v6.1.0 - The One To Get

This is major update - I highly recommend you update if you use cPlayer in any capacity. I have obsessed over this for the past few months. I have learned a lot. I'm still learning a lot. But I'm at a place where I am both happy enough to share what I have with you and also I need a break from this app before I burn out. This is a continuation of the huge v6.0.0 update but it's a major update on its own. Get it.

THIS IS NOT A GAME ENGINE!

Therefore there are many restrictions and limitations I have to deal with. If you want a game, go try out YARG and Clone Hero - they're great games with great teams behind them.
If you want a music player with some fun visualizations, then give cPlayer a try.
I am giving you a product that works perfectly fine for me on my Windows 11 gaming PC and Windows 11 gaming laptop. You may have a different experience. Please report here on GitHub or on my own Discord "Nemo's Nautilus" and I will gladly try to assist. This is designed and expected to only work on modern Windows. No support is given for Windows 7, Linux or Mac. Sorry.

As of v6.1.0 cPlayer is known to interact with the following game files, as specified:

Fully featured (album art, audio, charts)

Rock Band 1/2/3 (Xbox 360)
Rock Band 1/2/3 (PS3)
Rock Band 1/2/3 (Wii)
Fortnite Festival (PC)
YARG (PC)
Clone Hero (PC)
Fret Smasher (PC)

Limited Support (mostly audio only, some have album art, some have charts)

Rock Band 4 (PS4)
RockSmith 2014 (PC)
Guitar Hero: World Tour: Definitive Edition (PC)
Power Gig (PC)
BandFuse (Xbox 360)

I hope you enjoy this update to cPlayer.
I don't accept monetary donations but I do love getting feedback and I enjoy interacting with those who use any of my programs.

• Nemo

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v6.1.0

• major renderer overhaul to improve performance - based on the built-in FPS counter used for debugging, most modes improved from roughly 10–12 FPS to 30-40 FPS - second-screen performance now matches the built-in viewer in most non-video modes - video overlay on the second screen still carries a significant performance cost so FPS take a dive there
• major rework of many textures and assets for what I'm hoping is a cleaner and more cohesive look
• added new Audio Mixer feature that allows you to remix the audio on songs with isolated stems, so you can really listen to a song however you want - this replaces the old "Select tracks to play" form and the old volume control form, so it combines three things into one cool tool - thanks to raynebc for the idea
• tweaked highway perspective for less severe angle and more consistency with actual Rock Band perspective
• added animated track background
• added "Focus Mode" (all black, no videos or images)
• reworked how cPlayer detects and interacts with the original Stage Kit - now there's no noticeable performance loss and it automatically detects how many lights you have connected and automatically controls them all at the same time - meaning multiple Stage Kits are now supported - also put a lot of work into creating different patterns and beat recognition so it somewhat goes with the song's BPM - it does NOT parse the VENUE track for lighting cues however
• added support for FatsCo Lightshow and FatsCo Strobe - I only have one of each to test with but in theory it'll work with as many as you have plugged into your computer
• improved all karaoke modes both visually and functionally for a smoother overall experience
• improved cPlayer Karaoke Mode with smoother text edges, text stroke rendering, and more consistent lyric highlighting
• improved Modern Karaoke Mode highlighting to prevent spillover into the next syllable on certain songs
• improved the loading bar animation from stepped movement to smooth animation
• added a 5-second countdown to the Modern Karaoke loading animation, inspired by KaraFun
• disabled the random floating music notes that appeared during loading bars - the code is still present for anyone who wants to restore it in a fork
• fixed an issue where the ^ character could appear in lyrics for some Spanish songs, such as José José’s “Triste”
• added support for stripping Clone Hero .chart color codes from charter names when displayed in Modern Karaoke Mode
• fixed major issues affecting Clone Hero and YARG songs that include background videos
• most views should now display correctly over background video playback
• added support for detecting the video_start_time value used in Clone Hero-style charts, which had been overlooked in earlier versions
• updated .chart to .mid conversion to include lower difficulties - this is not yet visible in cPlayer itself, but keeps the conversion logic more complete and consistent for future use
• made change that allows decoupling of lyrics and vocals/harmony notes - this won't make a difference for Rock Band style charts but will allow for playback of another project's files i'm working on
• improved performance of scrolling lyrics so now it's tempo aware and lyrics don't bunch up over each other
• fixed bug where on Pro Keys sustain chords would drop the lower notes and only display the highest note
• fixed bug where on Pro Keys sustain broken chords/arpeggios would only hold the last note of the chord/arpeggio and not all the notes in the chord
• fixed bug where it would inflate your song play count when enabling/disabling audio tracks to play
• fixed bug where some songs with slow tempo and long sustain notes it would prematurely show the countdown to the next playable section while still in a sustain
• added ability to double click on the screen to make it full screen or to return it to windowed mode (functionality is not guaranteed with video mode enabled)
• fixed the update-checking code, which was mistakenly checking against an older version update file on the server and therefore always failed
• removed the AI-generated splash screen, which was apparently causing damage to the environment and making some users sad
• and much more!

v6.0.0 — Major Update

This is major update worthy of a new version number. I have obsessed over this for the past month. I have learned a lot. I'm still learning a lot. But I'm at a place where I am both happy enough to share what I have with you and also I need a break from this app before I burn out.

