s_ambient?

[Hipshot]

AFAIK, this variable can be used to turn off ambient sounds, but how can I define a sound as ambient? I have an ambient sound in my current (WIP) map, it adds a lot to the atmosphere, but will probably be annoying and might also damage the sound trace from other players. Do I need to something to the .wav externally or should I not use a target_speaker for this?

Edit: Trying this on DM1 and DM2 doesn't seem to have any kind of effect on all the ambient sounds in those levels.

[maz0r]

Doesnt s_ambient just disables all target_speakers? Sounds logical since all game related sounds will be triggered by either the player or are hardcoded sounds for interactive objects (doors, teleporters, etc.).

[Hipshot]

What do you mean by disabling them? Seems it doesn't do that...

[maz0r]

Ok I looked deeper into this (without actually having a q3 copy available). First looked into the q3 source and realized that s_ambient seems not to be implemented in baseQ3.
So I tried my luck with OSP, where I was sure s_ambient is available.
And I came up with this:

s_ambient <0|1> (default = 1)
0 - Disables looping ambient sounds of the current map
1 - Enables looping ambient sounds of the current map
---> Note: If this value is changed while connected, you will automatically
vid_restart to enable this option.

As it seems, s_ambient just disables all target_speakers which constantly play (respectively has spawnflag 1 (?) set).

So are you using baseQ3 while testing s_ambient? Then it shouldn't work, since it's not implemented. In mods like CPMA, OSP or even QuakeLive it should work.

[Hipshot]

Why-do-they-have-features-that-does-not-work?! Did they create the function - for modders to unlock??

[maz0r]

Dunno, are you sure the cvar even exists in baseq3? Maybe you'll set it in your config and hence it will be recognized in the console later on.
Maybe I can make some tests tomorrow evening.

[obsidian]

Why-do-they-have-features-that-does-not-work?! Did they create the function - for modders to unlock??

A programmer was probably working on it, then got called to do something more urgent, then forgot and never got back to it.

[sock]

Why-do-they-have-features-that-does-not-work?!

s_ambient is not a core feature of Q3, it seems it was added by mods (OSP) later on. The Q3 source (http://www.fileshack.com/file.x?fid=7547) has no reference to that console command unfortunately.

[4days]

is the sound one that you could put as 'music' on worldspawn, or does it need the volume around the level controlled by target_speakers?

[Hipshot]

Dunno, are you sure the cvar even exists in baseq3? Maybe you'll set it in your config and hence it will be recognized in the console later on.
Maybe I can make some tests tomorrow evening.

Uh, yea I did. Damn, stupid CPMA or OSP or vanilla. This has happened before too. But how could you really know, It's not like I'm gonna check the CFG every time I wanna type something I usually don't.

is the sound one that you could put as 'music' on worldspawn, or does it need the volume around the level controlled by target_speakers?

Well, then I can't have the music, but it's a good idea, might do that. And, also, it might sound strange to have it everywhere since it's a bit area specific.