Interactive Voice Macros
Xerond
Undefined Join Date: 2004-07-09 Member: 29817Members, Constellation
Undefined Join Date: 2004-07-09 Member: 29817Members, Constellation
<div class="IPBDescription">Quick, relevant voice macros to aid in communication.</div>Here's the concept:
When it comes to communicating with your team in-game, using a microphone is a great tool but everyone won't be using one, and likely shouldn't. When the entire team is using a microphone all the small peripheral chatter is heard by everyone. Stuff like,"follow me" "watch that!" "Build that!' "Weld me!" These small yet very important phrase needs to be said just not heard by everyone. If everyone is communicating, the mic channel is flooded and no one can hear the game.
Also, for anyone without a microphone or unable to talk for whatever reason, they can't communicate with other players quickly. Typing takes too long. And standard voice macro systems usually have some type of hierarchy to reach voice macros, ala TF2. When in an intense encounter or the like, hitting one key, looking at the list of ten things to say, and then selecting a key is a bother. You're also being given options of things to say that most likely are not all relevant to the situation at hand.
An example of my solution to these design problems would be to create a few groups of related voice macros.
We'll call these groups Command, Request, and Emotion.
Now depending on the player model's state, or what he is aiming at, will determine what will be said by that player model.
Each group will be set to a key ,
Z - Command: These audibles tell other players to do certain tasks(and to be more friendly, I would suggest they also include the player taking action for a certain task as well)
X - Request: These audibles ask other players to aid you in a task.
C - Emotion: These audibles vary from taunts, to jokes, to random sayings. Making the game more lively and fun.
As I move into a room with a couple other marines I would aim at a dropped resource node that is unbuilt and hit Z(command), which would then prompt an marine voice saying,"Build that while I cover you!" In that same instance, you could alternatively hit X(request) and say,"Cover me while I build." or joke around and hit C(emotion),"Is that thing working?" Much like taunts in NS, I would opt for the emotion audibles to vary and have different sayings. The other groups can too, but I would suggest having different tones of voice versus completely different phrases.
The cool thing about these audibles is that they'll only be heard within a proximity that is relevant to your team-mates around you. It's quick, easy to use, easy to learn, and is also quite powerful. Not to mention it will encourage players to stick together and stay within that audible radius.
More examples:
While aiming at a weldable you hit Z and say,"We need to weld that vent shut." Or hit X,"Cover me while I weld this." or C,"That vent is an open invitation to our party." or something to that effect.
You emote on a skulk corpse and say,"Keep em coming."
Or command when you see an alien life-form,"Contact Onos!" (it would be better if you can target this specific emote when an alien is in your clear field of view, so you don't have to be aiming precisely at the alien model to get this)
Or command on an alien structure, "Attack that node!" Or request on it,"Don't hit it yet." Emote on it,"Looks like they got here first."
Emote on a dropped health-pack,"Health-pack here."
Request on a team-mates model,"Wanna follow me?"
Emote on a dropped gun model,"Shotgun here!"
Command with your welder selected and out,"I've got a welder here!"
Request on a player holding a welder,"Weld me please."
A fade requesting on a gorge,"*alien tone and/or voice* Heal me."
I'm sure you get the idea. Whether or not teams would be able to hear each-other would be interesting. If so, I would suggest that the opposing team can only hear these audibles within a very close proximity, much smaller than the speaking team's heard proximity. Or, not at all.
_____________________________________
Also an alternative to having three bound keys to use for this voice macro system would be that you'd just have one key bound, the voice macro system simpler, but with a check system in place before you say something. For example you hit the voice macro key as your reticule is over a vent or object that needs to be welded, a quick text block pops up saying," Weld that vent!" and if you press the key twice, it will animate the command. This way players can check to see what they would say, before they say it, and if a player already knows the response then a double tap isn't that hard.
Or, alternatively. Rather than having the double tap be a check system, there is a retract option. You voice macro over an object when you hit the key once. And if you macro over it again within a short time, you respond by pulling your command back. "Cover that door." ... "Cancel that." Etc.
______________________________________
Or at last, you could kind of combine all three ideas into one. You only have two bound voice macro keys. One key: X = request. C = command.
