The reason I want to do this is to be able to layer the background music. (e.g, simple song starts playing, player triggers something, adds an instrument). I can work out the timing issues, if any.
I thought I could do that with MediaPlayer/Song, but it wouldn't work.
All I'm really looking for is the downsides to use SoundEffectInstance.
p.s, I don't use XACT, since I'll be changing over to MonoGame eventually.
Thanks
Actually, that's what the SoundEffectInstance is for!
It has limitations though, depending on the platform your game is running:
On Windows Phone, a game can have a maximum of 16 total playing SoundEffectInstance instances at one time, combined across all loaded SoundEffect objects. The only limit to the total number of loaded SoundEffectInstance and SoundEffect objects is available memory. However, the user can play only 16 sound effects at one time. Attempts to play a SoundEffectInstance beyond this limit will fail. On Windows, there is no hard limit. Playing too many instances can lead to performance degradation. On Xbox 360, the limit is 300 sound effect instances loaded or playing. Dispose of old instances if you need more.
Oh and by the way, it's been a long time since I played with XNA but I'm pretty sure that the XACT tool was no longer necessary by the end of it's life cycle.
I seem to recall that you could load an mp3 on the Content folder and play it via the SoundEffectInstance object.