[SUG] Assign Fail Sound / Replay Insert Mode

[WillLem]

Don't worry, I'm not going to go mad with loads of new topics, I just think this particular feature needs a bit of discussion before I go any further with it.

Basically, the Assign Fail sound triggers any time an assignment is attempted, but fails for any reason. Reasons could be:

1) Assigning a destruction skill when the path would immediately hit steel.

2) Assigning the same skill to a lemming that is already performing that skill.

3) Disallowed assignments (e.g. assigning a Builder to a Blocker).

4) Assigning a skill on the same frame to a different lemming when in Replay Insert mode (this one is new for CE)

It's not just "adding noise" unnecessarily, it's arguably very useful to have this. Players might not be aware that they cannot assign a Builder to a Blocker (for example), and the auditory feedback is important for signalling to the player that the attempted assignment has been acknowledged.

And, if we're disallowing skill overwrite in Replay Insert (we should!*), it lets the player know "there is already an assignment on this frame"; vital!

And OK, spamming might trigger it a bunch of times, but this is acceptible given the benefits.

Possible drawbacks:

It might become annoying: for this, we can simply make it optional.

It doesn't play nicely with skill queueing: OK, this one is a problem. I've checked, and it turns out that every possible skill assignment gets added to the queue, so it's not as if we can say "this skill has been queued successfully, no need to play the Assign Fail sound". We'd have to simulate the lemming at the point of the attempted assignment to see if it would become possible in the next 15 frames, which seems like a potential source of bugs more than anything.

Besides, queued assignments are not necessarily useful to the player on the current frame, which is absolutely the necessary point of feedback. The sound remains useful to signal "no, it's not possible to assign that skill on this frame; the fact that the skill may be assigned in a few frames thanks to queueing doesn't necessarily help the player. So, the sound is still valid.

Current proposal, then: Implement the Assign Fail sound, make it optional, we accept that it doesn't couple up with the skill queue system quite as nicely as we'd like (but still remains useful as a point-of-assignment signifyer nonetheless).

Thoughts? Suggestions?

*See this topic

[WillLem]

After a bit of feedback on the RC, it seems we need to decide whether to play the regular assign fail sound (get the RC for a preview) or the "hit steel" sound specifically when an assignment fails because the lemming would immediately come into contact with steel.

I chose to go with the "hit steel" sound because (a) it emulates Amiga (and possibly DOS?) behaviour and (b) it provides the player with a reason why the assignment has failed. The fact that the animation doesn't play out and the skill count doesn't decrease provides further visual reinforcement.

Icho's counterpoint to this:

miners and diggers on steel should make this exact sound as well and not the "hit steel" one. There the assignment fails as well, they do not hit steel! If so they would turn on top of that.

It's probably too soon (and too small a feature) to call a poll at this stage. What are people's thoughts on this either way?

[Proxima]

I agree with Icho. In Lix, you can assign a miner on steel to hit the steel and immediately turn. Being unable to assign is different from this.

[Mindless]

(and possibly DOS?) behaviour

You don't want to emulate the DOS behavior, I'm sure.  The DOS behavior is:

• When attempting to assign the bashing skill, play the "brick" sound effect if the checked pixel in front of the lemming is metal.
• When attempting to assign the mining skill, play no sound effect if the checked pixel below the lemming is metal or else play the "brick" sound effect if the checked pixel in front of the lemming is metal.
• When attempting to assign the digging skill, play no sound effect if the checked pixel below the lemming is metal.

So the only time a skill rejection sound is played is when the checked pixel in front of the lemming is metal (and even then only sometimes), and it's the "brick" sound effect.

[WillLem]

I agree with Icho ... Being unable to assign is different from this.

Fair enough, I can certainly see the reasoning behind it, especially if players are used to certain associations with the sound.

I'm still mostly convinced that playing the steel sound is the way to go, but if it doesn't get a good amount of support then the current likelihood is that we'll switch to using the same sound (i.e. the brick sound) for both.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this? Next update will probably be end of Feb, so there's plenty of time. The more people that contribute to the discussion, the better.

You don't want to emulate the DOS behavior, I'm sure.

Good shout, thanks for the heads up.

[Simon]

No strong opinion on the steel sound for a disallowed miner. If I assign during pause and the failed assignment doesn't advance physics, I know that it's not physically striking steel. If I assign unpaused, you risk misinterpretation.

-- Simon