Overview of Setting Up an Unreal Quartz Interactive Music System

Hey there!
Since May 2022, I've been learning and using Unreal for my day job at Unbroken Studios as well as teaching an Intro to Game Audio class at the University of Tennessee Knoxville during the Fall semester.
This video is a quick-ish overview of how to set up an interactive music system using Unreal Engine's Quartz system. This is just a 26 minute snippet taken from a 2.5 hour class I do once a week. It doesn't cover everything - that would end up being a MUCH longer video. But it does show and explain the high level structure of the blueprint, what each section is doing and its role as well as how to implement your music into it. It also highlights some potential issues you might have and suggests ways to avoid them.
Learning and working with UE has been so much fun and really empowered me to create things I wouldn't have been able to otherwise. It is a pretty complex and deep engine so there's a decent learning curve. But with some time and effort, you can definitely learn it. I've also really enjoyed teaching this college course on game audio! My students are very bright, enthused and creating some neat things!
To learn more about me and my work, go here: madsenstudios.com/

[@malcolmwaters3837]

Hi! Thanks for a very informative video. How would a weapon quartz clock be different? For let's say a rifle. Cheers

[@NathanSMadsen]

Hi there! I don't think it would be much different. The timing of the bullets would be what you'd need to configure closely. Also, the quantization boundary and tick rates would need to be set up correctly.
I would read up here: docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/WorkingWithAudio/Quartz/
And to be transparent, I've yet to use Quartz for gunfire, especially very rapid gunfire. I've heard of some games uses MIDI data since the latency reading MIDI can be lower than some other systems. This helps avoid the issue of having a sound played after the gunfire actually stops visually due to latency.

[@yueli-gf7ox]

感谢您的教程，它真的对我有帮助。但是我有一个问题，如果我达到了想要结束的状态，如何停止循环并添加音乐结局？

[@NathanSMadsen]

您需要创建一个调用停止函数的自定义游戏事件。 或者一个 hacky 的方法是将您的音乐并发设置为 1 并调用音量倍增器为 0 的新音乐曲目。或者您可以设置一个新条件，使所有播放的音乐层都变为静音。

[@yueli-gf7ox]

@@NathanSMadsen Thank you for your answer ~ Why did I use your method each layer of music gradually distorted...

[@NathanSMadsen]

@@yueli-gf7ox Two things could be at play here:
1) Do your music tiers contain additional parts? For example, is your music rendered out as:
Tier 1 Drums
Tier 2 Drums and Bass
Tier 3 Drums, Bass and Guitar
If so, this will naturally distort because you're playing more than one instance of certain parts. I cover this at @16:10 in the video.
2) Have you ensured that your tempo, time signature and total number of measures is all correct? If not, it's possible to cue additional layers of music on top of already playing instances. Especially if your music is rather long and the number of measures is short (i.e. 8 measures) then it could easily overlap upon itself.

[@yueli-gf7ox]

非常感谢您的回答，这为我解决了许多难题

[@yueli-gf7ox]

@@NathanSMadsen