GUS1M.WAD - Doomworld /idgames database frontend

Title:	GUS1M.WAD
Filename:	sounds/gus1m.zip
Size:	4.28 KB
Date:	05/14/94
Author:	Tom Klok
Description:	An optimized MIDI instrument mapping for Gravis Ultrasound cards with 1024K on board.
Credits:
Base:
Build time:
Editor(s) used:
Bugs:
Rating:	(2 votes)

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View gus1m.txt

========================================================================
Title                   : GUS1M.WAD
Author                  : Tom Klok
Email Address           : a344@mindlink.bc.ca, a00344@giant.rsoft.bc.ca

Description             : An optimized MIDI instrument mapping for
                          Gravis Ultrasound cards with 1024K on board.

NOTE!  If you don't have a GUS with 1024K, this wad will gain you
       nothing (but shouldn't hurt anything either).
       This PWAD contains no new MUS music files or sounds whatsoever.
       Nor does it require any new .PAT files, just those supplied
       with the more recent install disks.

========================================================================

Information
~~~~~~~~~~~
     As you probably know, Doom's wad file contains a resource named
DMXGUS which contains a list of all MIDI instruments (patch file
names) and a table specifying which instruments to load into card
memory. Since all 190+ instruments can't be loaded at once, the DMXGUS
file loads a subset of the full GM set and then maps the remaining
instrument numbers to the loaded instruments.

I was curious about the internal format of MUS files, and pretty
happy when the MIDI2MUS utility was released.  Thanks, guys!  Mucking
around with the original D_* MUS files Doom is supplied with, I
decided to compare the patches they used with the DMXGUS file to see
what kind of mapping was going on.  It turns out there's a lot of it,
but much of it is poorly set up. id's supplied DMXGUS file is almost
exactly the same as the ULTRAMID.INI file supplied with Ultramid 2.00.
That's a good shot at a generic GM mapping, but Doom never uses many
of the loaded instruments... and many of the instruments it DOES use
are mapped to something else.

Therefore, I've rewritten the DMXGUS file to match Doom's MUS
files as closely as possible.  I've booted out about 40 unused
instruments and added 29 new ones.  The difference is quite dramatic.
Some of the songs have percussion parts that were being thrown out
before; some of the instruments sound quite different.  It's a shame
that id didn't take the time to do this themselves, but I guess
they've been too busy tweaking other stuff.

Ok, how do I use it?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     Extract the GUS1M.WAD file to wherever you normally put new wad
files (ie c:\doom\wad), then use it as you'd use any other new WAD
add-on:

doom -file WAD\GUS1M.WAD

That's it!  Hopefully you'll hear the difference as soon as Doom's
welcome screen comes up.

Why only 1024K GUS's?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     Well, because that's what I own. :)  It's taken about 10 hours of
work to get the 1024K mapping to the point where I'm happy with it. If
someone else would like to help out with mappings for 256, 512 and
768K boards, then go for it!  Feel free to contact me for a few utils
I've written to make *some* of this easier.  Much of it is still trial
and error.

Will it work with id's shareware release of Doom?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     Well... yes, it will.  I'm not sure that should be a problem, as
it's not *adding* anything that wasn't there before... no new levels,
sounds, music, etc.  It's just touching up something that I feel
wasn't properly implemented in the first place.  And more importantly,
I can't think of any way of preventing it.  The typical means to foil
shareware use for new levels is to either insert them into episodes 2
or 3, or to use textures/objects not found in the shareware release.
Neither would work here.

Look at it this way: it makes the music Doom comes with sound
better on a 1024K GUS.  If you like the change, register Doom and get
ALL the music!  Please give id your support.  They're writing the best
damn games on the market, publishing them as shareware, and supporting
the GUS.  What more could we want?  Please let them know you
appreciate it.

Copyright / Permissions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
     Authors may use this optimized DMXGUS WAD in their own WAD files,
and may use it as a base to further modify the GUS's GM mapping,
provided they give me (Tom Klok) credit within the DMXGUS resource and
on their PWAD documentation.

Anyone may distribute this WAD, provided you include this text
file with attributions.  You may distribute this pwad in via any media
(BBS, floppy disk, CDROM, etc).

-- tk 08May94Su

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