Ambience and Weapon sound out of balance a bit?

[BorisLozac 1]

I've noticed that the game can be very quiet, almost muted, until you start firing and then everyone in the house and neighboors notice it. I like to hear birds and my player gasping and stuff, but then the weapons are way way too loud, i like them loud but then it's annoyingly loud.

Just thought i write that down, could be that someone else already mentioned it, in that case apologies..

[zimms 22]

I guess you haven't been at a shooting range too often? Not much bird sounds there, when everyone is firing his gun. ^^

[2nd ranger 282]

Yeah the ambient sounds and pretty much every other sound apart from gunfire is pretty quiet unless you're wearing headphones. Perhaps the idea was that when you had the sound up loud enough to hear everything else, gunfire would be realistically loud. I'm guessing not, though, just a balancing issue. Check the feedback tracker to see if there's a ticket for it.

[Zorg_DK 10]

+1 Can we please have a weapon and ambient sound slider? Ambient sounds are way too quiet.

[blu3sman 11]

A big issue with Arma 2 was the small relative dynamic range of different sounds. Basically gunshots, explosions, birds and footsteps were almost at same level. This was partly the source of negative feedback on weapon sounds ("no punch","toy guns" etc). You could compensate by cranking up the volume, but as the result was annoying deafening ambience.

That was out of balance.

In A3 the sound is as it should be.

[Zorg_DK 10]

A big issue with Arma 2 was the small relative dynamic range of different sounds. Basically gunshots, explosions, birds and footsteps were almost at same level. This was partly the source of negative feedback on weapon sounds ("no punch","toy guns" etc). You could compensate by cranking up the volume, but as the result was annoying deafening ambience.

That was out of balance.

In A3 the sound is as it should be.

No, it's not. I still vote for a way to adjust the volume for ambient sound.

[TacKLed 10]

TBH, they actually got it right. Gunfire in video games are usually uncharacteristically quiet, but its loud here which is nice. Most often then not you will have earpro in, which will muffle the surrounding noise and save your ears when firing a weapon when you are in the Army. Firing a M4, for example, is pretty loud in real life, so to see ArmA III have small arms fire that drowns out all other sounds is refreshing. Especially after ArmA II's disappointing sound.

[frag 0]

Yeah the gunfire sound are loud. But as said before, this is how it is in real life. But I agree 100% that they should have a

- Ambient sound slidder

- Gunfire / explosion slidder

I do no think it would be that tough to implement...

[aseliot 2]

Well IMO the general rifle (MX?) you have equipped, i dont know the name, sounds way too loud. It's a sound i would expect from somekind of bigger caliber stationary machine gun.

[TacKLed 10]

Well IMO the general rifle (MX?) you have equipped, i dont know the name, sounds way too loud. It's a sound i would expect from somekind of bigger caliber stationary machine gun.

Nope, it sounds about right.

[Ezcoo 47]

If you have Xonar DGX sound card, try to put SVN (normalization, probably also on other cards but maybe with different name) on when you're in game and fire a couple of shots. You might get surprised. :)

Works perfectly with JSRS too.

[roguetrooper 2]

I never play with headphones but I'm afraid to shoot in Arma III during (real) night (without turning down the overall volume so that other sounds can be heard).

I don't want the neighbours to shout at me "Cease fire, goddammit!" :D

[Troubletcat 10]

This is one of those cases where players should have the option to sacrifice some realism for a better experience playing the game. Yes, in real life, a gunshot is deafeningly loud compared to ambient noise.

When I'm relaxing in front of my computer, though, I want to at least have the option to hear the ambient sounds without having my ears completely blown off by gunfire. Add a volume control for it, or if not that, I'd say they should lower the gun sounds SLIGHTLY. ArmA 2 was bad. ArmA 3 is much more realistic, but still bad from a user experience perspective, and user experience is important.

[paecmaker 23]

I love the gunsounds in arma 3(atleast the mx) its so much a difference than arma 2.

However a slider would be a good idee that maybe not everyone like the high gunsounds.

[Zorg_DK 10]

I see what you mean when you say it's more realistic the way it is. But that extreme dynamic range difference in volume is not suited for headphones. I'm going deaf here. :(

[EricM 0]

I'd agree that ambient sound is too low, especially when raining : it looks like it's really pouring buckets of waters, but only with a very faint sound. I could boost everything, but I'd then be deaf at the first gun shot. And this isn't very consistent with the fact that you hear your footsteps quite well at standard volumre.

[tremanarch 6]

actually the gunfire is right! you can use earplugs and set headphones to max ;)

[EvenLease 11]

If I hear that damn ocean, from ArmA 2... Sounding like a hurricane or the wind blowing like a tornado...

I'll throw my headset/speakers out the window. God that was annoying. I LOVE how the Ambient sounds are lower in volume, in a warzone the only crap you hear is your rifle, your heart, and the scream of your brothers.

[bobby budnick 0]

This is one of those rare times I wish the practical needs trumped realism. I am poor and cannot afford to live in a house with a large yard. So any time I play Arma everyone within a 1 mile radius hears the gunshots. It has to be that loud or else you won't hear footsteps. It's not just about other people either. The sound of gunfire is annoying and jarring to me personally.

[BorisLozac 1]

I guess you haven't been at a shooting range too often? Not much bird sounds there, when everyone is firing his gun. ^^

I was a member of a shooting range for a long time thank you :) and fired quite a few handguns, fired an AK in military etc.. Yes the sound is awesome and very realistic, it should be loud, but also you should be able to hear some footsteps and wind etc, without having neighboors calling the police..

[oo para oo 13]

the surround seems to be iffy guy firing 200 meters away was same volume as up close meaning finding his poition in 3d surround very difficult. Also the main radio tower audio is very quiet. (ALL)

[KeyCat 131]

A big issue with Arma 2 was the small relative dynamic range of different sounds. Basically gunshots, explosions, birds and footsteps were almost at same level. This was partly the source of negative feedback on weapon sounds ("no punch","toy guns" etc). You could compensate by cranking up the volume, but as the result was annoying deafening ambience.

That was out of balance.

In A3 the sound is as it should be.

Couldn't disagree more! The current sound is worse than A2:OA at least on my machine and as other already said ambient sounds is way to quite (again on my machine)! Also there seems to be very little of positional audio in A3 compared to A2, it's very hard to get bearing of different sound sources even with headphones.

I'm sure the will look into it and tweak the balance etc. further down the road...

/KC

Edited March 16, 2013 by KeyCat

[Fuse 1]

Sounds good to me, but a slider would be ideal. Neighbors, significant others, or even just giving your own ears a break; there are lots of reasons a slider should be available.

I still remember a neighbor complaining about what "sounded like thunder" when I was playing BF1942: Road to Rome late one night. :)

[afp 1]

This:

Yeah the gunfire sound are loud. But as said before, this is how it is in real life. But I agree 100% that they should have a

- Ambient sound slidder

- Gunfire / explosion slidder

I do no think it would be that tough to implement...

[tremanarch 6]

solution: compressor.

/thread