City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

QoL-Itunes/Windows Media controls

IanTheM1

By IanTheM1,
Posted on: 2010-03-14 23:13 in Suggestions and Ideas

 

Posted

A small Quality of Life request: Can we get control slash commands and icons to control music players (ITunes, Windows Media Player, Winamp, etc.)? Having the song title appear as either a generic system message or in a new "music" channel would be a great bonus.

Edit:
To clarify what I'm saying, I would like a play/pause, stop, next track, and previous track commands or buttons. A system message could possibly capture the track being played and show it to the player. Bonus would be able to increase or decrease volume.

All this would only be local, so you would only hear what is playing on your own media player, not anyone else's. To do otherwise would open NCsoft and Paragon Studios to lawsuits from the RIAA for broadcasting. Not to mention it would be a huge lag on the game and I wouldn't want to hear what other people are listening to (I have my own taste in music and the reason to play music through a media player is to avoid the ingame music).



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Posted

Are you saying like put slash commands to put your Media Players music instead of the coh music...

Because if thats so then i would love that idea! to be honest...

Would also like it for the fact that others can hear the same song as well..

like set it up for /teamlisten or /selflisten for us.

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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tempstra View Post
Would also like it for the fact that others can hear the same song as well..

like set it up for /teamlisten or /selflisten for us.
That would sponge off a lot of bandwidth to stream music in the game, and while I would think there would be an option to not send music information to those who don't want it, I think it would just be more simple to keep it local, you can play your own music for your own amusement and not risk bothering other players with clashes of taste.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Oneirohero View Post
That would sponge off a lot of bandwidth to stream music in the game, and while I would think there would be an option to not send music information to those who don't want it, I think it would just be more simple to keep it local, you can play your own music for your own amusement and not risk bothering other players with clashes of taste.
Not to mention the instant legal tangle it creates.

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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tempstra View Post
Are you saying like put slash commands to put your Media Players music instead of the coh music...
No, that isn't what I meant. I meant being able to control the media players without having to alt-tabbing out of the game to control what music you hear. Being able to set volume of the media player would be a great bonus.

Streaming audio to other players would be bandwidth intensive and likely get NCsoft/paragon studios sued out of existence by the RIAA. That is the last thing that I would want.

Edit:
Updated original post with a clarification.



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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Snow Globe View Post
No, that isn't what I meant. I meant being able to control the media players without having to alt-tabbing out of the game to control what music you hear. Being able to set volume of the media player would be a great bonus.

Streaming audio to other players would be bandwidth intensive and likely get NCsoft/paragon studios sued out of existence by the RIAA. That is the last thing that I would want.

Edit:
Updated original post with a clarification.
run in windowed mode. the problem with this is there are to many media players to code to work with the game. and then you can't guarantee that it won't cause massive problems with the game.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
run in windowed mode. the problem with this is there are to many media players to code to work with the game. and then you can't guarantee that it won't cause massive problems with the game.
My response was that there be a special media player created for the game. I gave the example of JAM's JK2/JK3 Killtracker, which was a player-created utility for Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy that included a music player that would watch for commands made in-game that activated its features. (link to the utility here: http://jediknight3.filefront.com/fil..._Tracker;62941 Though I'm sure it means nothing to anyone here who didn't play those games)

That would leave them with just one media player to code commands for.

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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Risko_Vinsheen View Post
My response was that there be a special media player created for the game. I gave the example of JAM's JK2/JK3 Killtracker, which was a player-created utility for Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy that included a music player that would watch for commands made in-game that activated its features. (link to the utility here: http://jediknight3.filefront.com/fil..._Tracker;62941 Though I'm sure it means nothing to anyone here who didn't play those games)

That would leave them with just one media player to code commands for.
thats good... would it work for mac users? you can't forget about them. and since it would be client side, so as to not offend anyone else, the devs can not guarantee it will work correctly. i see this as an idea for a CoH/V 2 or another game but not this one.this just seems like something that would have to be built in from the very begining of writing code then something that can just be added in.

also, how much band width would it take to run? would people with bare minimum rigs be able to use it?

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
thats good... would it work for mac users? you can't forget about them. and since it would be client side, so as to not offend anyone else, the devs can not guarantee it will work correctly. i see this as an idea for a CoH/V 2 or another game but not this one.this just seems like something that would have to be built in from the very begining of writing code then something that can just be added in.

also, how much band width would it take to run? would people with bare minimum rigs be able to use it?
I know nothing of how the Mac works so I wouldn't know. Since it would be clientside and run absolutely nothing through the internet I don't see why it would affect bandwidth. If you're speaking of how much of an impact it would make on your computer's memory I don't see it doing more than a regular media player like Realplayer or Windows Media Player.

If coding the commands would be too much for the game then the utility could be coded to watch for command phrases within the game like JAM did. Unfortunately this runs the issue of spamming chat channels, because the way the JAM player worked was it would watch for when you said something like "!play Diary", which would enter the game's chat channels so that everyone could see it, but it would only be to activate the player.

