Request for Headphones Alteration/Reversion

[Jabronio]

 

TL:DR: re-add the toggle music notes button to headphones, so they don't have to be used as only an instrument, positive & beneficial change for immersion reasons without negatively affecting anyone. 

So, headphones used to just be an accessory, where you hit a button and it toggled the visible music notes around your character. At some point it got changed to an instrument, where you copy and paste the music pattern, like any other instrument.

Now, I can maybe understand the reason for this, but I am going to go out on a limb and say I never see anyone really using the headphones aside from myself, and that going back to the original would probably not affect too many people. I would not be surprised if it was arbitrarily added because TG code had this functionality just to match with them. I initially was going to ask to revert the headphones back to their old function of just a toggle button, and then Charlie pointed out that the option to toggle could just be added in addition to the instrument function.

I know this seems a minor change that will have no big impact, but I think it would be helpful for cultivating a more real and immersive experience for some people without inhibiting anyone else. I usually used the music notes when listening to music irl, and had it more or less as if my character was listening to that music. It also opened up conversations where people asked what my character was listening to IC, and led to some nice IC chats about music. I would not be surprised if more people used it for this reason if it were to be re-added. 

 

[Mitchs98]

I too miss this music note function, and used it a lot. On Goobina especially who always has headphones on, and always listens to music ICly even if I don't have any notes input into the headphones.

[ID404NotFound]

"oh no, they can't hear the nukies, they have their earpods in!"

[Bmon]

I personally think the old earphones were anything but immersive, more so cartoonish and out of place.

[LiberatedWaveMan]

9 hours ago, Bmon said:

I personally think the old earphones were anything but immersive, more so cartoonish and out of place.

like.. how though? i genuinely don't understand how this would take away from the game rather than add to it

[Spacemanspark]

11 hours ago, Bmon said:

I personally think the old earphones were anything but immersive, more so cartoonish and out of place

You're free to go tell that to the HRP server the feature originally came from :P

 

This feature was something I greatly missed when it vanished. It was subtle, but added a nice touch. 

[Carthusia]

Id love to have the option to turn it on without music playing just for the effect, nothing like a janitor moppin the halls, listenin and hummin a tune to himself while he ignores all the chaos around him.

"I'm paid to clean, not to care"

[Retrograde115]

Why would they even need to be an instrument? SS13 instruments suck ass. If you want to RP playing music in your headphones, literally just open up Spotify or YouTube.

The toggle definitely seems like the better option, being purely cosmetic. It might be cool if the toggle also made you effectively deaf while you were jamming out.

Edited June 4, 2022 by Retrograde115
a word

[Bmon]

13 hours ago, LiberatedWaveMan said:

like.. how though? i genuinely don't understand how this would take away from the game rather than add to it

put on some headphones in real life and play some music. do you see giant music notes flying around your head?

It's cartoonish to me but that's just my opinion

10 hours ago, Spacemanspark said:

You're free to go tell that to the HRP server the feature originally came from :P

I would if I played there, but not too interested in playing on a dead server tbqh

Edited June 5, 2022 by Bmon

[LiberatedWaveMan]

41 minutes ago, Bmon said:

put on some headphones in real life and play some music. do you see giant music notes flying around your head?

It's cartoonish to me but that's just my opinion

I would if I played there, but not too interested in playing on a dead server tbqh

...cartoonish
you do know this is SS13, right? we have clowns on-station, forks are as tall as humans judging by sprites, you can play a piano with one hand, pianos play themselves, vox exist (sorry not sorry,) and people will regularly drink pepperspray and eat vomit off the floor

even if this was cartoonish, which it really isn't, cartoonish tends to be the name of the game.

[Bmon]

6 minutes ago, LiberatedWaveMan said:

...cartoonish
you do know this is SS13, right? we have clowns on-station, forks are as tall as humans judging by sprites, you can play a piano with one hand, pianos play themselves, vox exist (sorry not sorry,) and people will regularly drink pepperspray and eat vomit off the floor

even if this was cartoonish, which it really isn't, cartoonish tends to be the name of the game.

but all those things exist in real life(self playing pianos, clowns, ect)... well except vox but vox more so sci-fi than cartoonish.

It's an art style thing and well again just my opinion which doesn't really mean much, don't know why you're trying to argue with me.

[Carthusia]

5 hours ago, Retrograde115 said:

Why would they even need to be an instrument? SS13 instruments suck ass. If you want to RP playing music in your headphones, literally just open up Spotify or YouTube.

The toggle definitely seems like the better option, being purely cosmetic. It might be cool if the toggle also made you effectively deaf while you were jamming out.

Its a good way to silently test and configure ingame midi music sheets without destroying peoples ears while you get them tuned and sounding good.