If you hit request on an object, it shows you what it will say. If you double tap request, you will say the request macro. If you instead hit command on the double tap, it cancels that request. And same thing vice versa.
<!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro-->***EDIT***<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
Here is a graphic to help explain the idea posted <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=10649&view=findpost&p=1768463" target="_blank">here on 4-23-2010</a>
<img src="http://www.onesynergy.org/developer/Trav/voice.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://www.onesynergy.org/developer/Trav/voice2.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
When it comes to communicating with your team in-game, using a microphone is a great tool but everyone won't be using one, and likely shouldn't. When the entire team is using a microphone all the small peripheral chatter is heard by everyone. Stuff like,"follow me" "watch that!" "Build that!' "Weld me!" These small yet very important phrase needs to be said just not heard by everyone. If everyone is communicating, the mic channel is flooded and no one can hear the game.
Also, for anyone without a microphone or unable to talk for whatever reason, they can't communicate with other players quickly. Typing takes too long. And standard voice macro systems usually have some type of hierarchy to reach voice macros, ala TF2. When in an intense encounter or the like, hitting one key, looking at the list of ten things to say, and then selecting a key is a bother. You're also being given options of things to say that most likely are not all relevant to the situation at hand.
An example of my solution to these design problems would be to create a few groups of related voice macros.
We'll call these groups Command, Request, and Emotion.
Now depending on the player model's state, or what he is aiming at, will determine what will be said by that player model.
Each group will be set to a key ,
Z - Command: These audibles tell other players to do certain tasks(and to be more friendly, I would suggest they also include the player taking action for a certain task as well)
X - Request: These audibles ask other players to aid you in a task.
C - Emotion: These audibles vary from taunts, to jokes, to random sayings. Making the game more lively and fun.
As I move into a room with a couple other marines I would aim at a dropped resource node that is unbuilt and hit Z(command), which would then prompt an marine voice saying,"Build that while I cover you!" In that same instance, you could alternatively hit X(request) and say,"Cover me while I build." or joke around and hit C(emotion),"Is that thing working?" Much like taunts in NS, I would opt for the emotion audibles to vary and have different sayings. The other groups can too, but I would suggest having different tones of voice versus completely different phrases.
The cool thing about these audibles is that they'll only be heard within a proximity that is relevant to your team-mates around you. It's quick, easy to use, easy to learn, and is also quite powerful. Not to mention it will encourage players to stick together and stay within that audible radius.
More examples:
While aiming at a weldable you hit Z and say,"We need to weld that vent shut." Or hit X,"Cover me while I weld this." or C,"That vent is an open invitation to our party." or something to that effect.
You emote on a skulk corpse and say,"Keep em coming."
Or command when you see an alien life-form,"Contact Onos!" (it would be better if you can target this specific emote when an alien is in your clear field of view, so you don't have to be aiming precisely at the alien model to get this)
Or command on an alien structure, "Attack that node!" Or request on it,"Don't hit it yet." Emote on it,"Looks like they got here first."
Emote on a dropped health-pack,"Health-pack here."
Request on a team-mates model,"Wanna follow me?"
Emote on a dropped gun model,"Shotgun here!"
Command with your welder selected and out,"I've got a welder here!"
Request on a player holding a welder,"Weld me please."
A fade requesting on a gorge,"*alien tone and/or voice* Heal me."
I'm sure you get the idea. Whether or not teams would be able to hear each-other would be interesting. If so, I would suggest that the opposing team can only hear these audibles within a very close proximity, much smaller than the speaking team's heard proximity. Or, not at all.
_____________________________________
Also an alternative to having three bound keys to use for this voice macro system would be that you'd just have one key bound, the voice macro system simpler, but with a check system in place before you say something. For example you hit the voice macro key as your reticule is over a vent or object that needs to be welded, a quick text block pops up saying," Weld that vent!" and if you press the key twice, it will animate the command. This way players can check to see what they would say, before they say it, and if a player already knows the response then a double tap isn't that hard.
Or, alternatively. Rather than having the double tap be a check system, there is a retract option. You voice macro over an object when you hit the key once. And if you macro over it again within a short time, you respond by pulling your command back. "Cover that door." ... "Cancel that." Etc.
