Suggestion: Proximity Voice Chat for PC

Elsonso · June 2023

JanTanhide wrote: »

I'm not a Console player but isn't voice chat on Xbox and PS part of the Xbox and PS networks and not built into ESO?

As I understand it, mostly a yes, and that is why PC does not have it. ZOS would have had to build, buy, or lease a VOIP solution to use just on PC, and that would have conflicted with existing third party VOIP systems used by players with other games.

tauriel01 · June 2023

So instead of just immature, toxic zone chat we have to ignore, there will also be someone saying these things out loud. what could possibly go wrong. If they implement this, it just means i'll be turning it off immediately.

Just_Attivi · June 2023

I dont have a ton of MMO experience under my belt, only a handful of them that I have tried, and only 2 that I really stuck with ever. But I was surprised when ESO didn't have voice chat. games dating back to the mid 2000's had it.

I do think proximity chat would be.... atrocious. Sure theres moments where it would be fun, but as a whole... no thank you.

However, party based voice chat, I am for. Want to more easily explain dungeon mechanics with your random group that isnt all in your discord? Want to coordinate in pvp a bit better with non-guildmates that happened to be at the same keep as you? Want to RP in voice with the people in that tavern? Just party up.
I think it would be a a wonderful addition. add in an easy to click 'mute' if you dont want to hear a specific person, volume sliders, and an opt in/opt out option in menus. all pretty standard features in games. particularly when there is no copy/paste functionality in the game by default (many people use mods to add it), getting randoms into a discord call for this one dungeon or this one fight is too much of a hassle. not to mention, maybe you dont have a server you can easily send out 3 invites to, or maybe the other people dont want you to have their discord names etc. In game voice within party (not proximity) opens up a lot of options that would greatly benefit those doing things outside of guild/regular friends in instances where you cant easily stop and type, and would be simple to ignore if you dont want it.

Jammy420 · June 2023

Kendaric wrote: »

Jammy420 wrote: »

I am all for this, it would be a HUGE improvement for RP as well.

It wouldn't be an improvement for RP at all. It would give the trolls just another tool to disrupt RP and that alone is reason enough to never implement it.

I'd turn it off permanently even if it was there. I have absolutely no desire to hear a cute Bosmer girl speak with a gruff male voice and a horrible accent. I still have nightmares from the one time I used in-game voice chat in DDO for RP...

If people are trolling, you report them and mute them. Simple solution. For the RP community this would be a boon.

Jammy420 · June 2023

Ragnarok0130 wrote: »

edward_frigidhands wrote: »

Hello,

I am curious to hear what other PC players think. Also open to hearing what Console players have to share regarding their experiences with using Proximity Voice Chat.

I've played on PC and console for many years and as a mostly PC player we honestly don't need it. We have easy access to a mouse and keyboard to use chat unlike our console brethren and if we have a need for voice people join discords.

Not everyone uses mouse and keyboard. With all the accessibility options being added, this is one that has been needed for a while. I have been strictly a controller user on ALL pc games since as long as I can remember, even Diablo 4 I play with controller. Keyboard instantly triggers my arthritis.

Ragnarok0130 · June 2023

Aorys wrote: »

too much toxicity in text chat already, no, thanks

I agree. From my time playing multiplayer games on console it's not just toxicity that is the issue - in fact toxicity is rather minor IMO; it's someone with an open mic eating loudly, playing music loudly, getting yelled at by his wife or mother, babies crying and dogs barking in the background that makes it a wholly unpleasant experience. I'm certain with ESO's current latency issues embedded game chat would only worsen that aspect of the game as well in addition to being poor audio quality.

PC doesn't need this nonsense as we have good third party solutions with discord where moderators can mute or kick rude or toxic people for the group - discord also happens to be the center of gravity for ESO guilds since ZoS has no real Guild support built into ESO to compliment a voice chat feature. Discord also is a soft bypass to the 5 guild limit in ESO and Consoles now have discord functionality too. I've met awesome people and guilds via being invited to their discord for raids that I would not have met had everyone just used a proximity chat function.

If proximity chat would come to PC I'm certain most would turn it off and never look back creating more wasted dev time and money that should be used elsewhere.

