PocketBM - A pocket beat maker

Games
1

Hi all! I am happy to share with you my first Playdate project, a beat making app called PocketBM.

It's nearly 99% done and I am working on the final bits and pieces and testing.

I firstly planned to keep a dev log from the very beginning but I didn't have much spare time to work on the project so I just spent most of the time learning the Playdate SDK and coding.

Now the project is almost complete, I thought I would started writing something here to keep a record of the development.

I really like to thank Panic for this wonderful little device and the brilliant SDK. As a mobile game developer, the Playdate SDK is one the the best that I have ever used.

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sequencer2

menu1

menu2

settings

help1

help2

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help4

A short demo video:
https://youtu.be/pXIABG-APjw

Features:

  • 16 tracks, each track can be either a sample track or a synth track
  • import custom samples for sample tracks
  • selectable waveforms for synth tracks
  • dynamic editing: edit notes while the beat is playing
  • basic sound design tools: ADSR, filters, delay and bit crusher
  • track name + colours (or dithering patterns to be precise)
  • soloing single track
  • mute tracks
  • panning and volume for each track
  • song arrangement labels
  • loop markers
  • copy/move/clear sections with the help of loop markers
  • 18 scales/modes
  • one chord track (chord will be played instead of a single note, not for the chromatic scale)

Functions of Assistant Menu 1:

  • Play + Scroll: play the beat and scroll the sequencer at the same time
  • Solo Track: play only the track at the cursor
  • Set Loop Start: set the starting step of the loop
  • Set Loop End: set the ending step of the loop
  • Reset Loop Markers: clear loop marks
  • Move Loop 2 Cursor: move the section within the loop markers to the cursor position
  • Dup Loop 2 Cursor: duplicate the section within the loop markers to the cursor position
  • Dup 1 Trk in Loop: duplicate only one track within the loop markers to the cursor position
  • Clear All in Loop: clear all the notes within the loop markers
  • Clear 1 Trk in Loop: clear the notes of one track only within the loop markers
  • Enable Loop: toggle on/off looping
  • Mute Track: mute the track at cursor
  • Trk Name: set the name of the track at cursor
  • Volume: set the volume of the track at cursor
  • Panning: set the panning of the track at cursor
  • Edit Sound: change the synth of the track to different samples or wave forms
  • Add Label: add arrangement label at the cursor position
  • Remove Label: remove arrangement label at the cursor position

Functions of Assistant Menu 2:

  • Pitch: change pitch of the note at cursor
  • Len: change length of the note at cursor (in unit of steps)
  • Velocity: change velocity of the note at cursor
  • Fill Every Beat: put default notes at every beat of the bar
  • Fill Odd Beats: put default notes at odd beats of the bar
  • Fill Every Step: put default notes at every step of the bar
  • Fill Even Steps: put default notes at even steps of the bar
  • Fill Odd Steps: put default notes at odd steps of the bar
  • +12 Semitones @Trk: add 12 semitones to all notes in the track
  • -12 Semitones @Trk: minus 12 semitones to all notes in the track
  • +Velocity 10% @Bar: increase 10% of velocity to all notes in the bar
  • -Velocity 10% @Bar: decrease 10% of velocity to all notes in the bar
  • Duplicate Bar: duplicate the bar of the track at the cursor to the next bar position
  • Dup Bar All Rows: duplicate the bars of all the tracks at the cursor to the next bar position
  • Clear Bar: clear the notes of the bar at the cursor position
  • Make Bar an Arp: use the note at the first step of the bar as the base to fill out an Arp pattern
10 Likes
2

This looks amazing. And I will probably buy it.
I know that PocketBM stands for Pocket Beat Maker.
However, PocketBM (BM is known as bowel movement in the west...which is poop) may not be the best name.
I would recommend making it the full name, Pocket Beat Maker. It's a fantastic name.

3 Likes
3

Looks awesome!
I'll buy it whatever name you end up with.. :poop::notes:

2 Likes
4

Thank you for your feedback and name suggestions. I agree with you that Pocket Beat Maker is a good name but I just feel that it's a bit too formal. I prefer to have a shorter and more playful name for the app. Sorry if that disappoints you but I may keep the name as it is.

