How Should the Exhaust Sounds Change Each Level?

[JTB10000]

I have been wanting to ask what you think PD should do the for exhaust sounds in their next iteration GT. It's quite obvious that they are going to keep the Sports/Semi-Racing/Racing exhaust format since they have done it since the beginning, but something needs to change about the way they handle them (completely changing to sound is not realistic).

So, my question to you is: how should the exhaust upgrades be done to where they can keep this format, but also be realistic?

I'll understand if this thread gets locked.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say completely changing the sound is not realistic?

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

 

[JTB10000]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say completely changing the sound is not realistic?

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

The sounds literally completely change. For example, Corvettes in GT6 go from sounding like V7.5's to ricer cars with a misshapen exhausts.

 

[diegorborges]

Want a good advice? Don't change the exhausts... only in some rare cases, it's worthy. And when it is, it's only for the sports exhaust.

Specially the Corvettes, some sound pretty OK (for Gran Turismo standards)...

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

The sounds literally completely change. For example, Corvettes in GT6 go from sounding like V7.5's to ricer cars with a misshapen exhausts.

I did not say the sounds in GT are correct but different exhaust systems do completely change the sound in real life

 

[Wide Boy]

Due to the sheer volume of cars they only have a few choices.

Simple is just modify the original sound if you put on an aftermarket exhaust.

More expensive but probably faster is to sample a dozen or so aftermarket exhaust manufacturers, preferably 4-5 exhausts from each maker.

Match those exhaust sounds to the cars by engine type for each supplier.
You choose which maker you prefer when you upgrade your exhaust.

There are huge differences in aftermarket exhaust sounds so you shold find something you like.

There is no way they can do more & model the performance differences from each manufacturer so its still generic just with your choice of favourite manufactures sounds

 

[LS Chiou]

I found it annoying that the 'trends' are different among cars and are unpredictable.

For example, some V8 sound majestic with full racing pipe, while some V12 sound awful with the same mod. Some cars sound the best in sport or semi-racing. General speaking, there's no general rule.

I always have to try them one by one, and pick the best sounding one. In several cases, I'm pissed off when forced to abandon them all and back to the stock form.

IRL, except louder, the sounds tend to be more growl, more spitting, more screaming, more solid, thicker, deeper, more everything in the same time when it approaching a straight pipe. But in GT, it's not like that. A total mess.

 

[Rafael F]

It's easy, the sounds should be like this:
* standard exhaust: "VEEeeee..."
* sports exhaust: "VROOOOM..."
* racing exhaust: "ROOOAAAAARRR!!!"

 

[FussyFez]

Due to the sheer volume of cars they only have a few choices.

Simple is just modify the original sound if you put on an aftermarket exhaust.

More expensive but probably faster is to sample a dozen or so aftermarket exhaust manufacturers, preferably 4-5 exhausts from each maker.

Match those exhaust sounds to the cars by engine type for each supplier.
You choose which maker you prefer when you upgrade your exhaust.

There are huge differences in aftermarket exhaust sounds so you shold find something you like.

There is no way they can do more & model the performance differences from each manufacturer so its still generic just with your choice of favourite manufactures sounds

This.


I could slap a powerflow cat back system on my car, and it would retain the standard tones, just be louder with a slight rasp on vtec.

If I fitted a buddy club full system, the rasps would be evident from much lower in the revs, with an absolute howling shriek on vtec.


It would be ridiculously time consuming to get all the sounds perfect.

It's a compromise that comes with 1300+ cars, or whatever the car count is now.


I would be happy with relatively generic sounds for 80% of cars, but the monstrous 600+bhp V8's and turbo nutters, should sound like 600+bhp monsters.

I love all of the pCARS sounds, they're beautiful.

 

[Wide Boy]

I love the way you guys generalise there is no hard & fast rule for pipes, different manufactures can & often do sound entirely different.

