[solecist]

So after working with the gun sounds for a fairly long time I have decided to post a little teaser. The sound I was going for is close to the infamous bank robbery in Heat. This means that the sounds are most suitable for open environments with lots of surrounding buildings. This will present the illusion that the sounds of the guns firing are reverberating and echoing off of the nearby buildings. They work OK indoors, as well, if you can overlook the echos. Although I don't think most people are as picky about that sort of thing as I am. I am calling it "ultra" realistic because these take sound design to the extreme: some people like that "clean" hollywood sound, and this is not that. Guns are LOUD, and if I could I would make them twice as loud as they are now, haha.

I have a video of most of the guns in action and am just looking for some feedback before I post the link to the mod. If there is even a little interest I will post them up ASAP. Take a look (and listen):

Make sure to switch it to 720p...it isn't just video quality; it's sound, too! Turn up your sound and MAKE SURE you have some sort of bass, haha.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWYWy00Tyak

All gun sounds excluding the sniper rifles (seem to have an issue replacing those) and the rocket launcher have been replaced. I have also modified the "whiz-by" sounds of bullets to include the tell-tale supersonic snap, the bow shockwave of the bullet. this is the sound created by a bullet as it breaks the sound barrier.

edit: mirror is available: http://www.mediafire.com/?mbcde77bb01bxp8

instructions below!

This post has been edited by solecist on Tuesday, Mar 13 2012, 22:24

[fakespyder]

Those weapon sounds would be great for a city or tunnel shootout. Nice work .
I hope you are able to provide a download link.
thanks

[Howard Stern]

I registered exclusively for this mod. Please upload it. This is what I've been waiting for for years.

[solecist]

haha, fair enough. i guess two is going to have to be enough. will edit the link into this post when it's done uploading.

edit: mirror, here it is: http://www.mediafire.com/?mbcde77bb01bxp8

instructions (readme is NOT currently included):

- go to your gtaiv folder, go to pc>audio>sfx>resident.rpf and BACK UP this file.

- download sparkiv (search the forums for a link - don't know it offhand)

- unpack weapons.ivaud from my rar file to your desktop (or wherever)

- open sparkiv

- click browse in sparkiv

- browse to pc>audio>sfx

- double click resident.rpf to open it

- click RESIDENT

- click import, find my weapons.ivaud file and click ok

- click save

- close the program and play!

shouldn't require enabling filecheck ASI loaders or anything fancy like that. tested with 1.0.4.0 only, but should work with all versions.

This post has been edited by solecist on Tuesday, Mar 13 2012, 22:24

[Howard Stern]

Oh, jeez - instructions for SparkIV, too? What a champion.

Downloading now. Any chance you'll be making alternate or updated versions? I predict this is going to be one of the most popular and sought after modifications around. I re-installed Bad Company 2 to try and rip their weapon sounds (even though I heard it's impossible) and learn how to incorporate them into GTA IV, but this mod is equal in quality or better.

PS: Sorry for the e-mail. I was desperate.

And also, if you're a guy like me and thinks audio - particular gunfire - is more important than graphics, play Bad Company 2 if you haven't already. I've never been immersed in such intense firefights in my life.

[solecist]

i may update it if there is any interest; i would like to get the sniper rifles working. technically, i have an alternate version without the echos (still heavy reverberation), but i doubt i'd piece that back together since adding the echos. crysis 2 has been taking up my modding time right now, haha, so i really haven't fooled with gta iv for a couple weeks.

i absolutely abhor games that do not understand how important the sound of a gun should be. crysis 2, i think, does it particularly well, but absolutely nothing compares to bad company 2, which is the only shooter i really play online. glad to see another fan! i wish the audio modding was more expansive in gta iv, i could do a lot more. volume control, especially volume control when guns are going off at a distance, would be a godsend.

[Howard Stern]

I'd been playing Crysis 2 before I got sucked into play GTA again and yeah, it does it pretty decent job in terms of audio - the standard pistol, especially. It's not that great all together, but in comparison to everything else out there it could be considered amazing.

Anyway, I've had enough time with this mod to say it represents the peak in realism and you're a God damn idiot if you don't install it. Out of all the other sound mods that bill themselves as 'realistic' - which are all horrendous jokes - this is the true one and adds an entirely different element of intensity to the gameplay. And best yet, there's nothing wrong with it. No flaws whatsoever.

My favorite so far is the Uzi, but I'm playing a new game and haven't had much time to experiment with the others. Is the M4A1 the same original sound modified for better reverb an echo? They sound similar. How'd you get these, anyway?

[solecist]

I can't remember the source of the m4's original sound, but i know it wasn't the vanilla version, because the quality is pretty bad on those. all the reverb and echoing is done by me in Audacity and Sound Forge, and most of the pre-edited sounds are random ones i've collected over the years. i rarely use just one sound for each gun...a lot of it is mixing and matching and then editing for consistency.

thanks, by the way! glad someone is enjoying it.

