AltSFX - a different sound effects package

[ALEXbr]

I decided to make a different sound effects pack for OpenTTD, as the options are very few. I decided to restrict myself to CC-BY or CC0 licensed sounds so that a sound effects pack could eventually be officialy packaged on certain linux distributions (AltSFX is under CC-BY 4.0). I decided to give it a little different "feel" (that's why I actually started to make this).
Github: https://github.com/ALEX11BR/AltSFX
Older versions here and in the post below

[+] Spoiler

altsfx.zip

Version 1 - beta

(17.79 MiB) Downloaded 254 times

altsfx.zip

Version 11

(15.84 MiB) Downloaded 262 times

The latest version is version 12, and can be downloaded from online content, or from here:

[ALEXbr]

A version with all the samples ready is here! Soon on BaNaNaS. Any feedback is ok. You can check the githib repository here: https://github.com/ALEX11BR/AltSFX

[kamnet]

Sounds are different and nice. A little too noisy for me on the busy OpenTTD opening screenshot, but I don't think most people would be bothered.

[ALEXbr]

Thanks a lot for your feedback! I noticed that certain sounds are very loud. Might fix that, but it's not a priority.
I have issues uploading the thing to BaNaNaS through the web browser (the connection resets itself in the middle of the upload), and I couldn't get the musa thing to good use.

[Wuzzy]

Overall, the sound pack is quite nice and I like to play with it. It's not quite on par with the quality of OpenSFX, but it's still good enough for me to keep it for now.

Thanks a lot for your contributions! Especially for making sure it's 100% libre! I really hope the default sounds for OpenTTD could be one day truly libre.

However, there are a lot of “little” things in the sound pack that bother me, and the little things just add up. This sound pack still needs some work before I feel comfortable to recommend it for “official” use.

I will list all complaints here:

In some of the vehicle sounds, you hear the vehicle going from left to right speaker. I find this extremely irritating. It should not sound like the vehicle is moving with the speakers, it should be uniform. If you hear a vehicle sound, it could be anywhere on the screen, so it's really odd to have the vehicle move from the left to right speaker. The sound should should be uniform on both channels.

The road vehicle horns don't sound natural, the horn just comes out of “nothing”, long after the engine sound. It's also very loud and very high pitched, it hurts my ears!

The concorde / high speed plane sounds are waaaay too long. It's not well in sync with the actual plane take off on the screen. The plane has a very fast take off.
The plane sounds in general take too long, much longer tan the take-off speed. IMO the plane sounds should all be tested if they are in sync with the plane take-off on-screen (assuming default speed for all planes, of course). And they all should be shorter in general.

The ship horns are VERY loud and aggressive.

The train sounds are mostly OK IMO. The maglev sound works nice, too.
The monorail sound is too long and too subtle. This one stands out; it doesn't go well together with the other train sounds.

The toffe mine sound sounds a bit “dark” and is not comical. It doesn't fit the overall Toyland theme.

I think the toy factory sounds are nice. I like how you added a rubber ducky sound, it fits nice with OpenGFX. Note in the original TTD graphics, IIRC the toy factory produces robots, not rubber duckies, but that's OK.

The suger mine is a bit too dull IMO.

The bubble generator sounds are perfect. Nothing else to say here.

The railroad crossing sound is too long. 7 beeps for a SINGLE crossing are too much. Maybe 3 beeps are enough (not sure). This really stacks up at busy crossings. Also, could use a fade-out effect, IMO, the end of the sound feels too “sharp”.

The new year sound (00.wav) is inappropriate IMO. This sound is only supposed to play when the year report pops up. Its an interface thing. If the player disabled the report, the sound does not play. So this sound should be an interface sound.

38.wav sounds like a drunken horse and it just sounds very, very silly. I would replace this one.

The sound for the (temperate) sawmill and the paper mill are wrong. You hear a chainsaw. But a chainsaw makes more sense in the forest. For temperate sawmill/papermill, a circular saw makes much more sense.

In altsfx.sfo, you use an odd licence name “CC3 ATTRIBUTION”. The correct name is “Creative Commons Attribution 3.0”, or short “CC BY 3.0”.

For some reason, the version number is not shown in the game settings menu. Compare this with OpenSFX, OpenMSX and OpenGFX, which all include a version number at the end. The readme should also mention a version number.

[ALEXbr]

Thanks for your opinions.
The loud ship sounds will definitely be fixed in the next version. I will attempt to fix the toffee quarry sound too.
The long plane landing sounds are under my attention too.
The road horn might be fixed, gonna see. Also, I couldn't really feel the "moving left to right vehicle sound" effect. Fade-outs were put, but they're like too short. Gonna see...
Might adjust the railway beep sooner or later... The new year sound might be changed, gonna see. The horse and sugar mine sounds, hmmm..., definitely not a priority for me to change... The circular saw might be put in the near future, but IIRC, I couldn't find a satisfying circular saw sound. Might revise the rail sounds in the future, gonna see...

I found problems in uploading AltSFX to BaNaNaS, probably uploading sound sets wasn't expected, but yeah...
I'm currently away from home, gonna start the work later today...

[ALEXbr]

I managed to upload AltSFX to bananas thanks to the novel upload tool. Turns out, the palette declaration in the .obs file was redundant, and counterproductive when uploading to the server, so it had to be removed.

[Wuzzy]

I have took some time to hear at it again. It's definitely better than the previous version. It's still not great, but it's getting there.

Toffee mine sound is much better now. Also the fixing of the level crossing was a big one. Although I think a fade-off instead of a hard cut would have been better.

I think the lion is a bit too pronounced.
In general, I think many sounds are too long, especially sounds that repeat often. Tropical birds and cold wind are two examples. I recommend you just test your sounds in-game more often, you will quickly when sounds play too often.

The truck horn sound is still an issue. It's still too loud, and played separately. In OpenSFX, the truck horn is overlay during the truck engine sound, which is how it should be. The same issue applies to the toyland variants as well, and additionally, the cartoonish sounds are way too loud.

The street placement sound is a bit dull, isn't it? Too much noise reduction, maybe?

OK, I understand you can't fix the sawmill sound yet, but I suggest to make it shorter (3-4 seconds max.). The sawmill industry plays its sound rather frequently.

Maglev sound has improved. Monorail feels a bit too subtle, but it's okayish now, now that it's shorter.

But overall, I think the other new sounds are fmore or less ine now. It's great to have it on BaNaNas btw!