______________________________________
Or at last, you could kind of combine all three ideas into one. You only have two bound voice macro keys. One key: X = request. C = command.
If you hit request on an object, it shows you what it will say. If you double tap request, you will say the request macro. If you instead hit command on the double tap, it cancels that request. And same thing vice versa.
<!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro-->***EDIT***<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
Here is a graphic to help explain the idea posted <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?s=&showtopic=10649&view=findpost&p=1768463" target="_blank">here on 4-23-2010</a>
<img src="http://www.onesynergy.org/developer/Trav/voice.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://www.onesynergy.org/developer/Trav/voice2.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
Comments
Example: Two oni (Whatever the plural form is) are attacking the base. You're with three marines and they're unaware of whats happening.
You need a quick voice macro to say "Back to base!" But it comes out something like "Weld that Vent!".
Maybe there could be emergency macros, things that tell squad mates that the base is under attack, or the infantry portal got destroyed. It could alert you to disasters, a siege or just tell you to be careful. Emergency could be v, as it wouldn't have to be used often and v is right above the space bar so it's in easy reach.
Other than that it's a great idea :)
You need a quick voice macro to say "Back to base!" But it comes out something like "Weld that Vent!".<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I don't think this could really be an issue because you can't point to a base; it's too general. Plus, the purpose of these communications are to reduce voice chat over mundane and ordinary things like "built that RT" or "I'll cover you while you weld."
Something like "get back to the base before we lose this game" should probably be said over normal voice comms.
But if you're in a room with a weldable, health-packs on the ground, two other marines, an alien structure, alien infestation, and un-built marine structure, a built marine structure. Your options in what you can say have expanded a lot.
In that same situation, request on the un-built marine structure,"Build that armory." Command on the alien structure, "Lets chop that down!" Request on a health pack,"We need more of those!"(This could double as a health-pack request to the commander) Request on a weldable," We need that vent welded!" Etc.
It is all based on what is around you. But when you get down to it and once a person has learned these macro responses in time; You could be communicating important tasks faster than if you had to actually hold down the mic button and speak what you want to say, essentially pointing your reticule at an object and tapping a key.
Just something I was wondering about, thanks :)
Please add it to the list, uwe!
Not sure if I'm imagining it, but I think UWE are considering something like this already.
Just something I was wondering about, thanks :)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well I think it would be easy to program priorities into the same system. Say for example, if armor is not = 100% then when you request on a marine who holds a welder, it will ask the marine to weld you instead of follow you. Logically if you want him to follow you somewhere, it makes sense that he should weld you before you move. And if your armor is 100%, then it would just ask him to follow you, you have no need to be welded.
So, request on marine with welder," I need welding."
*he has finished welding you*
Request on the same marine again, " Follow me."
There are a lot of possibilities with this that I haven't touched too much on yet. Such as rewarding players for doing a certain task.
What if you could emote on a marine while he is building a structure and it would say,"Good job man, I'm covering you." Little audio rewards that players could give each-other for completing tasks would encourage teamwork even more.
I'm not sure what a "normap" voice comm is, but I'm assuming it's like what we would see in something like Tribes? Example: Press X to bring up the voice menus, Press 1 to select Request, Press 3 to select Med Pack.
If that's what you were referring to then the OP's suggestion would be faster, require less memorization, and new player friendly and when all of those combine there's a pretty decent chance the OP's system would be commonly used in pub games.
If that's what you were referring to then the OP's suggestion would be faster, require less memorization, and new player friendly and when all of those combine there's a pretty decent chance the OP's system would be commonly used in pub games.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
yeah pretty much every modern multiplayer game has this sort of thing... ns2 will certainly have it without question.
edit: dont be cheeky, normap is a mispelling
Actually I went brain dead and totally missed it. I thought you were trying to be cool and combine two words. I blame that on Starcraft 2 where basically everyone does this to describe unit composition and upgrades.
