DCS Newsletter 28th April 2023 - Voice Chat | La-7 Development Report | WWII Fighters Sale

[BIGNEWY]

DCS Newsletter 28th April 2023 - Voice Chat | La-7 Development Report | WWII Fighters Sale
 

 

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

I am a bit tempted now to get a Mustang now for getting some Maverick vibe.

 

[Tom Kazansky]

Thanks for the news on voice chat progress! Can't wait to hear combat radio style sounds with real people.

[ThorBrasil]

I was considering buying the Mosquito, but it wasn't included in the promotion. A feather.

[peachmonkey]

exciting news for the in-game VoIP!

LA7 being close is even more exciting!

[nickos86]

No offence, but the VoIP got no advantages over SRS (that already got all required features and beyond) - why bother? The SRS is pretty much the standard on all MP servers and works great... 

BTW, can you share any news regarding the B-52 and the S-3B? 

Thanks. 

[AirWolf D]

Heya, Yes that's the way it is !!

[MadKreator]

6 hours ago, nickos86 said:

No offence, but the VoIP got no advantages over SRS (that already got all required features and beyond) - why bother? The SRS is pretty much the standard on all MP servers and works great... 

BTW, can you share any news regarding the B-52 and the S-3B? 

Thanks. 

I can see the in game voip being easier for new users not having to add any 3rd party apps, but I have to agree, its a bit late in the game to work on voip when SRS has been the standard for a long long time. I don’t see any server owners jumping ship unless it beats out SRS by leaps and bounds. IMO it would have been better to pay royalty(ies) to the SRS devs and incorporate it into the game. ( same could be said for lots of great mods, barthek’s terrain mods, Taz’s tree mods etc) If ED had a slew of official dedicated servers that used the built in voip, then it makes more sense, but adding tiny bits of functionality every year or two isn’t going to keep up with SRS or discord chat..dev time could be better spent somewhere else… ED’s game, their choice, and this is just one mans opinion of course

Edited April 29, 2023 by MadKreator

[BIGNEWY]

While we appreciate the feedback, and agree SRS is a great app. Having a in house out of the box voice tool is something we want to provide, it will help with new users who do not want to mess with outside apps. A voice tool for DCS has been asked for for many years and we are happy to provide it.

thank you

[peachmonkey]

1 hour ago, MadKreator said:

I can see the in game voip being easier for new users not having to add any 3rd party apps, but I have to agree, its a bit late in the game to work on voip when SRS has been the standard for a long long time. I don’t see any server owners jumping ship unless it beats out SRS by leaps and bounds. IMO it would have been better to pay royalty(ies) to the SRS devs and incorporate it into the game. ( same could be said for lots of great mods, barthek’s terrain mods, Taz’s tree mods etc) If ED had a slew of official dedicated servers that used the built in voip, then it makes more sense, but adding tiny bits of functionality every year or two isn’t going to keep up with SRS or discord chat..dev time could be better spent somewhere else… ED’s game, their choice, and this is just one mans opinion of course

 

even though it's being paraded everywhere like everyone and their mother uses SRS in reality it's not so, not even close. SRS is daunting at the first sight, it has so many options that the first time users are lost in what's required, and how to even operate it. Watching some youtube videos to explain the operation of a tool is a poor approach to app design. If ED manages to create a VOIP client that is similar to discord/fps games with  SIMPLE/ADVANCE setup it will cover both hardcore and noob radio users.

[Dragon1-1]

Well, as far as I figured, built-in VOIP is basically directly using your aircraft radio to talk to people, so pretty good, and simpler to set up than SRS. A good integrated solution will always beat an external app. 

[MadKreator]

2 hours ago, peachmonkey said:

even though it's being paraded everywhere like everyone and their mother uses SRS in reality it's not so, not even close. SRS is daunting at the first sight, it has so many options that the first time users are lost in what's required, and how to even operate it. Watching some youtube videos to explain the operation of a tool is a poor approach to app design. If ED manages to create a VOIP client that is similar to discord/fps games with  SIMPLE/ADVANCE setup it will cover both hardcore and noob radio users.