THIS IS NOT A GAME ENGINE!

Therefore there are many restrictions and limitations I have to deal with. If you want a game, go try out YARG and Clone Hero.
If you want a music player with some fun visualizations, then give cPlayer a try.
I am giving you a product that works perfectly fine for me on my overpowered gaming PC. You may have different experiences. Please report here on GitHub or on my own Discord "Nemo's Nautilus" and I will gladly try to assist. This is designed and expected to only work on modern Windows. No support is given for Windows 7, Linux or Mac. Sorry.

As of v6.0.0 cPlayer is known to interact with the following game files, as specified:

Fully featured (album art, audio, charts)

Rock Band 1/2/3 (Xbox 360)
Rock Band 1/2/3 (PS3)
Rock Band 1/2/3 (Wii)
Fortnite Festival (PC)
YARG (PC)
Clone Hero (PC)
Fret Smasher (PC)

Limited Support (mostly audio only, some have album art, some have charts)

Rock Band 4 (PS4)
RockSmith 2014 (PC)
Guitar Hero: World Tour: Definitive Edition (PC)
Power Gig (PC)
BandFuse (Xbox 360)

For the first time i'm shipping two files - the normal binary and a file called backgrounds.zip. The latter one includes background videos and images you may choose to use with cPlayer. You can use the ones that are being shipped, these additional ones, your own, or none at all. I give you options.

I hope you enjoy this new version of cPlayer.
I don't accept monetary donations but I do love getting feedback and I enjoy interacting with those who use any of my programs.

• Nemo

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🎨 User Interface & Visual Overhaul

Significant UI changes in my never-ending attempt to modernize cPlayer with my limited UX skills

Added splash screen, removed the old logo image, and updated the program icon

Significantly improved the display settings menu system — no more nested context menus; settings are now controlled through a fancy overlay form that you can adjust while the song is playing for real-time feedback

Improved how this change log is presented to the user in-app

Significant improvements to the Active Song Details display — looks better, allows copying song information, and lets you navigate directly to the song file on your hard drive

🎮 Chart & Gameplay-Style Visuals

Added RB/YARG-style visual display to show game charts in a look similar to Rock Band / YARG (with my own spin on things — this is not a game engine!)

Backgrounds can be removed, edited, or supplemented in /res/backgrounds/

Supported formats: .jpg or .png (recommended width: ~2000px)

Video backgrounds are supported in .mp4 format

Added option to display lyrics in static and karaoke modes for Rock Band-style karaoke mode

Significantly improved performance for all display styles that show scrolling lyrics

🎵 Karaoke & Lyrics Improvements

Added stroke to the lyrics in Classic Karaoke mode for a more polished look

Added option to use a solid-color background (with an elegant gradient) for Classic Karaoke mode

Added lead-in indicator when there’s a gap between phrases so the singer knows when to start singing in Classic Karaoke mode

Fixed behavior where Classic Karaoke mode would constantly change the background image when pausing, resuming, or changing tracks — backgrounds now only change when the song changes

📁 Format & Game Support

Added support for playback of Rock Band 4 PS4 files (extracted folder structure)

Drag and drop the songdta_ps4 file, or perform an automatic search from the top-level folder

Significantly improved video playback quality for Clone Hero and Phase Shift songs that include video files

RB-style charts can now be displayed over video, along with Modern Karaoke and cPlayer Karaoke display modes

🔍 Playlist, Filtering & Discovery

Added Favorites feature — cPlayer now tracks how often you play songs; clicking the Favorites button shows your top 50 songs (assuming you’ve played at least 50)

Added ability to filter by decade — click one or more decade icons to display only songs from those decades

Added ability to filter by genre — click the Filters icon, select one or more genres, and apply filters to narrow your playlist

Added ability to filter by instrument — select one or more required instruments and apply filters

Note: To include harm2/harm3 parts, you’ll need to rebuild your existing playlist the first time you run this version. If you’re starting from scratch, it will just work.

