A few gameplay suggestions.

[fuzzhead]

HEAVY AT

Is it possible after a H-AT rocket has been fired, the operator throw the disposable rocket on the ground (just like in vBF2), I think it adds the realism of the single shot H-AT that has been put into PR 0.8.

Unforunately this is a BF2 limitation. Currently there is no way to get an animation to play AFTER a weapon has been switched with the bf2 animation system.
If this was possible, than a whole new slew of options would be avaliable to us. we could animate a player safetying and slinging his rifle each time he switches from his rifle to some other item. We could could have complex medic animations, etc. The reason the SRAW/Eryx reloads works in vbf2 and not in PR is because in vbf2 your using a reload animation with multiple "mags", in PR as soon as you fire the weapon is force switched so your not carrying around an empty tube. The reason for the force switch is it would be confusing for the players whether their HAT has "ammo" or not because regardless of ammo count the deploy animation would always be played, suggesting that the weapon is ready to fire but when actually there is no ammo for it, even though the tube is physically present on the model.

DOOR BREACHER

I believe a door breacher would be good for clearing out rooms, without bringing down the whole building down (using SLAMS, C4). It should have a really small blast radius but still enough strength to bring down the doors. Perhaps only engineers on Insurgency maps.

This is already implemented with the shotgun for the engineers. Best used on Korengal as its the test bed for breachable doors, expect this to be implemented in future maps. We may eventually switch the shotgun to a more realistic breaching tool but thats further down the road.

BETTER GUN ROTATION FOR APACHE/COBRA

I find the rotation ridiculous right now on gunship's 20/30mm gun. AFAIK, the Apache can not aim its gun straight down which it can do IRL, this seriously affects CAS missions and gets really annoying when you have to fall back 100s of metres to engage the target.

I cant comment on this as its not my expertise, PM CAS117 about this issue if he does not reply here.

DIFFERENT SOUNDS FOR EACH GUNSHIP

I understand that all the gunships have 4-bladed rotors which gives it a distinct sound, but wouldn't the engine also give it a different sound? It seems its sometimes hard to tell if the helicopter hovering above you is enemy or foe (without getting out the map) because they all have the same sound which is rather strange.

Agreed. More unique sounds is always a good thing, its all about priorities though. PM jaymz with your thoughts about this as well as any potential sources you have for said helicopter sounds.

0.85 SUGGESTION: CHINOOK FOR USA

I was reading in the DEV Journal that the Chinook will be only used by the British in PR, why so? I believe that the Chinook is also used by the US which makes it a little unfair as the US factions already lacks a large sized helicopter (British have the Merlin, which is still quite a large transport helicopter). I have seen plenty of videos/images of Chinooks in Iraq and Afghanistan and here are a few.

The chinook will NOT be in v0.85 and may not make it into v0.9. A US Chinook is not out of the question, however its being implemented as a british asset first, mainly because it will have a very specific use on the new 4km Afghanistan map "Sangin" being developed by Dr Rank.

[AnRK]

Would be nice to have different heli sounds, never know what helis coming round the corner at the moment, could be a friendly transport coming to rescue you, or an enemy attack chopper coming to annihilate you. If it's done well, which I'm sure it would be, it'd add to the game in the same kinda way as recognising your teams assault rifle sounds.

There's alot more audio work to be done though I'm sure, stuff like all the H-AT sounding the same and all APC cannons sounding the same (you can tell the difference by the rate of fire though). I haven't the slightest idea how Jaymz and the other sound guys make new sounds for weapons, but I bet it take a long time, and stuff like this are more perfections then necessitates, so will probably be a while till we see them change.

[M.Warren]

Yeah I agree with the general sound of certain things. I can understand if sound samples aren't exactly that abundant. But I would atleast try to take what we have and give it alittle more treble or alittle more bass.

You know, something that's just minor to give it a different hue of sound. Maybe give the Cobra the lowest pitch due to the large 4 blades. Give the Apache the default sound for it's smaller 4 blades. Give the Havoc a slightly higher treble pitch for it's 5 larger blades. Then give the Z-10 the highest pitch for it's 5 small blades. Something to mix it up.

This would even be nice if we had some more explosion sound samples for variety.

I don't know who has played the BF 1942 mod called Desert Combat. But if you played it, you'd know that it has some of the best damn sound samples ever heard. If you used artillery you could hear it from one side of the map to the other. Each explosion had atleast 3-5 different tones. It was truely phenominal for it's time.

