[FF7PC][Tsunamods] Cosmo Memory: Complete Sound Overhaul

[Bonez]

Formerly known as "Bonez' Sound Effect Suite". Cosmo Memory uses the new FFNx SFX engine and is an entirely new mod rebuilt from the ground up with a ton of new features. This project started out in 2018 as a little mod to just replace the FF7 menu sounds with the menu sounds from FFXIII. Since that time, it has evolved into something far more... After following the community and modding the game for several years, I noticed the graphical and musical mods were growing and advancing but the sound effects department was totally stalled. I mean, it's an entire 1/3 of what your senses are taking in, along side the visuals and music! I wanted something to match the beautiful/advanced graphical and musical mods provided by the very talented authors/creators of this community... So, I present to you Cosmo Memory: A Complete Sound Overhaul.

Features:

• Replaces/updates all 724 original sound effects including battle, magic, enemy skills, limit breaks, summons, world
• Ambient sounds for every field and battle scene in the game
• Ground-conditional footstep sound effects for every field and world map
• FMV audio tracks completely rebuilt from scratch (Compatible with any FMV video mod and Echo-s voices)
• Voiced attacks or "grunts" for all party members
• Shuffles battle impact sounds as well as other often-repeated sounds randomly so you never hear the same exact sound twice in a row
• 3 selectable menu sound sets
• Complete compatibility with New Threat, Echo-S and any other mod

Launch Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zt0GRSb8KcA


IMPORTANT
-This mod REQUIRES 7th Heaven 2.4+ and FFNx 1.11+
You can download the latest 7th Heaven here : https://github.com/tsunamods-codes/7th-Heaven/releases/tag/canary

-For best experience, use headphones and set music volume to ~60%

FAQ
Will you add the option to/Can I turn off the replaced sfx?

Spoiler: show

No. There are several technical reasons for why. I won't go into all of them, but among which; it's impossible to use the stock engine for some sounds and the new engine for others. It's all one way or the other. If you were to "just stick on the ambience", then the new engine would be used for the ambience and you'd get no other sfx at all. Also a few of the fields have a stock ambience, so if you did import the vanilla sounds to the new engine, you'd have some fields with super high def ambience and some with crushed midi vanilla ambience. There are several areas in the game where doing this would be very awkward or be outright cringe. Some people suggest to change everything except battle sounds. The thing about that is many, many sounds are reused throughout the game. Just one example, a wave sound: The wave sound may be used in battle for the sewer monster, or Leviathan, but also used near the ocean. So, when you're near the ocean you'd suddenly hear midi waves next to HD sounds. This happens with probably half of the sounds in the game. There is also dealing with the complexities the mod adds like shuffled melee sounds. Setting up contingencies for if replaced battle sounds are off would compound those complexities. Which leads me to my second reason - I just don't want a hodgepodge mod where you'd have real recordings of birds etc. clashing against staticy-midi battle sounds. This was the problem with previous incomplete sfx mods for FF7. They only changed a hand full of battle sounds, which clashed against other battle sounds immediately surrounding them... Which leads me to most importantly; Cosmo Memory is a sfx replacement mod for the 724 vanilla sounds first and foremost. Identifying and making and editing and replacing them took 2 years to complete. That is the entire purpose of the mod - to update everything. The same way Nino replaces every model in the game, the same way SYW updates every field in the game, and the same way any music mod replaces every song in the game. The other features like ambience, footsteps, etc. were just last minute bells and whistles to go on top of them thrown in during the final couple weeks of development.

Most of the FF7 modder's philosophies are to provide the remake everyone really wanted. If Square had made the 1:1 remake, they wouldn't have used those original sounds...

Special Thanks:
TrueOdin - the FFNx sound engine
vertex2995 - world map footsteps

Download Cosmo Memory HERE Size: 350MB


If you enjoy the mod, consider a little something for the many many hours it took to put this together: Donate Here

[elias]

Lowering/raising the SFX volume in the game's Config menu seems to disable the SFX sounds altogether (menu cursors, engine sounds etc.). I'm using FFNx-v1.8.1.140 and I've set the correct settings in the FFNx.toml file during installation.

[Bonez]

Lowering/raising the SFX volume in the game's Config menu seems to disable the SFX sounds altogether (menu cursors, engine sounds etc.). I'm using FFNx-v1.8.1.140 and I've set the correct settings in the FFNx.toml file during installation.

You're right. Thank you. I've never had a reason to lower the SFX, only the music; as the SFX are already a much lower volume than any of the music. I likely would never have found this. The next FFNx canary will likely have a fix.

[elias]

Lowering/raising the SFX volume in the game's Config menu seems to disable the SFX sounds altogether (menu cursors, engine sounds etc.). I'm using FFNx-v1.8.1.140 and I've set the correct settings in the FFNx.toml file during installation.

