On 1/10/06, Fernando J. Rodríguez (Herr Groucho) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > El Mar 10 Ene 2006 06:30, Stéphane Magnenat escribió: > > Fernando J. Rodríguez (Herr Groucho) wrote: > > > El Lun 09 Ene 2006 05:51, Nuage escribió: > > > What about adding sound events triggered when a building or unit > > > is selected (different sounds depending on the state of the > > > building or unit selected), when GUI elements are used, when > > > units do something (harvesting, attacks, magic attacks, etc.), > > > when buildings do something (defense tower shooting a stone, > > > upgrades, destructions, etc.)? > > > > > > It would add some ambieance to the game... > > > > Well, some years ago we decided against adding sound because the > > music is already action dependant, and so sound would tend to > > disturb it/make noise. > > I had already read that in the lists archives, but nevertheless let me > tell you that the action-dependant musis is overrated. Sure: it was a > nice surprise the first time I played the game, to listen to a > changing music when my units engaged in combat, but that is all about > it. Only two contexts for background music, and it would be hard to > come up with a few more, or even confusing, as units may be doing > different things in different areas of the map at the same time, and > there could only be one background music played at a time. Only major > "states" or phases of the gameplay would deserve their own background > music. > > On the other hand, short and distinctive sounds tied to some GUI > actions or game elements provide better feedback, which is useful to > learn quicker to play the game and to play more effectively. > Consider my personal experience in this area: > When I was playing the tutorial set of maps, I had a hard time > figuring out that the construction site images displayed where I > wanted a building, didn't necessarily mean that any building activity > was taking place at all. I had to learn to watch at the small squares > indicating the number of units working on that building-to-be, or to > select the construction site and look at the "Working n/m" indication > on the side bar. > > It was also not obvious to me at first that a building under upgrade > ceases to serve its function while it is being upgraded. > > Now, how "short and distinctive sounds tied to some GUI actions or > game elements" help this? > If a constructing sound/noise was played whenever I clicked a > constuction site which was actively being worked on, and no sound at > all be played when no construction is taking place, then the player > could intuitively know what is going on with that building. > > Also, if when a building is performing its function (an inn feeding > units, a racetrack training units for speed, etc.) it made some > sound/noise when selected, people would know that it is really > working, much earlier than when they came to discover that sky-blue > bar at the side of the map that indicates how many units are inside a > building and how much time it is left until they leave. > > Done properly, sounds events would add usability and playability to > the game. > > Finally, I consider background music as such: background, and I > wouldn't mind if some short distinctive sound effects conveying more > gameplay information and feedback disturbs it (but it shouldn't), > specially as the music tends to get repetitive, in spite of it being > well composed. > > > > Now if someone produces clean, nice and > > proper sound, this can be reconsidered. > > I would have supposed that the hooks in the code to trigger said > sounds events would have to be in place before, so musicians/sound > authors have something to play with. > But anyway, let's see if someone interested in this can bring up a > proof-of-concept set of sounds so the reconsiderations can take > place. > > Thank you for reading so far. > > -- > Herr Groucho > > ID Jabber: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Señal distintiva: LU5MJR - 144,550 MHz FM. > Clave pública GPG: hkp://pks.lugmen.org.ar > Fingerprint GPG: B7BD 0FC7 D9A2 66F3 4EFC 45EE 7DE2 3932 597B 6354 > > > _______________________________________________ > glob2-devel mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/glob2-devel >
I certainly agree, the music originally incorperated into the game seems like just a quick way to give the game sound, without any real effort. What we would need for a full sound system is a sound artist, and those are hard to come by. _______________________________________________ glob2-devel mailing list [email protected] http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/glob2-devel
