Loud or obnoxious, what are the worst sounds in the game?

[gameboy1234]

Folks in chat the other day were complaining about some of the sounds in the game being too loud or having other problems.  I can't remember which sound now.  I think it was one of the Tanker/Scrapper/Brute defensive sets.  You turned it on and the noise it made is horrible.

 

But we suggested getting a list together then asking some of the fans to get a copy of Audacity (free sound software) and just adjusting the sounds files.

 

So what sounds in the game need work the most?  We'll start with a list of sounds then maybe ask the devs what they think.  Please note if the sound is simply too loud, or if it has other issues that need addressing.

 

 

[The_Warpact]

Typically this stuff is already in the Suggestions section or Tools, utilities, downloads section. 

There is alot of talk in the latter section, along with mods to change the sounds.

As far as a comprehensive list, then there isn't one to my knowledge. 

You can put Demons on the list...sssoo annoying. 

[blue4333]

Sonic Blast and Sonic Resonance. Those sounds give me the sound tolerance -res in real life to not play those powersets. Same goes with Psychic Blast, the womp-womp sounds are so annoying.

 

Necromancy and Demons Ear-Drums Blast - this happens when you zone in and your pets are summoned all at once at the mission door. Necromancy is way worrse, and the sound is linked to the howling twilight/twilight grasp FX; there was a fix somewhere in the forums for this.

 

 

[Black Zot]

Foot Stomp with more than one target.  You might as well set off a grenade on your desk.

 

Howling Twilight is similarly ridiculous, even if it only hits one thing.

 

And yeah, if you're going to zone with your pets out as a MM, you have two choices: alt-tab or suffer ear rape.

[Coyotedancer]

Mastermind Demons and Spine Burst are the ones that give me the ear-heebies.,,, Enough so that I have a keybind that puts Amtes' demons into the Praetorian Salute emote to shut them up any time I have to stand around with them, because that's the only way I can stand to play her. And I specifically made my two farmers Claws/Fire instead of the more popular Spines/Fire, just so I wouldn't have to listen to that constant *FwhapFwhapFwhap* thing, 😝 

[Outrider_01]

KB complaints

[biostem]

One of the biggest issues I have with the sounds is how, if I want to be able to hear glowies, and happen to have mystic flight on, there's this loud wooshing sound with even the slightest of movements.  Just as we have a 'minimal' option for the FX, I'd love such an option for the sound as well...

[srmalloy]

8 hours ago, Black Zot said:

Foot Stomp with more than one target.  You might as well set off a grenade on your desk.

This is reportedly being addressed. I've had a similar problem that pops up when I'm doing the 'Cure Lost' mission -- I normally hit the biggest target in a spawn first and I've had the ring of minions around an Anathema all pull out shotguns and fire simultaneously at the freshly-cured civilian; if I'm wearing headphones, having eight or nine shotgun blasts going off at once is physically painful.

[Black Zot]

11 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

This is reportedly being addressed. 

 

We shall see.  All I know is I'm not putting my hearing at risk to test a "fix" that may or may not actually fix anything (coughcoughMastermindscough), especially since it may still get reverted from the noise trolls bitching about it.

Edited August 7, 2022 by Black Zot

[Luminara]

Stone Armor with all of the toggles (except Granite) sounds like a Hoover in the lower intestines.

 

Time's Juncture is loud, whiny and takes at least 30 seconds to fade.  Side note: the graphics are also bad, can't see the ground when I'm jumping, had to /suppressclosefx 1.

 

The act of flying produces a loud wind rushing noise that causes me to subconsciously clench my jaw until I develop a headache.

 

Ice sword powers make loud, irritating whine when the sword is "drawn", and constant crackles and whooshes until it's "sheathed".

 

I've used the silence mod for flight and Ice sword draw sounds.

[Luminara]

Diamagnetic Interface.  High-pitched and constant, even after foes are defeated.

[Chrono-Bot]

I've joked I should be allowed to hunt people who idle beside me with spines burst on for sport.

[srmalloy]

1 hour ago, Black Zot said:

We shall see.  All I know is I'm not putting my hearing at risk to test a "fix" that may or may not actually fix anything (coughcoughMastermindscough), especially since it may still get reverted from the noise trolls bitching about it.

It's in the beta patch notes under "Game Client Adjustment and Fixes":  'Powers that play a sound on each target that is hit will no longer reach a deafening volume when there are many targets. When the same sound is queued multiple times at the same instant, the audio system now reduces the volume.' Whether the amount of reduction will need to be adjusted has yet to be seen.

[Herotu]

Demons MM
Teletrans

Toggle power sfx - why don't they just fade away?

 

7 hours ago, Black Zot said:

 

We shall see.  All I know is I'm not putting my hearing at risk to test a "fix" that may or may not actually fix anything (coughcoughMastermindscough), especially since it may still get reverted from the noise trolls bitching about it.

