Haha, misses always moans that I am working late into the night....just say got a tight deadline whilst she is out the house I get time so shhhhh [wink]
Trigurable user music.
- Thread starter Krux1
- Start date
Haha, misses always moans that I am working late into the night....just say got a tight deadline whilst she is out the house I get time so shhhhh [wink]
So the answer is to keep them loaded ready to play. And surely if you can share words and images you can share sounds. They all have potential copyright problems. For example, Curlyriff, your avatar.
Haha, the misses prolly thinks you are "working" when you are "posting" as well. C'mon buddy, let the cat out of the bag!
"Honey, I need to hit this deadline!! (loads up PC forums)"
Words don't (well at least most) and what images can we share now? Fan made is different (like my avatar). Also music still has much more depth into copyright and regardless if you want to share or not, legally you cannot share without the artist/publisher permission music.
In regards to them always loaded, that is also the problem that the audio files would take up massive amount of resources to be always loaded. The issue with triggers is that even when loaded it still has to load the track at the correct time. It's more complicated than this and I can't explain fully but the reason was given.
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Haha, the misses prolly thinks you are "working" when you are "posting" as well. C'mon buddy, let the cat out of the bag!
"Honey, I need to hit this deadline!! (loads up PC forums)"
Haha, seems pretty close to reality. Some times I get away with it when she watching one of her god awful TV reality tripe [big grin]
No that is not the answer, keeping things in memory (loaded) takes a lot of room. The more memory you take up the faster the system is going to run out of memory which means unused memory has to be cleared (garbage collected) more often causing "lag"
Plus dont forget the audio is sped up when you speed the game up whcih also take more processing to load the file then have to speed it up
that entirely depends on the amount of memory you have, no different than some people playing this game at higher FPS than others, there would be limits, like anything else, "using resources" is a terrible argument, because EVERYTHING uses resources, thats why limitations exist, no reason to not use the same principle here.
would triggered user music be taxing? yes. so much so that it cant and shouldn't be done? i personally don't think so, if implemented with the necessary limitations.
theres loads of ways to do this without it killing your computer, file size limitations, amount of triggered user music speakers limitation, music length limitation.....i dont buy the "oh we cant do it, too taxing..." statement.
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That comes down to balance what the devs feel are more important. They have given a minimum spec with the current features so now to add something more and then go actually you would need 16GB RAM to make it work and only 25% of your player base has this limits the feature.
If we all had the same spec machines things like the resource calculations Frontier have to do would be much easier and they could push features we haven't got. It's the same with terrain textures. If they knew we all had super machines with 12 core, 64GB RAM, SLI Titan X cards etc then it would be very different game.
I too would love for this to be added in down the road. Somehow...
I believe it was confirmed during alpha that Cobra Engine uses Wwise for audio. It was also said that it did not natively support custom music in the way it would be needed for Planet Coaster. Then the devs worked their usual Frontier Voodoo™ and they figured out a way to put it in the game! It manipulates well based on the listening point and all kinds of cool behavior! Sure it has some quirks still, but it's pretty darn good so far IMO. When that update came in, I was giggling like a little kid. Custom ride music, to me at least, completely and totally changes the experience for the better.
Now, without any real insight into how they did this, we can probably assume one of a few things:
1) They worked with Audiokinetic (makers of Wwise) and Planet Coaster uses an updated custom version of Wwise, or plugin for Wwise that enabled this capability.
2) They added an additional audio engine of their own to Planet Coaster that handles Custom/User sounds only.
3) Something else entirely?
Either way, assuming the above, it's very likely that currently trigger-able audio speakers in the game are implemented in the native Wwise system, which is limited to the built-in sound library, while the Music Speaker/Ride Music is not. So custom trigger-able sounds is not something as simple as just enabling a setting/feature, it's a major development effort. All we can do is wait and see what happens and hope for the best.
Regarding "memory issues":
Capacity and performance are not the same thing. Yes, loading sounds into memory takes up memory... However, having more things loaded in memory typically should not affect overall performance, that is not how RAM works. Once data is loaded into RAM, that data is just as quickly accessible as anything else in RAM, that is its purpose. The only time there is performance impact is when an application is waiting for data to be swapped in/out of RAM. If that is the concern, then all we should need would be to have a setting that specifies the amount of memory to limit for custom user data/audio. Then the game could just not allow you to set a custom audio file to any additional speakers in the park at that point.
