noiseworks Make sound direction be relative to the screen instead of the character

[Razorwings18]

Right now, noises are played relative to the character instead of to what the screen is showing. So if, say, there's a zombie to the LEFT of my character but I pan the screen so that the zombie is CENTERED, I will still hear the zombie's sounds to the LEFT.

 

Or, when checking if the coast is clear, I may pan the screen PAST a zombie that is to the character's LEFT, so that it now shows to the RIGHT of the screen. In this case, I will still hear the zombie on the LEFT side even when it's to the RIGHT of the screen.

 

This is confusing, and even dangerous when fighting in a zombie-heavy area, since it is not an audible representation of what you are actually seeing.

[lemmy101]

1 hour ago, Razorwings18 said:

Right now, noises are played relative to the character instead of to what the screen is showing. So if, say, there's a zombie to the LEFT of my character but I pan the screen so that the zombie is CENTERED, I will still hear the zombie's sounds to the LEFT.

 

Or, when checking if the coast is clear, I may pan the screen PAST a zombie that is to the character's LEFT, so that it now shows to the RIGHT of the screen. In this case, I will still hear the zombie on the LEFT side even when it's to the RIGHT of the screen.

 

This is confusing, and even dangerous when fighting in a zombie-heavy area, since it is not an audible representation of what you are actually seeing.

 

I get where you're coming from, however we're attempting to remain realistic where possible and the audio is meant to be what you're hearing as you are the character (viewpoint aside) and the camera panning is purely to compensate for the screen cutting your view short on what your character could actually see. 

 

Having the camera be a moveable listening device would be potentially highly cheeseable if the camera was the listener. Moving the camera would mean you'd get to hear sounds you shouldn't be able to and essentially act like a movable radar that you can send some distance away to listen for zombies breathing idle sounds etc.

[Razorwings18]

Thing is, if we were the actual character, we wouldn't be confused about where the sounds are coming from, whereas as it is, we as players are. There is a sensory mismatch between what we are seeing and what we are hearing, and I personally feel that is much more unrealistic than the alternative.

 

I see where you are coming from re hearing sounds you shouldn't, but in order to strike a balance, sound loudness could be calculated in terms of distance from the character, while sound positions could be based on the camera. Notice that the game is already kind of doing that with the zoom function: as you zoom out, sounds sound farther.

 

An alternative method would be to have a cutoff distance from the character: within a certain distance, when you pan, you hear the sounds; outside that distance you simply don't.