Sound Mods Not Working

[ReachNetwork]

Despite my best efforts I still can't seem to get a set of sentry sound mods functioning. Here's the story.

After watching some Trolling by Delfy, I noticed he had Sentry Sounds that were different. I've known about sound mods for some time but never bothered to try and get one... until now.

Via Gamebanana I downloaded a Sentry Sound Pack and placed it in my customs folder as directed by the instructions in the .RAR file that was downloaded from the site, inside the Team Fortress 2 folder. I did that properly because it worked. The sound files played like they should have. Now here's where the human error gets introduced.

I noticed that the sound files were simple .WAV files and figured being the smart guy that I am, they'd be easy enough to simply replace with my own. So I replaced some, but not all of the sound files with my own custom sounds. The ones that weren't replaced worked. The new files did not.

After extensive searching and a LOT of frustration I cannot fix the sound files that do not work. The files that were replaced were the Sentry_Shoot.WAV files, including Sentry_Shoot2.WAV and Sentry_Shoot3.WAV. And not only do they NOT work, the original Sentry Shooting sounds that would play with a fresh install of TF2 do not play either. The Sentry Guns firing sounds are pure silence, no sound is played at all when the sentry shoots.

After even more searching, and moving files around within the Custom Folder, nothing seems to fix it, but moving them always results in the same problem. The Sound Files that were included with the pack work, the ones I changed out do not play, and the normal sounds that you would expect to hear without a sound pack do not play either.

Additional Searching gave me some hints towards the following: Bitrate of the file can effect whether it's played or not, as well as the Hertz rate of the file itself. The most constant result I was finding is that files needed to be at 44.1KHz, so I went and checked my replacement files. They were all at 48.0KHz. This is where it starts to get even more odd. The sound files in the pack that weren't replaced range from 16KHz, 22KHz and 41KHz. But still function.

Google searches of time later, I couldn't find an actual consise anwser to my problem, or even a guide to make your own Sound Mod packs from Scratch, as that would have rules that you would have to abide by. I can't find either. I've tried everything I could think of, including saving the replacement WAV's that don't work as new ones at the recommended 44.1KHz, which as expected slowed the sound down, but didn't ruin the file. I couldn't tell the difference. That being said, saving the replaced files in the slower Hertz format didn't change a damn thing. The sound will not play.

That was 3 hours ago. I give up. Does the community have any insite to my problem or should I just cut my losses and give up on the sound pack entirely? The original Sentry_Shoot.WAV files I didn't like in the pack, so I won't use the original pack, I like the new sounds I made, and this has been the biggest pain in my ass that TF2 has thrown at me yet.

Snuffing out the obvious "solutions":
The new sounds that don't play are saved in .WAV format.
There are no conflicting sound files in any other spot that would mess up them playing.
They ARE loud enough. You can play them in a media player or sound editor, they sound like they should in those programs but TF2 continues to say "Screw you" to my face and not play them.
They were placed in the same spot as the original sound files in the pack were. The originals worked, the new ones do not.
After being placed in the same folder as the original pack sound files, they new files were renamed PROPERLY. "sentry_shoot.wav" shoot2 or shoot3.

Help me!

[big stinky retard]

/\/\aby yo played on a sv_p re 1 server (Broken keyboard keys yo)

[lil penis]

Sorry, bro, I'm experiencing the same problems.

Possibly some Update caused any Sentry Mod to quit working

[Gilamex]

About 90% of my (custom made) sound mods work, but my winning and losing sounds never do and its really ticking me off because those are my most favorite ones...

[Shakes]

Just as a precaution, make sure all of your custom files are named in all-lowercase. Also, after installing or changing any mods, make sure that you delete its associated soundcache file. For VPK mods, they will be called name-of-vpk.sound.cache. For mods in their own folders, it will be in the sound folder, and the file will be called sound.cache.

Note that for ALL of the WAV files in the game are 16-bit signed Microsoft WAVs and either 11025 Hz or 44100 Hz (this is known as the sample rate, not the bitrate). I believe all of the sounds for the sentry are also mono as opposed to stereo.

Originally posted by Dominic™:

About 90% of my (custom made) sound mods work, but my winning and losing sounds never do and its really ticking me off because those are my most favorite ones...

