ambient_generic playing constantly no ma Created 9 years ago2015-10-14 05:36:21 UTC by Alberto309

Welp.

I know the Goldsrc engine pretty good, but there's still something I'd need to know if someone will be able to tell me.

I'm trying to play with ambient_generic in Hammer and CS 1.6. I've made two different sounds: one is a music, the other one is the same music but it's edited because I've muffled it with GoldWave to give the illusion of it being behind walls (like the music you hear when you're out of the disco and then you open the door and the sound is clearer).
And... Yay! I made it! But this damn engine, for some reason, when I'm far enough from one of the sounds (respectively: large radius and medium radius), it stops, and when I go back to the sound radius it starts playing again but from the same position it has stopped before. This basically means that the two sounds aren't synchronyzed anymore, messing up the whole thang.

So, the one million dollars question:

Is there a way to make a sound to play constantly even if the client isn't in the sound's radius (and, of course, without setting it to "Play everywhere")?

Thanks in advance.

Haven't tested this, but do you suppose it still does that when the amb_gen is set to not be a looping sound? Could you rig up a looping multi_manager to trigger a non-looping sound (the music)?

That looks like the most possible workaround.

Is there a way to make a sound to play constantly even if the client isn't in the sound's radius (and, of course, without setting it to "Play everywhere")?

Agrees with Jessie
One MM for each track to manually start/stop the song, and an additional one that loops them, --and they should play continuously. My knowledge of cue points in the track itself is rusty, so if your WAV files don't work as-is, try them with: no cues, one cue at the beginning, and one at beginning/end.

If you can't get it sorted, work up a quick example map, and we can have fun fixing it for you

I believe that wouldn't work. You can only start/stop a sound if it's looping. Triggering a non-looping sound while it's playing will only cause it to start over from the beginning.

Relevant.

You're right Stu. The method I listed above would work for triggered sounds, NOT looped ones. (not sure what I was thinking there..)

My GS knowledge is waning majorly from disuse; Everything is so much easier to do with the input/output system and Source entities in general... [/lazy]

Damn.

What about a combination with logic_auto and multi_manager then?
Would you like to have an example map and try something out yourself?

I always hated entity work...

Would you like to have an example map and try something out yourself?

Absolutely yes

There you go:

Clicky :3

Info:

• Most of the stuff is VisGrouped;
• Compiled BSP included to see what actually happens when you go out of the sound's radius and to understand what I want to achieve;
• The two sounds are included;
• No wad file included (used more than one). Just replace the textures with the ones of your choice;
• The final product will NOT have that amnbient_generic's positions and there might be more of them with the same sound (muffled) in surrounding areas to maintain the same effect on distant zones of the map;
• I've identified the ambient_generic's positions with green sprites in the compiled BSP, so you can see where the entities are placed exactly;
• Both of the sounds are now set on "Medium radius", but feel free to change those parameters for testing purposes (of course);
• The RMF must be compiled with VHLT v34 and the provided BSP must be played on CS 1.6 or CS:CZ (the player size is different and played with HL would make you feel a giant).

Thanks a lot in advance.

Well that is a very neat effect just the way you have it. Even with my volume turned up to max, I can barely here the muffled track; so, although the tracks go out of sync effect still works very well imo

I will mess around with it a bit, maybe boost the volume of the muffled track a bit so it's easier to playtest. BTW, great track choice for this type of thing & very well done!

<youtubes stripper music>

Haha! Thanks bro.

The sound I've chosen comes from Vampire Slayers HL mod, one of the first HL mods ever made in 1999 (and one of my favourites one, not for the mapping tho lol).

Feel free to increase the sounds volume if you feel too; I personally use GoldWave as it's easy to use and enough for such things.

I want to achieve that effect because it's nice as you can see.

Bumpy bump.

Still nothing? Any news?

edit
Tried a bunch of things Berto, but no luck yet.. =(

Sorry mah man been busy @work and in general, and my tasks are piling up.. All I did so far is re-texture and adjust the volume of the muffled clip, but again, I think the effect works ok as you have it

Aw well.

No worries man, take your time. Tho the effect doesn't work right imho; I don't want it to screw up as soon as I go out of the sound's radius. It completely ruins the effect.

Until a better solution is found, I think your best bet is keeping the muffled sound low--maybe even one or two units lower than it is now--, so the splice is less noticeable walking room to room.

Since I haven't been able to make any headway using the ambient_generics constantly playing, will try triggers instead; I'm not quite sure how that will work yet, but we'll see

Just out of curiosity, would something like this be doable in Source?

Since I haven't been able to make any headway using the ambient_generics constantly playing, will try triggers instead

Ah, that could work. :3

Just out of curiosity, would something like this be doable in Source?

I'm not sufficiently acknowledged in Source, so I don't really know. We should ask Tetsu0.

Short answer: Probably.

I have not played so much with sound in Source as I probably should have, but you have greater control over your entities than GoldSource. You can even set a custom radius instead of "small, medium, large".

Could use either a Soundscape or a run-time script to modify the volume.

That sounds like you could set one volume to 0 and the other to 100 to switch between both, right?

That would be good if Goldsrc could do that aswell.

Like env_render but for sounds?