Better sound for our games! Request for more functionalities and a better sound API

Solar2D General Questions/Discussion
#1

Dear Ansca,

The current audio API has some issues. The volume control doesn’t seem to work and also you can control the volume of event sounds while using the application via the volume control. This might have been fine for general apps but it’s not sufficient for games which have continuous multiple sounds going on.

While looking at some documentation from Apple, Under AudioSessionProgrammingGuide, I noticed a few features that would be very useful for games.

As described in the documentation:

Allows mixing: if yes, audio from other applications (such as the iPod) can continue playing when your application plays sound.

Silenced by the Ring/Silent switch and by screen locking: if yes, your audio is silenced when the user moves the Ring/Silent switch to silent and when the screen locks.

I am a beginner but while investigating and reading some articles such as http://benbritten.com/2008/11/06/openal-sound-on-the-iphone/

it seems that Corona is currently using only AudioServices. As mentioned in the article this is sufficient for general apps but not for games. “That explains why all my sounds don’t loop well”

I would like to propose to implement OpenAl into Corona for game support. Audio is a huge part of games and without a proper API it really limits our creativity. Hope this makes it up high in the priority. I am sure a lot of the developers here are game developers.

Thanks

[import]uid: 8192 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 302307[/import]

#2

+10
The lack of volume control issue is critical !
Corona games (take for example Doodle Dash and RocketCup) really suffer from this bug.

Specifically the issue comes when user turns off music: the sound effects then only play at max volume and user has no control over volume setting with the hardware buttons of iPhone. Very disturbing! Makes the user exit the app asap! [import]uid: 7356 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7020[/import]

#3

Better sound API is already on our feature list for Corona Game Edition.

Thanks,
-Tom [import]uid: 7559 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7036[/import]

#4

Did any of these make it into game edition? i dont see any extra APIs in game edition for sound. [import]uid: 6317 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7101[/import]

#5

I think Tom is referring to the non-beta / non-prerelease version of Game Edition that is due to be released hopefully very soon. I don’t think you’ll get an official statement as to WHEN it will be released. [import]uid: 8194 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7112[/import]

#6

I hope it makes it for the next release :slight_smile: [import]uid: 8192 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7120[/import]

#7

Unfortunately the sound API hasn’t changed for the next GE release. We are looking at improvements for a release beyond the pending GE release.

-Tom [import]uid: 7559 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7134[/import]

#8

:frowning: Well. Then I hope the release after that is pretty soon. There is no way to release a game that has a little more than basic sound as is unfortunately. I sent Carlos my files and I think the sound API might be crashing on the iphone. [import]uid: 8192 topic_id: 2307 reply_id: 7135[/import]