As for helicopters. I wish we had a CH-53 for the U.S.M.C.

[Spaz]

I find the rotation ridiculous right now on gunship's 20/30mm gun. AFAIK, the Apache can not aim its gun straight down which it can do IRL, this seriously affects CAS missions and gets really annoying when you have to fall back 100s of metres to engage the target.

The real problem with this is that some gunners can look down more then other, the cobra can't look down as much as the Havok.

[AnRK]

Yeah I agree with the general sound of certain things. I can understand if sound samples aren't exactly that abundant. But I would atleast try to take what we have and give it alittle more treble or alittle more bass.

You know, something that's just minor to give it a different hue of sound. Maybe give the Cobra the lowest pitch due to the large 4 blades. Give the Apache the default sound for it's smaller 4 blades. Give the Havoc a slightly higher treble pitch for it's 5 larger blades. Then give the Z-10 the highest pitch for it's 5 small blades. Something to mix it up.

EQing the current heli sound and other default sounds which are cloned might be a cool short term solution to adding some variation actually.

As for the treble and bass thing, that could be your systems frequency response not been great. I use a creative 7.1 system (the cheap one not the rather flashy looking Gigaworks one) and have messed about with it for ages so the none-sub speakers don't sound thing and horrible and I've got it pretty reasonable sounding now.

You have to bear in mind that the sound DEVs probably use pretty decent home monitors when their doing sound stuff, and they'll probably create stuff that sounds good through them, unless they do what they usually do in the music/sound industry and playback sounds/music through nice studio monitors AND a cheaper system to make sure it sounds nice through both. So the guys with top end systems are happy - although they usually find something to ***** about like a .5 dB deficiency in 567Hz or something stupid - and the guys with not so great systems still have reasonable sound.

[M.Warren]

I currently use the Razer Piranha Stereo Gaming Headphones. I think they're the best around for sound quality, durability and comfort. I enjoy them really well. Only thing that may annoy you is the microphone on/off button doesn't stick in place, and the volume wheel tends to brush up against your clothes if you use the clip. Other than that, it's fantastic really. It also uses a USB hookup for an audio boost.

I give it 4.5 out of 5 stars. It's almost perfection.

I once owned the Razer HP-1 Barracuda 8-Channel Gaming Headphones. But it doesn't work well without the Razer Barracuda AC-1 Gaming Sound Card. In all honesty, the sound probably has alot of potential, but without the card it most likely goes to complete waste. Also the microphone clips into the headset and swivels freely. Also has a habit of reverbing sounds into your mic from the nearby headset. It uses a USB hookup for an audio boost, including 3 different speakers in a single headphone muff.

It gets a 3.5 out of 5 stars. Probably would be better if it had the sound card with it, but I don't know for sure.

As you can see to get the high end headphone sound system is... Retartedly expensive.

[AnRK]

Yeah I had a set of "surround" headphones a while back, apparently they were used at numerous pro gaming tourneys and such but they were bloody awful, would have been ok but the centre channel sounded really thin and wrecked the whole ambience. Always seem to get a really thin sounding centre channel on like every surround system I've come across...

[cyberzomby]

arent the pictures of that "chinook" from Fearosious a seaknight? I cant see a towned down hummer go out of that chopper! Especially the second one.
EDIT:

Hmmm after some google imaging I believe it is a chinook but still...

[Raegron]

Unforunately this is a BF2 limitation. Currently there is no way to get an animation to play AFTER a weapon has been switched with the bf2 animation system.

But.. it would be possible to change the firing animation, so when a soldier fires his HAT, the HAT animation starts playing which also contains a disposal animation. So it's actually one animation, not two. The same could be done with all other "single shot" weapons, like the LAT, the C4 detonator, etc.

[fuzzhead]

check the Light AT animations. They ALREADY have this disposal animation. problem is it only works when you click AND HOLD the weapon.

You can try this in the v0.8 right now:

1) get a Rifleman AT (AT4 for example)

2) fire the weapon like normal (just click once)

3) rearm and fire the weapon again, this time clicking AND holding.

Notice the disposal animation.

Trust me chuc has worked alot on this and has been unable to replicate it effectively. Not saying its not possible, by all means try to get this working and we will include it, but we were unable to. Its a small things anyways and does not really affect gameplay as its mainly a visual "extra".