Dominions 5

Dominions 5

galneon Dec 2, 2017 @ 8:53pm
Anyone had luck replacing soundtrack with Dom4 music?
I can't get used to this generic soundtrack. I've tried overwriting the gundry.sw2 files, but unfortunately, it seems the Dom4 audio files are 22 KHz and these are 44 KHz. The Dom4 audio plays, but is sped up because I believe the engine is trying to play them at a higher sample rate.

Dom5 just doesn't sound like a Dominions game to me and it's really messing with the vibe I get.

Does anyone know how these audio files were packed? I can't find anything that can open .al, .sw, or .sw2 files.
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Showing 1-15 of 16 comments
Chompski Dec 3, 2017 @ 12:39am 
I got you. Here's what I did.

1. changed rate from 44100 to 22050 after importing .al Dom4 files. Seems like original.
2. changed speed to 0.5x while keeping 44100. Seems a bit more crispy. I like this one better. Call it placebo effect.
Saved both as .sw2 with 16 bit signed encoding, whatever that means. Both sets became somewhat fat (no issue for me)

Here they are.
22050[drive.google.com]
44100[drive.google.com] (@mods @devs Please don't ban me.)

Congratulations. Now we have an inferior version of the soundtrack.

Why?

*Well, since all tracks after gundry12 will most certainly not play.
*Also, menu music is not random as it is in Dom5. (I picked timeless classic for that one. Honestly there was a couple of them that suited menu the best. Had a hard time choosing.)
*Also, in battles there will be no change of music. Cause it is liek that in Dom5.

Still, it's better, is it not? Overall I must repeat what I said in Honest Review thread - music and related stuff like music engine is definitely worse in Dom5, all other things being better.

@Kristoffer please? Pretty please? Help us tweak the music. It's like a fan made mod, no license issues etc., if one has both games, etc... surely nothing worth suing for. Can we have all Dom4 20+ tracks playing in Dom5 like they did in Dom4?

UPDATE: fixed links
UPDATE2: added missing track
Last edited by Chompski; Dec 4, 2017 @ 9:23pm
Abisha Dec 3, 2017 @ 2:11am 
Originally posted by Chompski:
I got you. Here's what I did.

1. changed rate from 44100 to 22050 after importing .al Dom4 files. Seems like original.
2. changed speed to 0.5x while keeping 44100. Seems a bit more crispy. I like this one better. Call it placebo effect.
Saved both as .sw2 with 16 bit signed encoding, whatever that means. Both sets became somewhat fat (no issue for me)

Here they are.
22050 [drive.google.com]
44100 [drive.google.com] (@mods @devs Please don't ban me.)

Congratulations. Now we have an inferior version of the soundtrack.

Why?

*Well, since all tracks after gundry12 will most certainly not play.
*Also, menu music is not random as it is in Dom5. (I picked timeless classic for that one. Honestly there was a couple of them that suited menu the best. Had a hard time choosing.)
*Also, in battles there will be no change of music. Cause it is liek that in Dom5.

Still, it's better, is it not? Overall I must repeat what I said in Honest Review thread - music and related stuff like music engine is definitely worse in Dom5, all other things being better.

@Kristoffer please? Pretty please? Help us tweak the music. It's like a fan made mod, no license issues etc., if one has both games, etc... surely nothing worth suing for. Can we have all Dom4 20+ tracks playing in Dom5 like they did in Dom4?
Why google drive? nobody likes google
Strategiusz Dec 3, 2017 @ 2:14am 
Run Dom4 in background. Play Dom5 with music volume set to 0.
Chompski Dec 3, 2017 @ 4:47am 
Okay I forgot to share. Silly me. Now links should work just fine.
I personally dont like half measures like youtube in background or whatever. To each their own I guess.
Last edited by Chompski; Dec 3, 2017 @ 4:47am
Silence Dec 3, 2017 @ 5:44am 
btw, I wondered : how do you read the .sw2 files ? Sometimes I'd like to listen to just some of them instead of all the tracks together ...
Phyvo Dec 3, 2017 @ 7:10am 
Originally posted by Chompski:
I got you. Here's what I did.

1. changed rate from 44100 to 22050 after importing .al Dom4 files. Seems like original.
2. changed speed to 0.5x while keeping 44100. Seems a bit more crispy. I like this one better. Call it placebo effect.
Saved both as .sw2 with 16 bit signed encoding, whatever that means. Both sets became somewhat fat (no issue for me)

Here they are.
22050 [drive.google.com]
44100 [drive.google.com] (@mods @devs Please don't ban me.)

Congratulations. Now we have an inferior version of the soundtrack.

Why?

*Well, since all tracks after gundry12 will most certainly not play.
*Also, menu music is not random as it is in Dom5. (I picked timeless classic for that one. Honestly there was a couple of them that suited menu the best. Had a hard time choosing.)
*Also, in battles there will be no change of music. Cause it is liek that in Dom5.

Still, it's better, is it not? Overall I must repeat what I said in Honest Review thread - music and related stuff like music engine is definitely worse in Dom5, all other things being better.

@Kristoffer please? Pretty please? Help us tweak the music. It's like a fan made mod, no license issues etc., if one has both games, etc... surely nothing worth suing for. Can we have all Dom4 20+ tracks playing in Dom5 like they did in Dom4?

