Tuba, tuba, tuba (and akkordeon too!)

Where to find?

There are several maps, that contain the Tuba. I know of two, feel free to add more:
-Xoylent (since certain autobuild), contains a Tuba in a secret room. To know, how to get there, watch this video made by Mirio:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7yuq53X4IQ
Note that this video was made on some older version, since secret room doesn't contain a tuba yet.
-bot-orchestra-stage, there are ALL weapons available from the beginning, including Tuba.

How to play?

Bear with me, it's gonna get a bit complicated.

You play different notes, whether you hold primary or secondary. Also, moving while playing, alters the note. There are 8 possible directions you can move, which gives you 18 different possibilities to play the note.

Primary fire, while stationary, plays a C note. Secondary fire, while stationary, plays a G note. Movement changes played note per fixed amount of semitones, depending on selected direction. Let me demonstrate current pattern (as of Jan 27) by the table, figured out by trial and error.

+3 +4 -1
+5 0 +2
-6 -5 -4

So, for example, if you move right, you add two semitones to note played if stationary. If you move backwards, you subtract 5 semitones from that base note, if you move forwards and to the left diagonally, you add 3 semitones to the base note, and so on.

Notes go like this:

C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#, A, A#, B, C and so on (sharped notes can alternately be written with flats, for example C#=Db, D#=Eb and so on)

So in the end you get those notes:

Primary fire:

D# E B
F C D
F# G G#

Secondary fire:

A# B F#
C G A
C# D D#

Also, by jumping, you raise played note by an octave (12 semitones) - essentially, it gives you the same note, but higher.
And by crouching you lower played note by an octave (credit goes to Halogene).

Use as a weapon

Tuba can also be used as an actual weapon - yes, you can totally frag enemies with it! Just hold fire, primary or alternate and stay close to the enemy. Tuba does obstruct quite a bit of your field of view, so it is pretty awkward to use as a weapon.

Akkordeon!

Thanks go to Halogene and Maddin for the information about this one.

When holding tuba, you can press reload (default: R) to switch to akkordeon. Mechanics of playing are the same, but of course it sounds different. You can then switch back and forth between both instruments with reload key.

Example

Try this melody:

CCGGAAG FFEEDDC GGFFEED GGFFEED CCGGAAG FFEEDDC

i remember when we were testing rad ished's version of soylent.

Rad Ished and i where playing while -z- sat on the top and played twinkle twinkle little star. It was weird and fun.

Tips for pros: use "reload" bind to switch to accordeon when holding the tuba.

---

Also see how the POWER OF MUSIC can make you FLOAT:

http://ompldr.org/vYzd3NA

Oh, and if you use crouch key, you play an octave lower, if I recall correctly.

I think I remember at one point div talking about MIDI input bound to aliases that would let you play the tuba using a MIDI keyboard. Was that implemented?

It's possible, I remember divVerent telling me, but I don't remember what you have to do. It would be awesome to meet on a server featuring the orchestra map and making music together with other people...

Found!

http://git.xonotic.org/?p=xonotic/xonoti...cd;hb=HEAD

Nice fingering chart for Tuba, @divVerent! Better than the traditional one.

i remember when we were testing rad ished's version of soylent.

Rad Ished and i where playing while -z- sat on the top and played twinkle twinkle little star. It was weird and fun.

how do you get past the door in soylent? what do i put as the admin name in i have stared a lan server? thanks!

You have to deserve access. Hint: look through xoylent's .map file

I wonder if we could get more people interested in development by including easter eggs and telling them to find out how they work by looking at the code.

Apparently reloading the Tuba twice now shows a bagpipe (or something of that sort)

Apparently reloading the Tuba twice now shows a bagpipe (or something of that sort)

It's a Klein Bottle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klein_bottle

Does this still work? I can't seem to get it to work, despite using ./all run -sndseqin 24:0 and aseqdump -p 24 correctly reacting to midi input... Anyone knows what I am missing?

Hm, ok thank you. But just to get it right, using

Code:

./all run -sndseqin 24:0

followed by a

Code:

exec input-tuba.cfg

in Xonotic console, then going to single player deathmatch Xoylent and getting the tuba would be the right procedure to test this?

I've seen that "it currently only works with ALSA", I am using pulseaudio but ALSA is present and basically usable. Do I need to tell Xonotic to use ALSA maybe?

Wooh, old thread! Hello Halogene!

Can you have a look at your console output for lines relating to SndSys_Init ? The engine provides some info on MIDI sequencer device initialization when using -sndseq.

Hi Mr.Bougo! Nice that you are still around :oD I don't find any SndSys_Init lines in console. I only get "S_Startup: initializing sound output format", but nothing else looks like it would do anything related to SndSys_Init. Maybe the -sndseqin option is not correct? It seems it doesn't register. If I use for example -sndseq instead of -sndseqin the output remains the same... :oS

Hi Mr.Bougo! Nice that you are still around :oD I don't find any SndSys_Init lines in console. I only get "S_Startup: initializing sound output format", but nothing else looks like it would do anything related to SndSys_Init. Maybe the -sndseqin option is not correct? It seems it doesn't register. If I use for example -sndseq instead of -sndseqin the output remains the same... :oS

Hi again!

After having a look, it seems like the SDL build uses its own sound lib and has no access to the ALSA MIDI device, so MIDI input is not defined.