FFNx v1.8.1.144 seems to have fixed this issue. That aside, would it be possible to turn down or adjust the SFX that occurs during the transition to a battle? I've always found that to be louder/longer than the rest of the SFX. Other than that, it's a great mod for what it has been so far.

[Hypnotic Mind]

I'm currently having problems getting the music to play after installing the updated FFNx driver 1.8.1.13+.  I've set the settings correctly on the FFNx.toml file and removed the "#" as mentioned.  The sound effects suite all work but only the default music plays.  The music mods I use are the the Tsuna Arranged and the EDMusic, and I used to use the Symphonic Redux mod before this, now they don't load at all even by themselves.  I also get the black screen blinking throughout the game.  Is there something I'm missing or doing wrong?

[Bonez]

I'm currently having problems getting the music to play after installing the updated FFNx driver 1.8.1.13+.  I've set the settings correctly on the FFNx.toml file and removed the "#" as mentioned.  The sound effects suite all work but only the default music plays.  The music mods I use are the the Tsuna Arranged and the EDMusic, and I used to use the Symphonic Redux mod before this, now they don't load at all even by themselves.  I also get the black screen blinking throughout the game.  Is there something I'm missing or doing wrong?

This isn't related to this mod, but to get music mods to work with the new FFNx, you need to enable external music and set the path for external music to "music/vgmstream", similar to how you did for the sfx. The next 7H release will not require all this, btw...

The black blinking thing is apparently an AMD issue. I don't know anything about it as I use intel... I do experience blinking if I use the program Borderless Gaming to make the game borderless, however. But that seems to be a Borderless Gaming issue.

[Dark_Ansem]

Sorry for the question, but how did you actually replace the sound effects?

[AuthenticM]

This is a cool project, Bonez. Congrats!

Are there videos showing the new sound effects in action? I'd love to see your mod in action.

[Bonez]

This is a cool project, Bonez. Congrats!

Are there videos showing the new sound effects in action? I'd love to see your mod in action.

My Youtube channel has a few videos of tests as well as previews for the original mods, which while outdated are still largely included in this one.
https://www.youtube.com/user/WTurner859/videos
I also post a lot more updates on the discord than I do here.

Sorry for the question, but how did you actually replace the sound effects?

Tediously. Very tediously.

[daedrixx2]

Sorry if my post isn't strictly inherent to the topic.

Is there a chance you could possibly upload a vanilla sfx pack for those of us who prefer the original sfx?
You see, the stock sfx playback engine of the game is bugged, and while FFNx has a sfx playback engine with those bugs fixed, it still requires a sfx pack to begin with.
I tried extracting the sfx myself with the old FF7SND (I couldn't get the new version of FF7SND working despite having installed .NET 5 x64 and x86, and having my antivirus off) and with cosmo095c, but after a few battles the game always crashes (if I only play in a field without entering battle mode the game runs fine).
Since you've so much experience with sfx modding, and your modded sfx pack works good, you surely know how to extract the sfx in a way that doesn't make FFNx crash.
That's why I'm asking you.


Thanks anyway 

[Bonez]

Sorry if my post isn't strictly inherent to the topic.

Is there a chance you could possibly upload a vanilla sfx pack for those of us who prefer the original sfx?
You see, the stock sfx playback engine of the game is bugged, and while FFNx has a sfx playback engine with those bugs fixed, it still requires a sfx pack to begin with.
I tried extracting the sfx myself with the old FF7SND (I couldn't get the new version of FF7SND working despite having installed .NET 5 x64 and x86, and having my antivirus off) and with cosmo095c, but after a few battles the game always crashes (if I only play in a field without entering battle mode the game runs fine).
Since you've so much experience with sfx modding, and your modded sfx pack works good, you surely know how to extract the sfx in a way that doesn't make FFNx crash.
That's why I'm asking you.


Thanks anyway 

You shouldn't NEED a sound mod... make sure your sfx option is set to "Original audio.dat" in the 7H driver settings (I'm assuming you're on 7H 2.3 to be having this problem)... If you need further help, hit me up on the qhimm discord. It'd be a lot easier to walk you through it.

[Tyler Durden]

Was this mod taken down? the link seems to be broken.

[Bonez]

I took it down temporarily as it's all but done and release is imminent.

[Fewtch]

I took it down temporarily as it's all but done and release is imminent.

HYPE IMMINENT

[Asherdoom]

i am very hyped for this mod. Any update?

[Bonez]

i am very hyped for this mod. Any update?