 

Right now the notes only show up when a midi is playing, one potential workaround is to put a song on, lower its volume to 0, and loop it 10 times with a super slow BPM, it effectively will have the desired effect until somthing more concrete is added like a toggle

[BottomQuark]

8 hours ago, Bmon said:

put on some headphones in real life and play some music. do you see giant music notes flying around your head?

Well you don't see notes flying around other people's head when they listen to music, but you can tell they listen to music if they cranked up the volume to max. You can hear the beat etc. you could interpret it as this very effect.

Anyway ss13 is not really grounded in reality in general. Paradise station is not meant to make it more realistic. We literally give chaplains some divine power, there are vampires and mages. That screams more of a fantasy than grounded sci-fi.

 

And seeing we added lately new class to vampires i would presume that making the game realistic is not the direction maintainers and admins want to take.

If some people want to have the notes flying around them i say let them have it.

It's really hard to notice someone's wearing headphones if the notes are not flying around. People usually don't examine other players to check what they are wearing. If you have notes flying around you it says imidiently "they are listening to music". Good design for people that want to be perceived in a specific way that requires them to wear headphones.

[Spacemanspark]

14 hours ago, Bmon said:

put on some headphones in real life and play some music. do you see giant music notes flying around your head

Realism != good gameplay. The notes aren't overbearing, either. Often times you'll hardly notice them. They add a subtle touch. 

If we wanted to remove many of the subtle touches akin to this, the game would become rather soulless.

14 hours ago, Bmon said:

I would if I played there, but not too interested in playing on a dead server tbqh

Missing the point of my statement and fitting in a snarky reply, but sure, why not. 

My point was largely that HRP servers think a good deal more about these sorts of things than most other server. If they're willing to put in something like this, it's generally because it's small, subtle, and non instrusive--while also bringing something else to the table. I'm one of the biggest 'muh immersion' players around, and I certainly can't find a problem with the notes. 

13 hours ago, Bmon said:

It's an art style thing and well again just my opinion which doesn't really mean much, don't know why you're trying to argue with me.

This is a suggestion thread, where people discuss and debate ideas. If someone disagrees with you, they may engage with you on that point--particularly when you appear to hold the more 'controversial' viewpoint within this thread.

[Bmon]

16 hours ago, BottomQuark said:

snip

You're right, we're more fantasy with a sci-fi setting and the nature of that isn't really grounded in reality, but it doesn't mean that we're automatically cartoonish with our art style.

Classes or bloodlines for vampires is more of a balance thing and well balance changes are one of the few expectations to realism because it's a direct gameplay change.

I think a more eloquent way to solve this is to just give the headphones a sound range of 1 or 2 tiles so that you can hear other peoples music if you get close enough.

9 hours ago, Spacemanspark said:

snip

I agree with your first statement about realism and gameplay but it stops at gameplay for me. I don't think headphones affected gameplay prior or after the changes to them and that it was instead an art style change, even if it was unintentional. I also don't think there is anything else as cartoonish as the old headphones were nor did it having its floaty music notes removed make the game (if even slightly) more soulless.

Aye, sorry for the more snarky reply but my point was that it doesn't really matter where it came from, that's neither here nor there since it's not our server. As an addendum to that we shouldn't take whatever a HRP server does as gospel. God knows, HRP servers have added some really dumb stuff over the years.

I am not shy about arguing my points, I just don't want this thread to be only me going back and forth with people when this is really more of a subjective opinion of mine.

Edited June 6, 2022 by Bmon
i got that backwards lol

[Spacemanspark]

8 hours ago, Bmon said:

it was instead an art style change, even if it was unintentional. I also don't think there is anything else as cartoonish as the old headphones

We may have to agree to disagree on this point. I'm personally not bought that any one SS13 server must absolutely stick to one art direction, unless it's a server with a specific theme--which Paradise is not. I do not believe the 'artwork direction' should impede features from being added, particularly features the playerbase enjoys. I don't think either of us will convince the other party of their respective side, however. 

I do not see the problem with cartoon natured aesthetics, which Paradise has had some of over the years, regardless of whether it's been removed now. As well, removing one small thing doesn't cause problems per se, but this does play into an overarching issue. 

8 hours ago, Bmon said:

my point was that it doesn't really matter where it came from, that's neither here nor there since it's not our server. 

When you port features from other servers, you should consider a few things; namely whether that feature fits within the server you're porting it to, and what the ideology was from the other server. 

8 hours ago, Bmon said:

As an addendum to that we shouldn't take whatever a HRP server does as gospel. God knows, HRP servers have added some really dumb stuff over the years.

This is an extreme. If I treated HRP servers as gospel, I would have left Paradise years ago, and I most certainly wouldn't be playing on a blatant LRP server now. Lord knows I have my own complaints about many of the other HRP servers around today. An unholy amount of them. 

Yet, it doesn't hurt to consider the thinking process behind some of their features--particularly when the argument being put forth is that it damages immersion, which is something HRP servers pride themselves on. I may also mention here that TG has also made many, many poor decisions over the years, yet Paradise ports from them quite frequently. I would argue that treating tg as 'gospel' would also do more harm than good. 

