Here we go again. Another week, another conspiracy by armchair audio engineers who read a few articles somewhere and then suddenly thinks they’re Erin Brockovich. But as they say in the south, when the Devil works hard, we work harder.
Let’s put this to rest, first and foremost, and then I’ll reveal why I’m a bit disappointed in y’all. First, did anyone ask themselves why this individual (who was asking for the empty mask the other day) focused on the masked files and not the ultrasonics?
Answer: It’s because you can easily see that the ultrasonic files are completely different just by loading them into any basic audio editing program. He was focusing on the masked files for a reason (that we’ll get to in a minute).
Two, did anyone bother to check the files in a hex editor? In Total Commander, analyzing Emperor HoM Qv2 (Masked) and Ascended Mogul Qv2 (Masked). 99% different, as indicated by the wall of red. Of course no one checked. Much more fun to believe that we’re ripping everyone off.
When in doubt, CHECK THE HEX. Hex editor read the literal binary code of a file.
Feel free to download Total Commander and try it yourself. Now, for the long part, and why I’m shocked that so many of you are this gullible:
@Fire banned this individual earlier this week because he tripped our piracy filters back in June, but we were so busy with Qv2 and upgrading the forum that we simply dropped the ball. He was pirating every single title and engaging with multiple piracy Discords and websites. He tried messaging multiple members to “trade,” thinking he could delete the private messages and we wouldn’t be able to see it. Why would you even think that we wouldn’t be able to see deleted messages, as if that wouldn’t be a basic administration function? If you trust someone who thinks they’re James Bond, but wouldn’t even understand that you can’t just delete a message to cover up their piracy… that’s on you. But, after he started trying to get “the exact mask” we use, @Fire recognized the username and banned him:
Here’s him on Discord, sharing our titles:
Note: The missing block was him saying something racist toward gypsies. Anyway, him asking for the “exact mask” was how we linked the two identities. After he was banned, he played ignorant (of course), claiming he had broken no forum rules:
Anyway, after @Fire banned him, he concocted this “experiment.” Now, we’ve seen this trick before. It works like this: A person takes an actual scientific principle, distorts it (or in his case, falsifies the results) with the hopes that we’ll post a lot of technical information to disprove what they said, and in the process, reveal secrets about the inner workings of our build and scripting methods to incorporate them into his own “build.”
If you really believed in this “noise cancellation” conspiracy, you’d never be able to prove it with the empty mask, because THAT relies on the assumption that we were just selling empty masked files, and you would prove it by taking the empty mask and having it cancel out the supposed finished subliminal. But, you know that can’t be true, because you’ve already analyzed the ultrasonic files and saw that there are vast differences, including the watermark that you can audibly hear if you “de-ultrasonic” the file.
So, the question isn’t “are they lying,” it’s – "how the hell are they able to create such smooth, identical sounding tracks (to the ear, since the hex editor shows the files are vastly different)? Enter the plan: If I can get the empty mask, then play my hand to get them to expose sensitive technical information, I can then build my own tracks using another mask (since ours is watermarked). I applaud you, as this attempt was quite clever. Spend that time in taking action on your life rather than trying to steal from us.
I’m disappointed that many of ya’ll FELL for it, even though I KNOW most of you know what a hex editor is. I KNOW most of you have Audacity and could’ve checked the ultrasonic files to see that they are vastly different. But you didn’t. You fell for his trap. People will do ANYTHING to get out of listening to their stack and taking action, including falling for crap like this.
Second: There’s a reason why all the major titles look similar on the surface (unless you open then with a hex editor) but the customs do not. I’m not going into great detail here, because that’s exactly what this individual wants, and this is the last time I’ll ever even go this far. First, you’re all assuming that the audio track is hidden beneath the mask, as if we just made a quiet vocal track, slapped a mask on top of it and voila!
Nope: There’s a ridiculous amount of processing that goes into it. Compression, limiters, EQ, etc., and it is all standardized and automated. The goal was to create absolute conformity within each title, that’s the point of automation. You can go to any McDonalds in the entire United States, order a hamburger and fries and it tastes EXACTLY the same. That was our goal: we created a standardization process that allowed us to create multiple titles that were as close to the same as humanly possible. Given the nature of a bespoke, custom product versus one we control, there’s bound to be more differences. But, for the most part, we succeeded in that standardized process (and that’s why we’re being awarded two patents on it):
EDIT: This is for Dragon Reborn ST3 and ST4 (both masked). First, you have the differences in the tags, which is to be expected:
And then you have all the audio differences:
Again, 99% different. Guys, Q has now cost us over $150k. That’s the reason why it took so long for me to quit my day job: we reinvested as much as possible into Q. We still are, actually, but we’ve just cut some strategic deals that changes the game a bit.
That’s also the reason why the files sound and look so much alike. We spent a lot of money in order to achieve that effect. We’re following the big tech model: we want your listening experience to be exactly the same, no matter what title it is. Ask @Fire about the huge fight I got into with Q-Programmer because I wanted the file sizes to be very similar, since many of our customers are in areas where they’re still using older phones and computers. I may have an iPhone 12 Pro Max with 512gb of space, but most people are not. I wanted all the files to be less than 100mb. We succeeded.
Ask @Fire about the first demonstration of Q, where the audio levels clearly jumped up and down as we listened to the file, and I spent about 2 weeks working damn near to exhaustion trying to help Q-Programmer develop the algorithm to detect the rising and falling of the vocal track and for Q to automatically change compression and EQ settings on the fly.
Now, the time I was going to spend on Solace today has been wasted, so I’m going to enjoy the rest of the day off.
BTW: “HarveySpector” is another pirate from the same pirate server.