Stepmania Help

[coolcash23]

I just discovered the wonderful world of Stepmania. If only you could somehow itegrate the songs into a PSX or PS2 game it would be over!!! Anyway, I have a problem. I guess I set the refresh rate too high in the "graphic options" section, so now when I start stepmania I can't see anything...the screen is gray. Since I can't see the menus I need someone to tell me how many downs I have to push to get back to "options" then how many downs I have to push to get to "graphic options" and then how many downs to push to get back to "refresh rate" then how many many right/left arrows I need to push to get it back to the "default" rate. I would obviously do this myself if I could see my screen...LOL.

Is there any way to just connect your computer to your TV so you could play these songs on the big boy TV instead of a small computer monitor? Holla at me.

[abrannan]

Easier way to do it. Go to the directory C:\Program Files\StepMania\Data, and open the Stepmania.ini file. Find the line marked RefreshRate, and set it to 0. Save the .ini file and restart Stepmania.

And many a video card out there has s-video or DVI (If you have an HDTV) output. Just re-set the shell on your system to be stepmania instead of explorer.exe and you've got a dedicated Stepmania machine!

[coolcash23]

I don't have an .ini file in my stepmania/program file...all I have is a .vdi file...any ideas...

[abrannan]

coolcash23 said:

I don't have an .ini file in my stepmania/program file...all I have is a .vdi file...any ideas...

Read the path I sent again. You're not supposed to look in stepmania\program, you need to look in stepmania\data.

[coolcash23]

I got it...stupid me...back in business. Who ever put this stepmania together is an all-star....even more surprising are the people who put together these sim files...someone has even done that new 50 cent, disco inferno!!

Now you're a DDR all-star, how come someone hasn't figured out how to integrate the cuts and the stepmania program into like a homebrew DDR psx game? Seems like it couldn't be too hard if people can make their own DDR mixes!? Anyway, thanks again.

[abrannan]

It's orders of magnitude harder to homebrew a PS2 game than a PC game. The compilers aren't generally available, and the Dev Kits that have compilers are several thousands of dollars, and not available to the general public. Now the Dreamcast Homebrew scene is another story, but it's still a lot harder to find developers for non-PC platforms.

[ryanddrfreak]

abrannan said:

It's orders of magnitude harder to homebrew a PS2 game than a PC game. The compilers aren't generally available, and the Dev Kits that have compilers are several thousands of dollars, and not available to the general public. Now the Dreamcast Homebrew scene is another story, but it's still a lot harder to find developers for non-PC platforms.

?explain more non complex and il understand?

[abrannan]

ryanddrfreak said:

?explain more non complex and il understand?

Okay, I'll give it a try. Everything a computer does boils down to a series of ones and zeros. The chips in any digital device performs certain actions based on certain patterns of those ones and zeros (bits). Humans don't think in bits, we think in languages. Therefore, we've developed tools to help us communicate with computers (programming languages). What a compiler does is act as a translator, converting human-readable instructions (program code) into computer-readable instructions (execuatable code). Each device is different, and has different machine code it can read. So, in order to program for a different device, you need the proper compiler. A Dev kit is a combination of hardware and software that allows programmers to work with a particular console. Sony controls access to the PS2 dev kits, and you have to pay a lot of money (several thousand) and pass other restrictions to obtain a dev kit.

Then you need to go through Sony's licensing process before you are allowed to produce games for the ps2. There's actually a good reason for this. Back in the days of the Atari, anyone could produce and sell games for the Atari console, regardless of whether or not Atari wanted you to. The market became saturated with horrible games, and retailers got gun shy and stopped carrying all games. It nearly wiped out the home video game market altogether, and it was several years before Nintendo came along to save it. Nintendo instituted near draconian licensing measures before you could produce games, but the system worked.

Now someone has taken the Stepmania code and used it to produce an arcade game, In The Groove. It was originally sold as a conversion kit for DDR machines, but now they're getting into full cabinet production. And it was recently announced that our very own RedOctane is partnering with them to bring In The Groove to the PS2 this summer.

[ryanddrfreak]

abrannan said:

Okay, I'll give it a try. Everything a computer does boils down to a series of ones and zeros. The chips in any digital device performs certain actions based on certain patterns of those ones and zeros (bits). Humans don't think in bits, we think in languages. Therefore, we've developed tools to help us communicate with computers (programming languages). What a compiler does is act as a translator, converting human-readable instructions (program code) into computer-readable instructions (execuatable code). Each device is different, and has different machine code it can read. So, in order to program for a different device, you need the proper compiler. A Dev kit is a combination of hardware and software that allows programmers to work with a particular console. Sony controls access to the PS2 dev kits, and you have to pay a lot of money (several thousand) and pass other restrictions to obtain a dev kit.

Then you need to go through Sony's licensing process before you are allowed to produce games for the ps2. There's actually a good reason for this. Back in the days of the Atari, anyone could produce and sell games for the Atari console, regardless of whether or not Atari wanted you to. The market became saturated with horrible games, and retailers got gun shy and stopped carrying all games. It nearly wiped out the home video game market altogether, and it was several years before Nintendo came along to save it. Nintendo instituted near draconian licensing measures before you could produce games, but the system worked.

Now someone has taken the Stepmania code and used it to produce an arcade game, In The Groove. It was originally sold as a conversion kit for DDR machines, but now they're getting into full cabinet production. And it was recently announced that our very own RedOctane is partnering with them to bring In The Groove to the PS2 this summer.

thanks that makes alot more sense