Audio & recording

Alongside writing status, Patterpad can track a separate recording status for the voice work: how far along each spoken line’s audio is. This is where a producer manages the recording pipeline, and where a scene can be played back as a performed table-read.

Recording status

Recording status works just like writing status (an ordered, colour-tinted ladder edited in Project Settings ▸ Audio Status), with two differences. It applies to dialogue lines only (narration and game event beats never carry one), and the default ladder runs missing → scratch → recorded → final. A line with no status set reads as the lowest stage, missing.

Recording status is off by default and opt-in, even for a voiced project (you might want voice scripts without tracking every take). Turn it on with the Track Audio Status? switch at the top of the Audio Status tab. The project also has to be Voiced (General tab); until both are on, no Audio row shows in the inspector, and recording figures stay out of the production report and its spreadsheet.

There are two ways to track it, chosen per project on the Audio Status tab:

• Manually (the default): select a line and pick its stage from the Audio dropdown in the inspector, exactly like the Writing dropdown.
• Audio Folders: turn on Use Audio Folders and set one audio root folder. Each stage then gets its own subfolder under that root, named automatically from the stage (so ../audio gives ../audio/scratch/, ../audio/recorded/, ../audio/final/) with the lowest “not recorded” stage having none. Patterpad reads every line’s recording status straight from the files: drop a line’s .wav (or .mp3) into a stage’s folder and the line takes that stage. If a line’s audio sits in more than one stage, the most finished one wins (a recorded/ take beats a scratch/ one), and a line with no file anywhere reads as missing. The folders are watched live: add or remove a file and the status updates on its own. Here the inspector shows the status as a chip you can’t edit (it comes from the files) with a ▶ play button next to any line that has a clip.

Each audio file is named after the line’s id, not its wording or where it sits, so editing a line, moving it, or reordering it never loses track of its recording. To find a line’s id, select it and click the #id in the inspector header to copy it; or paste an id into search (or run patter resolve <id>) to go the other way, from a filename back to the line. The same id keys the line’s translations. See the IDs explained.

Recording status feeds the same places as writing status: filter by it with Review ▸ Find Lines by Recording… (or the search window’s Recording mode), and it’s broken down per character in the Production Information report.

Getting the audio into your game

Your game can play the right take for each line with no folder-search of its own. On Publish Bundle (or Production ▸ Update Audio Manifest), Patterpad writes a small patteraudio.json next to your audio listing each line’s winning file. Ship the audio folder, point a tiny resolver at it, and the runtime maps a beat to its clip. → Audio (runtime)

Playing with audio

When a project is in Audio Folders mode, the Play window gains an Audio toggle. With it on, Continue becomes a table-read: each line plays its clip and the next beat waits for it to finish, so the scene plays back at performance pace. A line with no clip is timed at a natural reading speed so the read stays in rhythm. Step still moves one beat at a time, playing each line’s clip as you go. See Playtesting.

Recording scratch takes

In Audio Folders mode you can also record quick scratch takes right inside Patterpad, a fast way to hear a scene before you book a session. It’s the one bit of the audio pipeline a writer reaches for as much as a producer: rough a line in your own voice, at your desk, and hear the scene read back. Turn on Enable scratch recording on the Audio Status tab and choose which stage’s folder the takes land in (the scratch stage by default).

Then, for any line at or below the scratch stage (one that hasn’t already got a more finished take), the inspector shows a ● Record button. Click it and a full-screen recorder takes over, opening on a cue screen: the line, its speaker, and a badge saying where its existing take stands - no take yet, take out of date (the line was edited after it was recorded), or take up to date. From there, press Space to record - a 3·2·1 countdown, then it records your microphone while everything else pauses, and Space again finishes the take (or Esc cancels). Patterpad trims the silence off each end, saves the take into the scratch folder, and the line’s status updates to match. No files to shuffle.

After each take you can replay it, re-record it, or carry straight on: Record next ▸ moves to the following line, and Next needed ▸▸ jumps ahead to the next line whose take is missing or out of date, skipping everything already covered. The same skip buttons are on the cue screen, so a tidy-up pass works from anywhere: open the recorder on any line, hop from needed line to needed line, and stop when nothing’s left. The next-line preview carries the same badge, so you always know whether the suggested line actually needs a take before committing to it.

Each take remembers the exact line it was recorded against, so if you later edit that line, the inspector flags it ⚠ out of date - and the recorder’s badges pick out exactly which scratch needs redoing.