The Great Ensmallening: Part 3 (Mesh Accuracy + Sound Fidelity)

[[DE]Rebecca]

1/22/2021 Update:

Some final tests are being done before we can ship these changes. Expect Part 3 of the ensmallening to arrive next week on PC!

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Tenno, 

We bring you Part 3 of the ensmallening. By now you already know about Part 1 and Part 2, but now we will go into how we are changing Mesh Accuracy and Sound Fidelity.

We expect the download size to be 7 GB  with an estimated 3.6 GB of savings overall, meaning the game just got 3.6 GB smaller in file size!  These numbers may vary slightly. 

Our target release for this is *next week on PC. Until then, read on about how we are continuing to optimize Warframe, while also making gains in quality!

Mesh Accuracy:
A big part of the Ensmallening Part 3 is how Meshes are changing. Not only are we reducing filesize, we are also significantly improving quality.Look to this Before and After for the improvements you can expect:

 

BEFORE:
Take care to observe the eyes and mouth and ear details. Jagged details are widespread. 

AFTER:
Take care to see the improved contours and details across the Mesh. A much smoother finished piece!

 

Sound Fidelity:

This one is for the audiophiles! 

We are making some changes to the way we handle encoding of Warframe’s audio. We are replacing xWMA with OPUS and a new ADPCM encoder! ADPCM will provide less noise and brighter mids. It also has improved spatialization so that the full audio mix just feels more alive.

Here is a spectrum plot of sine sweep 20-20k with the new ADPCM encoder above the old. Much improved!
 

In general, Opus will really improve the way you hear Warframe’s accompanying music. We also expect this to improve general synchronization and any start up lag! Stay tuned for a future Devstream where we go over this in a bit more detail, too, for the audiophiles out there!

Cheers Tenno!  
 

[Voltage]

Awesome! :)

[(XBOX)AMONGTHEWEAK]

Nice, but Cross-Save/Play when?

[[DE]Rebecca]

1 minute ago, (XBOX)AMONGTHEWEAK said:

Nice, but Cross-Save/Play when?

We said when we have something meaningful to say, we'll say it, because until then it's just going to be empty noise and 'we really need to get this done'. 

[Voltage]

7 minutes ago, [DE]Rebecca said:

-snip-

Might just be me, but the before and after images did not embed / is not there.

EDIT: It was fixed. Thanks!

[Fangrin]

Tenno it up

[JaceML6]

sounds good

[ThisIsMyWarframe]

Looks great, super pumped for those audio upgrades. Sound team is killing it as always!

[(XBOX)Chicken Joe2449]

This is awesome! When octavia prime comes can we have a slight rework where if i replace 1 of her abilites that sound on madachord will play from a different ability? then we still get all the sounds from the songs we want.  Example: I replaced resonator with fireblast and now there is no bass... Could bass then play when i activate Metronome?

 

[TheLordBlackadder]

The before/after appear very small for me.

EDIT: Fixed.

[LillyRaccune]

Can there be an option to Opt-Out of texture compression? My budget build PC has been crashing mid-game continuously ever since the last "Great Ensmallening".

I would be thrilled to let it take more space on my disk, if it meant that I get better stability.

[LillyRaccune]

10 minutes ago, [DE]Rebecca said:

This one is for the audiophiles! 

Can we get more selection of volume sliders? I want to hear the birds and crickets in Plains of Eidolon at max volume without going deaf during combat! 💖 Thanks

[trunks013]

Sounds upgrade ! I'm in ^.^ 

[A7roboBOT]

Mesh changes look nice on the operator, but could we see some examples of weapons and frames?

[Old_Fogie]

6 minutes ago, [DE]Rebecca said:

We said when we have something meaningful to say, we'll say it, because until then it's just going to be empty noise and 'we really need to get this done'. 

Wow.... Ok. Um, appreciate your busy and such, but may I politely suggest switching to decaf?

[LillyRaccune]

Also a dedicated volume control for Tranq Rifle would be great! 💖

EDIT: While I'm on the topic, can we get the beeping for the tranq rifle to come with a stereo-scopic function? It would be nice to know if the fluffy little critters are behind me, to the left, or to the right. Maybe really quiet if they are super far away, or perhaps have an increased sustain/pseudo-echo to give me a clue about their distance.

Better yet! Provide a visual solution so the hearing impaired can get in on the fluffy-wuffy conservation too 💖 I have tinnitus, but at least I can hear. Many people have it worse than me.

 

[---Swaggi---]

Alright looking forward :)

[(PSN)xBellikx]

Will Frost's Prime, Festive and immortal skins ever get a prime toggle? so it actually doesn't look disjointed when I try to mix them with alt helmets, that one little detail in his neck that makes the difference between regular and prime, it has been bothering me since a while now.

[[DE]Rebecca]

Just now, Old_Fogie said:

Wow.... Ok. Um, appreciate your busy and such, but may I politely suggest switching to decaf?

I already drink Decaf in the afternoons! I'm just stating the facts of the matters, no one wants cross save more than I, and I am simply summarizing Steve's words from December and before. 

[Bluefoxorgin]

thank you for the updates reb 

 

[Krilexis]

Im seeing the mouth was just ugly 😆

Good thing about sounds but does this change has negative impact on fps?

[trunks013]

9 minutes ago, Old_Fogie said:

Wow.... Ok. Um, appreciate your busy and such, but may I politely suggest switching to decaf?

Well i think she is more of a tea person but i may be wrong ^.^ 

[Ragingterror]

Those are some striking visual changes. Me likey!

[(NSW)Kadet]

Any ideas how these ensmallening changes will impact consoles (particularly switch)?  Do you think smaller meshes and audio sizes will improve load times?  The audio section said there may be some performance improvements at least in synchronization.

PS - the before and afters do look better ;)

[Mephane]

Will this also fix the phase of stutters at the beginning of every mission where it appears the game is still loading stuff and blocking the rendering pipeline while waiting for assets?