This might be because the mod you installed is using WAV files instead of MP3s. A lot of sound mods might have this problem, as most of the game's sounds were converted to MP3 a little while back.

The best way to test your mods is a) making an itemtest server (suitable for most mods) or b) create another server on one of the other maps. If they work on your own server, but not other servers, then this means sv_pure is either set to 1 or 2 on that server, and only certain mods will work.

[Gilamex]

Originally posted by Squish, Son of Squain:

The best way to test your mods is a) making an itemtest server (suitable for most mods) or b) create another server on one of the other maps. If they work on your own server, but not other servers, then this means sv_pure is either set to 1 or 2 on that server, and only certain mods will work.

I'll be sure to try this sometime, I'll try to come back with results... hm.

[SurpriseGmg]

There's the rare chance that mods suddenly break after updates or corruption. Just try redownloading the mod, or try another one. This happened to me, my camera noise turned into the equivalent of a screaming kid.

[Gilamex]

Originally posted by SurpriseGamer:

There's the rare chance that mods suddenly break after updates or corruption. Just try redownloading the mod, or try another one. This happened to me, my camera noise turned into the equivalent of a screaming kid.

That's what a few of mine are, but i'm too lazy to update them.

[SurpriseGmg]

Originally posted by Dominic™:

Originally posted by SurpriseGamer:

There's the rare chance that mods suddenly break after updates or corruption. Just try redownloading the mod, or try another one. This happened to me, my camera noise turned into the equivalent of a screaming kid.

That's what a few of mine are, but i'm too lazy to update them.

I just stopped using them altogether. They really broke the flow of modded servers, and sometimes completley just ruined them.

[MarkBV]

Can someone help? I have like no experience installing mods. I've only installed the better Engineer FPV animations. But now I'm trying to instal a mod that makes the mercs use profanity upon certain voice lines. But it's not working. I download the mod, I extract it, I put the VPK inside the custom folder, I test it on map itemtest and a custom server, I set sv_pure to 0, but it doesn't work. What am I doing wrong?

[Gilamex]

Originally posted by MarkBV:

Can someone help? I have like no experience installing mods. I've only installed the better Engineer FPV animations. But now I'm trying to instal a mod that makes the mercs use profanity upon certain voice lines. But it's not working. I download the mod, I extract it, I put the VPK inside the custom folder, I test it on map itemtest and a custom server, I set sv_pure to 0, but it doesn't work. What am I doing wrong?

Wow, way to revive a dead thread. From what I can tell, sound mods are severely limited to which ones work nowadays... you should be able to use any sound on an sv_pure 0 server though, I believe. It has something to do with loading up the server. I remember hearing something about how when you launch the game, the first server you connect to is important and sets the entire game to use the sound mods or not (for some reason). So if the server is set to pure 0 after you connect, it messes stuff up. It has to be 0 before you connect, I'm not sure how to do that though. (Not even sure if this'll help. I haven't dealt with custom sounds beyond what's allowed in sv_pure servers in years).

[MarkBV]

Originally posted by Gilamex the Bunnicorn:

Originally posted by MarkBV:

Can someone help? I have like no experience installing mods. I've only installed the better Engineer FPV animations. But now I'm trying to instal a mod that makes the mercs use profanity upon certain voice lines. But it's not working. I download the mod, I extract it, I put the VPK inside the custom folder, I test it on map itemtest and a custom server, I set sv_pure to 0, but it doesn't work. What am I doing wrong?

Wow, way to revive a dead thread. From what I can tell, sound mods are severely limited to which ones work nowadays... you should be able to use any sound on an sv_pure 0 server though, I believe. It has something to do with loading up the server. I remember hearing something about how when you launch the game, the first server you connect to is important and sets the entire game to use the sound mods or not (for some reason). So if the server is set to pure 0 after you connect, it messes stuff up. It has to be 0 before you connect, I'm not sure how to do that though. (Not even sure if this'll help. I haven't dealt with custom sounds beyond what's allowed in sv_pure servers in years).

Yo thanks, but it seems it was actually working. I was testing my mod on the itemtest server, but it seems like it only works if other players hurt me, not if I hurt myself.
But it also seems that that wasn't the mod I was looking for. It ads profanity to only a few hurt voice lines, but the one I saw in a video was one that added them to many voice lines. Dunno where that one is, but at least this one is working. Thank you again!