Local VOIP? - Question for Mr Gates

[The Degenatron]

Will there be a location base VOIP for players? For example, the ability to talk to players who are within 20m of you?

I understand that this represents a huge technical challenge in tracking player locations and using that data to dynamically add/remove players from a local channel.

Is it even possible?

[Bittermen]

I'd love that.

[EisenKreutzer]

ArmA2 does this, IIRC, so it's far from impossible. But I'm not sure if it has a place in Planetside 2.

[GreatMazinkaise]

I will turn it off.

[The Degenatron]

ArmA2 does this, IIRC, so it's far from impossible. But I'm not sure if it has a place in Planetside 2.

No place in Planetside 2? I'd say planetside needs it more than most. The ability to quickly convey tactical information to those around you is critical IMO. You are going to be working with more people than just your squad-mates.

While I am aware that other games have done it, PS2 and Forgelight are a completely new animal and it's not fair to assume anything based on what other games have done.

I will turn it off.

And you should have that option. Along with selective muting of the I-need-attention-Timmy!'s of the world, which adds a whole other layer of complexity to the feature.

[Stardouser]

I think we need some way of identifying people who are speaking by a change in the color of their friendly identifier marker that's always over their head. That way if they spam we can selectively mute. Turning it completely off just because sometimes there will be abusers is a kneejerk reaction, and frankly, I think people who have it turned off should also be identified by a change in appearance of the friendly identifier over their head. That way, when I try to yell a warning to someone in another outfit or squad and he dies because he was globally muting, I can let him know I tried to save him.

[Comet]

Maybe there should be a local chat channel for every contestable space? Or put them in small groups?

If I am flying over head with a squadron of liberator's and reavers, it'd be nice to communicate with the ground forces we roll up on so we can co-ordinate our attack on the fly instead of taking 5 minutes to get everyone setup into squads.

I can see how this would be annoying though too if people were always popping in and out of a local channel =/ All the more reason to join a large outfit :)

[Troika]

I remember Higby mentioning that they are at least experimenting with different VOIP channels and local channel is one possibility. I can't remember which interview it was though, but it caught my attention as I think it really worked well in DayZ/ArmaII.

[Jeepo]

Would be great to have it. We use it at Tactical Gamer in both ArmA and Project Reality (using the great mumble program) its pretty essential once you start working with other squads. You speak and work of them but can't talk directly otherwise.

[Nemises]

yeah, it would be very very excellent to have local / 3d positional voice channel...

It made such a massive difference when used in project reality using mumble/murmer... being able to locate a person from their voice audio source really added a HUGE amount of immersion...

I noticed there is a /y channel for text chat, which I believe is a locational based text channel..so..the precedent is there..

[atheistunicycle]

I'll be playing the bard class in PS2, for sure.

[Littleman]

I'm all for this, but it has to be push-to-talk only. I don't think anyone cares to have that one moron running around where every gunshot blasting from their speakers accompanied by the most god-awful incoherent "music" the world has ever known can be heard wherever they go. Granted, I should be able to selectively mute their ass even if they find a way to have that key permanently pressed, but at least these guys will have to go through the effort. That's a deterrent in itself.

Otherwise, being able to relay tactical info to anyone nearby would be a boon, and any sorry schmuck that would mute me for it can eat the boomer I was trying to warn them about.

[vVRedOctoberVv]

I love the concept... but the douchebags are a plenty, sadly. It will be TeamSpeak for me. VoIP will probably never be used :P

[Shizora]

I love the idea!

[TechTBW]

Will there be a location base VOIP for players? For example, the ability to talk to players who are within 20m of you?

I understand that this represents a huge technical challenge in tracking player locations and using that data to dynamically add/remove players from a local channel.

Is it even possible?

Higby on in game VOIP:

"It will automatically create channels for vehicles you're in, squads, outfits (based on outfit permissions of who can use it) and (possibly) proximal chat for near by allies etc. We're putting a lot of effort into our voip solution. "

[Rivenshield]

I'd like to see a solution where you put your crosshairs on someone and 'fire' to talk to them. Or something like that. It should be brief, temporary, and they should be able to mute you if they want. I really want the ability to send and receive warnings from anybody on my side that I can see... but hearing *everybody* around me is going to reduce things to a garbled roar.

Some kind of command cert where you can communicate with other commanders at your level would be nice too. If I just got my ass run over by a bunch of Magmowers, I want to warn the guys in the base they're heading towards.

[EisenKreutzer]

Higby on in game VOIP:

"It will automatically create channels for vehicles you're in, squads, outfits (based on outfit permissions of who can use it) and (possibly) proximal chat for near by allies etc. We're putting a lot of effort into our voip solution. "

Well, thats awesome! I hope they go through with it.

[XxAxMayxX]

there has been talk of a voice over channel for vehicles.

[Cutter]

I'm sure there will be more than enough trash talk we don't want to see in general chat. That's not something most people would want with VOIP. And when you consider how many people could be involved in an intense siege on one base it'd be nothing but noise with everyone shouting, insulting, etc. No, I'm good with Teamspeak for my clan only, thanks all the same. With co-ordinated clan efforts for sieges it's easy enough to setup channels in Teamspeak for multiple groups and channel hop anyway.

[TAA]

I hope there is. A local voice channel with very limited range would be fantastic.