ACCEPTED Audio Overhaul for Skyrim (by David Jegutidse)

[exploiteddna]

How does this compare to Sound Propagation Overhaul?

thats a good question. i never got into that mod too much. I think i installed it once but something i didnt like at the time made me uninstall it. My first thought is that I think the two mods are different in terms of their overall goals and definitely in their approach. I could be wrong. 

The funny thing is, I was wondering about SPO just recently.. thinking about how popular it once was at the beginning but now i havent heard much from it in a while. I do wonder how the two stack up against each other

 

There are certain features of this mod that just really impress me. Ive mentioned a few of the reasons already above. Another feature ive just experienced is some of the "running/moving water" sounds.. like a large waterfall in the distance. I really like the type of sound and feel it adds a new element of realism. Some places i think might be a little too loud (like markarth's flowing water systems), but this may be due to the fact i chose not to patch the AOS waterfall descriptors and left the ones from realistic water two in place. I have made an override patch for it and will go back to markarth to see how loud/quiet it is now :)  /rant

[torminater]

Well compare the 2 feature videos from skyrim mod sanctuary about sound propagation overhaul and audio overhaul skyrim... gopher tested them almost identically.

[mothergoose729]

I am playing now with AOS, ultra realistc bow shoot sounds and crossbow sounds, smooth sheathe and draw, improved combat sounds, and improved horse pain sounds, and a couple others. This mod really thrives with ambient noises and with its judicious use of echo and reverb. I am pretty sure at this point there are different sound profiles for different interiors, which is wonderful.

 

I was pleasantly surprised when ultra realistic bow sounds overwrote the somewhat distracting bow string twangs but it kept much of the impact noises and arrow whistling. Whistling arrows is not at all realistic but it is a great deal of fun :).

 

Biggest flaws for me is the lack of compatibility with IHSS and the random splash bug I have come across. michaelw if you would consider patching IHSS that would be wonderful, because IMO IHSS does foosteps a lot better than AOS in pretty much every way.

 

Hoping for a fix to the splash bug in the next update, but its a minor flaw so I won't be too disappointed if it doesn't happen. I am playing around with immersive thunder in place of default AOS thunder. AOS has a rather faint, distant thunder sound, which just feel inappropriate when using minty's lighting mod.

[DoubleYou]

Just load the IHSS esp after the AOS esp if you want the IHSS footsteps.

[mothergoose729]

Just load the IHSS esp after the AOS esp if you want the IHSS footsteps.

I had both of them loaded before and what I got was correct horse step noises, but all NPC and PC footsteps sounded the same regardless of the ground type. I let BOSS sort my load order, so it might not have been optimal. In any event a compatibility patch would make the whole thing a lot simpler. 

 

As of right now I am using AOS over IHSS, but I do miss IHSS quite a bit. 

 

AOS was updated yesterday and I haven't had a chance to try it out. Reading the update log it doesn't appear that AOS has changed anything in regards to my own issues, but they have introduced some pretty cool new features I am excited to play with. Namely, there is a different impact effect now for arrows on shields. That aught to be really cool. 

 

edit:

(29.10.2013)

Version 1.5 Update now available in Files Section. Requires version 1.4 installed beforehand! Just override AOS.esp

UPDATE 1.5

- fixed a bug with arrow on shield impacts not playing

- fixed an issue where Bethesda used walking footsteps on sneaking NPCs and sometimes even sprinting or running, instead of the actual sneaking footstep sounds. (I was mildly shocked when looking at the impact data, after becoming aware of this problem by a video from Gopher)

Now NPCs use sneaking footsteps when sneaking...duh

- Mixing and attenuation tweaks for: some water sounds, dwemer contraptions, distant impacts such as blacksmith hammers and pickaxes, distant wolves and deers, dragon wing flaps and more

- fixed a tavern (can't remember the name :P) using an inappropriate acoustic space, meaning more appropriate reverb.

Unless glitches or something being weird come up, this might be the last version before 2.0 which will feature a host of new sounds including interior (dungeon) ambiences and weapons.

Can't wait to try out the sneak step changes.

[MontyMM]

I think this should now be looked at seriously for STEP inclusion.

[rootsrat]

Agreed. I have it installed now, while I'm testing my new build and I'm really impressed!