Added ability to filter by song language

Click the Filters icon and select a language

Important: This only works well if the song was properly authored in Magma with the correct language selected

You’ll need to rescan and rebuild your playlist the first time you run this version to populate language data

🎛️ MIDI & Audio Enhancements

Added option to select No Keys and No Vocals in the MIDI options

Previously, you had to choose either Keys or Pro Keys, and Vocals or Harmonies

You can now opt for neither

Added tool to allow users to add an AV offset value to compensate for Bluetooth headset latency

Specify your Bluetooth latency and play in sync even with wireless headphones

My Sony headphones have ~250ms latency, but you can experiment up to 3000ms in real time to find what works best for your setup

🔀 Insta-Mix Improvements

Improved Insta-Mix by adding genre families and allowing multiple songs from the same seed artist, even across different genres (for artists that cross genre boundaries)

🔗 Nautilus Integration

Added Nautilus integration

After an upcoming Nautilus update, the Visualizer will accept input from all games supported by cPlayer

Limited support for sending data to CON Explorer, File Analyzer, and Audio Analyzer (Rock Band / CON files only)

🛠️ Fixes, Restorations & Miscellaneous

Fixed broken Play, Pause, and Next buttons in the tray icon when cPlayer is minimized

Percussion is back!

Awesomeness Detection is back!

Various other under-the-hood improvements

v5.1.1

• Improved highlighting behavior when using Classic Karaoke mode so it should no longer "go over" to the next syllable
• Improved behavior so now next lyrics will appear up to 1.5 seconds earlier than you're supposed to sing them so you're not mumbling through the first word or two (this is dependent on the song)

v5.1.0

• Added Second Screen option so you can use cPlayer with multiple display set ups - one screen acts as the controller and the other one displays the charts (click and hold to drag, drag to the right screen, double click to maximize, double click again to minimize)
• Now can choose to force displaying of PART VOCALS instead of harmonies on Classic Karaoke mode
• Now can choose to force displaying of PART 1 and PART 2 harmonies only (ignoring PART 3) on Classic Karaoke mode
• Now displays background image by default on Classic Karaoke mode - can be disabled and can also be rotated through 5 presets (you can replace with your own)
• Now supports animated background for Classic Karaoke like how it was introduced with Rock Band Karaoke
• Many other improvements to how Classic Karaoke works
• Completely reworked how the Stage Kit is used - no more per instrument note-specific usage, which was resource intensive and not very fun anyways - now it's randomized but based on song BPM (this is still a work in progress)
• Stage Kit now works outside of the Game Mode displays, should work no matter what mode you're in
• Added option to enable/disable use of the Stage Kit LEDs, strobe light and fogger, so you can use what you want and not anything that you don't want
• Eliminated SlimDX in favor of Vortice.XInput due to changes with recent Windows 11 updates breaking compatibility with X360 peripherals (the Stage Kit in this case)

v5.0.0

DEVELOPMENT FOR DARK EDITION HAS ENDED AS OF v4.0.3 - I've poured too much time and energy into BRIGHT EDITION to keep them both updated while having different code bases
CPLAYER BRIGHT EDITION IS NOW SIMPLY CPLAYER AND WILL BE THE ONLY VERSION WITH FUTURE DEVELOPMENT

• Added Classic Karaoke Mode (right click on the display screen -> Display: Karaoke Mode -> Classic Karaoke) - supports up to three vocal parts - is a much closer approximation to classic karaoke look and behavior than the old mode which has now been renamed as cPlayer Karaoke - you can customize all colors to your liking or keep the defaults
• Added Rock Band Karaoke Mode (right click on the display screen -> Display: Karaoke Mode -> Rock Band Karaoke) - simulates the Rock Band vocals experience as best as I can without having a proper game engine - thanks to StackOverflow0x for the idea
• Added support for playback of Clone Hero .chart files - this is an early feature so some things might be broken - let me know
• Added option to enlarge whatever is playing to full screen by double clicking on the display screen, double click again or press Escape to go back
• Changed "Save" buttons to "Close" in the option screens to make it clear that was their function - thanks to StackOverflow0x for the suggestion
• Changed all instances of "...do you want to do that?" to be more clear as to what the user was about to do - thanks to StackOverflow0x for the suggestion
• Changed default behavior for Play button - now when you throw a song file at cPlayer and press play it will automatically default to the first file in your playlist if you have nothing selected, or it will play the selected song if you have one selected, this eliminates the need to double click on the playlist but that still works - thanks to StackOverflow0x for the suggestion
• Fixed bug when rebuilding playlist metadata it would not calculate average BPM so that information would be lost from the playlist
• Fixed GUI bug/design issue where Pro Keys/Keys and Harmonies/Vocals were mutually exclusive options in the MIDI options screen but it appeared as if they weren't - thanks to StackOverflow0x for the suggestion
• Fixed audio bug that would happen with 7 channel songs where channels would not be distributed correctly - thanks to StackOverflow0x for pointing out the issue
• Fixed broken playback of YARG .yargsong and Clone Hero .sng files
• Fixed wonky playback of Fortnite Festival .fnf/.m4a files
• Fixed broken Play Next feature
• Many other under the hood fixes and improvements

