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Sound in MMOs
UknownAspect
Member Posts: 277
I was thinking yesterday about immersion and games that I really got into and felt I was a part of, and I felt that there was one thing in particular that was really taking away from my MMO experience.
When I first play an MMO, I keep the sound on and the music on, to see what is offered by the developers. But it normally isn't long that I get bored with the soundtrack and find no real use to a lot of the sounds that are made, so I'll turn my sound off and run pandora in the background.
But games like Doom 3 and just about any horror/thriller game you'll want to play with headphones on or surround sound so you can tell if demons are breathing in the next room, or if something is sneaking up behind you, or if perhaps there is something dark looming around the corner.
I don't think MMOs use this resource enough. Sound is only used as a polishing element, to make spells seem cooler and to give environments more emotion. Sound should be integral to combat, or hell, looming danger. If I am in combat and something explodes next to me, I should get a high pitched ringing sound for a second and lose sound for a little bit only to have it come rushing back a few seconds later like I've seen in some other single player games. This could be used tactically too, perhaps if you know there is a stealthed rogue around, hearing the footsteps could be indicative of its location. Vice versa could also be used, flashbang grenades like those used in counter-strike, or a whole new line of sound based weaponry made to confuse the player or mask the noise of approaching forces.
There are a great many possibilities to use sound to add depth to these games, why are MMOs not taking advantage of them?
MMOs played: Horizons, Auto Assault, Ryzom, EVE, WAR, WoW, EQ2, LotRO, GW, DAoC, Aion, Requiem, Atlantica, DDO, Allods, Earth Eternal, Fallen Earth, Rift
Willing to try anything new
Comments
I enjoy the immersion that sounds and music can give in an mmo. For me, Anarchy Online on release was the first and last game that totally grabbed me with its music as an integral part of the experience, leaving Omni ent to head out to the woods, it was eerie, cool, and perfect.. perhaps I am jaded now after a few years.. Lotro does a nice job as well, but AO had it right...
Now you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup,
You put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle,
You put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot.
Now water can flow or it can crash!
Be water, my friend.
~Bruce Lee
I'd have to say that Age of Conan has been my favorite game for Sound and Music in MMOs. The one place it fails in this regard, is that the NPCs don't talk, which bothers me a lot. The NPCs you attack don't even say anything to you as they attack, very bothersome. The rest is fantastic however.
And I'd have to say that Lord of the Rings Online is the absolute worst MMO I've played for Sound and Music. From how every staircase in the game has the sound effect of running on Sand, to so many of the lakes and rivers making absolutely no sound what so ever when you're standing directly beside them. Rushing water that makes no noise at all? What the hell?
And LOTRO's music? Holy crap, welcome back to the mid 90s... complete garbage.
Sound is a vastly important thing to me. Most games do "alright", but its really rare to get one that is actually impressive.
What I always considered to be important in MMORPGs in matters of sounds (at least for me) are the sounds you hear when you move (by feet or on a mount or whatever).
If the game does it right, you can hear the differences when you walk on wood, sand, grass, rock, pebbles, mud/swamp etc. That adds a lot of atmosphere for me. If a game doesn't have any footstep sounds, or they're always the same, then it annoys me quite a bit.
In matters of music: I love some of the tunes in FE and some of AoC and WoW were great too. Allods Online had sometimes a nice one as well.
Oh, and also the different types of sounds that weapons create when they hit someone. Blunt weapons on cloth / leather / chainmail / plate, swords, weapons you thrust with etc.
Let's play Fallen Earth (blind, 300 episodes)
Let's play Guild Wars 2 (blind, 45 episodes)
To me, footsteps sounds would be the literal first-step in sound production in my MMO.
And Everquest II nailed theirs. The only MMO I've played that ADDED sound effects to your movement based on the Armor you're wearing.
Heavy Plate Armor... you could hear it on your avatar.
Leather Armor also... too badass.
Well done on that, EQ2. Buuuuuuuuuut.... still not ever going to play that one again.
There are a few games out there (multiplayer) that use sound as a queue to what's about to happen. It's an over looked part of game play that if used properly can elevate your ability to deal with situations.
I like sounds in game and they're always on for me. The foot steps, various attacks... all this stuff I find important to my enjoyment of the game. The music they put in however doesn't always seem to fit my taste though. More often then not I'll run my own music very subtly in the background that if things get real quiet I can make it out and listen to it but when there's action or something's going on the music gets lost in the sounds of the activities.
The most important thing for me is Atmosphere however, and I look for it when I'm entering a dark spooky forest, or some haunted ruins, or anything for that matter. If I am walking past a light forest I want to hear birds chirping, if I'm walking through a meadow and it's dusk I want to hear crickets chirping. If it is a haunted or dark forest I want the sounds of random snapping tree limbs or strange rustling in various directions to make me wonder what's going on beyond my visual distance and really make you fee like you're in some kind of danger, be it perceived or real.
No required quests! And if I decide I want to be an assassin-cartographer-dancer-pastry chef who lives only to stalk and kill interior decorators, then that's who I want to be, even if it takes me four years to max all the skills and everyone else thinks I'm freaking nuts. -Madimorga-
I agree with everyone here, I also believe sound should be a very important part of the game. Although it should be used for immersion and atmospherics no doubt, it has so much potential to be integrated into gameplay mechanics too. The problem is sound is actually a pretty expensive resource on a PC.
Most people use the onboard audio chipset that's on their motherboards, or default to software audio rendering taking up CPU cycles. Most people simply do not have dedicated audio boards that can process 256 tracks of 24bit positional audio at once.
Also, it takes really talented people and a good studio to produce quality sound effects, so in the end, sound is often just delegated to the lowest common denominator in games. Not to mention the extra programming logic that goes into the game to trigger sound events etc. I wish I knew how we could change this.
Three words: Final Fantasy XI. Even putting aside the soundtrack (I love it, but everyone has their own taste in music and there's no music *everybody* likes), the ambient sound in it is just the best I've ever experienced in an MMORPG.
Final Fantasy XI not only bases your movement sounds on your armor, but also on the ground you are traversing and the weather. If it's raining, you splash. If you're moving across snow, you hear it crunch beneath your feet.
Recently a lot of the United states has been getting pounded with snow, and this really is my favorite time of year for one reason alone. The absolute serenity that comes from the silence instilled by a world covered in snow.
As many of you know, if you go outside at night after a huge snowfall and the clouds have cleared, the scene of the woods and a field, even in the suburbs instills a great emotion with the wind still a full moon lighting up everything brighter than it has ever been at night. The world is motionless in silence and everything is covered in white.
This is the kind of scene I'm thinking of when it comes to games, I want to have that experience where I feel that my every movement ever so subtle can be heard bouncing off walls and trees. Even the slightest sound carries for miles.
I want this in my games. Get on it developers.
MMOs played: Horizons, Auto Assault, Ryzom, EVE, WAR, WoW, EQ2, LotRO, GW, DAoC, Aion, Requiem, Atlantica, DDO, Allods, Earth Eternal, Fallen Earth, Rift
Willing to try anything new