Ambiance sounds

[Guillak]

An alternative to the music-in-all-scenes suggestion that has been brought up several times: put simple ambiance sounds, instead of actual musics. For instance at [url="http://youtu.be/kI3jO-XBuik"]Raven's Peace[/url] or at [url="http://youtu.be/LJ4R6qnNUWk"]Fenth Beach[/url]. And why not broadcast appropriate sounds when the weather changes (rain, etc.), like an automatic voice spell.

=> Hopefully it would not interfere with the personal music the player is currently listening on his computer.
=> I'm no specialist at all, but wouldn't it solve the problem of copyrights? I assume there are numerous of such sounds available for free, that we can take from the Internet (e.g. see the first comment of the person who put the "Spring birds" video online).

[Chewett]

find some decent sounds and find some decent locations, then pray

[Prince Marvolo]

http://naturesoundsfor.me/

[Shemhazaj]

[i][color=#808080]it's a cool idea but it'd have to be optional, just like the scene music.[/color][/i]
[i][color=#808080]For some people connection is slow and things are already taking time to load.[/color][/i]

[Kyphis the Bard]

Have it as an option in the options menu that is by default off.

[Guillak]

My idea was to use it instead of musics for those scenes that don't already have one, so it could reuse the existing music parameters.

[quote name='Prince Marvolo' timestamp='1330628068' post='105639'] [url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/"]http://naturesoundsfor.me/[/url] [/quote]

This just looks (sounds) perfect to me. It lets you mix sounds from [url="http://www.freesound.org/"]freesound.org[/url], which are free of use, and allows you to save them as OGG files (to be converted as MP3 or whatever), or to simply save the newly created sound on their server (I guess only the parameters are saved and the sound is recreated on the fly). You can then claim ownership for your mix, so no copyright problem.

A couple random examples (made quickly, there are probably better things to make):

[url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/Near_Sanctuary"]Near Wind's Sanctuary[/url]
[url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/Ravens"]Raven's Peace[/url]
[url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/GMill"]Golems' Mill[/url]
[url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/ferry"]Angien's Ferry[/url]

As far as I understood, the current musics are not hosted on the MD server, but come from YouTube. If each scene were to have its own music/sound, I suppose it would be better to keep them coming from third-party servers, as all those sounds would probably be a pain for the server bandwidth if all sounds were stored as .ogg/.mp3 files on it.
The "save as link" possibility of this site is as handy as a YouTube solution in my opinion. Plus, when creating a link, you receive a mail with the following:

[quote]
We'd like to let you know that it is possible to register a user at our
website and claim authorship to your composition.

Claiming authorship to a composition gives you these possibilities:
* Write description for your composition. You can explain how do you use it
and why did you choose those specific sounds.
* Put a link to your website. This way you can promote your blog, website
or twitter account.
* Get more attention for your composition. Authorized sound compositions
are highlighted among others and get more attention from website visitors.[/quote]

Win-win?

[Soothing Sands]

Well i'm just going to say right now... we definitely don't need a sound for every single scene. A few special ones, maybe, to accent their appearance. I think having a waterfall sound at golem's mill is not helping anything at all. Find a few scenes that have a deeper message you want to convey, and find some music for that.

summary-
I would vote against any water sounds in a water scene

[Guillak]

I couldn't resist and made a sound player myself to see (hear) how it would feel, but the way I coded it was deemed too open to potential abuses, so I won't release it. That said, I just recap the main ideas here, in case something similar gets done some time.

Regarding possible "messages to convey": I talked to Soothing Sands about it; the goal here is not to add nor alter any meaning to the locations—the scene drawing itself and the poem in it suffice (and I don't grasp many of them anyway, that would be a tad pretentious)—, but just to immerse the player more in the game. And why not make you pause longer in such or such location because of the relaxing feeling it inspires … or the opposite.


So I've been using:[list]
[*]YouTube links only. Those found in e.g. [url="http://naturesoundsfor.me/"]http://naturesoundsfor.me/[/url] are great but a bit repetitive after you heard them a lot. I noticed a more advanced sound mixer at [url="http://www.ambient-mixer.com/"]http://www.ambient-mixer.com/[/url], but the mixer is heavier and takes time to load. YouTube videos (hidden, so you just hear the sounds) are a nice compromise in my opinion.
[*]"Continuous" sounds, i.e. if you move from one location to another and the sound played here is the same, then the video doesn't restart, it just keeps playing.
[*]Up to two videos playing simultaneously: a "global" one that covers a whole land, keeping the sound transitions smooth as described above; and a "local" one for scene-specific objects (e.g. streams, burning torches, etc.).
[/list]
All are relatively neutral and unobtrusive sounds. The list I've been using so far (outdoor only):
"Global" sounds: [url="http://youtu.be/nxj4yhoOTN4"]Marind's Bell[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/x_lfcwO03xI"]Loreroot[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/PsXxQZrl_qM"]Underground[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/d47zR5rXDsc"]Storm Coast[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/eEFG6lk5xFA"]No Man's Land (north)[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/1XRkEDCNyUI"]No Man's Land (south)[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/AnlnDenJAkM"]Archives[/url]
"Local" sounds: [url="http://youtu.be/ZNNIes8zUk0"]fountains[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/GX1EWDn_TCE"]creeks[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/KtXG2xzKmEg"]torches[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/8VoZVpeIL-Y"]howling wind[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/2bSwUiLmZRg"]near White Lake[/url], [url="http://youtu.be/UWFjhEYXbbU"]near Green Lake[/url]

[size=2]Muuuur, let me play with sounds please :-)[/size]

[J-D]

I think this is an excellent idea, but some people might prefer to listen to their own music while playing so, as stated above, it should be optional.

[Espartano]

[quote name='J-D' timestamp='1334870650' post='109282']
I think this is an excellent idea, but some people might prefer to listen to their own music while playing so, as stated above, it should be optional.
[/quote]
Its a nice idea, and the musics are optional, at options Play scene music: enabled

Edited April 21, 2012 by Espartano

[J-D]

[quote name='Espartano' timestamp='1335015750' post='109365']
Its a nice idea, and the musics are optional, at options Play scene music: enabled
[/quote]

I was referring to the ambiance noises being optional.

[Prince Marvolo]

I think it would also be nice of the weather spells are able to trigger sound, rain sounds, storm sounds, etc.

[Fyrd Argentus]

How about the ambience sounds are optional AND only occur if there is a weather spell in effect AND occur only if a scene-specific music has not been selected?

Q: Is scene music selection tightly controlled, or would you open that up for a wp?

Edited April 22, 2012 by Fyrd Argentus

[Pipstickz]

There are few people who have ever received the voice spell, which allows the caster to change scene music temporarily (I believe to a youtube video), Cryxus is the only one I know of and he got five casts. So, to answer your question, it is unlikely to become available in the WPShop.