VOX announcement system

Black Mesa Archive The Cafeteria
#1

Before release devs teased that the Black Mesa VOX announcement system would be upgraded, storytelling-wise. In the final game, what happens is great: the voice is first a friendly female semi-robotic voice, until Black Mesa is taken by the military, and then it changes mid-sentence to a male, not-friendly-at-all, overly-robotic scary voice.

And it’s just awesome. But don’t you think that the effect is diminished by the fact that you hear the VOX system so rarely? In Half-Life 1 you heard it all the time. They cut out, particularly, some great lines that helped to give you the idea that the whole facility was compromised. And, after the voice-change, when the military are in control, they should also threaten Freeman.

So when the change happens, most people won’t have even noticed or won’t even remember that female voice, so it won’t cause the intended shock.

What do you people think?

#2

Great :slight_smile:

It’s a great effect. While it’s just a voice, it serves the purpose of making it look like the facility is much bigger than it is, that things are happening in the whole facility, both before and after the incident. And after the military take control, it serves a similar purpose, with the military talking about conflict in the whole facility. Also, it’s especially useful as a tool to scare you: they are supposed to threaten you through the VOX system.

So… where all of those already recorded? Did you trim it down? Expanded it? :wink:

#3

Ouch! OK, that explains why I don’t remember hearing the voice at all. Adding Vox back in would be very cool, because it was one of the more atmospheric parts of Half-Life without really standing out as a “thing” to take notice of.

That’s good to hear.

edit
Though I’m not sure I get the switch from female to male voice. Are the military just after something that sounds more evil and less friendly? I liked Vox because the voice is so cool and impassionate, and doesn’t sound pre-recorded like the train ride announcement. I always read it less as system designed to be pleasant or hostile and more a crude vocalisation of system commands. Guess I’ll have to listen closer after this gets added back in to know either way.

#4

I’m pretty sure the marines just used a “default robotic voice”. The female voice is artificial too (not actually artificial; I mean in-universe), but it is modified to sound friendly and human-like. So when the military take control and start using “new lines” (Instead of “Doctor X report to…” and such and such), it defaults to a ‘basic’ voice.

That’s how I understood it, at least.

#5

I guess that makes sense. So are we still using the old “record one word at a time” method, or is it more like the old Microsoft Sam text to speech kind of “robotic” voice?

#6

No, it’s all recorded as any other dialogue. I meant it’s artificial in-universe. I’m pretty sure that the Black Mesa devs actually recorded these lines with people and then mixed them up to sound robotic. But in-universe, what I think is supposedly happening is that when the military take control and hack the VOX system, it reverts to a “basic” voice -male and robotic.

#7

In the orignal the only time you heard the female Vox I recall was during the tram ride on In Bound. Once you get to your destination it was always the male Vox.

Now I do like how it was changed but another way I saw how it could be done is since Vox is supposed to be some kind of AI it could have switched over to the un friendly male Vox after the incident happened and the facility was compromised.

#8

No one ever said it was an AI. It’s something more like microsoft sam.

#9

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdLRZzCf_kk

This video indicates 1 of 2 things. Either Vox is an AI based off how Vox responds to the player doing the same thing over and over. Its also possible that theres a scientist sitting back watching what going on and selecting the responses.

But I think Vox being an AI based off this is more believeable than some scientist sitting in a little cubical watching whats going on to select proper Vox comments/announcements.

#10

Good to know there will be more VOX in the future. Unfortunately, I wish it was there for the first play-through. At least I’ll have a good excuse to replay it.

#11

Great to know that it will be fixed! Maybe some other things will be fixed with future updates too then.

I liked the switch from female to male vox voice midst-sentence very much… it was very dramatic and cool.

Again i want say, that you did an amazing job. Black mesa is to 90% extremely perfect!

I m looking forward to forthcoming improvements via patches! (more hecu marines vs. xen aliens encounters/fights, implementing some missing parts, e.g. in surface tension when possible, changing the reaction time/accuracy of the hecu marines, etc…)

#12

Do you know what an “easter egg” means? It only happens in that location for a reason.

#13

That can be triggered by any secure door that responds with VOX.

#14

it’s still an easter egg dude

it’s something no one will notice unless they mess around

don’t overthink this, it’s just an automatic voice announcement system that uses a vocabulary to string together words to form sentences

#15

Probably the easy way to reduce the entity count for the VOX system is to make it an NPC that talks, and just use a microphone to rebroadcast it instead of cycling ambient_generic entities. Dunno how complex that would be to set up though…

#16

I thought it was either

a) pre-recorded (not AI) female voice like at train stations that gets turned off and the military then starting making announcements themselves ‘live’.

b)pre-recorded female voice that gets switched according to secret protocol to an emergency backup system that happens to be male.

#17

I thought the female announcement system was relatively recent and set up for current needs, and the male announcement system was much older, but more robust, thus making it perfect for the HECU’s purposes.

#18

So basically, you’re talking about preforming a GLaDOS in Black Mesa. :wink:

Clever, very clever.

#19

I know it’s probably a long shot, but is there any chance of getting a version with everything included for those of us who don’t care about filesize? Pwetty pwease?

#20

Ill gladly uninstall some games I dont use much just to have more room. I want more Vox sounds and I dont really care what others think. Vox being AI makes more sense considering it notified you of unauthorized biological beings in the air vents and in the different sectors. It also noticed the explosion in the Test chamber and notified the facility about it.

Aperature has a part where Cave talks about Black mesa stealing their inventions. They have an AI they were working on so why couldnt Black Mesa steal the idea of an AI system and use it as well.

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