Dividing "sound Effects" Into In-Game And Menu Sfx

[Anaesthetic]

The main idea is pretty much summed up in the thread title.

 

To elaborate, I think it would be a good idea to separate the two. I know I'm not alone in that I like to listen to tunes while I'm playing, so naturally I have the game's music on mute. During games there is not much issue. Gunfire, alarms and enemy noises will peep over the sound of my tunes, but that's just natural and is also integral to gameplay. In the menus however, sound plays much less of a role, if it plays a role at all. Sure, there is the notification that tells you there is an alert mission, but these only appear about every half-hour and stay active for about another hour (depending on the mission). 

 

One thing that doesn't serve a purpose is the omnipresent hum heard in the menus. I understand that it enhances the ambiance for some, but to others it can be distracting or even a nuisance. Even when sounds from the game are heavily reduced in the volume mixer (relative to other programs such as iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, TeamSpeak, etc.) the hum can easily overpower whatever else is playing.

 

The hum can be disabled by setting SFX volume to zero, but the volume must be set back to its original value in-game so that one can hear gunfire and alarms again. This in itself can be annoying (as it must be done every time); but on higher-level missions it can even be dangerous as certain enemies (notably Infestation) can swarm the player at the spawn point while he/she is vulnerable sifting through menus and waiting for changes to confirm (which is unavoidable and requires at least 2-3 seconds).

 

With all of this in mind, I think it makes sense to separate menu and game sound effects. One could keep important gameplay elements active while having the freedom to listen to whatever they have in the background unimpeded.

 

Any thoughts for or against are welcome. :)

 

-Anaesthetic

[[DE]George]

We will keep this in mind for a future update.

[Anaesthetic]

Thank you! It's very much appreciated.