This is what I was talking about in paragraph 2 of the OP:
"Also, for anyone without a microphone or unable to talk for whatever reason, they can't communicate with other players quickly. Typing takes too long. <b>And standard voice macro systems usually have some type of hierarchy to reach voice macros, ala TF2. When in an intense encounter or the like, hitting one key, looking at the list of ten things to say, and then selecting a key is a bother. You're also being given options of things to say that most likely are not all relevant to the situation at hand.</b>"
Yeah lots of voice options would be good since I assume they are rather cheap to produce.
Hell to start, I think it would be fun just making up all the different sayings, especially for emote sayings or taunts. That would be an interesting community project...
Maybe the system has the mute built into the interactive aspect. Say if a marine says like 5+ things in a row, when you request on him, you're given an option to mute him. Or whatever threshold sounds like spam. Realistically if a single marine walks into an occupied room, or even an empty one, saying 5 different things, or 5 of the same things. Should other marines have the ability to mute him? I think that would be fascinating feedback. If you're a new player, and you walk into an area, spouting commands, and 1.. then 2... then 3 marines have now muted you... thats pretty much everyone saying you're not important enough to listen to. And that means don't abuse it.
Or, it could be built into the scoreboard. When you pull up their name, you can place a check mark into a small mute field.
Also I'm not entirely sure if this is something I'm just making up, but I think that us europeans speak less on VoIPs built into games (since there's so many languages that can clutter things up; it's usually quiet in speech-chat in games), spending some effort to built-in commands would/could be really helpful for public games.
And muting people could perhaps be done with another key? Since these commands would only be heard when you are nearby, just aiming at the annoying ###### and hitting a button should be simpler (and less detracting from the game).
For one, it requires you to do one important thing - you have to be looking / aiming at what it is you want to talk about. I could aim at a vent and press 'X' and 'request you weld that up', or I can be aiming down a hallway looking for skulks and press the VCV macro and command a vent weld. Why can't I ask for the weld when not even in the room? Because I have to be aiming down the vent. Ultimately this will make this method of communication faster than a keyboard, but ultimately one of the slowest, unreliable ones. Imagine trying to keep the cursor on a leaping skulk and fumble with whatever god damn keys and trying to remember what's going to be said, and instead you moan something out about how bad the plumbing is because you emoted on a pipe.
This issue is also going to spring up in the event things are too far away, or are obstructed by teammates or something making it unreliable at best. While I guess it's an alternative to the retards who are too stupid to use a mic, the best way to deal with that is to just ban them for being ######s and tell them to go back to 1997. I mean, if you need a weld, you're going to have to wait for someone to pull out their welder? Maybe find the guy in the sea of bodies and spam 'X' on him? That's completely impractical.
Furthermore, this context-sensitive method is going to be entirely insufficient for anything that doesn't involve your immediate environment. Thusly you'll still need voice macros for things like calling for help, in which case you now have two systems when you only should have one.
So I want to ask what good your system is for announcing things that require me to have unobstructed, stable aim at them when the entire point was, as you said, being in the 'heat of the moment'. What are you doing, backflips down a hall on your way to build an RT? Of the examples, you used exactly one of them ("Onos spotted") is more vital and easier than using a voice comm menu chain. I don't want to have to hunt around on a floor to aim at a Shotgun, or even better, I don't want to have to hear this worthless crap period. It was bad enough getting macro spam from idiots who think I give two ###### about their armor values and what flavour of ice cream they prefer.
For these reasons, it feels really gimmicky. Voice comm menus typically fail because they're configured by idiots who haven't thought of how to make it sensible, easy to remember, and easy to use. Number keys are horrible for a voice comm menu.
Relevant: <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=107801&hl=" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index....=107801&hl=</a>
<!--quoteo(post=1762765:date=Apr 5 2010, 11:20 AM:name=Temphage)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Temphage @ Apr 5 2010, 11:20 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1762765"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Furthermore, this context-sensitive method is going to be entirely insufficient for anything that doesn't involve your immediate environment. You'll still need voice macros for things like calling for help, in which case you now have two systems when you only should have one.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
If you're trying to communicate to the entire team you should probably be using voice or text chat. In any modern (read: not Tribes) video game an extreme minority of players take the time to memorize three letter voice macros. The OP's suggestion system would reduce over all voice chat spam, reduce the need to stop and type, and improve squad teamwork.
It's an awesome idea.
