I'm not saying that the present solution in the "Cliffs of Dover" engine is ideal...but I don't think its as bad a solution as some people make it out to be...Many natural effects like the doppler effect...or engine damage...or echo/reverb effects (like taxi out of a shed into open air), can not be adequately delivered by sound files alone...The initial impact of a pre-recorded engine start up is outstanding, but what about all the "little" details of reality, like how sound waves travel and change (decay,reflect,shift) as the sound source moves around the "player"? What about engine damage, or changes in RPM? I have heard some convincing work done by "outside" modders for the "IL2 1946" game engine. But I don't think that, that solution is perfect either...I'm always hearing the microphone compression, and sound file looping to match RPM ect...its good work, very good even. But it always sounds like a recording to me...it doesn't "sound live".

Your worried about sounds when there is major stuttering and fps issues

They told us why they didn't do it this way in some posts during the previous months.The problem with this is not so much having to fly expensive equipment overseas on a chartered flight (although it can be expensive as well), but most of all that getting someone to run an engine that's now a very expensive to run and maintain museum piece with no readily available spare parts is going to cost a lot of money.

Thinking about it, some engines are pretty rare (especially German ones) and their total hourly cost (operation and maintenance) could be higher than that of a modern engine used in a modern general aviation aircraft. Now imagine how many hours are needed to get accurate recordings across the entire RPM range or rent a ride on a flying warbird to capture the propeller and wind noise at high speed.
Finally, nobody's going to let you run a DB601 at WEP when they use reduced power settings on flying 109s to preserve engine life, probably not even if you paid a good amount of money.

I'm not saying what we're getting is optimal, but i can certainly understand why it is the way it is. If i won in a lottery or something i'd rent a charter flight, fly their sound engineers to some museums and pay for the expenses of running the engines, but sadly i haven't won in one yet :grin:

Also, this:

A recording is a recording, it's not dynamic. To get a truly believable effect we'd have to spend hours upon hours of recording in very small increments across the entire RPM range, which means even more expenses.

A modern turboprop can push an aircraft's hourly operating cost to $400 or so. I'm going by memory here from the Cessna Caravan manuals, you can find them online, and that one uses the ubiquitous Pratt and Whitney PT-6 series which is a much simpler engine and probably has less moving parts than the high powered pistons found in warbirds, it's reliable as hell and has readily available spare part supply and servicing. I'm just guessing here, but i think that running a rare WW2 engine could probably cost at least $1000 per hour total (fuel, servicing, inspections, etc).

It seems to me that there are two camps here. One group is happy with the stock in-game sounds of IL-2 while the other desires and pushes for the modded sounds from the likes of Jafa and Tiger33 (this has been true since the beginning of Il-2 modding). I belong to the latter group but I can respect the viewpoint of the stock purists. It is becoming increasingly obvious to me that you cannot easily reconcile these two camps. In light of this, I say that the Cliffs of Dover devs allow for modded sounds to be selected by the user (thanks Azimech for the idea). Include the the stock sounds as default for the purists but have a switch in the sound setup that will make the game look to an alternate(user-defined?) sound sample folder. Standardize the file structure of this alternate location to make sound modding easy and let the users decide how their game sounds. Sound files will not compromise the integrity of the game as far as gameplay is concerned. I believe now that this is the only way to make everyone happy and that by doing this, the sounds issue that began with IL-2 in 2001 will disappear forever. I hope this approach is taken by both the Cliffs of Dover devs and by DT for the original IL-2.

Cheers,

Fafnir_6

Actually, if cost is their only reason to why they haven't gotten some realistic sounds, they must be flat broke lol. As for stock IL-2 sounds, that's for pigheaded laymen IMO. I can make stock IL-2 engine sounds myself every single day when I go for my daily morning #2.

I like your thinking fafnir. Can't please us all with one solution and I can't kill each and every "IL-2 purist" either. :D

This is from my (original series) IL2 experience and what I was able to see/hear from the YT videos:

There is no denying that both the original and latest IL2 sounds aren't accurate. They don't sound like the Merlin or Daimler Benz engines we are used to hearing from YT videos and flight shows.

However... when put in the game context - to follow engine physics, damage, fly-byes etc, they do the job far better than any other moded sounds I've ever heard. In other words, they serve their purpose and get the job done. Moded sounds are great, and have come a long way. But still not up to the level they should be IMO.

Now, mind you I am sort of an audiophile (audiophile wannabe would probably suite me better :D), so having these stock sounds is in no way satisfactory from my point of view. But, with what they had - not having big enough budget to fly their sound engineer to UK and record them, they did a darn good job. At least the in cockpit sound (engine) is very much believable.

Thank you for your support :). Credit for the idea should go to Azimech, though (he dreamt it up as a possible addition in a future DT patch for the original IL-2). The idea may also help focus Maddox games' limited resources on coding (fixing stutters, framerates, 64-bit exe, etc) rather than cooking up new sound files. Something DOES need to be done about the sounds, regardless of where you sit in the debate. A quick look at the number of outraged posts about the sounds in CoD confirms that this is an important issue for many of us.

Cheers,

Fafnir_6

~S~ Thor,

I don't really feel that stock IL-2 sounds is capable of more than a doppler effect and giving you a rough idea on what your rpm you're running. Even the rpm sounds way too high than what you'd actually experience in a big a$$ V12 running at 3000rpm maximum and usually 2000rpm.

Here's one of the reasons to why I swear to guys like Jafaem when I play the game. The DB600 soundpack:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBwSYxhJllQ

I'm sure I myself will find the in cockpit sounds in CoD believeable to some extent but compared to the visuals and FM/DM in CoD, from what I've seen from released in game vids, sounds are lagging far behind quality wise.

Fair enough, I will admit I do not have the latest installment of moded sounds. ;)

This video really tells the story. About CoD, I will have to test it before making any judgment. YT videos really aren't a good comparison.

Is that the only way?

I wonder if their might be a way to digitally model each of the engine sounds more accurately? I don't hate the idea of synthesized engine sounds...I just think that they could have spent some more time modeling the various characteristics of each engine.