I thought about a few names last night and nothing sounded as good as the original one to me. I guess it's because I picked the name from the very beginning and it's hard for me to accept an alternative right away.

And come to think about it, a weird name isn't necessary a bad thing. That will definitely makes it more memorable! I reckon from now on, you will always remember that there's a beat making app called PocketBM for Playdate :laughing:

1 Like
5

I'm not sure if it's me or if the sound is out of sync on the video. Makes it hard to appreciate what's going on. The music doesn't seem to match the passing blocks?

6

The video was recorded on a PC using the Mirror app with OBS. I can see that the playhead (a small moving white bar near the top of the sequencer) has gone out of the screen in the video. The sync is much better on the actual Playdate device. Guess I need to make some recording with the real device instead. My hands are old and ugly and I may need to find a hand model :sweat_smile:

I just recorded a short clip showing the scrolling on the real device. I must say it's still not as smooth as I wanted it to be but I don't have time to optimize it now. I may try to find ways to improve it in the future.

7

Absolutely love the UI of this, great job! Do you have any socials where we could follow your progress?

8

Thank you for your feedback and good idea of getting connected with the socials. I just set up one and will post about my future developments.

https://x.com/JunX_KhorsMedia

As for PocketBM, I just added in a last minute feature: auto save, and I now consider it done!

I will submit the app to Catalog tomorrow and see how it goes. I plan to release it on itch.io, on 4th September, as a celebration to my wife's birthday :grinning:

1 Like
9

I now see the cursor! I was expecting the notes to play when they reached the left edge of the screen.

10

Oh right, I got you. It’s how the trackers worked in the good old days. For PocketBM I tried to mimic the modern day DAWs instead. :smile:

11

Just fixed a couple of small but nasty bugs before the release. Sometimes it feels like you can never finish a project because when you keep testing, you will find imperfections and even bugs.

Anyway, I reckon it's ready for the release!

I put together a longer demo track for the release. I have been learning EDM production on and off for a while but my skill level is still at a beginner level due to many factors. This little track is a bit lame but I guess it's good enough to just serve as a demo :sweat_smile:

I am sure people with better music production skills can create much better music with PocketBM.

12

Just submitted PocketBM to Catalog for consideration. I hope they like it :blush:

When I got my Playdate few months ago, my main goal was to make games for Playdate. I studied the SDK and made small prototypes and soon found that there seemed to be no easy way to convert or make music to be played in-game for Playdate. MP3 files need to be played as stream and WAV files are mainly for sound effects.

The audio engine of Playdate is so nice and it's a pity there's no native music making app for it which can enable developers to make game music and play back the music with the audio engine directly.

I will start cleaning up the code and release the source code (in C) of the player on github soon so that other developers can make use of the music files created with PocketBM in their games. The file format of PocketBM is just plain json anyway and it's easy to understand and people can write their own players too.

13

Oh dear, forgot to include the demo track in the zip file when submitted to Catalog :sweat:

Hopefully the review team will contact me for a resubmission or file update.

14

You can send a new file using the Dropbox link you used when you submitted or follow the instructions written here:

15

Why not just Pocket Beats? Catchy

16

Thanks for the help! I think that's for people who have their games/apps already published in Catalog but I guess no harm to give it a try.

17

Yes, that's a nice name indeed. I actually thought about this name when I was considering to change the name after @catbeard 's comment. But then I thought for this title, people might relate to music playing rather than music making. I also did a quick search of that name just now and it's already taken by a music making app on iOS :sweat_smile:

18

What about Cranky Beats?

19

Thanks for the suggestion but as I mentioned, I am pretty much stuck with the original name: PocketBM.

Shakespeare once said, "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet" :laughing:

I will only change the name if the app is accepted by Catalog and they want me to change the name because they also reckon it reminds people of PocketPooPoo :sweat:

1 Like
20

I've just started to making tutorials on how to use PocketBM. Here is the first one for the basic operations of the app:

1 Like