TUTORIAL: HOW TO MAKE A SOUND MOD FOR TDU

[Nick1999]

Greetings!

Over the past week i've learned myself how to make sound mods for TDU and so will you!

Anyway let's start with few basics tools you're gonna need;

1. Sony Vegas 17 (If you don't have legal copy, you can always get a free trial which lasts for 30 days, or you can crack it)

2. TDUMT (Test Drive Unlimited Modding Tools)

3. Samples from Video Games!

I RECOMMEND GETTING SAMPLES FROM GAMES SUCH AS GRID, DIRT, GTR2, NFS, FORZA etc..

 

I'M USING SAMPLES FROM GTR2 FROM SIMBIN!

 

BEFORE YOU DO ANY MODDING, PLEASE DO A BACKUP!

 

Before we even start doing any modding itself. We have to be sure what audio.bnk are gonna modify today's example is LP720_Cpe_audio

Now let's begin:

 

PAGE 1:

1. Open TDUMT program and pick File Browser.

 

2. After you picked File Browser. On the left side of your screen you're gonna see a yellow file named Sound. As soon you click on it you will see few files but the one you're looking for is Vehicules.

3. We found the LP720_Cpe_audio in the program. Now we're gonna do a New Folder on Desktop and you can name it however you like. Let's call it 720 for our example. Then we will CTRL + A everything and click Extract... to your 720 Folder on your Desktop.

 

NOW I'M GONNA TELL YOU SOMETHING ABOUT THE CarVSTConfig.xmb FILE.

CarVSTConfig.xmb file is a coded file from Atari that regulates on what RPM the sounds activate in-game. I do NOT recommend messing with the file itself as it can break the whole sound.

4. Now that you extracted all your files to your 720 Folder. Now we have to check how long are the samples. For this example i will use Lambomurci_onhigh file. Now Right Click --> Properties --> Details and check Length. As you can see our file is 00:00:05 long which means it's a 5 second loop. 

5. After we know how long the sample is we can now open Sony Vegas 17!

 

PAGE 2:

AUDIO EDITING SECTION!!

TDU Recommend .WAV format is 177 Kbps, 44.100 Hz, 4 Bit, Mono, ADPCM. 

We can get that easily with these steps.

1. Open Sony Vegas 17.

2. Drag and Drop the Lambomurci_onhigh to the Editing Section so we can access Render As... options.

3. On top left you will see a tab called File. After you clicked on it. Click Render As...

4. As soon you click Render As... tab, you will be greeted with a rendering section.

5. Now find the Wave (Microsoft) tab and click Default Template.

 

6. After you clicked Default Template you can notice that you can notice that a new tab lighted up under the name Customize Template, click on the tab.

7. After you clicked on the Customize Template tab, you have to change the Format from PCM (uncompressed) to Microsoft ADPCM.

8. After you did that now we have to pick correct Attributes. We have to find 44,100 kHz, 4 Bit, Mono. Once you find it, click on it and then click OK. And we have our Template finished under the name Default Template (*)

P.S YOU CAN ALSO SAVE THE TEMPLATE BY CLICKING ON THE STAR ON THE LEFT SIDE OF THE TEMPLATE BY CLICKING FILTERS OFF --> SHOW FAVORITES ONLY 

NOW LET'S GET TO THE REAL DEAL OF SOUND MODDING!

PAGE 3:

1. Firstly let's put Lambomurci_onhigh on the 1st channel in Sony Vegas, then we put the sample to 2nd channel

2. As you can see that 2nd channel sample is too long. If the sample is too long the game cannot read the file and it won't work! So what we have to do is trim the to the lenght of the original TDU sample 

3. Once you're done trimming the 2nd channel. Now you can delete the 1st channel and export the sound under the name Lambomurci_onhigh on 177 Kbps, 44.100 Hz, 4 Bit, Mono, ADPCM format

P.S KEEP IN MIND THAT YOU HAVE TO REPEAT PAGE 3 FOR EACH SOUND YOU HAVE! SUCH AS;

-idle

-onlow

-onmid

-onhigh

-offlow

-offmid

-offhigh

-starter

After you done with all the sounds in correct lenght and format now it's time to import the sounds back to LP720_Cpe_audio.bnk file

PAGE 4:

1. Open TDUMT program and pick File Browser.

2. After you picked File Browser. On the left side of your screen you're gonna see a yellow file named Sound. As soon you click on it you will see few files but the one you're looking for is Vehicules.

3. Find your LP720_Cpe_audio.bnk file and find the tab named Replace and click Keep Name... 

4. Now it's gonna ask you to find the Lambomurci_onhigh file

5. Repeat for every file

6. Once you're done replacing every file. Congrats, you've made yourself a sound mod!

 

 

 

 

Edited April 21, 2020 by Nick1999

[vit-jan0]

Tutorial #2 Here is my tutorial inspired by Nick1999 , but using different (free) audio editting software

How to modify TDU1 car engine sound?

