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Discussion - Bored of EQ's Battle Music? I have a solution. (1 Viewer)

eqmzr06

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Jul 13, 2020
RedCents
270¢
I don't know if anyone else has gotten tired of the original 2 battle themes when you activate melee combat in EQ, but I took the liberty of finding out how to change it however I desired.

First, you boot up the EQ patcher. After it finishes checking if your installation needs to be patched, before you hit "PLAY" you open the EQ install folder. In that folder, you will see 2 MP3 files called "combattheme1.mp3" and "combattheme2.mp3." All you need to do is paste your own MP3s into that folder with the same file names. For example, the battle theme from a Final Fantasy game.

As the EQ game randomly chooses theme 1 or 2 to play throughout your session, you will need to replace both songs in your EQ folder to ensure you get to listen to the song that you want.

As an FYI, you will need to do this little hack every time you boot up the EQ patcher if you want to continue to use custom battle music. The patcher will restore the original EQ battle music every time it boots up. I have not found a way to stop the patcher from doing that, but it's a simple matter to spend the 20 seconds before pressing "PLAY" in order to not have my ears go numb from the bum bum bum bum BUM BUM BUM BUM original music. c( :

Anyways, in my experience, the best songs to use for custom battle themes are songs that start quickly and maintain good energy throughout. If the song starts too slowly, you may press the combat key repeatedly because you haven't heard the battle song start, yet.

Songs I have enjoyed using are :
- Final Fantasy battle themes (regular and bosses)
- Castlevania themes
- Actraiser Filmore theme
- F-zero themes

Many of the NES and SNES classic songs are fairly punchy and quick to start. They work well as battle themes. I've also confirmed that MP3s encoded up to 320kbps bitrates still work without any problems, so you can use high quality MP3s.

I hope this helps someone enjoy the act of EQ combat a bit more. ( :
 
Only boss fight song you need is Jecht Fight Theme (Otherworld) from Nobuo Uematsu at end of Final Fantasy X. Best boss fight music ever.

 
Last edited:
Luclin soundtrack music playing in background.

Interesting, the following appears to have been omitted from the patch notes:

Previously unreleased music for every Shadows of Luclin zone was recently unearthed from a dangerous trek through the studio archives. These musical pieces will now play when adventuring on Norrath's most cat-filled Moon.

 
I turned off all eq sounds back in ummm, early 2000. The first thing I do when I install eq on a new computer is go into settings and turn off all the sounds, music, etc. I watch eq videos and think, omg, what is that horrible noise? I guess some people actually leave the sound on. :banjo:
 
Great tip! You know how to avoid the patcher, right? Then you only need to replace the MP3's on patchday.

I think you can make a powershell script to replace them as well, then just run the script to launch the launcher.
 
For TLPs I used to do that powershell script (not for music, but for the old style particle effects). I can dig it out if someone wants it for this.
 
Wow, I was wrong, it HAS been a while since I used this. It's a batch file...

Bash:
@ECHO OFF

:GETDIRECTORY
IF EXIST "%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Steam\steamapps\common\Everquest F2P" GOTO STEAM
IF EXIST "%PUBLIC%\Daybreak Game Company\Installed Games\EverQuest" GOTO NOTSTEAM
ECHO ERROR: Can't find EverQuest Directory.
GOTO ENDERROR

:STEAM
SET EQGAMEDIR=%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Steam\steamapps\common\Everquest F2P
SET NEWLOADSCREENS=%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Steam\steamapps\common\Everquest F2P\uifiles\knightly\loadscreens
GOTO MAGELO

:NOTSTEAM
SET EQGAMEDIR=%PUBLIC%\Daybreak Game Company\Installed Games\EverQuest
SET NEWLOADSCREENS=%PUBLIC%\Daybreak Game Company\Installed Games\EverQuest\uifiles\knightly\loadscreens
GOTO MAGELO

:MAGELO
ECHO Checking Magelo...
IF NOT EXIST "%PROGRAMFILES%\Magelo\Magelo Sync\MageloSync64.exe" GOTO GINA
TASKLIST /FI "IMAGENAME eq MageloSync64.exe" 2>NUL | find /I /N "MageloSync64.exe">NUL
IF "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="0" GOTO GINA
START "Magelo" "%PROGRAMFILES%\Magelo\Magelo Sync\MageloSync64.exe"
GOTO GINA

:GINA
ECHO Checking GINA...
IF NOT EXIST "%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\GimaSoft\GINA.appref-ms" GOTO LOADSCREENS
TASKLIST /FI "IMAGENAME eq GINA.exe" 2>NUL | find /I /N "GINA.exe">NUL
IF "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="0" GOTO OTTO
START "GINA" "%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\GimaSoft\GINA.appref-ms"
GOTO LOADSCREENS

:LOADSCREENS
ECHO Setting up custom Load Screens...
IF NOT EXIST "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_loadscreens" GOTO CHECKFILES
GOTO FIXLOADSCREENS

:FIXLOADSCREENS
del /q "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\default\loadscreens\*"
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_loadscreens\*" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\default\loadscreens">NUL
rmdir /q /s "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_loadscreens"
GOTO CHECKFILES

:CHECKFILES
IF NOT EXIST "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims" GOTO STARTEQP
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims\spellsnew.edd" "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.edd">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims\spellsnew.eff" "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.eff">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims\combattheme1.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme1.mp3">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims\combattheme2.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme2.mp3">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims\eqtheme.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\eqtheme.mp3">NUL
rmdir /q /s "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims"
GOTO STARTEQP

:STARTEQP
REM Start EverQuest with the patcher
ECHO ============================== NOTICE =====================================
ECHO == When patching is complete, click Play and then X out of the launcher. ==
ECHO ===========================================================================
start /wait "EverQuest" "%EQGAMEDIR%\LaunchPad.exe"
GOTO DELETEFILES

:DELETEFILES
mkdir "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims"
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.edd" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.eff" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme1.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme2.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims">NUL
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\eqtheme.mp3" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_soundsanims">NUL
del "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.edd"
del "%EQGAMEDIR%\spellsnew.eff"
del "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme1.mp3"
del "%EQGAMEDIR%\combattheme2.mp3"
del "%EQGAMEDIR%\eqtheme.mp3"
GOTO CHANGELOADSCREENS

:CHANGELOADSCREENS
IF NOT EXIST "%NEWLOADSCREENS%" GOTO END
mkdir "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_loadscreens"
copy /y "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\default\loadscreens\*" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\original_loadscreens">NUL
del /q "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\default\loadscreens\*"
copy /y "%NEWLOADSCREENS%\*" "%EQGAMEDIR%\uifiles\default\loadscreens">NUL
GOTO END

:END
EXIT /B 0

:ENDERROR
ECHO Pausing due to error.
PAUSE
EXIT /B 1

To adapt this you would just follow the same pattern that I used for the load screens. Probably remove the deleting of the files (and magelo and gina if you don't use those). The deleting of those files will give you the old spell effects and the old combat theme. The load screens thing just replaces the load screens with whatever pictures you put in that directory.
 
You guys just need a .bat file to overwrite the combat .mp3 files with whatever you want, so you can easily fix it after using the launcher/patcher. It's all DOS CMD prompts basically.
 
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