has one or many. This might be the case, as the files I have seen that do contain audio don't get replaced when I open up the game. I initially thought it was the DA file but it may be this PCM file instead if there is one. The files I have been working with are ACX files that are music containers that contain each line of dialogue separately, but each ACX file contains an entire scene within the game, so one ACX file would contain something like 20 or so lines within that. They are separated by a click, I suppose thats how they got it to work for a visual novel type of game. For reference the game that I am working on is an english patched version of the revolutionary girl utena game.

 

[mgfcortez]

I appreciate the advice and I will look out for this PCM file if it has one or many. This might be the case, as the files I have seen that do contain audio don't get replaced when I open up the game. I initially thought it was the DA file but it may be this PCM file instead if there is one. The files I have been working with are ACX files that are music containers that contain each line of dialogue separately, but each ACX file contains an entire scene within the game, so one ACX file would contain something like 20 or so lines within that. They are separated by a click, I suppose thats how they got it to work for a visual novel type of game. For reference the game that I am working on is an english patched version of the revolutionary girl utena game.

Oh well your working on another game lol I've read many things trying to find out how to edit Saturn games, and from what I've read every game is different, your best bet is to ask about the game your working on. because some Saturn games are just redbook audio and can easily be replaced, and others can not be replaced. but each game maker did their games differently, so Dracula X NITM and revolutionary girl utena game are going to be different ways to convert the audio. everything I said here maybe of no help to you my friend, sorry.

best thing you can do is type the game in a search and maybe add reddit to it, like..

how to replace the audio in the sega saturn game revolutionary girl utena game reddit

and if you don't get anything useful change it up, me I rad across maybe 20 posts but all old and just read as much as you can, and it may help.

I tried searching a bit. sadly it having an Anime seems to be a hindrance to you searching for how to do it, just keep reading a bunch about Saturn audio replacing editing. and you may see some files that look like the same in the ISO. take care. sorry I couldn't help much.