Fair enough I’ve used SRS for so long its second nature I suppose. I will admit its almost overly complex. I’ve never used more than the most very basic functions of it.  I’m definitely not advocating srs is the best thing ever, especially not for new users. A built in one would/will be great when its complete enough to compete ( with the mindset of: my buddies and I actually use xbox chat on the pc over any games built in ones because it is solid and great clarity ( over COD’s built in chat for example)). Point being, people will migrate to whatever functions the best. I’ve yet to see public servers that use the in-game VoIP over srs or discord( which I’m not a fan of personally). I am very interested in being able to create your own radio sounds that ed mentioned. I would love all the chat to actually sound like its a real aircraft radio!

[MadKreator]

3 hours ago, BIGNEWY said:

While we appreciate the feedback, and agree SRS is a great app. Having a in house out of the box voice tool is something we want to provide, it will help with new users who do not want to mess with outside apps. A voice tool for DCS has been asked for for many years and we are happy to provide it.

thank you

Criticism and opinions come from passion most of the time not hate ( I’d like to believe). We are all still here playing because we love DCS! Deep down the vast majority of us really appreciate everything the ED team does for us! Never said enough, but truly thank you guys for all of your hard work and dedication!

[Hotdognz]

Ill happily give the new in game voice a try again but so far every time we have tried to use it as a group in the past its been very mixed results (reported in the bugs setion) hopefully it's better this next update.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

[Hoirtel]

What will be interesting is the integration with the Comms menu, I think it would be interesting to block VoIP on frequencies that are set to airfields, tankers etc so that they are distinguished. One big problem with SRS at the moment is needing two bindings for each transmit button, so that you still access the Comms menus (not entirely avoidable) and also have another for talk. From looking at the button map it looks like two bindings are still required but maybe this will change.

[rob10]

6 hours ago, Hoirtel said:

.... I think it would be interesting to block VoIP on frequencies that are set to airfields, tankers etc so that they are distinguished. One big problem with SRS at the moment is needing two bindings for each transmit button, so that you still access the Comms menus (not entirely avoidable) and also have another for talk.

Can't agree with taking that away.  Yes it's a bit of a pain, but reality is that in MP in many cases you're going to want to both be able to use the COMMS menu options AND communicate with other players on voice on the same frequency (i.e. landing on the carrier we use the COMMS menu mainly to get BRC, but voice call the rest).

[Dragon1-1]

RAZBAM does have a solution for that, short PTT push opens the comms menu, long press is VOIP. Ideally, AI comms would be integrated with VOIP fully, so that all people on the channel hear everything, just like IRL.

[greco.bernardi]

It would be great if some openAI code could be implemented in DCS to make the communication interactions between players and DCS more natural than a communication menu...

Imagine how much fun it would be if you could just type in the frequency of the airfield radio channel, press the button and make a voice call, just like in real life, to get clearance or to call the ground crew, without a menu of commands or default responses. 

I hope ED is already looking at an AI solution not only for behaviour but also for communication between players and the game.

 

[Hoirtel]

50 minutes ago, rob10 said:

Can't agree with taking that away.  Yes it's a bit of a pain, but reality is that in MP in many cases you're going to want to both be able to use the COMMS menu options AND communicate with other players on voice on the same frequency (i.e. landing on the carrier we use the COMMS menu mainly to get BRC, but voice call the rest).

Yeah, maybe. One of those things that would need to try to see how it works. Just needs the integration of comms options and VoIP to be a bit better. For your example, it would be good if they could install two radios in jets to they could do these types of things easily....

[Dragon1-1]

4 hours ago, greco.bernardi said:

I hope ED is already looking at an AI solution not only for behaviour but also for communication between players and the game.

You don't need AI to do what you're proposing. In aviation, there are strict procedures regarding as to how things are said, you don't need an AI to make up responses. Voice recognition is part of Windows, and if ED wanted to implement it, all they'd have to make is implement a VoiceAttack-like macros into DCS, with VAICOM-like ability to interface with the sim. VAICOM has some inadequacies in keyword choice (for example, it won't understand "chocks", you need to say "wheelchocks" for some reason), but to some extent you can do that already.

