Suggestion: Change how zombie sounds work

Black Mesa Archive The Cafeteria
#1

Right now, zombies in Black Mesa have an idle sound that plays continuously without almost no delay. This is very annoying as their sound range is also pretty big and that their idle sounds are VERY loud compared to their HL1 counterparts. This makes a lot of areas where there is one or even multiple zombies annoying.

youtube.com/watch?v=t4Kb3s2PB9Q

Here’s a video to showcase how the zombie is constantly making sounds even when not startled. The zombie is even “sleeping”!

My suggestions are:

  • Reduce radius of sound range
  • Mute zombies when never having seen player (or an occasional sound?)
  • Add a much bigger delay between idle sounds. The zombie sounds IMO are fine but constantly hearing them when not even seeing them is quite annoying. (Very annoying when there are multiple zombies in a map!)
#2

That’s already a feature with source, called “Gag”.
zomb.JPG

But because it’s a entity flag, someone has to manually check it.

#3

I am aware of this. Most of Unforeseen Consequences does not have this checked which means a lot of ‘sleeping’ zombies are making constant sounds. I don’t know about any zombies further in the game since I just started replaying the game now.
Outside of that, I still think zombies should be almost silent by default until very near one or having been agitated.

#4

This actually seems to be something the developers did deliberately, as in the cafeteria in Office Complex and a few other zombie-heavy areas these sounds are actually included as part of the soundscape and not even generated by actual zombie entities.

#5

It’s fine to have some zombie ambient noises but to hear gurgling all the time everywhere gets quite annoying.

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.