9 hours ago, Bmon said:

I am not shy about arguing my points, I just don't want this thread to be only me going back and forth with people when this is really more of a subjective opinion of mine. 

Presently, you're about the only person presenting counter arguments and dissent to a feature that many others appear to have interest in. If you express such, you should be ready and expecting to defend your viewpoints. I don't think it's bad that you're positing your own thoughts, mind, on the contrary. But you can't be surprised when others push back against you. 

[Jabronio]

On 6/5/2022 at 6:47 AM, BottomQuark said:

Well you don't see notes flying around other people's head when they listen to music, but you can tell they listen to music if they cranked up the volume to max. You can hear the beat etc. you could interpret it as this very effect.

Anyway ss13 is not really grounded in reality in general. Paradise station is not meant to make it more realistic. We literally give chaplains some divine power, there are vampires and mages. That screams more of a fantasy than grounded sci-fi.

 

 

This is more or less why I think this would be a good thing. Realism does not always mean better. There is a ton of places in Paradise where overlooking reality makes the overall enjoyment better, or where things would not make sense if you took them realistically. Two things that stand out are

1. Comms. There is no logical explanation for how comms work. You know who is talking, and what their job is. Its part of suspension disbelief. If comms were treated as realistic, things would be very boring, or even just outright confusing. Comms add fun to the round.

2. Being able to examine someone and seeing they're starving to death, merely because they have not eaten in a few hours. Its minor, but it fits with the music notes. You should not be able to see or notice these things, but they are there anyway because realism is not always the correct way to do things. Adding them back would not make things any more or less cartoony or unrealistic. 

Also, I am pleasantly surprised how much attention this thread has gotten so far. I'm glad I was not the only one who missed this feature. 

[Bmon]

16 hours ago, Spacemanspark said:

snip

Agree to disagree, yes. I think sticking to a uniform art style is best.

If you port something it should always fit into the server you're porting it to. The ideology of server it comes from means little to nothing though imo.

My point is more that just because a codebase that is higher level or roleplay than ours doesn't mean it should get a pass on it being a right fit for Para. Same applies to LRP codebases, yes.

Again, I don't mind arguing my points. Also, do note, this is the Paradise forums. The majority of posts on this forum are either ban appeals or admin complaints, most people only use discord.

 

Oh yeah, I was under the assumption that the floaty notes got removed, they're not. 

You can easily loop the headphones to be playing for over 12 hours by opening the import menu and importing a song with a single note for 1000 lines, the maximum amount of lines(copy paste is your friend).

Set the repeat to 10, BMP to 12 and volume to 1 then open the advanced panel, set instrument to !!HONK!!, note shift to -100 keys / -8.33 octave and lastly volume dropoff threshold to 0.1 then click play. Or just copy the settings in this image.

You won't be able to hear anything because the music being played it beyond human hearing and too quiet. Should get your floaty cartoon notes for over 12 hours... yes I still don't like them.

 

Edited June 7, 2022 by Bmon

[LiberatedWaveMan]

On 6/7/2022 at 12:40 AM, Bmon said:

Agree to disagree, yes. I think sticking to a uniform art style is best.

If you port something it should always fit into the server you're porting it to. The ideology of server it comes from means little to nothing though imo.

My point is more that just because a codebase that is higher level or roleplay than ours doesn't mean it should get a pass on it being a right fit for Para. Same applies to LRP codebases, yes.

Again, I don't mind arguing my points. Also, do note, this is the Paradise forums. The majority of posts on this forum are either ban appeals or admin complaints, most people only use discord.

 

Oh yeah, I was under the assumption that the floaty notes got removed, they're not. 

You can easily loop the headphones to be playing for over 12 hours by opening the import menu and importing a song with a single note for 1000 lines, the maximum amount of lines(copy paste is your friend).

Set the repeat to 10, BMP to 12 and volume to 1 then open the advanced panel, set instrument to !!HONK!!, note shift to -100 keys / -8.33 octave and lastly volume dropoff threshold to 0.1 then click play. Or just copy the settings in this image.

You won't be able to hear anything because the music being played it beyond human hearing and too quiet. Should get your floaty cartoon notes for over 12 hours... yes I still don't like them.

 

If you have to go through that level of bullshit to have this effect, maybe we should just add the no-noise headphones effect again? And since you so kindly gave us a way to do this ourselves, evidently you must not mind it that much, right? I mean really, you're not doing your argument any favours.

[Bmon]

15 hours ago, LiberatedWaveMan said:

If you have to go through that level of bullshit to have this effect, maybe we should just add the no-noise headphones effect again? And since you so kindly gave us a way to do this ourselves, evidently you must not mind it that much, right? I mean really, you're not doing your argument any favours.

sigh

https://github.com/ParadiseSS13/Paradise/pull/17949