From my experience which to be honest is mainly with bikes
Pipes can be noisy across the rev range or just at high rpm.
Some go deeper some go screamier & some just plain wail.
Some are relatively quite on the overrun others are glorious, some bark others spit & growl
I had a Yoshi exhaust that was a licence loser because you just had to go as fast as possible so you could change down several gears because you just had to hear the pack of banshees screaming at you.
That particular exhaust was at least as quite as the stock till nearly 2/3rds the way round the rev counter then it introduced itself with a deep rumble turning into a full blooded scream like a cross between a Honda V Tec & formula one car.

For those who ride bikes & I cant recommend it if your worried about your engine seals though this has been done on at least a dozen bikes with no harm noticed bar punishing your chain.

2nd or 3rd gear at around 40mph hit the kill switch & count to 3 then put it back on.

Result is a big bang & growl along with an instant wheelie & several feet of flames out of your exhaust so best done at dusk to see them.

Generally a crowd pleaser discovered by my mate when his bike developed an intermittent firing fault on 2 cylinders which unexpectedly cut out & then back in. He had a hairy ride home it normally cut back in mid corner much to our amusement.

 

[LS Chiou]

....


2nd or 3rd gear at around 40mph hit the kill switch & count to 3 then put it back on.

Result is a big bang & growl along with an instant wheelie & several feet of flames out of your exhaust so best done at dusk to see them.
....

Wide Boy, or Wild Boy?

 

[Vegard]

Exhaust systems should mainly alter the acoustics of an engine, not the impulse characteristics.

They should use the manifold tuning to represent percieved impulse alterations as a result of plumbing modifications.
Give us realistic options.

And, I have to mention intake sound and tuning as well, because without that GT will never sound right.

 

[FT-1]

The thing is, most of the sounds produced by stock exhausts on road cars are usually accurate, but the sound samples are too quiet and lack depth.

Different problems arise when after-market exhausts are fitted. While they are louder than stock samples, the tone completely changes, resulting in a sound which does not match the layout of the engine (E.g. 6 cylinder sound for a flat-4 car)

The best step for PD to take is to make the stock exhaust sound louder for modified exhausts. I wouldn't mind if the louder samples sounded the same at every level, but I would rather have that than completely inaccurate sounds.

 

[Automotive]

I always had the idea for PD to outsource the Exhaust function & Sound. They make partnerships/ Sponsor with custom rims.... Why not do the same with Body kits and Exhaust. Could you imagine if we had a little shop in the game to get custom exhaust from..... Flowmaster, Magnaflow, SLP Loudmouth, Boria. Even custom Exhaust Tips. In other words... Tune your car to the sound you want. Almost nobody would have the same sound and nobody can complain on the accuracy of the sound. I love the sound of the BMW M5 right now with Semi & Racing Exhaust but it could be better. Sounds like it's Supercharged. Which leads me to another question... Why is M3 Coupe or any other BMW Road car does not have the option to Supercharge or Turbo when surely you can in real life... The M3 Coupe Sounds horrible with anything but it rides on rails if tuned right. Makes me angry.... This is how I want my M3 to sound like.

 

[thestig11]

It's easy, the sounds should be like this:
* standard exhaust: "VEEeeee..."
* sports exhaust: "VROOOOM..."
* racing exhaust: "ROOOAAAAARRR!!!"

perfect explanation right here, I may even put it in my signature!

 

[Crispy]

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

I believe backfire on cars is caused by a richer Air-Fuel ratio rather than the exhaust.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Well I have had cases back in the day where I bottomed out and knocked the muffler(s) off a few cars and in addition to the car being very loud there would be a good bit of popping out the exhaust when backing off/engine braking. I don't think backfire is actually the correct term for this but that is what most people seem to call it.

 

[eSZee]

Stock character should be retained with street+semi. Just added rasp due to smaller muffler/larger pipe/less baffling.
Race should just be rasp on top of rasp on top of metallic noise and resonance on top of crackling and popping.

Stock+street


semi-racing


RACE

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Can't tell much about the sound in that race clip, first clip wind making about as much noise as the exhaust.

