VOIP volume

[ModeZt 0]

I can't hear ppl speaking ingame. Here are the major troubles:

- low volume for all channels. please add the ability to adjust VOIP volume in sound settings

- in Direct Communication a man speaking in 15m from you should have same volume as a man standing near you. ( by Frederf )

- when i hold the chat button don't cut off sound if i'm not speaking loud enough(it's like using auto-activation with push-to-talk at the same time. stupid.) (by Osmo )

Edited June 29, 2009 by ModeZt

[osmo 0]

In addition to having a separate volume for VOIP (radio and direct talk), it would be nice to have the VOIP in a bit better quality and more reliable.

Ventrilo, using GSM 6.10 codec at 11025 Hz / 16bits offers much better voice quality with very low bandwidth usage and never cuts off. People don't want to use ArmA II's in-game voice chat due to this, which is a pity because Ventrilo/TS do not offer directional proximity based voice chat.

Combining Ventrilo's reliability and sound quality with ArmA II's ingame voice chat radio channels and direct talk would be great. For now ArmAII's in-game voice chat is pretty much unused feature because people want to be able to hear team mates even if they are in a vehicle which has it's engine turned on.

Another thing, when you use push-to-talk the voice should be sending all the time and not only when it detects high enough volume of sound from the microphone. If someone speaks a bit quieter it keeps cutting off because of this completely unnecessary limit.

Edited June 28, 2009 by Osmo

[frederf 0]

I really, really, really want to use VON for all communication within ArmA2. Having a TeamSpeak server is simply another administrative drain, another hoop for players to jump through, and can't do what VON can do. Having TeamSpeak in effect effectively creates two classes of players while playing publicly: those on TS and those not. It's bad news.

Right now VON is simply not sufficient for primary use however and this is a real shame. First Audible channel has a poor volume vs. distance function. At 0m it can be heard OK but at 20m it's a tiny fraction of what's needed. The function needs to stay loud at 100% for a moderate range and then fade away from there.

[CarlGustaffa 4]

Same here. VoN just doesn't cut it quality wise with its cut off problems. And directchat over VoN is for us completely useless. Thus the only workable solution is standalong VoN like TS. Visitors won't join TS. And for me, TS and game VoN cannot coexist (produces only static noise).

[frederf 0]

VON quality is part of the server config profile. I think it's a value 1 to 10 with the default being 6.

The cutoff, if true, is a hugely stupid "feature." Cut off is for voice activation, not push to talk.

[<-Falco-> 10]

Right, this need to be improved, I just tried yesterday and...is way too low to hear anything if you are not close enought.

[osmo 0]

I'd like to add something to this.

When you set the VOIP quality to 10 from the server config, the quality is ok. It's still far from Ventirlo quality, but it's acceptable. I can even live with volumes being low by turning up the radio volume and enduring the automatic radio reports for "UNKNOWN VEHICLE" etc. But in addition to this, the voice keeps breaking up.

We would love to use this VOIP with our team, but it's impossible if 1/3 of what your team mates say just breaks up. Sometimes it works fine for a while, other times the voice breaks up all the time and you can only hear few words. Playing with that is impossible.

So, right now, my biggest wish for the VOIP is to have better reliability. Why Ventrilo never breaks up and we can hear each other perfectly always? I would really like to have this reliability with ArmA 2 in-game voice chat.

So, please BIS, the game is awesome and the idea of VOIP with 3d proximity based VOIP + radio channels are awesome, but I don't think anyone uses it unless the issues with reliability can be fixed. This is very sad, because I would really like to use the in-game voice chat with my friends.

[Flouncy 10]

Agree the built-in chat is poor. While technically groovy, the distance and direction feature is a hindrance to quality team gaming.

After experimenting with Teamspeak and Ventrillo, my group of mates and I now exclusively use Skype. Yes, Skype. Voice quality is exceptional, faultless. There seems to me zero impact on game performance too. We use conference calls to do it.

Give it a go, you'll be pleasantly surprised.

[Meek 10]

In a thread about gaming-oriented VoIP, Mumble deserves a mention, it is a superior alternative to Ventrilo and Teamspeak, it is also open-source.

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/

VON would be preferable if it worked correctly.

[frederf 0]

I've found that we've become very lazy and stifling of personal initiative when using Teamspeak. It's an overdone luxury to talk to everyone as if they're in the same room no matter the intervening distance or disruption.