Would be nice if ATC was able to make jokes and small talk like IRL, that's about the only thing ChatGPT is really good at if you're not into prompt engineering. However, as with HB's Jester, a canned system of randomized responses would do that, as well. And no, you can't use AI voice synthesis to sound like a human, either. They're close, but not there yet. ED could, however, hire decent voice actors, or bribe some aviation YouTubers with free modules if they record some lines for them.

[Gunfreak]

4 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

You don't need AI to do what you're proposing. In aviation, there are strict procedures regarding as to how things are said, you don't need an AI to make up responses. Voice recognition is part of Windows, and if ED wanted to implement it, all they'd have to make is implement a VoiceAttack-like macros into DCS, with VAICOM-like ability to interface with the sim. VAICOM has some inadequacies in keyword choice (for example, it won't understand "chocks", you need to say "wheelchocks" for some reason), but to some extent you can do that already.

Would be nice if ATC was able to make jokes and small talk like IRL, that's about the only thing ChatGPT is really good at if you're not into prompt engineering. However, as with HB's Jester, a canned system of randomized responses would do that, as well. And no, you can't use AI voice synthesis to sound like a human, either. They're close, but not there yet. ED could, however, hire decent voice actors, or bribe some aviation YouTubers with free modules if they record some lines for them.

I think ED needs an text to speech thing. So you can make any callsign you want and the various AI dialog in game will use that call sign. Same with writing dilaog in mission making. There is a lot of good text to speech programs now with much more realistic voice and pronaoucation. So it won't sound like Steven Hawking.

[Dragon1-1]

Try Operation Sandworm (or just watch some videos of it) for how it works out in practice. I gave it a pass based on that. Yes, it's not exactly the best TTS, but even good ones sound flat and somewhat robotic. If you find one that sounds good, then you can use it to record AI dialog, but I wouldn't use TTS for the whole sim. Admittedly, many pilots do try to affect a calm, deadpan voice on the radio, but not quite to that extent.

[Gunfreak]

1 hour ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Try Operation Sandworm (or just watch some videos of it) for how it works out in practice. I gave it a pass based on that. Yes, it's not exactly the best TTS, but even good ones sound flat and somewhat robotic. If you find one that sounds good, then you can use it to record AI dialog, but I wouldn't use TTS for the whole sim. Admittedly, many pilots do try to affect a calm, deadpan voice on the radio, but not quite to that extent.

The voice used now in game coms doesn't sound much better then what some text to speech sounds like. I haven't played Sandstorm. But if you watch those silly Facebook reels you'll notice the same woman voice on like 90% of the vidoes. That's some kinda text to speech bot thing. And sounds about as natural as the ATC or my AI wingman in DCS.

[Dragon1-1]

Yeah, that's because current voice acting is old, as in, LOMAC era, and IIRC acted by one of the devs for most part. Try Russian ATC voices (also old, but they sound like actual voice actors and have better mastering) or SC comms to hear how it really should sound. You can't get that with a TTS bot, and that's the standard ED should be aiming for with any new content.

[greco.bernardi]

20 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

You don't need AI to do what you're proposing. In aviation, there are strict procedures regarding as to how things are said, you don't need an AI to make up responses. Voice recognition is part of Windows, and if ED wanted to implement it, all they'd have to make is implement a VoiceAttack-like macros into DCS, with VAICOM-like ability to interface with the sim. VAICOM has some inadequacies in keyword choice (for example, it won't understand "chocks", you need to say "wheelchocks" for some reason), but to some extent you can do that already.

Would be nice if ATC was able to make jokes and small talk like IRL, that's about the only thing ChatGPT is really good at if you're not into prompt engineering. However, as with HB's Jester, a canned system of randomized responses would do that, as well. And no, you can't use AI voice synthesis to sound like a human, either. They're close, but not there yet. ED could, however, hire decent voice actors, or bribe some aviation YouTubers with free modules if they record some lines for them.

I think that a simple voice recognition commands will not good enought. The ability of game realy undestands what is said is the key of a natural comunication... A stupid ATC, crew or wingman that can´t undestand what is said because you didn´t talk a command as scripted is in nowdays a poor solution in my opnion.