Yeah this includes all of you who don't like to read the **word edited by moderator** readme file! (Note : most of this isn't for MAC users... I don't have a Mac.
To get started open notepad (for people with a PC) and save a file in a folder with the desired song as a .sm file in the folder (this will allow Stepmania to recognize your song. If you wish to edit down the song to a desireable length then your going to have to figure that out yourself... because writing something on that would take longer and if you have the software to do that --- you probably already know...
Editor key commands :
* Escape = menu
* Up/Down = prev/next line
* Left/Right = change snap (4th,8th,12th,16th,24th,32nd and so on notes)
* 1 through 0 = add/remove note
* Enter - Set selection begin marker
* Space - Set selection end marker (pressing space once sets a start point for a section to record. Pressing it again sets the end of that section)
* Ctrl-P - Play back current selection (if no selection, play whole song)
* Ctrl-R - Record over current selection (if no selection, record whole song)
* F1 - Displays these commands.... incase you forget
* F4 - Toggle Assist tick on and off (helps you determine if your notes are on beat by making a tick noise on each step/note
* F5/F6 - change difficulty (if no modes besides one was created then it does nothing
* F7/F8 - change BPM of the song.... I will explain how to get a correct BPM later
* F9/F10 - decrease/increase stop (pause) at current beat
* F11/F12 - change offset (this comes in useful if you want a background movie to start right when a song starts.
* [/] - Decrease/increase sample music start
* {/} - Decrease/increase sample music length
* M - Play sample music
* B - Add or edit background change
* Insert - insert beat and shift down (a command I find useless)
* Ctrl - down - 2X (and so on)
* Ctrl - Up - speed modifier decrease (does not go below 1X)
* Shift + number - lay mine
Arrow layout on keyboard (none-numeric keypad)
Left - 1
Down - 2
Up - 3
Right - 4
[b]BPM (Beat Per Minute)[/b]
getting a BPM the easy way... goto download.com and get Mixmiester BPM analyzer... scanning a folder with music files in it gives you the correct BPM...
Q : How do you do BPM changes then? And stops (pauses) Mixmiester won't display them!
A : It is up to you to decide when to use those and at what speed... speaking of which most songs drop to half of their speed or double... in which case you can use a special command in Stepmania.
First just make the steps as you want them (this is for a BPM change - pauses have to be done manually.) Press the space bar on the point where you want the change to occur and go to the point where you want it to end and press space - the selection should be selected... Now then... press Enter and go down to Tempo... select Expand 2X (for songs that suddenly jump to a higher speed) or Compress 2X (for songs that slow down...)
But keep in mind when using this if your doing a gradual slow down your going to have to do it manually using F7 and F8.
[b]Repetive Note Patterns [/b]
Is there a point in the song that has the same old beat/words that you just don't feel like making more steps for again? This is easy... goto the section of the song where those notes are... goto where they begin and press space to select the start.... then goto the end of that note section and press space... then press ENTER and select copy... now goto the section where the repeat beat starts and press ENTER and select paste at current beat... be sure not to select paste at begin marker or you'll have some trouble deleting some garbage or the possibility of your file being wrecked if you didn't save before this....
[b]SAVING! IMPORTANT[/b]
Like with any old file saving frequently is important so if you mess up the file you can always err not have it messed up... even though Stepmania saves a back up file that you can retrieve it is best not to screw up...
How to save :
* Escape = menu
* Up/Down = prev/next line
* Left/Right = change snap (4th,8th,12th,16th,24th,32nd and so on notes)
* 1 through 0 = add/remove note
* Enter - Set selection begin marker
* Space - Set selection end marker (pressing space once sets a start point for a section to record. Pressing it again sets the end of that section)
* Ctrl-P - Play back current selection (if no selection, play whole song)
* Ctrl-R - Record over current selection (if no selection, record whole song)
* F1 - Displays these commands.... incase you forget
* F4 - Toggle Assist tick on and off (helps you determine if your notes are on beat by making a tick noise on each step/note
* F5/F6 - change difficulty (if no modes besides one was created then it does nothing
* F7/F8 - change BPM of the song.... I will explain how to get a correct BPM later
* F9/F10 - decrease/increase stop (pause) at current beat
* F11/F12 - change offset (this comes in useful if you want a background movie to start right when a song starts.
* [/] - Decrease/increase sample music start
* {/} - Decrease/increase sample music length
* M - Play sample music
* B - Add or edit background change
* Insert - insert beat and shift down (a command I find useless)
* Ctrl - down - 2X (and so on)
* Ctrl - Up - speed modifier decrease (does not go below 1X)
* Shift + number - lay mine
Arrow layout on keyboard (none-numeric keypad)
Left - 1
Down - 2
Up - 3
Right - 4
BPM (Beat Per Minute)
getting a BPM the easy way... goto download.com and get Mixmiester BPM analyzer... scanning a folder with music files in it gives you the correct BPM...
Q : How do you do BPM changes then? And stops (pauses) Mixmiester won't display them!
A : It is up to you to decide when to use those and at what speed... speaking of which most songs drop to half of their speed or double... in which case you can use a special command in Stepmania.
First just make the steps as you want them (this is for a BPM change - pauses have to be done manually.) Press the space bar on the point where you want the change to occur and go to the point where you want it to end and press space - the selection should be selected... Now then... press Enter and go down to Tempo... select Expand 2X (for songs that suddenly jump to a higher speed) or Compress 2X (for songs that slow down...)
But keep in mind when using this if your doing a gradual slow down your going to have to do it manually using F7 and F8.
Repetive Note Patterns
Is there a point in the song that has the same old beat/words that you just don't feel like making more steps for again? This is easy... goto the section of the song where those notes are... goto where they begin and press space to select the start.... then goto the end of that note section and press space... then press ENTER and select copy... now goto the section where the repeat beat starts and press ENTER and select paste at current beat... be sure not to select paste at begin marker or you'll have some trouble deleting some garbage or the possibility of your file being wrecked if you didn't save before this....
SAVING! IMPORTANT
Like with any old file saving frequently is important so if you mess up the file you can always err not have it messed up... even though Stepmania saves a back up file that you can retrieve it is best not to screw up...
How to save : Press ESCAPE and go down to save.
Adding a background video
A movie file must be placed in the same folder as the song and .sm if it is already edited to your liking and it is just 1 file SM should play it automatically without modification... but sometimes things are not on time with the song so you'll have to mess with the timing BEFORE you start making steps.. unless you don't care if it is synced correctly with the song.
Making the correct song name and artist display :
Press ESCAPE and select song info... all of that can be edited in there.
Changing difficulty of selected mode :
Press Enter select step statistics... you will see it... select it and change it.
Anyway with just that all of you SHOULD be able to figure out the rest for yourselves... for additional information :
http://www.stepmania.com/stepmania/viewfile.php?file=README-FIRST.html#The%20StepMania%20editor
http://www.stepmania.com/stepmania/mediawiki.php?title=FrequentlyAskedQuestions
And that is all.
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and I can use the program to get it.