[Tiger]

Been trying this the last few days myself. Really impressed. At first, I thought I wasn't going to like it, the sound of moving in armour was a bit of a shock but you really need to give it a chance. I don't think I could live without it now. The only thing I'm not so keen on is the loudness of waterfalls/rapids. I know it's realistic but I tend to lose a bit of dialogue when NPCs are being drowned out. On my headphones, crossing the bridge East of Whiterun is deafening. I altered the mod to lower the volume of waterfalls and rapids a bit and am very pleased with the result. Still loud but not so deafening. Fantastic mod.

[exploiteddna]

Been trying this the last few days myself. Really impressed. At first' date=' I thought I wasn't going to like it, the sound of moving in armour was a bit of a shock but you really need to give it a chance. I don't think I could live without it now. The only thing I'm not so keen on is the loudness of waterfalls/rapids. I know it's realistic but I tend to lose a bit of dialogue when NPCs are being drowned out. On my headphones, crossing the bridge East of Whiterun is deafening. I altered the mod to lower the volume of waterfalls and rapids a bit and am very pleased with the result. Still loud but not so deafening. Fantastic mod.[/quote']

yeah ive actually been in contact with lordkorn about the waterfall loudness (the rushing/flowing water sound). Originally I liked the sound .. Actually, I still do, but it can be a tad bit overwhelming sometimes. Im going to be making a some tweaks to those settings and either posting the changes as an optional patch on my patches page, or sending them to LK for inclusion into the main mod, or both.

[deathneko11]

sorry for sticking my nose in here but, because of the way this mod modifies a lot of vanilla objects to do what it does, doesn't this make this mod incompatible with a LOT of mods? i mean it even causes some incompatibilities with mods like Dragon Combat Overhaul. Features of DCO are broken because this mod just modifies dragon sounds, but it's because of the way that this mod makes those modifications that breaks certain DCO features. I'm not sure of the specific details but I believe that AOS would require an astonishing number of patches or edits in TES5edit in order to make it not break various sorts of load orders.

[TehKaoZ]

Unfortunately This is the nature of sound overhaul mods, no way around it. michaelrw has been kind enough to provide the tedious service of providing patches to the various mods that need it upon request. Still, the actual amount of conflicts caused by AOS are usually minor and don't really "need" to be patched since most of the things being overwritten are not noticeable. I actually think I'm running more patches for stuff like CoT than AOS.

In addition, while I don't have the entirety of Core STEP installed, I don't think it conflicts much anything on that list (short of the sound mods).

 

Most of these types of mods get abandon or removed because of how hard it is to do a mod like this.

[exploiteddna]

sorry for sticking my nose in here but' date=' because of the way this mod modifies a lot of vanilla objects to do what it does, doesn't this make this mod incompatible with a LOT of mods? i mean it even causes some incompatibilities with mods like Dragon Combat Overhaul. Features of DCO are broken because this mod just modifies dragon sounds, but it's because of the way that this mod makes those modifications that breaks certain DCO features. I'm not sure of the specific details but I believe that AOS would require an astonishing number of patches or edits in TES5edit in order to make it not break various sorts of load orders.[/quote']

---

i can't really agree with anything you said.

there arent any significant conflicts between DCO and AOS. There is a single conflict and it has to do with an explosion record. The patch for that can be found on the patches page ( https://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/44541//? ), along with patches for many other popular mods. There are also quite a few mods that have been confirmed compatible.

 

with respect to DCO, if it truly is incompatible with AOS, the conflict has to be somewhere in the DCO scripts, maybe they look for a variable that has been changed or something. The other thing is, thousands of users have used DCO and AOS together (with the DCO patch) and this is the first Ive heard of DCO breaking

[DoubleYou]

Dragon Combat Overhaul patch is available. Yes, it requires a lot of patches, and Michaelw has a whole mod page full of them. While the incompatibilities with this mod are numerous, ELFX is worse. I have made 15 patch esp files to make ELFX compatible with my load order, and I only have half that amount installed for AOS. And none of my ELFX patches are even out in the wild, and this still hasn't dimmed the amount of crazy fans for that mod. Most people don't even realize the conflicts exist.

[Aiyen]

Most people just place the mods late in the load order, and then it obviously work... at least partially. Especially when it comes to weather, lighting and sound then the game is just badly made.

It is a nightmare to patch since you effectively have to patch every cell!

 

This is also the main reason I am still using SOS... There I have made the patches required... and I know it takes about a day or so to make new ones! Not to mention that I use highly custom lighting and weather.... so it takes even longer to double check everything! :S

[Spock]

In Oblivion those were changes Bash could handle really well with tags :(