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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Risko_Vinsheen View Post
My very first post on these forums had to do with this :P

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=209680

So I'm all for it!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Risko_Vinsheen View Post
As for extra feature that could be added (Cyborg had combat auras, Magic had Costume Change Emotes, Science had the Super Tailor) could add in an MP3 player functionality. Set up a playlist outside of your game and when in game with simple slash commands can manipulate it like any other media player.
...
Back when I played Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy there was a player made program that did just this. A music player you could control from within the game itself. And when you used one of the commands it would give you a message that only you could see to tell you what song is now playing or whatever.
Not quite. Notable differences: I am not talking about a separate add-on. I'm talking about full integration with the game for everyone that would want to use a standard media player. I named the top 3 (iTunes, WMP, Winamp). That other superhero mmo from Cryptic has integrated iTunes support.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Risko_Vinsheen View Post
/play *songtitle*
/pause
/nextsong
/prevsong
/vol%% (replace the %% with a number to manipulate volume levels, i.e. /vol67 to put the volume at 67% full)
/nowplaying (just as the name suggests, would tell you what song you're currently listening to)
Okay this part is what I was thinking.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
run in windowed mode. the problem with this is there are to many media players to code to work with the game. and then you can't guarantee that it won't cause massive problems with the game.
How about the ability to load in a .m3u playlist and play MP3s internally? This way players can make their playlist(s) in the media player of their choice then play it in the game.

/playmp3 <filename>
/playm3u <filename>

The only problem is that it is unclear if MP3s are out of patent-hell or not.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Risko_Vinsheen View Post
My response was that there be a special media player created for the game.
It doesn't need to be a full-blown media player.

I'm going to break this next bit up to be clear which statements I'm responding to:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
thats good... would it work for mac users? you can't forget about them.
Besides that, Macs have media keys, and iTunes responds to media keys on both the Mac and PC. This fact is why I suggested iTunes first. Winamp is for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The only other player I suggested was Windows Media Player, which the majority of players use.

iTunes has a Software Developer Kit (SDK) to control iTunes with other programs. This would allow Paragon Studios to send and receive information to iTunes. Actually playing MP3s internally would make it universal (Windows, Mac, Linux), but there are still questions as to whether the patents are still valid and Linux isn't supported.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
and since it would be client side, so as to not offend anyone else, the devs can not guarantee it will work correctly.
This objection has absolutely nothing to do with the suggestion.

You do realize that there are a lot of client-side only effects in the game right? Gravity Control's Propel for instance. Besides this, it would be very easy to test: try to play a sound file. It would be very obvious if the sound played or not.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
i see this as an idea for a CoH/V 2 or another game but not this one.this just seems like something that would have to be built in from the very begining of writing code then something that can just be added in.
The iTunes SDK "allows programmatic control of iTunes from languages like JScript, Visual Basic, C#, and C++" or Applescript. The function calls are exactly the same as any other internal function calls. The SDK has all the references needed to call the functions requested above (track listing, play, pause, stop, next track, previous track, volume).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
also, how much band width would it take to run? would people with bare minimum rigs be able to use it?
Zero bandwidth needed. Nothing is being touched over the Internet. All information would be transfered through RAM.

An internal player would have all information in the .M3U playlist or the MP3 itself.



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Posted

sorry snow, wasn't trying to argue against it just trying to get a little better understanding of how it worked in other games. i still do not see this as something they would want to do in this version of CoX. and again, i still see it coming down to the codes working correctly in the game. of course, they do make a speaker system for mp3/ipods that can be used. i have one and it works perfectly and doesn't interfere with my game play.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
sorry snow, wasn't trying to argue against it just trying to get a little better understanding of how it worked in other games.
I'm sorry that I read that as an attack. I've edited the response.

The other superhero mmo from Cryptic has iTunes and Winamp controls built it. These two programs cover most (not all) media types. Both are available without cost.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
i still do not see this as something they would want to do in this version of CoX. and again, i still see it coming down to the codes working correctly in the game.
The amount of code they would need is very small, especially if they only did iTunes support. I'm guessing that you aren't a coder/programmer, so I'll try to describe what is happening in general terms.

Apple has made a library of routines to access iTunes. This is similar to what nVidia and ATI do with their graphics cards. What the developers have to do is hook into this library (Apple provides the specs and documentation, and would work with Paragon Studios to get it set up) and call the related functions. This is basic object oriented programming. In fact, they could assign this to a new programming hire as a means to get them up to speed on how the game works (it is that simple).

What it boils down to is that CoH, when given the command to play a song, would do something like:
Code:
music=itunes.play();
That would be all that is needed to play a song.

To get the track information:
Code:
trackinfo=itunes.trackInfo();
iTunes would handle the request and tell CoH what track was playing. Winamp is similar.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sharker_Quint View Post
of course, they do make a speaker system for mp3/ipods that can be used. i have one and it works perfectly and doesn't interfere with my game play.
That is why I put QoL (Quality of Life) in the title. It isn't something that is needed for the game. People can still play iTunes, WMP, Winamp, or any other media player in the background. It is just one of those "it would be nice to have" things that doesn't harm anyone requests.



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