Shared parks/blueprints/workshop items, would not (should not?) contain the sounds anyway and speakers that were set to a custom sound in those parks could just be set back to nothing when saved/uploaded by the game automatically. Or, when loading a park, if that limit is reached, set those remaining speakers back to nothing. Better yet, how about workshop items with speakers set to custom sounds should just be set automatically to the music bell sound, in-sequence to the Planet Coaster theme jingle! haha! That would be awesome.
I'm not a fan of limiting an applications capabilities to meet the lowest common denominator of hardware, that is part of the point of PC Gaming, we don't have the limits that consoles have, a lot of our games can actually get better as they age! I have 32GB of memory in both computers my Wife and I play Planet Coaster on (Desktop & Laptop). I say, bring it on! In fact, I DARE YOU to try to use up my computers' memory Planet Coaster!
Anyway, hopefully this is a feature we will get some time in the future...
I believe it was confirmed during alpha that Cobra Engine uses Wwise for audio. It was also said that it did not natively support custom music in the way it would be needed for Planet Coaster. Then the devs worked their usual Frontier Voodoo™ and they figured out a way to put it in the game! It manipulates well based on the listening point and all kinds of cool behavior! Sure it has some quirks still, but it's pretty darn good so far IMO. When that update came in, I was giggling like a little kid. Custom ride music, to me at least, completely and totally changes the experience for the better.
Now, without any real insight into how they did this, we can probably assume one of a few things:
1) They worked with Audiokinetic (makers of Wwise) and Planet Coaster uses an updated custom version of Wwise, or plugin for Wwise that enabled this capability.
2) They added an additional audio engine of their own to Planet Coaster that handles Custom/User sounds only.
3) Something else entirely?
Either way, assuming the above, it's very likely that currently trigger-able audio speakers in the game are implemented in the native Wwise system, which is limited to the built-in sound library, while the Music Speaker/Ride Music is not. So custom trigger-able sounds is not something as simple as just enabling a setting/feature, it's a major development effort. All we can do is wait and see what happens and hope for the best.
Regarding "memory issues":
Capacity and performance are not the same thing. Yes, loading sounds into memory takes up memory... However, having more things loaded in memory typically should not affect overall performance, that is not how RAM works. Once data is loaded into RAM, that data is just as quickly accessible as anything else in RAM, that is its purpose. The only time there is performance impact is when an application is waiting for data to be swapped in/out of RAM. If that is the concern, then all we should need would be to have a setting that specifies the amount of memory to limit for custom user data/audio. Then the game could just not allow you to set a custom audio file to any additional speakers in the park at that point.
Shared parks/blueprints/workshop items, would not (should not?) contain the sounds anyway and speakers that were set to a custom sound in those parks could just be set back to nothing when saved/uploaded by the game automatically. Or, when loading a park, if that limit is reached, set those remaining speakers back to nothing. Better yet, how about workshop items with speakers set to custom sounds should just be set automatically to the music bell sound, in-sequence to the Planet Coaster theme jingle! haha! That would be awesome.
I'm not a fan of limiting an applications capabilities to meet the lowest common denominator of hardware, that is part of the point of PC Gaming, we don't have the limits that consoles have, a lot of our games can actually get better as they age! I have 32GB of memory in both computers my Wife and I play Planet Coaster on (Desktop & Laptop). I say, bring it on! In fact, I DARE YOU to try to use up my computers' memory Planet Coaster!
Anyway, hopefully this is a feature we will get some time in the future...
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In regards to the memory issue. I understand that, but if they have already got 8GB allocated to use and that is their minimum spec then there now is already none left for the sound guys to allocate on a permanent basis. Now if they could get it to load dynamically in an effective way so that it doesn't lag then it may resolve it someway to getting it. However people always push things and ask for more (like I have with management
) so trying to kerb the amount allocated will lead to other issues no doubt. I think added more options for triggered sounds would be good though. However if we get it working technically, how do we get around the copyright. Do we expect Frontier a 3rd party that can work on Wwise to allow real music and sounds to be used? Can Wwise provide this service? Who foots the bill?
In regards to the memory issue. I understand that, but if they have already got 8GB allocated to use and that is their minimum spec then there now is already none left for the sound guys to allocate on a permanent basis. Now if they could get it to load dynamically in an effective way so that it doesn't lag then it may resolve it someway to getting it. However people always push things and ask for more (like I have with management
However if we get it working technically, how do we get around the copyright. Do we expect Frontier a 3rd party that can work on Wwise to allow real music and sounds to be used? Can Wwise provide this service? Who foots the bill?
Remember, those recommendations are computer recommended specifications, not the requirements for the game specifically.
