EpiQuake - New ORIGINAL HQ Sound and Music Pak

[rdmusic]

Wow, that's a TON of feedback. I appreciate it... but these sounds aren't supposed to be listened to separately outside of the game.. they have a much different sound and vibe when heard outside of the game. All of these sounds work together as one in the world... and (in my professional opinion) sound great doing so.

I think you may be missing the point of the mod, which is why I'm defending it (I normally steer clear of forum conversations like this one). I wasn't out to recreate the originals.. how boring would that have been? The wind sounds were all deliberately replaced with a more mechanical vibe. In fact, everything I replaced was very deliberately thought out and of my own personal artistic (unique) vision. Hence the reason I made the enforcer a straight up cyborg, made the knight more robotic than human, and made the super nail gun sound more like a well machined silenced stealth weapon... just all changes I wanted to make to change the vibe of the game a bit and give it a fresh audio makeover. Basetry and Baseuse ONLY show up in the slipgate complex maps at the start of each episode... so it makes sense why they are techy in nature. These are hi tech military bases. This is why listening and critiquing these outside of the game is a bad idea.. they're out of context and really do sound different in game. Also, just because a sound is called swamp in the directory.. doesn't mean it must sound like a swamp. It all depends on where it's being used in game and how that sound fits into my audio vision for EpiQuake. The naming conventions were completely strange to begin with and, unfortunately, I had to stick with the original names to get this to work as easily as possible.

You have to understand that without tweaking the code base there's no way to control the reverb and the overall "burned in" effect sounds great to my ears. As for low end... if you don't have a sub or really good headphones you'll be missing much of what I've done with this pak. Almost all of the sounds have some sizeable low end / LFE elements added. The Demon in particular sounds AMAZING with some killer low end if you're rocking a sub.

Just FYI and as a soft reminder.. I do music and sound professionally full time and have been doing so for 10 years. These sounds were mixed / mastered on a professional audio workstation with top of the line studio monitors and sub. While I appreciate your criticisms.. they are all subjective and I question the speaker setup you utilized to make some of your observations. I may make a few adjustments here and there.. but this was released for a reason (b/c I felt extremely happy with what I had done) and paying game clients take priority over this little mod.

If you don't like EpiQuake, then by all means... don't use it .

[sock]

rest assured after the elitist welcome here I'm not sure why the hell I'd ever feel the need to come back...so congrats, mission accomplished. You guys really truly know how to make a new contributor feel welcome. Had I posted this in the "works in progress" section, then all of this feedback would be welcome... but maybe you shouldn't always give (or feel the need to give) unsolicited advice / feedback unless the author requests it.

All feedback removed as it is not welcome in this thread.

[Henry]

Hi rdmusic,
You even made a trailer?
I watched it and 2 scences caught me the most:
"Your password is incorrect" for closed doors. Hmmm.
The ogreīs chainsaw sound is great.
It seems a bit too industrial and loud for me though.
The Quake ambience is more about "Roooar"īs and "Grrrr"īs.
But without a doubt a lot of work was put into your pack.
Always great to see people with new releases.

[Syluxguy28O3]

coo. im am gonna snag this l8r when i get home!

[rdmusic]

Its out early!

Download the mod and check out the lanch trailer here:

EpiQuake

Enjoy!

[rdmusic]

Thanks!

Just finished up a very cinematic release trailer for the mod.

Really excited to get this project out into the world for all to hear!

Rich

[Polarite]

Very nice project !
I will definitely try this out.

[damage_inc]

Ummmm... I "wet" myself with the demon LINK! Man, Quake is gonna be kinda scary again So eager, thanks.

[rdmusic]

Added a couple of "Old VS New" examples to the moddb page for those interested.

Check 'em out:

SHOTGUN

You hear the old shotgun sound first, followed by the EpiQuake version.


DEMON

This is a quick comparison of old vs new sounds. You'll first hear the old Demon sight, jump, and death sounds, followed by the cinematicfied EpiQuake versions.

[rdmusic]

Thanks all .

I just posted a news article over at moddb regarding exactly what was replaced... figured I'd post it here too. I plan on adding some old VS new sound examples next week leading up to release so be sure and check the moddb page and/or track the mod! Still on track to release next friday (possibly earlier).

What has been replaced exactly?
Bear in mind that the sounds done for this mod are 100% original, and in some cases stem from newly recorded foley and/or vocal work. Rather than just take sounds directly from sound libraries and slap them in the mod, all of these sounds were designed / edited carefully from many sound sources.

Weapons - ALL of the player weapon sounds are new. In fact, many of them stem from original recordings.

Ambience - ALL ambient sounds have been replaced with original sound design work

Monsters / Enemies - All of the Enemy sounds aside from the Bosses, Fish, Blob, and Shambler have been replaced. So outside of the exceptions listed above, enemy attacks, sight, pain, death, and idles are all new. In fact, most of the sounds were done from scratch and enemies like the Enforcer and Wizard have had new vocal work recorded on top of their sound overhaul. As an homage to the original sounds, I kept the Enforcers "Stop!" "You There!", etc etc vocal work the same, just re-recorded it and processed it slightly differently. In fact, the Enforcer is now more of a cyborg in sound... when you kill him and he slumps over dead computerized female voice now emits from his suit saying "Check For Pulse...". The Chainsaw creepiness of the Ogre has been overhauled and amped up and the Demon... well, the Demon sounds downright huge and nasty now. Just wait until you hear it jump and/or land next to you. Thats just a quick example of some of the small but cool details added to the sound design for EpiQuake.

Platforms, Doors, and Buttons - ALL of these have been replaced with new sound design work. While many of them are true to the originals, the sci fi / medieval factor was cranked way up through vicious sounding cranks to ethereal beeps to signify a platform has stopped.

Player Sounds - Basically EVERYTHING except for the player death sound, which I've always been kinda partial to. The new in / out of water, lava, slime sounds are all stereo panned with reverb added for a sense of space. The pain sounds now have a certain brutal crunch / blood splat vibe to them.

Items - MOST of the item sounds have been replaced. New armor sound, new quad damage suite, and new (more realistic) hazard suit sounds.

Miscellaneous - Various other sounds were replaced and designed from scratch including all of the GUI / Menu sounds on the front end side of things, all of the teleportation sounds, the "talk" beep, trigger sounds, and the key pickup sounds.

[gdiddy62]

Very cool sounds in most instances. This is a very ambitious project and I look forward to your work. It is AlWAYS nice to have new work being done on our Quake game we all love. I DO think your musicscore is GREAT!

[Spirit]

Impressive! Much better and especially more creative than my project. More "cinematic", just as you said. That word really describes it succinctly.

I like how you made everything super loud. Fits the graphical style you use perfectly.

The telephone ringing gives it a nice subtle surreal feeling, reminds me of the Max Payne nightmare sequences. Maybe some baby crying might work for additional feeling of despair and confusion?

[rdmusic]

This is VERY real....and not just some upsampling gimick. If I wasnt serious, theres no way Id be using my real name .

You'll see err...hear..for yourself next week my friend.

Rich

[Syluxguy28O3]

if you are asking if the project is real, then yes. check out the moddb page he has.

[_Smith_]

These videos and this description... I was pretty sure it was another Spirit's trolling. Is this for real ?