Couple of missing features

[Quenaelin]

Features which should be added to this game or next patch.

Editing waypoints:

1. Waypoint box could be draggable immediatly when you left click on the box to activate it. Clicking right mouse button on the box could activate/show command menu, so you would be able to add commands without returning back to your unit when zooming in and out. I don't like to use those damn shortcut keys so often.

Sound:

2. Sounds are still quite undynamic and I found out that you are using still same explosion samples as in CMB0, explosion sounds are weak and speech is loud this is quite unrealistic to me. Tune up those explosion sounds little bit and lower other sounds, you can calculate desibels if you like. Air pressure for explosion is much much bigger than yelling it should damp every other sound under it, explosion is about 140 db and yelling is about 80-90 db, machine gun fire is about 130 db. So every time when you increase 10 db loudness of those samples should be doubled. So explosion samples should be 64 times louder than yelling samples (somebody correct me, if I am wrong about this), but anyway explosion and machine gun fire should be very much louder than they are now.

[Andreas]

Remember that the sounds you hear are not the final version. They have been downsampled for the demo.

[Quenaelin]

I know this is demo, but I just hope they will be sampling and leveling these explosion sounds little bit better than in CMB0, sound is very important thing for creating immersive athmosphere.

One other thing is crew loss, there is no info which kind of crew member is killed or injured, this should be added as well. It would be nice to know if it is driver who is injured so vehicle cannot be moving, or gunner is injured so that rate of fire is slower, now you just have to guess which crew member is injured.

[Michael Emrys]

I have a diverging viewpoint. I live in an apartment and I like my neighbors. Having loud explosions blasting out of my speakers at any time of the day, but especially at 3:00 AM, is just not on. On the other hand, if I were to turn the sound down to the point where explosions no longer threatened the integrity of my plaster ceilings, I would still want to be able to hear the other sounds that comprise so much of the ambience of the game. I know that flattening the amplitude of sounds compromises the authenticity of the game to some players, but for my part that is a sacrifice I am willing to make. Seems that there should be a mod for those who want more bang for their buck.

P.S. I am also willing to forego sleeping in a soggy, frigid foxhole, eating cold rations, and having people shoot at me. I guess that makes me a wuss, huh?

Michael

[ September 11, 2002, 10:15 AM: Message edited by: Michael emrys ]

[KG_Jag]

The explosions machine gun chatter and the sound of near misses are great and add to the game, but are not nearly as important to game play as being able to hear the voices of your (and the enemy) troops. One thing in the demo that was changed from CMBO that I did not like is that those voices seemed to be miked down in comparision with the battle sounds. I hope that change does not carry over to the final version.

[Le Tondu]

Originally posted by jagcommander:

The explosions machine gun chatter and the sound of near misses are great and add to the game, but are not nearly as important to game play as being able to hear the voices of your (and the enemy) troops. One thing in the demo that was changed from CMBO that I did not like is that those voices seemed to be miked down in comparision with the battle sounds. I hope that change does not carry over to the final version.

I for one cannot understand what the voices are saying and therefore I cannot say that I care about them. They may add a certain touch to the game, but they're really not important to me. Maybe as the months roll by, I will perhaps begin to get an inkling of what they're saying. Who knows?

Its the battle sounds that I find incredibly fun to listen to.

[Fred]

There is a simple solution to the 'weak' explosion sounds; fire up your fav wave-editor and increase the volume (I increased all explosions to 300%), and now BOOM!

I like it, that CM can be customized in many ways.

Fred

[Andreas]

Well, I just tried charging a bunch of German halftracks into a Soviet position - why you ask? Because I can, and it was my wont to do so. I listen to the game on my stereo, and the chatter of the MG 34 together with the sound of guns ripping into the HTs, and the odd catastrophic explosion drowned out almost all the 'Wir werden alle sterben' and 'Ich will hier raus' that my German Hampstertroopers had to utter just before they were cut to pieces. I think you really should wait for the final game before making judgements on the sound...

[MikeyD]

I've noticed the quality of the sound in the game has a lot to do with your computer speaker setup. I've got a tiny imbedded mono speaker in my old mac G3 towerand you can imagine the sound quality. My brother's recently-purchased pc has great dual speakers that produce sounds in the game I could scarcely imagine were there! And I've heard headphones that go for the bass notes, some for the high notes.

