Adding MP3 or Music to your map

I heard a rumor that the CS:Source engine would allow MP3's to be used
as background music or sound FX. Is this true? If it is or isn't how do
I add Music to my maps now? The old way doesnt seem to work. I want to
add some Techno Music to my LaserTag map, and I am having hard
time fiinding agood looping wave file to use.. I have one but cant seem
to get it to work like I did in Old CS. Please advise.. thank you.

HL2 SP has background mp3s, I'm not sure exactly how to implement this tho. CS Source probably doesnt, its a multiplayer mod, background music doesnt really add to the experience in the same way it does in singleplayer. Personally I think its a bad idea, if people want to listen to techno music while playing CS, they can run winamp in the background and listen to their own music. This is just going to bloat the total filesize without much real gain in gameplay experience, so I'd recommend against it.

Using custom wavs/mp3s is really simple. Just make sure your soundfile is in 44khz 16 bit stereo format. All you do is put it (say the name of your file is song.mp3) in your cstrike/sound folder (create the sound folder if you dont already have one) and when you make your ambient generic, for name just put whatever, and soundname is going to be song.mp3 (yes you have to put the sound name and include the filename extension). I use alot of custom sounds in my maps and havent had a problem yet (cs source works fine)

Mmmmm, i'll mark this as answered with a final note - don't forget to include some kind of button to toggle the sound on/off - you risk alienating a lot of potential players otherwise :smile:

Thanks Guys.. Did you use a ambient_General, or a soundscape?

Have you ever played LaserTag? they pump loud annoying Techno into the
arena.. its part of the feel, part of the fun. Now had this been lets
say de_dust.. then no I would not add Techno music at all. But its
needed to be a real live LaserTag arena..

What would you recommend to use to make the sound file 44kz at 16 bit stereo?

As for a way to turn it off.. if I get enough complaits from players I
will add a feature like that.. even though I think it would ruin the
map as well as the feel.

Thanks Guys.. Did you use a ambient_General, or a soundscape?

Have you ever played LaserTag? they pump loud annoying Techno into the
arena.. its part of the feel, part of the fun. Now had this been lets
say de_dust.. then no I would not add Techno music at all. But its
needed to be a real live LaserTag arena..

What would you recommend to use to make the sound file 44kz at 16 bit stereo?

As for a way to turn it off.. if I get enough complaits from players I
will add a feature like that.. even though I think it would ruin the
map as well as the feel.

Well, I'd make it an MP3, not a .wav. Wav's are uncompressed and
huge. Now since it's background music, it doesn't have to be of
the utmost quality. So if it has to be 44khz, lowest bitrate you
can go with MP3 compression is 96kbps, and that's what I would use.

Thanks Guys.. Did you use a ambient_General, or a soundscape?

Have you ever played LaserTag? they pump loud annoying Techno into the
arena.. its part of the feel, part of the fun. Now had this been lets
say de_dust.. then no I would not add Techno music at all. But its
needed to be a real live LaserTag arena..

What would you recommend to use to make the sound file 44kz at 16 bit stereo?

As for a way to turn it off.. if I get enough complaits from players I
will add a feature like that.. even though I think it would ruin the
map as well as the feel.

Look up "Forceflow" on the memberlist, I think he wrote a tutorial about sound conversion. But mp3 seems to be the more sensible option..