[ade2]

this mod looks (sounds) awesome. I want to install it on my xbox 360 (it's jtagged so I can modify stuff). I tried following the steps above, there are matching files for the xbox 360 version, but after modifying them the same way, the game (and xbox) crashes on the first loading screen (the very first one with loads of text only)

any ideas what I need to do?

really really want the mod, I've always hated rockstar's gun sounds, it's the one thing they just never got right.... except for the rpg, that one is awesome

[solecist]

one of the problems with the weapons.ivaud file is that it can't be over a certain size. the closer i was getting to 20 mb the more likely it was to crash my game; so i had to limit the length of most of my sounds. maybe the xbox ivauds are more compressed or compressed in a different way that requires that ivaud file to be even smaller. just a guess, though, as that was the only issue i had with crashing.

here's a test you could do: go to gtagarage.com and download one of the sound mods there. these sounds are typically much shorter than mine and keep the ivaud file size down to about 14 mb. try using one of those weapon.ivaud files and see if you still crash. if you do, it could just be an incompatibility issue between the xbox and the pc; or it could even be related to the ivaud editor i used.

[ade2]

QUOTE (solecist @ Apr 4 2011, 18:59)

one of the problems with the weapons.ivaud file is that it can't be over a certain size. the closer i was getting to 20 mb the more likely it was to crash my game; so i had to limit the length of most of my sounds. maybe the xbox ivauds are more compressed or compressed in a different way that requires that ivaud file to be even smaller. just a guess, though, as that was the only issue i had with crashing. here's a test you could do: go to gtagarage.com and download one of the sound mods there. these sounds are typically much shorter than mine and keep the ivaud file size down to about 14 mb. try using one of those weapon.ivaud files and see if you still crash. if you do, it could just be an incompatibility issue between the xbox and the pc; or it could even be related to the ivaud editor i used.

It's a good point and actually the weapons.ivaud file is less than 2mb in size on the xbox. I will try what you said and report back.

[solecist]

ade, i checked that file out. the audio in that ivaud is not compatible with the ivaud tool. they must use a different audio format for the xbox sounds. sorry!

[ade2]

QUOTE (solecist @ Apr 6 2011, 03:37)

ade, i checked that file out. the audio in that ivaud is not compatible with the ivaud tool. they must use a different audio format for the xbox sounds. sorry!

Ok thanks for checking. My assumption is that the xbox uses a custom audio format, encoded by the xbox development kit software. If you're interested, out of curiosity, read on


After some googling I found these snippets from the xbox docs

...The Xenon system south bridge also contains a key hardware component for audio—XMA decompression. XMA is the native Xenon compressed audio format, based on the WMA Pro architecture. XMA provides sound quality higher than ADPCM at even better compression ratios, typically 6:1–12:1....

...The lowest-level Xenon audio software layer is XAudio, a new API designed for optimal digital signal processing. The Xbox Audio Creation Tool (XACT) API from Xbox is also supported, along with new features ...

So I guess we need updated software to deal with the xbox .ivaud package, and probably use the XDK to encode.

I could make it myself if I got my hands on the ivaud editor source code probably but I'm a bit busy now.. maybe later

[solecist]

yeah, i have some familiarity with that format. too bad! i honestly wish i knew something about xbox modding...red dead redemption is begging for it, imo.

[Prof_Farnsworth]

QUOTE (solecist @ Apr 3 2011, 18:52)

i may update it if there is any interest; i would like to get the sniper rifles working. technically, i have an alternate version without the echos (still heavy reverberation), but i doubt i'd piece that back together since adding the echos. crysis 2 has been taking up my modding time right now, haha, so i really haven't fooled with gta iv for a couple weeks. i absolutely abhor games that do not understand how important the sound of a gun should be. crysis 2, i think, does it particularly well, but absolutely nothing compares to bad company 2, which is the only shooter i really play online. glad to see another fan! i wish the audio modding was more expansive in gta iv, i could do a lot more. volume control, especially volume control when guns are going off at a distance, would be a godsend.

Just wanted to say this mod is great. I love the sound effects and reverb. If you do update it, could you possibly include the version without the echoes, or maybe just one echo? It takes away a little bit when fighting in an open area. Perfect for the inner city though.

Great job!

[Mr. Violence]

nice one dude
just a thought:How about you make reverbless versions for weapons but use verberating versions as SLOWMO sounds(they are somwhere close to the end of .ivaud).It'd be awsome, especially for people who make movies so every time they'd use a slowmo effect in a video, it'd play those sounds, which would be sooo much more dramatical than the original ones.R* really makes sh*tty sounds.I can get you some resource if you need it

[Lanzfeld113]

Going to try this tonight. You might be my hero!

GREAT WORK!!!

[solecist]

mirror added to the top! http://www.mediafire.com/?mbcde77bb01bxp8

got a request on youtube, thought i'd throw the mod back up.

[PacketOVerload_x64Bit]

Wow.

For the most part sounds amazing. Might be a bit too much flange-type in the echo, but will have to try. Otherwise for urban warfare these sounds are kickass. Question: I won't be able to try for a day or two but are the explosions in there as well?

Nice job good sir!
-Packet

[solecist]

yeah, that's probably an issue with the reverb filter i used in soundforge. it is extremely hard to get the reverb right.

i actually did modify the explosions, but they're in a separate file. i didn't include them because it requires that the sounds are of an extremely low quality, making it sound like garbage either way, haha.