Adding A Song

Adding a New Song to RA2 (By Kane 148)

Tools Needed: XCC Mixer, XCC Mix Editor, XCC IMA ADPCM WAV Writer Plug-In , Red Alert 2, Winamp or Windows Sound Recorder, MP3 song (Winamp) or Wave song (Sound Recorder)

Step One:

First, open Winamp and press Ctrl + P to go the Preferences menu. Go to the Output Plugins, and select the XCC IMA ADPCM WAV Writer Plug-In plugin. Go to configure, and select your RA2 directory (usually C:\Westwood\RA2\) as the output directory. Now select "Close", and play the song that you wish to add. It will play real fast, and you will hear no sound, but that means that it is coverting the file. When it’s done, change back to your normal output plugin, and close Winamp.

Alternatively, you can use Windows Sound Recorder (in XP) to do this. Convert the file to .WAV before you begin, then open it in Sound Recorder. Save it in the RA2 directory with the options Format:PCM, Attributes: 22.050kHz, 16 bit, mono. This does the same thing as Winamp in the description above. Please note that Windows Vista's Sound Recorder is unable to do this, but XP's can be copy-pasted (it is named sndrec.exe and is in the C:\windows\system32\ directory).

Step Two:

Now go to your RA2 directory using Windows Explorer, and rename the WAV (if necessary) so that the filename is about 6-8 letters long or less.

Step Three:

Now open XCC Mixer and go to the Launch menu. Select XCC Theme Writer > Red Alert 2. A box will pop up in a few seconds that says "X themes have been written to theme.ini" (X= the number of tracks). Now click "ok".

Step Four:

Go to the Launch menu in XCC Mixer and select XCC String Table Editor > Red Alert 2. Look in the bar on the left and select "THEME". Now find the tag for the song you added. It should be named "THEME:xxxx" (xxxx=the filename of the WAV you added). Click on it once, and then click the Edit button. In the big box it should say the track's filename. Now change that to be whatever you want the song to be called in the Music Tracks list in Red Alert 2. (example: if the filename is killer.wav, the tag will be THEME:KILLER, and you should change "killer" in the big edit box to be the song's title). Now click "Ok" to close the edit box, and click the "Ok" button near the bottom of the screen. You will be taken back to XCC Mixer.

Step Five:

Now go to the Launch menu in XCC Mixer and select XCC Mix Editor. Now click "New" to create a new MIX file. Name it expandxx.mix (xx= 1-99), and save it in your RA2 directory. Now click "Insert", and select the WAV file that’s in your RA2 directory. Click "Open" to add it to the MIX file. Now click "Save", "Compact", and "Close" in that order. You can now close XCC Mixer and Mix Editor. All you have left to do is to delete the WAV file from your RA2 directory, since it is now inside the MIX file.

The track should now play normally in Red Alert 2! You can also add multiple tracks by preforming the steps on multiple songs.

Alternative way using Audacity

Please note this assumes you're doing only a replace (or override) of one of the game's original themes. If you wish to add a completely new theme, analyzing the theme(md).ini file is mandatory (or just check the tutorial above from step two onwards).

Step One:

Go to "File">"Export">"Export as WAV"

Step Two:

Under "Save as type", the "signed 16-bit PCM" option should the default selection. Else set it manually.

Do note that the "Metadata Tags" all need to be empty so XCC Mixer reads the WAV as Format 0001, the WAV format the game uses.

Don't forget to name it properly (no more than 8 characters) and save to the game's directory/folder. To test whether or not it worked, save the WAV under the name "grinder" for RA2 (this assumes you're using vanilla theme.ini, or at leat one that doesn't change the menu's theme).

You'll always hear proper stereo if it's in the WAV file, regardless of menu or in-game.