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If you were playing through a game and you got to a part where an alarm would be playing for a really long time, would you want an option to silence the alarm, like your character getting earplugs, or would you play with the alarm going off in all its glory?

I don't think there's a person on earth who wouldn't shut off an annoying alarm given the choice.

redgroupclan wrote:If you were playing through a game and you got to a part where an alarm would be playing for a really long time, would you want an option to silence the alarm, like your character getting earplugs, or would you play with the alarm going off in all its glory?

I would probably seek for a way to disable the alarm, seeing as an alarm would mean more enemies.

It's almost always a good gameplay option to be able to disable alarms, it's called an intermediate objective - an objective that the player assigns themselves in the very short term. But to just shut off the alarm sound and keep the effects of the alarm on going seems a bit odd. I guess as long as the player had no way of forgetting the alarm was going off, like enemies kept spawning etc then it would be ok. Maybe just fade the alarm volume down over time until it is more an ambient sound than a blaring alarm?

Black_Stormy wrote:It's almost always a good gameplay option to be able to disable alarms, it's called an intermediate objective - an objective that the player assigns themselves in the very short term. But to just shut off the alarm sound and keep the effects of the alarm on going seems a bit odd. I guess as long as the player had no way of forgetting the alarm was going off, like enemies kept spawning etc then it would be ok. Maybe just fade the alarm volume down over time until it is more an ambient sound than a blaring alarm?

What Stormy said, but also try to design the alarm so that it doesn't sound.. well.. annoying.

Examples of alarms that are "proper" alarms, in the sense that they're annoying(like a proper real alarm should be):

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmrXN6q0eu4
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoX7vd30zq8
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erMO3m0oLvs

Some examples of synthetic alarms. Some more annoying than others. But have a shot at making your own!

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S-PQzlPSus
• http://soundcloud.com/corewarp/alarmdonegud

EDIT: lol, didn't answer the question.
If the alarm is made like a proper alarm(IE: very annoying to listen to), then yes, I'd very much like to turn it off. But if you made an alarm with a smart design, perhaps with 1-2 second breaks, then I could listen to that shit all day.