Overwatch sounds

[Floyd]

@GordonReturns

I think he was trying to say that later on in the game, when the military has control of the system, that there is only static and NO announcements. To be honest, I think it would be annoying depending on how loud that static is. Would it only turn on periodically and then off? I think the HECU radios did something like that at times. There would be like 2-3 seconds of static and then nothing.

The statuc wouldn’t have to be loud. As long as you can make the player notice the speakers that the voice is announced from at the beginning of the game, by the end of the game they should be able to notice the speakers as well as noticing that the quiet static coming from it signifies that the military has abandoned the base.

I don’t think it should be made silent towards the end though, since it is a computerised system. Since the military took it over instead of destroying it I see no reason as to why it should stop its automatic messages in the Lambda Core.

It’s been a while since I’ve played Half-Life, so I can’t remember if it’s actually silent at all. I just based that off what UrBY said. Regardless of whether or not it does go silent, I still think that the silence makes sense. The military took over control of the voice announcement system, but by the ‘Forget about Freeman’ chapter, they definitely seemed to have lost control of the situation and that would include the announcement system. It would be a very powerful feeling to have the announcers go silent as a way of signifying that no one is there, and reinforce the notion that the last hope of humanity has abandoned the facility.

@Mr. Someguy

That’s because the Overwatch Voice was broadcast from the Citadel.

How would you know that? Aside from being a very flawed idea announcing everything from the citadel (sound can get lost and distorted very easily for one), it would be a lot of hassle. I always thought they sounded as though they were coming from speakers dotted around the city like the Breencasts. I always got the feeling that they were about 30 meters away.

[UrBY]

Overwatch announcements were broadcast via speakers and APC’s as far as I know. The only sound to emit from the citadel was the alarm during Red Letter Day.

[intooblivion]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l1j139o_zI

[baconeggs]

Perhaps he meant that all the signals originate from the Citadel, but are broadcast through different speakers, which is quite correct.

[Alcator]

@Floyd

It’s a shame that some of those were never used. That specific sentence would have worked well.

Actually, the sentence is not semantically correct.

“All science personnel will be terminated until you surrender” is a nonsense. Termination is permanent. You cannot terminate someone and then, after Freeman surrenders, un-terminate them.

Besides, it would be promising something the military is not going to honor anyway.

I guess they cut it for reasons similar to why they cut “Eh, Freeman, you never really planned to have children anyway, right?” - “Nonsense! Nothing has been proven!” dialogue during the Test chamber pre-disaster talk: They simply decided that it’s either “too much cliché” or “destroying the mood”.

[JeffMOD]

@Alcator

Actually, the sentence is not semantically correct.

“All science personnel will be terminated until you surrender” is a nonsense. Termination is permanent. You cannot terminate someone and then, after Freeman surrenders, un-terminate them.

Besides, it would be promising something the military is not going to honor anyway.

I guess they cut it for reasons similar to why they cut “Eh, Freeman, you never really planned to have children anyway, right?” - “Nonsense! Nothing has been proven!” dialogue during the Test chamber pre-disaster talk: They simply decided that it’s either “too much cliché” or “destroying the mood”.

But they can kill every scientist they see until he surrenders. Some of them were taken hostage before Freeman became public enemy no. 1.

@Floyd

It’s been a while since I’ve played Half-Life, so I can’t remember if it’s actually silent at all. I just based that off what UrBY said. Regardless of whether or not it does go silent, I still think that the silence makes sense. The military took over control of the voice announcement system, but by the ‘Forget about Freeman’ chapter, they definitely seemed to have lost control of the situation and that would include the announcement system. It would be a very powerful feeling to have the announcers go silent as a way of signifying that no one is there, and reinforce the notion that the last hope of humanity has abandoned the facility.

It doesn’t, it’s just automatic warning messages about the sector, not facility-wide announcements made by the HECU.

[UrBY]

“All science personnel will be terminated until you surrender” is a nonsense. Termination is permanent. You cannot terminate someone and then, after Freeman surrenders, un-terminate them.

WRONG!

“All science personnel will be terminated until you surrender.”

Basically “We will continue to terminate science team personnel until you surrender. When you do surrender, we will stop terminating science team personnel.”

Either English is not your first language, or you have a disabled head.

[raw_bean]

No, he was right, that sentence as written doesn’t actually mean what you’re all trying to interpret it to mean. You’d need some unwieldy sentence like “More and more science personnel will be terminated until you surrender or they are all dead.”

That said, the grunts in HL were infamous for their lack of good communication skills: “Yore dead Freemen” anyone?

[DrasarSalman]

What if the overwatcher was attacked by the monsters (shoud happen nearly at the start of the spread like hearing the sientist that leads the prodject getting a head crap to shot his mouth:zip: or as a spoiler)

[JeffMOD]

@DrasarSalman

What if the overwatcher was attacked by the monsters (shoud happen nearly at the start of the spread like hearing the sientist that leads the prodject getting a head crap to shot his mouth:zip: or as a spoiler)

:facepalm:

1. In HL, it’s the VOX
2. It’s a computer, it wouldn’t be attacked by aliens, let alone headcrabs

[UrBY]

I’m glad someone understood that post. O_o

[Mont_Blanc]

Headcrap is nice name for headhumper

[Dillxn]

@JeffMOD

:facepalm:

1. In HL, it’s the VOX
2. It’s a computer, it wouldn’t be attacked by aliens, let alone headcrabs

Lmfao you’re a genius

You should be an internet-engrish translator for African scam artists! ;D

[JeffMOD]

I may have understood that only because I fell down a flight of stairs as a kid…

[Nosehole]

@JeffMOD

I may have understood that only because I fell down a flight of stairs as a kid…

A valuable asset if you’re cruising the interwebs!

[defenestrationist]

@UrBY

The old announcement system was a great way of portraying the status of the facility. First you have the announcements for science personnel, then the security and medical emergency response calls, then the military take control and later on it goes quiet.

Attention. This announcement system now under military command.

First time I heard that, I crapped myself.

You have really hit the nail on the head when you say portraying the status of the facility. There is something about the old VOX system that makes black mesa seem almost alien in itself. I would often get chills when the HL1 VOX spoke in that monotone and unclear voice.
Valve didn’t quite get that same feeling in HL2, with Overwatch. I never really felt disconnected enough from Overwatch. It felt too human. I think with the HL1 VOX the fact that you can feel completely disconnected from it and feel like its not talking personally to you, gave the game a great sense of loneliness, which on occasions got a bit much.

But I really hope they can get the balance between the clarity of Overwatch and the alienation feel of HL1 VOX

[Eric_Fong]

@intooblivion

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l1j139o_zI

I laugh my ass off at that.