Creative eax effects
- Thread starter SkeeterUK
- Start date
99.9% of EAX is really a gimmick.
In fact to be fair, there is actually only 2 games that I have noticed any environmental effects ever...
Half Life 2
In the bit on the beach, with the antlions, the part where there is a shed... In there!
If you shoot your pistol inside and then outside, you can hear it sound ... sort of not bad.
UnReal Tournament 2004
In the junkyard domination level, when you run through a tube and shoot... it goes echo-ey while you are in the tube.
I have not noticed these effects on any other game at all.
So, my opinion is that its utter crap.
As for adding effects to Music... Its sad. You either have a sad life and feel the need to do it to improve naff music, or, its just sad music.
In fact to be fair, there is actually only 2 games that I have noticed any environmental effects ever...
Half Life 2
In the bit on the beach, with the antlions, the part where there is a shed... In there!
If you shoot your pistol inside and then outside, you can hear it sound ... sort of not bad.
UnReal Tournament 2004
In the junkyard domination level, when you run through a tube and shoot... it goes echo-ey while you are in the tube.
I have not noticed these effects on any other game at all.
So, my opinion is that its utter crap.
As for adding effects to Music... Its sad. You either have a sad life and feel the need to do it to improve naff music, or, its just sad music.
You'd be surprised at what environmental effects you're hearing. Remember back in the day when npcs on the other side of walls used to sound like they were right next to you? Environmental occlusion stops that from happening now. A good example is Bioshock. When you emerge from the chamber, just having entred rapture, the bubbles on the other side of the a big window are deafening with EAX off. With EAX on, they're faint, as they should be. I'm almost always hearing reverberations in games - can't understand how you'd miss them.
HL2 is an odd example. IIRC it's not an EAX title and it does its own environmental audio. It does do environmental audio relatively well though. Tell me you can't immedtiately hear whether you're in an open or enclosed environment. Crysis also has it's own pretty good environmental audio system, as do a number of other titles.
I guess you shouldn't really notice good environmental effects that often if you aren't listening for them because they should just sound natural within the gaming environment. With good sound design, they do often sound natural. Doesn't always work. Reverb was a little off in Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines for example.
I can think of quite a few examples where not having environmental audio is horrible. Try the campaign map in Rome: Total War in DirectSound mode. Nasty. Thankfully the sofware mode (stereo only) simulates a lot of EAX effects.
HL2 is an odd example. IIRC it's not an EAX title and it does its own environmental audio. It does do environmental audio relatively well though. Tell me you can't immedtiately hear whether you're in an open or enclosed environment. Crysis also has it's own pretty good environmental audio system, as do a number of other titles.
I guess you shouldn't really notice good environmental effects that often if you aren't listening for them because they should just sound natural within the gaming environment. With good sound design, they do often sound natural. Doesn't always work. Reverb was a little off in Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines for example.
I can think of quite a few examples where not having environmental audio is horrible. Try the campaign map in Rome: Total War in DirectSound mode. Nasty. Thankfully the sofware mode (stereo only) simulates a lot of EAX effects.
Ah yeah, I see how you are coming at me on this one...
Indeed you are totally correct, the whole idea is for the game to sound perfectly natural, and I have been listening out to a few things and I have noticed one big thing.
I mostly game on my headphones
Now, Audio that is on teh left of the screen or that comes from the left is fine and is how it should be etc, however, stuff from the right is not coming through correctly.
I have a Cretive card and the drive bay add-on, and I have a handful of these , ranging from Audigy 1 and 2 to XFI and they all do this.
So, I played in 5.1 and the sound is better but I have noticed that there is a big mistake somewhere alongh the lines
When I play the Test sounds for each speaker, they go left right, left surround, right surround, bass and finally center, and they play the correct sound through the correct speaker. I also have a couple of WAVs that are 5.1 and these too, also play through the correct speakers.
However...
In games, the sounds from the left, do indeed play from the left, but the sounds from the right, play from the rear right???
The Speakers are connected correctly and they play music as they should, with only having a "surround sound" output from the rear when playing Music, the center and bass also giving just a centeralised surround output and the bass giving just thump thump and rumble sounds as they should, and as I said, directed sounds are good, but games just dont play ball at all.
Confused?
Indeed you are totally correct, the whole idea is for the game to sound perfectly natural, and I have been listening out to a few things and I have noticed one big thing.
I mostly game on my headphones
Now, Audio that is on teh left of the screen or that comes from the left is fine and is how it should be etc, however, stuff from the right is not coming through correctly.
I have a Cretive card and the drive bay add-on, and I have a handful of these , ranging from Audigy 1 and 2 to XFI and they all do this.
So, I played in 5.1 and the sound is better but I have noticed that there is a big mistake somewhere alongh the lines
When I play the Test sounds for each speaker, they go left right, left surround, right surround, bass and finally center, and they play the correct sound through the correct speaker. I also have a couple of WAVs that are 5.1 and these too, also play through the correct speakers.
However...
In games, the sounds from the left, do indeed play from the left, but the sounds from the right, play from the rear right???
The Speakers are connected correctly and they play music as they should, with only having a "surround sound" output from the rear when playing Music, the center and bass also giving just a centeralised surround output and the bass giving just thump thump and rumble sounds as they should, and as I said, directed sounds are good, but games just dont play ball at all.
Confused?