v4.0.3

• Added option to select background color, lyric color and highlight color when using Karaoke Mode
• Added option to Rebuild Playlist (metadata + audio) which will not only scan and update the playlist metadata but will also scan the .mogg files and use the actual audio length for the duration - thereby fixing songs that do not have duration in their DTA files - this is a slow process but it seems to be accurate

v4.0.2

• Changed video player from WMP to VLC, more modern and should work on Linux via WINE
• Fixed issue where the player would hang at the end of the song if there was only one song in your playlist and you had Shuffle Songs enabled
• Added support for custom author name colors (mainly a Clone Hero thing)
• Fixed reading of crazy track number values from bad Clone Hero .ini files
• Fixed playback of songs with exactly eight channels where channels would be mixed up and you would not be able to isolate them correctly with multitrack songs
• [BRIGHT EDITION ONLY] HOPOs are here! - when playing in Game Style mode, HOPOs will be displayed for BASS and GUITAR charts where appropriate
• [BRIGHT EDITION ONLY] Fixed behavior where Game Mode instrument charts would leave empty vertical space to allow for non existing vocal tracks in instrumentals

v4.0.1

• Fixed broken compatibility with songs that use .ini metadata files introduced in the big v4.0.0 update
• [BRIGHT EDITION ONLY] Fixed bug where on Game Style mode orange and green notes were flipped
• [BRIGHT EDITION ONLY] Changed behavior of how play/pause/stop buttons work to eliminate bug where you would have to click on pause twice before it would pause

v4.0.0

BRIGHT EDITION IS HERE!
I was told cPlayer could use a more modern UI and more recognizable buttons rather than rectangles that told you what they did. So I took this to heart and went to work. This is the outcome. I really like it and I hope you do too.
For now Bright Edition and Dark Edition have feature parity with the exception of the one feature mentioned below, but I believe in the not-too-distant future I might just drop the Dark Edition and work exclusively on Bright Edition.
Both editions have their own Github repositories, so anyone can clone the Dark Edition repo and keep working on it when I stop.

(BRIGHT EDITION EXCLUSIVE) Added Game Style mode that displays the song's MIDI contents in a form inspired by Rock Band 3 - I do not have a 3D engine and this is not a YARG/Clone Hero competitor, this is simply a visualization tool, but I think this one is a major improvement over the 10-year old MIDI display mode (still there) - both modes are bottlenecked by WinForms limitations but i'm too far in to change platforms. I'll continue to work on streamlining and improving performance in the future.

NEW FEATURES, BUG FIXES AND IMPROVEMENTS TO BOTH EDITIONS

• Added limited Stage Kit support during playback of songs with MIDI files - enable Stage Kit on the Instruments menu, select the controller slot that your Stage Kit is occupying, click on the instrument name of the instrument that you want cPlayer to use to control the LEDs (all) and the strobe (drums only) - fogger is not currently integrated because I couldn't think of a use case for it, i'm open to ideas
• Added microphone passthrough feature for a more genuine karaoke experience - your microphone must be recognized by Windows as a universal audio device - click on "My microphone isn't listed!" on the Microphone Control form for instructions on how to make your USB microphone work if it's not working right off the bat
• Added support for Fortnite Festival files using the custom .fnf metadata format and the original .m4a audio - a little wonky for now but it "works"
• Added support for YARG .yargsong format
• Added support for playing back videos when using YARG's exCON format (video must be where the .mid and .mogg files are - see previous release notes for supported video file name and formats, also supported in the more command Clone Hero/YARG folder structure)
• Changed Karaoke Mode behavior so when it shows you one whole word at a time, it colors it progressively as the word is being sung, similarly to how it also colors the current phrase being sung
• Added support for playing Karaoke Mode lyrics over video if the song has both a video file present and Vocals charted
• Added ability to display unpitched vocals properly
• Fixed compatibility issue with RB4-to-RB2 special DTAs files that would lead to the songs not loading or loading with wrong data
• Fixed behavior when scanning for CON files it would encounter a file with permission restrictions and it would fail the entire scan instead of skipping the problem file
• Fixed behavior when scanning a folder and there are no target files found, cPlayer would get stuck on loading and you couldn't do anything or exit the program
• Many other bug fixes and significant code improvements as I was going through integrating the above