4 banger may not be the best example either. Would be nice to have a good example from a strong V8.

I was thinking about an old Firebird I used to have, I installed a Olds Rocket 455 in it and had to drive it about 1/2 mile with open headers on it to the exhaust shop to get the pipes made up. Even at an idle that thing was loud and even with the tiniest bit of throttle it was almost deafening inside the car.

 

[CarreraGT]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say completely changing the sound is not realistic?

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

Exhaust upgrades are done very poorly in GT. It doesn't even sound like they have been recorded, as I have now found 3 cars that sound identical: Holden Monaro and Ferrari F40 with sports exhaust and Shelby GT500 with semi-racing exhaust.

Under no circumstances should a 5.7L naturally aspirated pushrod V8 (with silly Chevy firing order) sound the same as a 5.8L quad cam supercharged V8 sound the same as a 2.9L twin turbocharged flat plane crank V8. It's just pathetic PD, clearly no effort has gone into it at all...

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say completely changing the sound is not realistic?

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

The backfire isn't created due to exhaust change...not sure where you got that info from unless you mean something else. Maybe you mean it allows those type of noises to be more clear when driving.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

The backfire isn't created due to exhaust change...not sure where you got that info from unless you mean something else. Maybe you mean it allows those type of noises to be more clear when driving.

Yeah poor choice of words I guess. Technically a backfire is when it blows back through the intake but I can't count the number of times I have heard the pop in the exhaust called a backfire, fire popping out the exhaust pipes which are typically at the rear [back fire] perhaps.

At any rate if you watch a race car with pipes that exit the side especially you will see flames pretty much every time they let off along with a popping sound which is what I was referring to and is often referred to as a backfire

 

[LMSCorvetteGT2]

Yeah poor choice of words I guess. Technically a backfire is when it blows back through the intake but I can't count the number of times I have heard the pop in the exhaust called a backfire, fire popping out the exhaust pipes which are typically at the rear [back fire] perhaps.

At any rate if you watch a race car with pipes that exit the side especially you will see flames pretty much every time they let off along with a popping sound which is what I was referring to and is often referred to as a backfire

Oh I see so you mean when there is an excess full dumped during that off throttle in braking or low speed corners. So basically the exhaust making the noise more clear than say a standard road going one on most cars even performance cars to a certain degree. Thanks for clarifying.

Also the exhaust should be more deep and clear as you upgrade the car and engine @ the OP

 

[LS Chiou]

.....

The best step for PD to take is to make the stock exhaust sound louder for modified exhausts. I wouldn't mind if the louder samples sounded the same at every level, but I would rather have that than completely inaccurate sounds.

I've thought the similar thing, but it can be done better by some 'simple' process -- based on the stock sound and give some altering to the frequency response (EQ), and some more texture (larger amplitude of the pulse).

I'm not sure how much it takes in the software, but these are just very common things in recording/audio industry. And by such process, at least it'd be much better than random and messy effects we have now.

 

[HuskyGT]

Just make cars sound accurately to their real counterparts (no more V12 Lambos sounding like V8's and V10's), and give the sounds a bit more oomph without making it louder. Do that right, and I personally wouldn't mind if the sounds didn't change when replacing the exhaust.

I've been playing Forza 3 for almost a month now. Wow... It sounds dumb, but the sound is part of why I keep playing it. Sounds don't change if you change the exhaust, but the sounds are so rich, they have the perfect volume, no distortion (like those horrible sounds that NFS Shift and Shift 2 have), and overall they sound much more realistic. But most importantly, they are ACCURATE; something that GT has been failing ever since the first game. I haven't heard a single car yet with an incorrect engine sound.

 

[MSTER232]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say completely changing the sound is not realistic?

Stock on many real cars is very quiet, sports louder and throatier, race very loud, backfires and such. in other words the sound completely changes

I think what he means is that the basic "character" of the sound should still be there because the same engine is being used when the exhaust is changed. But it should get louder, "darken" in sound and amplified bass when you go for sports, semi-sports or racing exhausts.