I'd say the mod is all together about 97% complete. I'm actually streaming all development of it on Twitch... I'm doing a final full run-through of the game and finding stray sounds/finding things to change or fix along the way. I'm currently at the base of Gaia cliff if that gives you an idea how much time is left. So once I'm through the game, It'll be out... Having said that, I have been doing a thing where you can get a current early copy by redeeming channel points on twitch. 

[hiqueique]

Hi!
i'm using the reunion mod. Is there a way to install the files manually?

[Bonez]

Only the main original sounds could be used with Reunion. The other features; ambient sounds, shuffled sounds, fmv sounds and voiced attacks would not be compatible for various reasons.

[Xezcente]

Looks like a lot of work and it does sound nice but shouldn't this be in the WIP section?

[Bonez]

Looks like a lot of work and it does sound nice but shouldn't this be in the WIP section?

Technically, maybe. Then again, technically most mods on the site are a WIP - and always will be; we're never quite done with them and always can find something to fiddle with. But as you can see, I initially provided a download link to a release - I just took it down temporarily. Plus it would just have to be moved back in a week or two when I'm finished. Not to mention if it was temporarily moved, then there'd still be the "This topic was moved" cluttering up Releases so it would essentially accomplish nothing. Not sure why it's an issue for you, but your rigorous janitorial attitude is appreciated nonetheless. Welcome to the forum.

[Psiloc]

Any chance this is nearing release, or can we have the beta link back? Currently replaying and wouldn't mind trying this out before I'm done

What sort of configuration options were you considering? I'd really like if you could toggle on the new sounds (ambience and footsteps etc.) independently of the replacement sounds for when I'm in a more vanilla kind of mood.

[Bonez]

Any chance this is nearing release, or can we have the beta link back? Currently replaying and wouldn't mind trying this out before I'm done

What sort of configuration options were you considering? I'd really like if you could toggle on the new sounds (ambience and footsteps etc.) independently of the replacement sounds for when I'm in a more vanilla kind of mood.

Not yet. And no because some of the ambient sounds come from the original engine, so you'd have some high-quality-real-life-recording ambience and some original-midi-made-of-static ambience. So unfortunately, you have to go with high-quality-real-life recordings for everything

[Psiloc]

Not yet. And no because some of the ambient sounds come from the original engine, so you'd have some high-quality-real-life-recording ambience and some original-midi-made-of-static ambience. So unfortunately, you have to go with high-quality-real-life recordings for everything

No problem, makes sense and thanks for getting back to me. Keep us posted!

I'd really like that beta link back though... or better yet a newer pre-release! I know that may be hard to prioritise though

[Bonez]

I just wanted to give a bit of an update and explanation for the delay.

Work is nearly done. It's been nearly done for a long time, but there is a reason for that.

As I've said many times I'm going through the entire game and bug squishing. A single playthrough doesn't sound like it should take a long time, but you'd be surprised. The reason that it's taking so long is because I'm not only bug squishing my own mod, but I'm also essentially QA testing the brand new sound engine it's based on at the same time. And now that I'm in the late game in my playthrough, I'm in a largely untested area of the game. There have been many, many times where I've sat down to start working and in the first 5 minutes run into some kind of bug like an infinite looping sound, or an entire sfx channel breaking, and then I have to completely halt the work for anywhere between a day to a week until it's fixed. I literally can't continue because the bug may effect subsequent sounds and I'll miss something. So I have to report the bug, sometimes even help diagnose the bug and wait for a fix before I can continue in order to ensure a complete bug-free-playthrough of the game can be completed (and this doesn't even account for any fixes that may break something earlier in the game. I haven't found any yet, but that isn't to say it hasn't happened. That bridge will just have to be crossed when I get to it). This actually happened tonight, for example. I wanted to play all night, but in my very first fight, I discovered a new bug keeping half the magic sounds from playing. Since literally all of the sounds I have left to replace are in battle, I had to stop and get the bug fixed. Odin's a legend and fixed it at soon as he saw the report, but that was the whole night gone. Of course there have also been the new features being added that have pushed the release back as well; ambient, then battle ambient, then grunts, then footsteps, then ground conditional footsteps... But at this point, they're all done.

That reminds me. If you didn't know, I've now added footstep sounds to the entire game that change depending on what kind of ground you're walking on. So yeah, that's pretty rad.

So that's where we are. all the features are complete, the engine is in a good spot, in my playthrough I'm getting ready to head back and parachute into Midgar. So I'm very close to the end of the game. There are only about 27 sounds left in the game to replace. like 10 of them are in the Gold Saucer arcade, like 5 are Super Nova and the rest are some late game enemy attacks I just haven't come across yet, so we're real close. Barring anymore show-stopping bugs, it should be smooth sailing and closer than ever.

[Bonez]

Cosmo Memory is officially available.