Guild Wars 2

Is there any chance you can improve the (what often seems like) nearly-zone-wide shouts NPCs make regarding events?

Basically, NPCs will often blurt out a line of dialogue or an announcement that can be heard for a great distance across the zone. This is usually the case for group-encounter type events, and/or champion style mobs, etc. The problem is, rarely does it sound like the NPC is shouting across a great distance or broadcasting from far away, instead it literally sounds like the NPC is standing next to you, pretending to shout at a normal volume level. It’s almost like you took the voice recording from the voice actor at the mic and just put it straight into the game without making any attempts to modify it for believability at all.

Isn’t there something you can do to make these more authentic? Perhaps adding some mild echoing or something just to get across the point that an NPC is shouting something from a great distance? Otherwise, I keep looking over my virtual shoulder to see who is having a conversation with me only to be confused when no one is there. More often than not it just comes across like the audio bugged out and I’m hearing a line of random dialogue that isn’t actually supposed to be playing for me (and I know that does happen, but that’s not the case here).

It’s funny (in a bad way) because when NPCs in my immediate vicinity are talking about something important I can barely hear them. Every one of them a low-talker.. it’s like they’re a mile away. But NPCs who are literally miles away I can hear speaking clearly like they’re standing right next to me.

I love the amount of audio in the game but I really dislike the way it’s been implemented in many ways. There are many examples, but if you’re looking for a specific one, the Champion of the Sun meta-event in Caledon Forest is a good place to start.

I have experienced the same annoyance with certain heart / event callers.

I know they’re busy, but I think adding things like this – (even more) dynamic reverberation that will account for distance would help a lot. Immersion is all about the little details.

Yeah there seems to be something wonky with their volume – they’re often far too loud and sound really close to your ear, whereas they should sound quieter and a bit more muffled with distance, or echo or something (e.g. if in mountainous region) unless the NPC happens to be right next to you.

Perhaps not quite related, but sometimes I’ll hear player lines from buffs/boons (e.g. that centaur line from a human, an asura saying, "Accelerate", etc.) as if they were right next to me when there is, in fact, no player nearby.

I was going to report this as a bug, good to see there is a thread already talking about this. At one point I thought it was just me, but after a while, of random shouts I came to the conclusion that its a bug. This definitely needs some tweaking.