The Aching
"The Aching" patch #1: "The Burden of Memory"
Salutations from the nightmare realm!
We’ve finally rounded off our first content patch for The Aching. It’s been a bit hectic on our side of things with life seemingly throwing everything it can at us all, but I’m happy to say we persevere and “Burden of Memory” is finally ready for the public.
This content patch is only about 50% new game content because this also sees us moving over to our heavily improved Gorgon Scripting Engine 2.0. The new engine now supports a full blown MPU-401 driver with sound data configured for both General MIDI and the eponymous Roland MT-32 MIDI Module. Our configuration defaults to Tandy mode still as MT-32 emulation would require ROM images that are still to this day copyrighted and we don’t have permission to provide them with our game. You may be wondering why we don’t default to the General MIDI soundtrack and that’s because we can’t guarantee that a modern platform actually supports GM emulation.
We’d also like to point out that there is a shiny new PCM sound driver that supports the Tandy DAC, Disney Sound Source, and even the original Sound Blaster sound card! All three of these are supported by emulation but as they all also sound the same in play we defaulted to the Tandy DAC as we’re already defaulting to Tandy video and Tandy 3-voice music.
These additions bring the engine up to our original target experience!
This update isn’t just minor bug fixes and engine improvements though. Oh no! We’ve hidden new rooms, new items, and even a few new puzzles! We hope you enjoy exploring the world once more as you search for the new additions. We’d like to point out that the critical path is unchanged, though now there are alternative solutions to some of the progress gates, including the ability to complete the game without ever suffering any harm!
Can you lead the Acolyte to the city on the horizon without getting them hurt??
~the Lobdegg
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The Aching
Horror adventure game in an unsettling other world.
More posts
- Version 1.09 available now!Dec 15, 2023
- Now on Steam!Feb 21, 2023
Comments
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That's fantastic news! One question: I use MT-32 emulation for years now for my DOS games. I tried to do the same thing I do with every MT-32 game: I unpacked DOSBox (portable) to the directory of The Aching, inserted the two ROM-files and started the game via Gorgon2 > EGA > MT32 and Sound Blaster. Now I hear the MT-32 music (which sounds fantastic by the way) but other sound effects are either missing (the waterfall sound) or distorted (the blowing winds right at the beginning where you see the city far away sound more like some kind of flute... is there a specific configuration I have to use in the DOSBox conf?
Thank you.
Unfortunately those aren't bugs. We're pretty new to the MT-32 and the current solution for the wind chimes was to use the flute and as for the waterfall we just couldn't find a way to express it via the music system that we were happy with. We've been researching into the more complex side of MT-32 programming with modifying patches but it's still early on yet.
An engine expansion we've toyed around with is possibly using meta data to link missing music tracks with the PCM sound effects pack, but we haven't settled on a particularly elegant solution for that idea.
A lot of this is a hold over from the Tandy 1000 3 Voice Sound mode only days where that was what we had so we made due.
What I will say is this won't be the last non-bug fix patch for the Aching and if we find a better solution we'll readdress some of the more questionable solutions to these challenges we're currently employing.
Hey
Thank you for your reply. I understand. I'll play the game in the originally intended way then. Thanks!