v1.0.0-beta.29

• Sound volume normalization (online songs only).

  The ReplayGain algorithm is used to normalize the volume of each song. From now on, every song will have roughly the same loudness. Some songs are very loud. As a result, the volume of songs is decreased, on average, by 15%. This only applies to online songs, as the ReplayGain value must be precomputed.

  Bemuse music server authors: To normalize the sound volume, please specify the replaygain: key in the YAML front matter of your song’s README file (example), then run bemuse-tools index again.

• Overall volume decrease.

  Some platforms (e.g. Chrome on Mac OS X) can process audio using 32-bit float format all the way from the browser to the operating system. This means it’s possible to have sounds playing above the full volume without clipping if the system volume is decreased. Other platforms clip the audio signals that exceed the full scale as data leaves the browser to the system. This means the audio will sound distorted, even when the system volume is decreased.

  To resolve this, the overall volume is deceased. For online songs that have replaygain tag added, Bemuse will adjust the volume of the song to give around 6 dB of headroom.

  For custom BMS, there is no precomputed song volume information. In this case, Bemuse reduces the song volume by -4.2 dB (based on the result of BMS loudness study). This means in this version, custom BMS will play at 62% volume of the original. I think this is good, because this means less clipping and more dynamics. Please turn up your volume!

  Feedback is welcome! Please tweet to @bemusegame.