I don't want to hear any 'emote' commands on corpses. I don't give a ###### about that and it's just going to get old. I don't need people barking out orders and stating the complete ###### obvious every time we enter a room because they don't want to be the ones to stand there with their ass in the wind while someone else does the killing.
"____ spotted" barks are unreliable at best, and completely worthless at worst, especially when it comes to the faster lifeforms.
After a week of listening to people spamming 'emote' on corpses and constant nagging about bull###### I don't care about (for example 'WELD THAT VENT' when I don't have a ###### welder) this is going to get REALLY old.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So you're against voice macros in video games entirely? Because what I quoted from you said you prefer the Tribes system. In that system you're being spammed useless ###### from the entire team regardless of your equipment or distance. You just did a 180 in your logic and I'm now confused.
1) Way to gloss over every other point I made against this system so you could throw out an ad-hominem attack.
2) The key point was 'easier'. Voice comm menus provide an alternative that isn't faster than a mic but is removed from the mic comm system with a textual indicator. When a commander drops a medpack, you have a bright visual and audio cue, do you not? What good does it do to have some retard yelling 'MEDPACK HERE' with absolutely no context as to where this medpack is? The same goes for any droppables. If marines are losing droppables on the ground, that's a problem with the GAME DESIGN, not a lack of communication.
As I pointed out, maybe you don't remember the %H / %A / %L commands or whatever the hell they were that people put in irritating text macros with colors and crap. They were 100% worthless, all they served as was spam that just about nobody cared about. Now we want to turn it into an audio component you can spam with a single key too?
Let's take the welder example. With this FLAWLESSLY BRILLIANT SYSTEM, once I locate the guy with the welder and accidentally ask a guy to follow me instead because he ran in front of my crosshairs, I try again and I say "HEY, WELD ME!".
Now take the system that exists in other FPS games - a passive system where the WELDER is alerted to the status of friendlies, forgoing the spam. In Battlefield 2142, when you hold the medpack in your hands, you can see the health bars of all your friendly units and critically wounded ones flash at you. There's no requirement to ask for someone to give you health - they are provided with a passive, spamless tool to help them in that regard.
<b><!--sizeo:5--><span style="font-size:18pt;line-height:100%"><!--/sizeo-->When it comes to communication, QUALITY > QUANTITY<!--sizec--></span><!--/sizec--></b>
I figure someone as hard-up their own ass as you should know this already. This system does NOT implement quality communication, but burdens the game with quantity.
3) Any and all 'fun' voice comms should be stripped out and shot in the street.
The more I think about this idea, the less I like it, especially since the examples the OP provided are absurd and practically contradictory. I'm finding myself hard-pressed to rationalize anything but an extremely neutered version of this idea that only works in very specific cases (buildings, for example) but that could easily be wrapped up with an auto-bark (ie: You start building an RT, and a request for cover is automatically shouted). I can think of an extreme few situations where a context-sensitive comm key would actually provide quality information. And for what it's worth, '____ spotted!' commands are not really that useful in NS.
Man .txt was so much better when you people never talked.
So you are against all voice macros then? I'm still confused by your complete turn of logic.
Maybe I wouldn't gloss over your posts if you would stop ninja editing your content and changing it. One of your major arguments is the removal of the emote command which I agree with. I glossed over it / ignored it because you singled that out, nitpicked it, and tried to bring the entire idea down because of it. Ironically, you claim I did this to your own argument. The request/order hot key ideas are good because you get fast and useful communication without spamming the entire team with chat. I didn't need to know that some guy on the other side of the map asked the person near him to weld a vent or weld him.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Let's take the welder example. With this FLAWLESSLY BRILLIANT SYSTEM, once I locate the guy with the welder and accidentally ask a guy to follow me instead because he ran in front of my crosshairs, I try again and I say "HEY, WELD ME!".<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The idea that you find this to be some demerit to suggestion is absolutely hilarious.
For the record, I legitimately do not understand your arguments. Even your counter arguments (quality over quantity) seem to support this suggestion. You're taking this to some extreme, pretty standard for you, where every marine will be spamming nonstop on each other and every possible object in the environment.
What if there was a client side feature to disable this kind of voice macro? I assume that would put all of your concerns to rest?