Danikat · June 2023

I wouldn't be able to use it most of the time, even just to listen, so I'd miss out on any discussions happening over voice chat.

Whether or not that's a problem depends on how it's used and how often. There's already lots of guilds and groups who mainly or exclusively use voice chat, but I simply don't join those groups and stick to one who do use text chat. If it became the main way players communicate like it is on console I suppose I'd either have to stick to playing solo or find another game.

Tandor · June 2023

It wouldn't affect me directly as I don't have anything to do with voicechat or indeed the main zone chat (although it irritates me that some private proximity text comments using "/say" persist on my screen in other zones). However, if its design, development, testing and implementation impact on developers' time and resources and, whether or not I use it, it impacts on the server's performance then I'm totally against it.

LatentBuzzard · June 2023

edward_frigidhands wrote: »

Proximity chat is generally off by default in any game, including ESO.

Well then do we have a surprise for you ! Proximity chat on ESO console is enabled by default. Every. Time. You. Log. In.

TaSheen · June 2023

LatentBuzzard wrote: »

edward_frigidhands wrote: »

Proximity chat is generally off by default in any game, including ESO.

Well then do we have a surprise for you ! Proximity chat on ESO console is enabled by default. Every. Time. You. Log. In.

Oh my gosh! You mean they've never fixed that? Didn't that happen about 2 years back now?

Jamie_Aubrey · June 2023

Hell NAW

Panderbander · June 2023

LatentBuzzard wrote: »

edward_frigidhands wrote: »

Proximity chat is generally off by default in any game, including ESO.

Well then do we have a surprise for you ! Proximity chat on ESO console is enabled by default. Every. Time. You. Log. In.

I've noticed no such issue on PS5

Onomos · June 2023

No way. I've seen zone chat. I would never want to hear it, too.

Marcus684 · June 2023

There has never been anything that I've seen in zone chat and thought to myself, "You know, I really wish I could hear that person's opinion spoken out loud".

I'd hate to see ZOS' devs spending any time developing this vs. fixing the multitude of lingering bugs and implementing all of the basic QoL features that they currently leave to addon authors.

fizl101 · June 2023

TaSheen wrote: »

LatentBuzzard wrote: »

edward_frigidhands wrote: »

Proximity chat is generally off by default in any game, including ESO.

Well then do we have a surprise for you ! Proximity chat on ESO console is enabled by default. Every. Time. You. Log. In.

Oh my gosh! You mean they've never fixed that? Didn't that happen about 2 years back now?

It was fixed a while back. If you turn it off it stays off (at least on playstation, cant say for xbox)

Braffin · June 2023

While I'm not against the implementation of said chat, I don't think it would change the current statuts. PC players have easy access to various tools for communication (especially discord) and people which are willing to use voice chat already use them.

Sure, in theory it could help with communication in pugs, but to be honest: I think most people would simply deactivate this feature out of various reasons and stick with the tools they already have at hand.

AnduinTryggva · June 2023

There are a heap of free tools for voice chat for PC jockeys. No need to eat up bandwidth with voice chat that most players will turn off.

SilverBride · June 2023

The toxicity in zone chat is bad enough in text. I certainly don't want to actually hear it and be subjected to other's loud music etc..

Elsonso · June 2023

SilverBride wrote: »

The toxicity in zone chat is bad enough in text. I certainly don't want to actually hear it and be subjected to other's loud music etc..

I will have you know I play only the best loud music when I play ESO.

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

There are a heap of free tools for voice chat for PC jockeys.

None of them are integrated with ESO like the console ones, and having something that is ubiquitous across all of the players online would eliminate the whole negotiation over which third party chat software is common across everyone, or dictating that everyone use Discord, or whatever happens to be the favorite.

Even if people turned it off in most situations, it would be there for easy use when it was needed or helpful.

Amottica · June 2023

It is unnecessary and a waste of time and money as we have superior options on PC. The reason console players have it is due to their lack of options outside of the game. It would also be another reason for players to kick other players from dungeon groups and we know that will happen.

DrNukenstein · June 2023

People will go into town and blast audio [snip]. It's human nature, only a fool would think otherwise.

[edited for inappropriate content]