I am not convinced the game actually uses 8GB of memory when running. I'll check when I get home from work (~6 hours).
Regarding, copyrights... We have custom music available in the game already, it can be anything you want. This is a non-issue. I'm not sure why you are so hung-up on it.
I have uploaded Planet Coaster videos to YouTube with custom ride music, and not had any issues, other than the videos sometimes do get tagged as containing copyrighted material and therefore have ad's forced on them occasionally and I can not monetize them, neither of which I have any issues with.
Because we don't share the custom music (not legally you shouldn't be anyways). The park still functions as intended with speakers even without custom music.
Triggers require specific sounds to make sense, if you cannot share that specific sound/music etc then it becomes a broken trigger that makes zero sense.
You can put videos up with custom music if you own the music, you cannot legally share that with others and then send them the music file unless you are the owner/creator of said music. You do not being the owner because you have brought a CD or a digital download. It is technically a lifetime lease. It is the same reason you cannot legally copy your CD's to hard drives or MP3 players by law although people do because no one enforces it. However if a company picks up that Frontier is allowing distribution of music that they don't own they may be liable.
But yeah the difference between how the music is used as player makes it work with one and not the other in principle.
The reason Frontier gave was purely technical but I just thought I should point out the other reason that they may not have mentioned. I mean yes Frontier could add the option in a technical term but how do you now make your trigger play a song such as Metallica at the right time or a snippet even from that song if you don't own it. Now that trigger doesn't make sense if it's something specific.
If you want generic music during the ride, place a speaker with custom music so it plays.
Regarding issues like this that are stated to be "technical limitations"; those explanations are completely true, and trust me when I say, that if the developers could give us triggerable sounds and all terrain paint in one map (for example), then they would. I can't go into specifics on things that I know, as I am under NDA, I don't know all the reasons, but it is definitely something that was discussed when I was at the office. Only Frontier themselves know how their engine works exactly, and while that may seem like its easy to just edit it in any way they want and add something in; as with everything programming-wise, its never that simple. Sacrifices have always got to be made, but believe me when I say that if triggerable sounds were a simple thing to add without being taxing on RAM usage or disk streaming then they would have implemented it.
There is of course always hope that a solution can be found in the future, a good example is with custom music itself not being possible until a solution was discovered (where's Vampiro? [haha]). Audio files do tend to take up a lot of memory, so storing them in memory in a game like this is not going to be a simple task.
There is of course always hope that a solution can be found in the future, a good example is with custom music itself not being possible until a solution was discovered (where's Vampiro? [haha]). Audio files do tend to take up a lot of memory, so storing them in memory in a game like this is not going to be a simple task.
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Em are those NDA not lifted now the features are out in the wild anyways? Just out of interest.
Nope. The NDA wasn't specific to Planet Coaster, I can't talk about anything I saw at the office or discussed with the developers that is not officially known.
And that's why I said, earlier in this thread, make it a user option. If user has the resources/memory use the preloaded triggerable sounds otherwise don't use custom triggerable sounds.
Checkboxes for everyone and everything!!!
True, there really is no solution to that. You would not be able to share "completely" a park/ride like that other than video recordings. That does not make this any less of a great feature to have though.
I think we agree, that if we ever do get this feature, that saves would most likely never contain "external" audio data. That would effectively absolve responsibility I would think. Since, "illegal music" will never be shared by the game/steam workshop, if someone uploads a zip with their park file and a bunch of MP3's then they have committed the crime. It has nothing to do with the game/Frontier as they have not provided any mechanism that directly shares music files.
We can only hope for the best I suppose.
One can only imagine how taxing it would be for the computer to play on-demand sound files each time a trigger gets activated for each car of each train, and it will get played regardless of where you are in the park. Now multiply that depending on how many triggers there will be and how many rides have these triggers.
A good optimization would be to not let them play if you're not on-ride but that may kill the realism. It's a slippery slope for the devs, I suppose.
A good optimization would be to not let them play if you're not on-ride but that may kill the realism. It's a slippery slope for the devs, I suppose.
I was honestly thinking the same thing too, I would be fine with that though.
Em, OK so you mean like about the Cobra engine then for instance?
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Yep completely, I would love the feature. I think though the sensible solution would be to have a great selection of pre-recorded and we would request Frontier to produce some more. I mean it may be they could licence a few specific songs, thinking to things such as Rck'N'Roll roller coaster, having AC/DC highway to ❤︎❤︎❤︎❤︎ as a trigger as you shoot down a fiery volcano or similar for instance.