I'm really looking forward to a workable VON system to lessen the unnecessary overhead of having to get everyone on a chat program and then into the game separately. The second, and possibly more important reason, is that constant communication often means constant micromanagement. As a common leader of team, squad, and occasionally platoon sized player forces I can say that being able to talk to everyone at all times is an absolute curse.

[An Fiach 10]

It would help immensely if the direct chat wasn't also tied to the rest of sound effects and was on radio instead.

[no use for a name 0]

It would help immensely if the direct chat wasn't also tied to the rest of sound effects and was on radio instead.

ya this is probably my biggest gripe. It definitely needs it's own volume control

[frederf 0]

I don't want VON to be tied to Radio or Effects. I want it to be its own darn slider!

[Lowe 10]

In a thread about gaming-oriented VoIP, Mumble deserves a mention, it is a superior alternative to Ventrilo and Teamspeak, it is also open-source.

http://mumble.sourceforge.net/

VON would be preferable if it worked correctly.

Another vote for Mumble here, stunning bit of OS software. Definitely the best gaming VOIP currently available. :)

[maxter 10]

I don't want VON to be tied to Radio or Effects. I want it to be its own darn slider!

Agreed. A separate VON volume slider would make a huge difference. Being able to silence the damn auto reports while still hearing players perfectly fine, yes please.

[osmo 0]

I made a request for the volume sliders in the A2 Community Issue Tracker. Vote it if you wish for it to be implemented:

http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2660

Another report about VOIP breaking up:

http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2659

Someone mentioned the auto-reports. It should be apparently possible to disable them from game options / difficulty settings (auto report), but disabling this does not work, the auto reports are still there. Here's a bug report of that:

http://dev-heaven.net/issues/show/2658

Edited July 8, 2009 by Osmo

[frederf 0]

Thank you so much for utilizing the tracker to register these issues!

The autoreports can be disabled only in multiplayer setup I think. You'd have to do some text editing or run a dedicated server to realize the effects.

[galzohar 31]

I hadn't had much volume issues with VOIP, but people do get cut off a LOT making it impossible to understand anything.

[Baron von Beer 0]

+1 for volume. Currently use skype (small group of people), but would love to be able to use what's in game. Without volume control though, it is of little value. Even when quiet in game with nothing going on, can barely hear others when we've tried it.

[EricM 0]

VOIP ingame is such an awsome feature on paper... and yet we never use it because of those small issues.

Instead I use Skype, in audioconference, perfect sound all the time and no hasstle to configure. I would love to be able to use the various channels and directionnal sound though...

[IronPants 0]

I've wanted a separate slider ever since VON was introduced in arma - though when ACE came out, I just turned off the AI radio messages. While having the direct channel tied to sound effects does make sense, the overall volume of direct chat should be increased!

[zeep 3]

With regards to volume; Please make all VOIP chat channels visible in the audio menu, allowing users to set all levels to their taste.

As for connection; Please optimize the stream and make this one of the priorities for the patch-future.

:)

[Nazul 10]

It annoys me to use external apps for communication.

TS2 and Vent dont display who's talking, Vent has a plugin for g15 keyboard which is handy but how many people have a g15...? Its also a problem of opposition being able to hear being in the same channel with those 2 apps.

Im very disappointed with the in game comms.

[Halli~SPARTA~ 0]

Respectfully saying guys that if to much is used on Voip it will drain a servers resourses

and as such it is low grade.... But with that said I would like to see a volume slider myself.

If you want true tactical gaming then the Teamspeak/Ventrillo is the only way to go

as they can be set up with sidemission channels, Vehic,chopper and ect with zero draw on the servers core(s).

[CarlGustaffa 4]

@Frederf: True, autoreport can be turned off. But people are generally not good enough on rebinding 'report' to something different from the (default) 'aim mode'. Meaning that everytime time they spot a new enemy and takes aim, he will report it ingame (which nobody understands) and at the same time report it over voice (VoIP or TS). And in the end, we couldn't hear any of it.

So, yes to a separate control for direct chat. Makes everything feel more alive, and directchat can be used with soundmods with excellent sounds but excessive volumes.

I hate TS as well, but unfortunately the current implementation kind of forces it. TS usage obviously doesn't help the current public game situation.