Putting your hearing at risk is a strange way to put it. Surely, you have a volume control on your end of things? If not, there's a slider for that.

 

Ahhh, you need the volume high for the search ping? In that case, all the sounds would need to be modded individually, unless there were an individual slider for the search ping.

[ZorkNemesis]

My issues are mostly with lingering sound effects that tend to get annoying after a while.  Some of my least favorites:

• Temporary Invulnerability.  Some powers use that same sound effect but do not fade out: Shark Skin and Crystal Armor for instance.
• Quills gets annoying after a while.  Thankfully that'll be toned down in combat soon but even if i'm just idling I often shut it off to do other things out of play.  Irradiated Ground as well, but that one's a bit better and doesn't have on-hit sounds.
• The heartbeat sound made by Rise to the Challenge gets annoying after a while too.
• Kheldians reusing the same sound effect on every single power.  Only takes one attack chain to get old.  Peacebringer sounds are worse than Warshade sounds.
• Whenever a mob is either immune to KB or pinned in a corner by a Singularity.  Hearing the KB aura going off non-stop is extremely annoying.

[Luminara]

Sewers, helicopters and Portal Corp portals.

[Black Zot]

2 hours ago, Herotu said:

Well I don't have that problem. 

 

That wasn't a valid argument when Steam's new UI was giving people migraines, and it ain't valid now either.

 

The only other time I've had audio problems remotely like this is the train emote in World of Warcraft, which both plays considerably louder than the rest of the game and stacks.  Trolls would spam it and cried up a storm when the WoW devs took steps to fix the problem.  Notice the pattern?

[Herotu]

47 minutes ago, Black Zot said:

 

That wasn't a valid argument when Steam's new UI was giving people migraines, and it ain't valid now either.

 

The only other time I've had audio problems remotely like this is the train emote in World of Warcraft, which both plays considerably louder than the rest of the game and stacks.  Trolls would spam it and cried up a storm when the WoW devs took steps to fix the problem.  Notice the pattern?

Nope. You'll have to elucidate.

[roleki]

 

[TheZag]

Im not saying you have to,  but its possible to check if the stacking sounds have been reduced enough without hurting your ears.  I have sensitive ears and i have the inagme slider down to like 5 and then i use headphones that are partially off my ear.  I can tell when a sound would have been ear splitting but without the pain.

 

 

[Oubliette_Red]

On 8/6/2022 at 11:35 AM, Krimson said:

Demon MMs are why I play the game with the sound off. 

 

Yeah the incessant demon roars are annoying, that's why I changed mine to infant giggles.

 

Same goes for the MM Bots constant tromp-tromp-tromp every time they move. They wear rubber duckies on their feet now.

 

[Oubliette_Red]

1 minute ago, Krimson said:

I'm sure I could change it if I wanted to. I still have all the music and SFX I extracted a decade ago, but I had some sort of PIGG opener back then. Worst case though, I turn up the sound to look for glowies and a Demon MM is there. That's fine. It's when you're waiting for something like a Hami or MSR to form and they just moan incessantly. But yeah, sound off so I only notice on occasion. 

 

Fortunately, you don't need the pigg viewer to change sounds, you just need to know the folder location and sfx file name and make those in your game folder and the game will pull the sounds from there rather than the sfx in the compressed pigg files. You can sub silence, or some other sound to your liking. There are so much of hte sounds in the game that I do like so if I can avoid turning it off completely I'm willing to sub a few dozen files.

 

[Black Zot]

19 hours ago, Herotu said:

Nope. You'll have to elucidate.

 

Let's see, the only game noises I've had issues with:

 

1. play stupidly loud compared to the rest of the game's sounds

2. stack their effects to become even louder

 

These two traits invariably lead to:

 

3. getting abused by trolls who start whinging any time someone suggests "nerfing" their audio spam

 

Notably, this trifecta of ear-rape has only happened on two games out of the literally hundreds I've played, which means most developers, including at least one of the HC team, realize what a stupid idea it is to apply 1 or 2 to anything.  Now it just remains to be seen if they follow through or give in to the whinging trolls and leave the noise pollution in place.

[srmalloy]

13 hours ago, Oubliette_Red said:

Same goes for the MM Bots constant tromp-tromp-tromp every time they move. They wear rubber duckies on their feet now.

I will never understand the idiocy behind the decision to make the Bots feet bare metal when rubber/elastomer pads would not only be quieter but give better traction. It's like trying to be stealthy with the Soviet Fifth Tank Army behind you.

[Black Zot]

15 minutes ago, srmalloy said:

I will never understand the idiocy behind the decision to make the Bots feet bare metal when rubber/elastomer pads would not only be quieter but give better traction. It's like trying to be stealthy with the Soviet Fifth Tank Army behind you.

 

To be fair, if a tank army is following you down the road, people aren't really looking at YOU, are they?