I have found youtube video with clean engine sound of the car of my choice and used this sound for a TestDrive Unlimited 1 car.
Result is not terrible and not too good. But here is how i did that:

1. Download TDUMT (TDU Modding tools 2) software Mini Bnk manager - https://github.com/djey47/tdumt2/releases

2. Open it and select appropriate .bnk file. For example C:\Program Files (x86)\Atari\Test Drive Unlimited\Euro\Bnk\Sound\Vehicules\Enzo_FXX_audio.bnk

3. Click Load button, then click Unpack all button. Open appropriate .wav audio file located in the output directory you have defined. Open it in the Audacity software - https://www.audacityteam.org/
On the bottom, click "Start and end of selection" and instead define to show Length and end of the tracks, it is important later to see the length.

4. you can find on the internet appropriate videos/sounds: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=ferrari+fxx+sound+onboard&atb=v126-1&iar=videos&iax=videos&ia=videos
You are looking for the rather rare, several seconds long sound which RPM is steady - same on the beginning and on the end.

5. Find online tool to convert your video into a sound. For example i searched: youtube to wav audio" and i found https://ytmp3.cc/en13/

6. add your sound file in Audacity and make sure it is mono, not stereo (track dropdown/arrow menu or the Tracks/Mix menu has the option). Stereo had issue playing right in TDU1. Find the part of the track with steady engine sound and highlight this part and copy this part into new track for future use.

7. double click original TDU engine sound track in Audacity to see its length and note the length.

8. copy the best (most steady sound) part that match the original sound track length into yet another new track leaving longer version for possible future use

9. click File, Export, Export as WAV and Save as type: Other uncompressed files, WAV, Microsoft ADPCM. Before confirming, you may backup original .wav sound before overwriting.

10. Now do the same for other sound file (possibly there are multiple files for each engine RPM and also files when the gas pedal is pushed and when it is released! so total maybe more than 6 files to make!) For each RPM audio file you may want to modify pitch (the Effects menu) or the Speed to make the sound different.

11. re-pack the sounds into a .bnk file using "Repack" button in the TDUMT software. The directory to select is in my case "C:\work\Enzo_FXX_audio.bnk" directory.
It saved Enzo_FXX_audio.bnk file which i then copy to C:\Program Files (x86)\Atari\Test Drive Unlimited\Euro\Bnk\Sound\Vehicules\Enzo_FXX_audio.bnk (backing up original before overwritting!!!!!!!)

9. Launch TDU1 to see the result.

10. Save the Audacity session for future use and further work.

ISSUES:

- car makes no sound. I do not know the cause, but it helped to quit Audacity and TDUMT and start it again, load the original bnk file in TDUMT, unpacking and copying already customized audio files from previous unpack to new unpack and then repacking.

- the high RPM sound is not fluent in looping. Answer:
A) maybe your sound track is too short and not same length as original, try to increase length a bit, but possibly not more than 1 second above original track length? You can try playing your sound in loop (doubleclick track or click "Solo" button and then Shift+space or shift + play button) to see if the error is in different/non matching beginning and the end of your sound track - https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/tutorial_looping.html . Then you can maximal zoom-in and find some anomalies in the sound/adjust it by a "pencil tool". You may find that there is a gap between the sound sequences (inc ase you had too short sound and used cloned/duplicated the sound to make it longer. Use menu Edit / Clip boundaries / Join.

Edited December 18, 2021 by vit-jan0

[Nick1999]

Thanks for this simple tutorial! I hope we can inspire many other modders to make more sound mods!

[kadencabs]

I know im sounding dumb but can someone tell me what offhigh,offlow,offmid,onhigh,onmid,onlow mean because im confused trying to make a 350z sound mod

[TDUZoqqer]

2 hours ago, kadencabs said:

I know im sounding dumb but can someone tell me what offhigh,offlow,offmid,onhigh,onmid,onlow mean because im confused trying to make a 350z sound mod

files with "off" at the beginning are the decelerating samples (when you're off the throttle), self-explanatory what "on" is then.

 

low-mid-high are the states of the revs. low revs are like 1000-3000 rpm, mid is 3000-6000 and high is 6000>. Obviously the numbers are an example and not specific in practical use since its depending on the rev range and the samples, but you get the point

[tatarus39]

Thanks for the tutorial, very useful! There's some things though I'd like to change and I do not know how to do it, these are gearshift, horn, windows and door sounds. I see some car soundbanks with custom sounds for the above (also, with some soundbanks windows sounds are missing in-game), but I can't figure out where to set them, are those set in CarVSTConfig.xmb or somewhere else?

Edited June 20, 2022 by tatarus39

[iFabz]

Issues : mod has no sounds....

Because memory size more than 766 kb (yes, i found it. There's a car sound sized 769 kb...it doesn't work)