Many have been wondering how to mute individual music channels in N64 games. Although this method does not apply to all N64 games, it does work with a few.
This is the method Rare used in a few of their games on the N64.
To test this you will need:
1. Project64 emulator
2. Hex editor
3. SubDrag's N64 midi tool
4. A Rareware ROM (Killer Instinct Gold, Blast Corps, Diddy Kong Racing, and Conker's Bad Fur Day are the ones I tested that used this method. Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie do not use this format).
5. Patience.
Process:
1. Open your ROM in the hex editor. Make a copy of it and save it under a different filename. This way you can edit one copy and use the other as a reference.
2. Use N64 Midi Tool to find the midi sequence locations.
3. Find one of the sequences in the hex editor.
4. (Almost) every sequence in this particular format starts with 0x44 as the first channel. After the last channel comes the tempo control, which is usually a nibble with value "80 01."
5. Enter zeros where you want to mute the channel. Each channel (except the first) is 4 bits. Note that Conker's BFD relies on 0x44 (the first channel) in order to keep the correct tempo.
6. Save the edited copy of the ROM after each change made in the code.
7. Open the edited copy of the ROM in your emulator (I used Project64 1.6).
8. Find the location of the song in the game and listen to individual channels. I recommend you use save states, as you will have to restart the ROM every time you change something. Save states before the song is in RAM though, or else it will remain unchanged during gameplay.
This is the method Rare used in a few of their games on the N64.
To test this you will need:
1. Project64 emulator
2. Hex editor
3. SubDrag's N64 midi tool
4. A Rareware ROM (Killer Instinct Gold, Blast Corps, Diddy Kong Racing, and Conker's Bad Fur Day are the ones I tested that used this method. Banjo-Kazooie and Banjo-Tooie do not use this format).
5. Patience.
Process:
1. Open your ROM in the hex editor. Make a copy of it and save it under a different filename. This way you can edit one copy and use the other as a reference.
2. Use N64 Midi Tool to find the midi sequence locations.
3. Find one of the sequences in the hex editor.
4. (Almost) every sequence in this particular format starts with 0x44 as the first channel. After the last channel comes the tempo control, which is usually a nibble with value "80 01."
5. Enter zeros where you want to mute the channel. Each channel (except the first) is 4 bits. Note that Conker's BFD relies on 0x44 (the first channel) in order to keep the correct tempo.
6. Save the edited copy of the ROM after each change made in the code.
7. Open the edited copy of the ROM in your emulator (I used Project64 1.6).
8. Find the location of the song in the game and listen to individual channels. I recommend you use save states, as you will have to restart the ROM every time you change something. Save states before the song is in RAM though, or else it will remain unchanged during gameplay.