You'll need to use the GLX build for that; that should build with ALSA by default on Linux and you should be seeing the message that I mentioned:

Code:

SndSys_Init: using the ALSA module

I managed to connect the output of VMPK to Xonotic but it's hard for me to test because I have to take focus away from Xonotic to hit the virtual MIDI keys

If you can see the connection between your MIDI device and Xonotic with aconnect -l I think you'll be close!

EDIT: use at your own risk but it appears possible to make a SDL build with ALSA audio with those changes in the Darkplaces makefile.inc. The key inputs are sent and audio output appears to work, at least in the menu.

Code:

diff --git a/makefile.inc b/makefile.inc
index a08c5dbc..69ad7ff2 100644
--- a/makefile.inc
+++ b/makefile.inc
@@ -168,7 +168,7 @@ OBJ_MENU= \
# being linked, because it should be recompiled every time an executable is
# built to give the executable a proper date string
OBJ_SV= builddate.c sys_linux.o vid_null.o thread_null.o $(OBJ_SND_NULL) $(OBJ_COMMON)
-OBJ_SDL= builddate.c sys_sdl.o vid_sdl.o thread_sdl.o $(OBJ_MENU) $(OBJ_SND_COMMON) snd_sdl.o $(OBJ_SDLCD) $(OBJ_VIDEO_CAPTURE) $(OBJ_COMMON)
+OBJ_SDL= builddate.c sys_sdl.o vid_sdl.o thread_sdl.o $(OBJ_MENU) $(OBJ_SND_COMMON) $(OBJ_SOUND) $(OBJ_SDLCD) $(OBJ_VIDEO_CAPTURE) $(OBJ_COMMON)


# Compilation
@@ -236,7 +236,7 @@ CMD_UNIXMKDIR=mkdir -p
# Link
LDFLAGS_LINUXCL=$(LDFLAGS_UNIXCOMMON) -lrt -ldl $(LDFLAGS_UNIXCL)
LDFLAGS_LINUXSV=$(LDFLAGS_UNIXCOMMON) -lrt -ldl
-LDFLAGS_LINUXSDL=$(LDFLAGS_UNIXCOMMON) -lrt -ldl $(LDFLAGS_UNIXSDL)
+LDFLAGS_LINUXSDL=$(LDFLAGS_UNIXCOMMON) -lrt -ldl $(LDFLAGS_UNIXSDL) $(LIB_SOUND)


##### Mac OS X specific variables #####

Wow, cool insights here, thank you! I will have to find out how to use the glx build from all script, but that's a challenge I'll try to master :o) Many thanks!

Wow, cool insights here, thank you! I will have to find out how to use the glx build from all script, but that's a challenge I'll try to master :o) Many thanks!

Oh sorry I left that out! No spoilers then, but don't forget to update the thread when you figure it out. You know where to find me if you want the answer

Haha, there I was thinking you'd just add the info here anyway and I get around investigating this myself conveniently but noo, you're just too polite! Xo)
But actually this was so easy to figure out that even I managed :oD a simple ./all help did the trick and this showed that I need to do

Code:

./all run glx -sndseqin 24:0 +exec input-tuba.cfg

And voilá, there I am playing the tuba on my midi keyboard. Awesome! If only there wasn't this lag... and it seems it's not really possible to play fast runs because the single notes seem to have a certain minimum length to play. But then again Xonotic isn't a midi instrument... ;o)
Thanks for helping, works beautifully!

Awesome! You did insist on not getting a hint haha. Glad you found it easily

About the input lag, the tuba balance cvars (g_balance_tuba_*) don't look like they would cause much delay (the animtime and refire are both 0.05 which is close to the ticrate of 0.0333333 second). Are you playing on a local server? I wonder how fast your fast runs are.

I was playing a local game on Xoylent :o)
With fast runs I mean things like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fx3gcOpGnsQ
...ok I'm exaggerating, but even if I'd play that on 0.25 speed it wouldn't register properly. Anything faster than "are you sleeping" is troublesome :o/ and the tuba plays with like 0,2 secs lag which makes it really awkward to play in the first place. It feels like... ever seen the experiment of people wearing VR glasses and having artificial lag on their view? That's sort of the visual analogon to how it feels :oD
But as I said, it would be really displaced to expect Xonotic to work like a latency free synthesizer. I figure that's not what developers were focussing on when coding :o) I love the mere function of piping midi controls through to Xonotic, just awesome!

I was playing a local game on Xoylent :o)
With fast runs I mean things like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fx3gcOpGnsQ
...ok I'm exaggerating, but even if I'd play that on 0.25 speed it wouldn't register properly. Anything faster than "are you sleeping" is troublesome :o/ and the tuba plays with like 0,2 secs lag which makes it really awkward to play in the first place. It feels like... ever seen the experiment of people wearing VR glasses and having artificial lag on their view? That's sort of the visual analogon to how it feels :oD
But as I said, it would be really displaced to expect Xonotic to work like a latency free synthesizer. I figure that's not what developers were focussing on when coding :o) I love the mere function of piping midi controls through to Xonotic, just awesome!

Not sure how much the latency would affect the music, but I've always hoped to have a "live concert". I did a few songs in Xoylent rooftop (I actually played songs from Fiddler on the Roof) but that space is quite limited (one would fall off so it requires constant adjusting).

Anyway, any music friendly map for this? Perhaps I can revive my server to host it and people can have a live concert together.

There is no GLX executable any more :o/ is there any way to get midi input to work with SDL?