FAKK2 Editing
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Tutorial04 uses tutorial03's level but adds a .snd file. The .snd file is just like the .scr files. It's text based and contains the information that allows the game to spawn sound entities of various types in your level at load time. However, instead of creating a .snd file from your favorite text editor, the genius' at Ritual Entertainment have created yet ANOTHER in game tool to help level designers and sound engineers add sounds to the levels. It's called "zound" and can be access by two ways through the console. 1) type: pushmenu zound or 2) type: togglemenu zound. I actually have this menu and many others bound to keys using the togglemenu command rather than pushmenu. Ok, lets begin the tutorial.

The Interface

The Buttons and Function
TOP BAR

Current: No idea.

Origin: no need to worry about it (at least not for this tutorial).

Targetname: You can assign any sound to have it's own name, afterwards you can play the sound through the level script by referencing to it using the sounds targetname.

Add Speaker: adds a speaker sound which can be looping or play once, or play once whenever it is triggered.

Add Random: adds a random speaker sound which will randomly play depending on the min Delay, max Delay, and chance of being played settings.

Volume: modify the volume of the sound.

Channel: Purpose unknown.

Min Delay: Minimum time reached before the random sound can be played.

Max Delay: Maximum time reached before the random sound can be played.

Sound: brings up a directory listing of the sounds you can choose from.

Chance: I assume a percentage that determines whether or not playing the sound is successful. Adds to the randomness.

Show: make the sound entity visible in the game world. Shape = pryamid wireframe display.

Hide: make the sound entity invisible in the game world.

Type: Purpose Unknown.

BOTTOM BAR

Left green arrow: cycles to the previous sound entity and selects it. Selecting it will bring up it's settings which you can modify.

Right green arrow: cycles to the next sound entity and selects it. Selecting it will bring up it's settings which you can modify.

Update: Very important, if not used you will lose lots of work in tweaking sound entities. This basically saves all the changes you made to a sound entity.

Reset All: Purpose Unknown.

Delete: Delete's the selected sound entity.

Replace: Purpose Unknown.

Save: exports your work to a .snd file with the same file name as your level. This is the file that contains all the important info about where to spawn the sounds and what the sounds actually are.

Add Music Trigger: Will add a trigger to the level that will change the music to the specified type.

Add Reverb Trigger: Changes the sounds properties so it sounds different. You can make the sounds produce echos as if they are inside a cave, or bouncing off of canyon walls, etc.

Any other button not covered means I haven't played with it yet. I'll update this list when I have.

How to Add Sounds

The zound system works very similar to the camera system in that if you want to move to another spot in the level, either walk there using your normal game controls or turn on noclip in the console to fly around. Once you arrive at the spot you want to add a sound, you can click on the "add speaker" or "add random" in the upper right corner. The "add speaker/random" will create a sound entity in the same location as julies head. The difference between the two is that the speaker can be looping or only play once depending on how you set it up. The random sound is played at random intervals depending on the settings you choose. Using Min Delay, Max Delay and Chance will directly affect the randomness. Once the sound is created, you can click on the "sound" button on the bottom row of the top tool bar set. When you do, a directory listing will appear. Navigate to the sound directory and choose which ever sound you feel is appropriate. A single click will play the sound while double clicking will choose that sound and place the path into the text box next to the sound button you clicked on. Besure to modify the Volume and Min Distance for the sound located on the top left side. Before you do anything you must click on the "update" button located on the top portion of the bottom tool bar. This will essentially save the current sound entity and it's properties you modified. Otherwise, if you use the green arrow keys to move to or create another sound, you will lose the work you did on the previous sound, even the sound you chose will not be saved. So, update often, and save often as well. When you click on the cyan colored save button it simply writes a .snd file with the same filename as your level.

There are many other things to play around with, such as the "add music trigger/add reverb trigger" which I haven't gotten around to documenting yet. I'll update this tutorial with new information soon. Hopefully, this will be enough to get you started. When you are satisfied, hit your escape key to exit the editor, bring up the console and type in your map name. This will allow you to play your level and hear the sounds. If something isn't right, simply bring up the zound editor and modify it on the spot. Gotta love that eh?

-BrushBaron