Why do they keep changing well know, beloved sounds?

[Pengalor]

and I'd reckon very few of the people here can, either.

Oh, I remember the old gun sound very well because it was the reason I started playing the game with the sound off. That sound was horrid, unrealistic, and unbelievably repetitive and grating. That said, it's pretty obvious OP is trolling after that second post, no one believes that the sounds made this game popular.

[Accendor]

Maybe turn the volume down a little. Many people can play with sounds on while chatting in voice, it's pretty much a non-issue.

Na, its not really possible. Like at all, all the sounds, explosions, sword wuuushes etc are completely overwhelming as melee, even on lowest settings.
Its not a problem anymore tho, since voice emotes are on a different canal now and I can just turn that one up and use discord to automatically lower the game volume whenever somebody is talking.

[Pengalor]

Same reason I watch movies with the volume turned on. Sound helps me immerse, and I play games to get immersed in my surroundings. This is a really weird, arbitrary aspect of the game to gatekeep on.

That's not what gatekeeping is. They aren't saying 'you aren't a WoW gamer if you play with sound on'. They're just saying there is no reason to have it on, and they're right, you don't need it.

[LoLcano]

Wait people play game with sound on ? music sure but game sound is horrible , the scream of voidelf when you use kill command , ugh,

[Niwes]

hmm, i have a complete other opinion than most ppl here it seems.

first, where obviously everyone agrees: sounds are complete taste. 50 ppl like sound A while 50 ppl like sound B.

but exactly because of that, imo its the worst thing you can do, to change it after many years. because you change something in/of a product many customers committed on, once in the past. this is not good customer handling. blizzard can do this because „blizzard“ and because they have such a broad audience and such a high fluctuation of players/customers.

other companies never ever would do that. a lot of customers committed themselfes to the product for reasons. dont change that reasons aftwerwards. if something is really is broken, ofc fix it. but when you have the situation that either way you have the same amount of ppl liking old stuff as the amount of ppl liking new stuff, dont change it.

the difference is like this:

old sound: 50 likes, 50 hates. original product, ppl know to what they committed themselfes to.
new sound: 50 likes, 50 hates. nothing else.

in the end of the day its taste and for the change itself this means nothing, either way. but in the first variant you „loose“ additional things or lets say you „add“ negativity.

so, its always bad to change stuff based on taste, in a product, when ppl already had committed themselfes to it (since years). you just cant win anything with it, because its just taste, in general. but always add an additional negative effect.

Most companies know this and do not do this for excatly that reason.

[Akka]

I don't care about gun sound (I don't play with guns), but one change that left me dumbfounded was the fireball.
It was originally this crackling, fiery sound with a large "boom" impact that felt just adequate.
It became some sort of, ironically, wet splash, which really doesn't fit.

Never understood that.

That's not what gatekeeping is. They aren't saying 'you aren't a WoW gamer if you play with sound on'. They're just saying there is no reason to have it on, and they're right, you don't need it.

Wrong.
Maybe some don't, but if I don't have some sound on, it really throws me off. I rely on both visual and audio cues for real-time feedback.

Not even talking about the obvious immersion factor, which has a huge impact.

[Michael Jackson]

hmm, i have a complete other opinion than most ppl here it seems.

first, where obviously everyone agrees: sounds are complete taste. 50 ppl like sound A while 50 ppl like sound B.

but exactly because of that, imo its the worst thing you can do, to change it after many years. because you change something in/of a product many customers committed on, once in the past. this is not good customer handling. blizzard can do this because „blizzard“ and because they have such a broad audience and such a high fluctuation of players/customers.

other companies never ever would do that. a lot of customers committed themselfes to the product for reasons. dont change that reasons aftwerwards. if something is really is broken, ofc fix it. but when you have the situation that either way you have the same amount of ppl liking old stuff as the amount of ppl liking new stuff, dont change it.

the difference is like this:

old sound: 50 likes, 50 hates. original product, ppl know to what they committed themselfes to.
new sound: 50 likes, 50 hates. nothing else.

in the end of the day its taste and for the change itself this means nothing, either way. but in the first variant you „loose“ additional things or lets say you „add“ negativity.

so, its always bad to change stuff based on taste, in a product, when ppl already had committed themselfes to it (since years). you just cant win anything with it, because its just taste, in general. but always add an additional negative effect.

Most companies know this and do not do this for excatly that reason.

This is what I don't get about the argument "bUt ThE dEvS kNoW bEtTeR tHaN u".

Really? Was there ever a poll? Was there ever a census? Do the devs really know who likes what better?

Cause there were literally dozens of threads per day when the "updated" models came out in WOD (which are still not finished to this day, human faces continue to look atrocious for the most part, same face issues persists, etc), which were all deleted or swept under the rug.

The devs even removed the options to run the command in game that let you see the old models, which literally made me stop playing human characters.