In the initial post was a suggestion that involved clicking the 'right mouse button'... What's a right mouse button? You mean you have more than one?

[ September 11, 2002, 01:38 PM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[Cameroon]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, I just tried charging a bunch of German halftracks into a Soviet position - why you ask? Because I can, and it was my wont to do so.

LOL. Andreas, you just made my sig.

[Andreas]

Hehe. Cameroon, email me once you have the game, I'll send you the scenario.

[Quenaelin]

You can use earphones, if your neighbours cannot take it. But I think those people who like authentic sounds, like me, should get it, becouse everything else in this game is trying to be authentic, so why not sound. I guess I have to edit those sounds myself then. But I have to mix down every sound except explosions. Do you know any sound editing tool which can change volumes to all sound wave files at once?

I meant PC's mouse, which has usually three mouse buttons, I guess MAC users just have to use keys, for these options I suggested, why not to take full advance from PC's mouse and why just use one button, it makes no sense to me. Or there could be other choises for MAC users as well, command menu can be shown with double clicking viewpoint box and if you want to drag viewpoint box then just click and hold mouse button.

[ September 12, 2002, 08:20 AM: Message edited by: Quenaelin ]

[Foxbat]

Mac users don't need no stinkin' extra keys, until they get a Logitech Optical USB Wheelmouse that is... the number of "1 is enough to, mouse buttons rock" converts among my Maccer friends is amazing

Right-click order assigning at the waypoints would be interesting, but I think the reason for right-click dragging is to make it a more deliberate action.

[ September 12, 2002, 09:09 AM: Message edited by: Foxbat ]

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Quenaelin:

Features which should be added to this game or next patch.

Sound:

2. Sounds are still quite undynamic and I found out that you are using still same explosion samples as in CMB0, explosion sounds are weak and speech is loud this is quite unrealistic to me. Tune up those explosion sounds little bit and lower other sounds, you can calculate desibels if you like. Air pressure for explosion is much much bigger than yelling it should damp every other sound under it, explosion is about 140 db and yelling is about 80-90 db, machine gun fire is about 130 db. So every time when you increase 10 db loudness of those samples should be doubled. So explosion samples should be 64 times louder than yelling samples (somebody correct me, if I am wrong about this), but anyway explosion and machine gun fire should be very much louder than they are now.

I completely disagree.

The sounds of CMBO have good dynamics and especially they are not that much psychoaccoustically enhanced for small speakers, that they suggest bass, but there's none.

My two subwoofers let the earth shake when i turn the volume playing CM up.

And driving with the vehicles @ zoom level 1 when suddenly a grenade explodes or even hits, lets me quite often twitch.

I also like the non-linear increase of volume when zooming in and also the stereo-field is quite natural and gives good impresions of distance.

I doubt you really want realistic volume levels - :eek:

And it's not possible to transmit the volume-relations onto a game, using only 16bit samples and most people are using only small loudspeakers with weak amplifiers.

If you want 40dB dynamics between sounds, this is much more than small sound-systems can handle - either you'll hear the explosins but no speaking, or speaking but the explosions would become completely distorted.

Also -40dB and less volume on 16bit samples introduces lot's of digital distortion to the samples.

But nevertheless, it's a good idea for sound-purists: if i find the time, i'll try to make a ExtremeDynamicsSoundMod

In CMBO it is a great compromise between playability and realism. I even find, that the

surroundings' sound was a little bit too loud, and once the loops are detected, it is getting annoying.

[ September 12, 2002, 10:31 AM: Message edited by: Steiner14 ]

[Quenaelin]

Yes, I know this is only game, so compromises have to be made, anyway I will try realistically leveling those sounds. I have quite good sound system, so loudness is no problem to me, but it is true that nobody can play this game if sound levels were authentic, sound differences are too high to bear. But maybe fuzziness of war doesn't come out in this game so good in case of sounds, in war movies sound is always better, maybe they could include some echo effects or perhaps environmental audio, so these effects could make this game even more realistic.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Quenaelin:

You can use earphones...

I knew some bright fellow was going to suggest that.

But no, wearing headphones for several hours at a time is definitely NOT on.

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Quenaelin:

...maybe they could include some echo effects...

Now that would be interesting. I've never heard a weapon being fired outdoors when there wasn't an echo. Of course, it could get confusing when you have a hundred or more going off simultaneously...

Michael