Which audio file format is best?
06-26-2009, 03:51 AM
Here's a few things to consider:
MP3 is actually an owned/trademarked format. So if anyone plans to make money on their games, they will be required to pay the owner (The Fraunhofer Institute) for licensing: http://www.mp3licensing.com
Now the benefits of MP3 are reduced filesize from the standard .wav format. And since RPGMaker XP plays streaming MP3 files, you can loop the music with no noticable pause or break when the music re-starts.
Ogg or "Ogg Vorbis is a completely open, patent-free, professional audio encoding and streaming technology with all the benefits of Open Source." - Vorbis.com. Yep, I got that from the official website, and what that means is FREE USE dude. No royalties to pay unless you wanna use someone else's music or sound effects.
The benefits of .Ogg are similar filesizes to MP3 (maybe marginally larger or smaller), and decent quality. RPGMaker XP doesn't have streaming Ogg support, so it isn't suited for long 'looping' music pieces. It will have to fully load the file before playing the piece. However, RMVX does have streaming support for Ogg files with a running length of 3 seconds or more.
MP3 is actually an owned/trademarked format. So if anyone plans to make money on their games, they will be required to pay the owner (The Fraunhofer Institute) for licensing: http://www.mp3licensing.com
Now the benefits of MP3 are reduced filesize from the standard .wav format. And since RPGMaker XP plays streaming MP3 files, you can loop the music with no noticable pause or break when the music re-starts.
Ogg or "Ogg Vorbis is a completely open, patent-free, professional audio encoding and streaming technology with all the benefits of Open Source." - Vorbis.com. Yep, I got that from the official website, and what that means is FREE USE dude. No royalties to pay unless you wanna use someone else's music or sound effects.
The benefits of .Ogg are similar filesizes to MP3 (maybe marginally larger or smaller), and decent quality. RPGMaker XP doesn't have streaming Ogg support, so it isn't suited for long 'looping' music pieces. It will have to fully load the file before playing the piece. However, RMVX does have streaming support for Ogg files with a running length of 3 seconds or more.
