A sound theme is a named set of sounds. It is used to map from a sound name. Themes may inherit from other themes as a way to extend them.

The mandatory supported sound file formats are WAV/PCM 8-48kHz, 8/16bits, and OGG/Vorbis I. WAV at 48kHz/Stereo is the recommended uncompressed format, and OGG/Vorbis I is the recommended compressed format. The sample must be normalized, in order to be mixed down nicely with a suitable average replay level.

Sounds and themes are searched for in a set of directories, called base directories. The themes are stored in subdirectories of the base directories.