 

[CarreraGT]

I think what he means is that the basic "character" of the sound should still be there because the same engine is being used when the exhaust is changed. But it should get louder, "darken" in sound and amplified bass when you go for sports, semi-sports or racing exhausts.

They should sound like they do in real life, simple as that.

Any idiot with access to YouTube can tell you that the cars don't sound right. How GT could be happy with the product the way it is is goes completely against Kaz's vision of perfection and "simulating everything".

As your quote implies, a WRX with a straight through muffler still sounds like a boxer, it's just louder. Mufflers are pretty simple, it's not rocket science

 

[LS Chiou]

Muffler itself is simple, but the overal sound is not.

Take the majority cars with inline 4 IRL, they also sound similar with stock exhaust, all muted. But if you drive them hard, you'd hear different sound in the car. And with after market parts, they would sound even more differently.

Bore x stroke & cam timing of the engine itself, designs of intake & exhaust manifolds, spec/position of catalyst, mufflers themselves and their positions, bore x length and bends of the pipes, body structure and sound proofing arrangements.... All these factors count.

Also, the sound is changing with rev and load, which means it's changing constantly by the driving conditions. In other words, in the game, you have to prepare a lot of samples for mapping the conditions of the car and the conditions of driving. And there're many of them on the track.

I'm not sure if PD has sampled the sounds of all cars in the game, at least many of them sound pretty good in stock form. It's part of the mods sound bad. (OK, maybe it's quite a big part.) But if the sounds of all cars in the game with every mods have to be sampled, that'd be a huge project, no doubt. And how all the huge content in the game (think all the details of tracks and cars) should be properly arranged in the resource distribution is another headache.

I agree PD hasn't done it perfectly, and any idiot can hear many of the sounds aren't right, but it's not any idiot can fix.

 

[CarreraGT]

Muffler itself is simple, but the overal sound is not.

Take the majority cars with inline 4 IRL, they also sound similar with stock exhaust, all muted. But if you drive them hard, you'd hear different sound in the car. And with after market parts, they would sound even more differently.

Bore x stroke & cam timing of the engine itself, designs of intake & exhaust manifolds, spec/position of catalyst, mufflers themselves and their positions, bore x length and bends of the pipes, body structure and sound proofing arrangements.... All these factors count.

Also, the sound is changing with rev and load, which means it's changing constantly by the driving conditions. In other words, in the game, you have to prepare a lot of samples for mapping the conditions of the car and the conditions of driving. And there're many of them on the track.

I'm not sure if PD has sampled the sounds of all cars in the game, at least many of them sound pretty good in stock form. It's part of the mods sound bad. (OK, maybe it's quite a big part.) But if the sounds of all cars in the game with every mods have to be sampled, that'd be a huge project, no doubt. And how all the huge content in the game (think all the details of tracks and cars) should be properly arranged in the resource distribution is another headache.

I agree PD hasn't done it perfectly, and any idiot can hear many of the sounds aren't right, but it's not any idiot can fix.

You've missed the point entirely. Yes one 4 cylinder engine may sound slightly different to another 4 cylinder engine due to the design parameters you have listed, but that doesn't mean that one car will sound completely different with a different exhaust system.

I'm not for a minute suggesting that sound modelling is simple, but using a sound sample that sounds nothing like the car should is not only unrealistic but it makes the game look (and sound) cheap

 

[Griffith500]

There shouldn't be "levels". You should be able to spec the entire system, start to finish; same for the intake. It should be possible to design it to complement the engine tuning or conflict with it. That implies providing "kits" containing complementarily tuned parts, but providing the detail to let players tweak away and even make their own kits if they want to...

The sound is an intrinsic by-product of the way the engine is performing, so that should fall out naturally from the same system. I think PD could be brewing something very interesting in this area.

Take those Imprezas: what if I want the equal length sound with the sports system? Or vice versa if it's a Japanese spec car? I'd love to be able to create odd-ball designs, too, and I have a few that sound great but aren't really used in real life already saved up in my special "collection".