And like @Akka mentioned below you, jesus christ the Fireball sound....what is that new thing? Why would you do this? Such an iconic sound that no one ever complained about, and that sounded like what you would expect a fireball to sound like.

[Pengalor]

Wrong.
Maybe some don't, but if I don't have some sound on, it really throws me off. I rely on both visual and audio cues for real-time feedback.

I'm sure if you actually put some effort into it you'd be fine. For clarity, I'm talking about the actual game sound. Things like DBM I totally understand, but that's not part of the game sound.

- - - Updated - - -

first, where obviously everyone agrees: sounds are complete taste. 50 ppl like sound A while 50 ppl like sound B.

This, kids, is what we call a 'false equivalence'. Presenting it as though it were a 50/50 split is completely disingenuous (as it pretending there's no negative side from not changing it). The old gun sounds, as an example, were widely hated, it was a minority that liked them. They changed them to appease the majority, if they hadn't then people would still continue to hate those sounds today, perhaps even more so.

[Aleksej89]

It would be a really simple thing to make an option where players select do they want "gun sounds set 1, 2 or 3".
Just a bit of QOL improvements and choices, i personally also dislike the modern gun sounds in wow.

[Pengalor]

It would be a really simple thing to make an option where players select do they want "gun sounds set 1, 2 or 3".
Just a bit of QOL improvements and choices, i personally also dislike the modern gun sounds in wow.

Someone already linked an addon earlier in the thread if you really want them that much.

[Akka]

I'm sure if you actually put some effort into it you'd be fine. For clarity, I'm talking about the actual game sound. Things like DBM I totally understand, but that's not part of the game sound.

I could be fine, but I'd lose some fine-tuning. Especially when it comes to rythm and situational information.
In fact your DBM argument kind of examplifies it : I don't use it (and never have), and being aware of the game sound on is precisely one reason I don't need it (as every fight gives its own cues, both audio and visual, that DBM simply plasters in a more obvious way).

[Pengalor]

I could be fine, but I'd lose some fine-tuning. Especially when it comes to rythm and situational information.
In fact your DBM argument kind of examplifies it : I don't use it (and never have), and being aware of the game sound on is precisely one reason I don't need it (as every fight gives its own cues, both audio and visual, that DBM simply plasters in a more obvious way).

Being frank, if you play without DBM then you likely aren't playing at a level where your effectiveness particularly matters anyway so really you could just as easily get away with sounds off.

[Segus1992]

The game was at its PEAK PLAYERS with those sounds. Those sounds had carried this game for 3 expansions to then a record player number.

How can you write with a straight face that this decision was made by people who are more competent and qualified, especially when talking about Cataclysm, of all things?

Fucking christ people use this argument for every stupid thing in WoW. Do you seriously, honestly, believe SOUND EFFECT DESIGN is the reason why WoLK was the most popular? Can you actually be that dense?

[baseballfan]

Auto attack crits. Almost every melee weapon has lost these sooo satisfying sounds and it is an extreme shame.

Feral sound effect updates in bfa. Absolute worst sounding things in the game. Prefer mangle sound effect to be back as well for feral.

Seed of corruption sound change is also terrible imo. I really loved the old sound.


There are definitely many other sound changes that have happened that I do not like, but these are just the worst offenders.

[Michael Jackson]

Fucking christ people use this argument for every stupid thing in WoW. Do you seriously, honestly, believe SOUND EFFECT DESIGN is the reason why WoLK was the most popular? Can you actually be that dense?

And you're the 5th person I think in this thread who pretends that's what I said just to create drama.

I'm done repeating myself, read and understand what the person I responded to typed, then what I typed in response.

[Morae]

Tbh, while I did like the old gun sounds I'm more annoyed they changed male orc gun animation. I loved that animation. I have not at least been able to get it to play out so I think its gone. If someone can correct me on this, plz, tell me where they put it!

[Nnyco]

And you're the 5th person I think in this thread who pretends that's what I said just to create drama.

I'm done repeating myself, read and understand what the person I responded to typed, then what I typed in response.

I mean it is literally on the first page that you indeed said it.

The game was at its PEAK PLAYERS with those sounds. Those sounds had carried this game for 3 expansions to then a record player number.

[Gaidax]

Gun shot was a beloved sound?

KEKW... *chokes from laughter*

[Chaotic1962]

Some changes were good, some bad. I used the silencer mod since i saw it because the gun sound was godawful.

Does anyone remember the chain lightning sound shitshow? Pepperidge Farm remembers.

[Ielenia]

The game was at its PEAK PLAYERS with those sounds. Those sounds had carried this game for 3 expansions to then a record player number.

What you wrote there seems to heavily imply that "those sounds", as you name them, were the cause, or at least a big contributor to the game's success. But they didn't. You have, at best, correlation, that in no way implies causation. That's like saying "we had great music back in 60's. Why did they have to implement color TV!?"