UPDATE: fixed links

How did you save to .sw2? Audacity?
Ozone Dec 3, 2017 @ 7:38am 
The music files in Dom5 are not 44khz, they are 22khz stereo, except for the very first file which is mono for some obscure reason.

Why don't you just mute the music and play your own playlist in another software? It's a lot simplier !
Ogami Dec 3, 2017 @ 7:41am 
Originally posted by OzoneGrif:
The music files in Dom5 are not 44khz, they are 22khz stereo, except for the very first file which is mono for some obscure reason.

Why don't you just mute the music and play your own playlist in another software? It's a lot simplier !

This. Set ingame musik to zero, play the Dom 4 OST with the Steam Music Player in the overlay.
Done.
amuys Dec 3, 2017 @ 7:49am 
Thank you so much
galneon Dec 3, 2017 @ 9:39am 
Thank you so much, Chompski! Ideally, they'd externalize the playlist to a text file. It wouldn't take care of the non-random main menu/battle music (without additional work), but it would allow us to hear all the music.

At some point I will look into hex-editing a larger playlist. I've just noticed all 12 gundry tracks are referenced in the executable separated by padding with the intervals between references being 9CC (2508). It should be easy to insert the remaining renamed (or even original name) Dom4 tracks into circulation provided the code is sane.

If no one else has taken care of this before I get some free time to mess with it, I will post an update to this thread at some point.

Edit: Did you miss one Dom4 track, Chompski? I see 21 .als and 3 .sws (specifically the falsos) in Dom4's rawsound dir. Or is one a duplicate or looped version of another?

Edit2: What I said earlier about inserting new music (gundry13, etc) at predictable intervals didn't work--changing the size of the executable results in a crash on startup (broken pointers I assume). However, in the executable there's one blank music reference 9CC after gundry12. I've referenced gundry13 there and am currently listening to the game in the background to see if it ever chooses to play it.

Edit3: Here is my testing methodology so no one else wastes their time: I renamed the shortest piece of music gundry1.sw2 and renamed copies of it all the way through gundry12.sw2 (the last official track name supported). gundry13.sw2, the reference I edited into the .exe, never played once. This is either supremely bad luck with shuffle play, or adding additional tracks beyond gundry12 is futile, at least for a neophyte like me. What a shocking regression we have in music variety and, in my opinion, quality. :(

Here's an alternative solution. Take the Dom4 music you downloaded above and extract half into one directory and half into another. Make duplicates of your favorites and put them in the opposite directory so that you have 12 (mostly) different tracks in each directory with the files renamed gundry1 through gundry12. Each time you are going to start the game, switch your soundtrack by copying one of the 12 track collections into your rawsound directory. This way you have two 12-track soundtracks. If you want, you can even switch them out (except maybe the one being played if it's locked) while the game is running.
Last edited by galneon; Dec 3, 2017 @ 6:17pm
Chompski Dec 4, 2017 @ 10:12am 
Sorry, I don't have a lot of time right now, I'll take a look tomorrow, hopefully. It seems I indeed missed one track. It looks like its "in_vernali.al"

Anyways, you can quickly prep this one yourself, here's what I did.

1. Download audacity stand-alone or installer (I prefer standalone=zipped)
2. In there do File-Import-Audio then one of Dom4 tracks.
3. Check, it will play twice as fast.
4. Click on the track name e.g. "falso4" with an arrow next to it, select rate, then 22050.
5. It will slow down hopefully, now File-Save Other- Save as Other Uncompressed Files - select HEADER = RAW, ENCODING=SIGNED 16 bit PCM, click ok, rename .raw file to gundryX.sw2, place into rawsound folder. It should work

To make frankensteined 44100 you would need to use Effect change speed WITHOUT changing rate.

Guys, I get what you want to say about using third-party stuff to "enable" music. If it works or you, great. Lets keep this topic focused on replacing original soundtrack in-game.
Last edited by Chompski; Dec 4, 2017 @ 9:28pm
sqeecoo Sep 17, 2019 @ 4:44am 
I know it's been a long long time, but has any of you guys manage to set this up? I really miss my dom4 music!
Abisha Sep 17, 2019 @ 7:24am 
Originally posted by sqeecoo:
I know it's been a long long time, but has any of you guys manage to set this up? I really miss my dom4 music!
you know you can launch both games and turn music off Dominions 5
this way you also avoid inferencing on copywrite licence's
✏pencils✏ Sep 18, 2019 @ 6:42am 
Originally posted by sqeecoo:
I know it's been a long long time, but has any of you guys manage to set this up? I really miss my dom4 music!
Yeah, if you read the posts closely enough you can probably figure it out as well.

An easier project is changing the fonts from the in-game defaults. Anyone can probably figure out how to do that (hint: it involves renaming .ttf files).
Catowl Sep 18, 2019 @ 10:49am 
Would it be possible for Devs to allow modding music in? I think if that was made possible it'd take like a week for people to put together some mod with thematically appropriate music for each nation. I'd love some more celtic music when playing TNN.
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Date Posted: Dec 2, 2017 @ 8:53pm
Posts: 16