Ask Epic Anything: Audio | September 13, 2023 at 12:00 PM ET

[GraceYen]

@Rynex_FNC

Many devices have built in sounds, can we please have an option to remove them or maybe even just a way to know what Channel Mix they’re routed to so we can remove them manually? An example is the Signal Remote Device which had its sound changed this season for no apparent reason, and now has an even louder and more annoying SFX.

Currently, creative devices have a mix of audio support ranging from audio effects playing all the time, audio effects that can be disabled, with a few devices that allow for users to select their own audio. For any devices that currently allow users to disable audio, a workaround is to add an Audio Player device that will play the audio you want when the other device is triggered/activated etc. Unfortunately the Signal Remote Manager device currently doesn’t support disabing audio. Longer term, we believe devices should have a unified way to control and customize audio. For the short term, we are prioritizing a handful of devices to allow users to disable audio ( such as the Creature Spawner ). Thank you for sharing feedback that the Signal Remote Device is another one where disabling audio would be important. We’ve also taken note of your feedback that displaying which control bus it feeds to can help users control volume using the Mixer Device.

[dave.axe]

@Saga18

Right now UEFN has some very limited and often confusing rules when it comes to imported audio and how this is treated during the evaluation process.
Is there any plans to give us a full, detailed breakdown on how this process works?
I feel this is something that is sorely lacking, a comprehensive guide on what sources of audio are permitted, full breakdown on sampling, free samples, etc and when/if this will actually be expanded and improved in the future.
Even when making your own audio or music and/or using widely available free samples you’re at risk of random rejection for unspecified issues which makes no sense, it does the complete opposite and makes you NOT want to use custom music or make any at all.

Music rights are super complex. Even royalty free and “copyright free” music often come with limitations on how it can be used. And we are actively exploring ways to bring more music to the ecosystem. For now, the safest path is to use music your own original music - either that you’ve created or that you own all the rights to. If you’re using your own original music and your island is still getting rejected because of it, please surface that through player support so we can address it.

[GraceYen]

@Knight_Breaker

Are there plans to have UEFN eventually to have all the same features as UE does (in terms of audio features)?

Our goal is to bring the power of Unreal Engine Audio to Unreal Editor for Fortnite. Our first priority for Beta in UEFN was to focus on allowing users to import their own audio, and leverage the new Audio Player Device to add audio. We focused on adding features to meet many of the common requirements for audio such as spatialization and being able to control what triggers audio as examples. We continue to evaluate features available in Unreal Engine to bring over in a way that makes sense in the context of UEFN. In some cases such as for MetaSounds, it might mean exposing read-only versions of MetaSounds to start since that might allow more users to leverage pre-authored MetaSounds rather than expecting users to create their own from scratch.

[GraceYen]

@EquinoxFNC

Is there any plan on letting us play the same sound multiple times at once from a single audio player device?
currently we can only play one instance of a sound at a time per audio device with the controls of having it either do nothing when triggered or the device to restart the audio, but we do not have the ability to make it play the sound again, overlapping the current sound playing.

The underlying audio component does support multiple sounds playing on them, but they all have their parameters set on all instances of the audio component. It’s possible to expose that and allow multiple sounds to play on an audio component, but there is some more work to be done to build it into the Audio Player Device. We will have to see where it fits on the priority list.

[Ghost_Rush]

@MegaRapture52

When people walk away from audio when it has limited distance and then walk back into the area, the audio stops playing. Why is that?

We’d appreciate it if you could send that to us in a bug report. If you head over to Topics tagged fortnite and click on “New Topic” and choose “New Issue”, it will submit a bug report that comes directly to us.

[PandaParkes]

@latundaPC

Will audio devices support localization for audio? How to do localization properly?

We currently don’t have any plans to support this but I’ll bring it up with the team.

[audioSlacker (Michael)]

@Ai-Interactive

users have noted although music volume can be reduced in audio settings, music from emotes etc still plays.

Thank you for calling this to our attention, we will talk about how we can make this work in the future.

[Ai-Interactive]

Thank you, I assume this extends to other components such as vehicle tricks etc. from memory there’s no option but perhaps some exposed variables on those devices in future updates will give creators more control.

[Ghost_Rush]

@Wertandrew

Audio on some platforms sounds choppy (plays slower and with quick breaks), is there a reason this can happen and can we fix it on our side?

This is likely the result of adding too much content which causes underruns and performance issues. We are looking at adding better metering so users can know if they’re hitting performance limits on some platforms.

[PandaParkes]

@djpixel

How do we add custom accessibility icons to our sounds, similar to Fortnite’s “Visualize Sound Effects” feature?

This is certainly something we’d like to implement but we have nothing in the pipeline at the moment.

[dave.axe]

@Kiriousaurus

I definitely agree with the music part! I think I meant more of ambient sound effects and such. I just had a map denied due to an ambient beach loop that I bought in a UE Marketplace pack.

Got it. Please report that through player support so we can take a look at it!

[dave.axe]

@Wertandrew

Why is there a time limit on audio tracks?

If there is a demand to increase the time limit, this is something we can revisit in the future.

[Flak]

We’re wrapping it up over here folks! Thank you so much for joining us and for your great questions! We may be getting in touch with some of you for more information or help with your issues.

Thanks also to our Epic Experts for jumping in and answering questions!

More information coming soon about our next Ask Epic Anything AMA!

[Flak]

@MegaRapture52

When people walk away from audio when it has limited distance and then walk back into the area, the audio stops playing. Why is that? I am also having a hard time trying to find out how to make looping audio follow a player even when i use the “play on instigator” serting.

Hi there, please DM me with what you are trying to accomplish and we can investigate further.

[PandaParkes]

@AhomiGoi

After creating a ton of audio systems and combining audio players, I was wondering if sometime reverb volumes/effect for audio cues will be added

We’re looking into reverb solutions for UEFN so watch this space!

[Ghost_Rush]

Thanks everyone! We appreciate you taking the time to share your questions. Keep on making great experiences with our tools!

[PandaParkes]

Thanks everybody for all your questions! It’s great to see how much interest there is in making great sounding experiences in UEFN

[audioSlacker (Michael)]

Thank you for all the questions! Super informative for us to understand what your concerns and issues are!

[GraceYen]

Thank you so much for all the questions. It was so exciting to hear from everyone and to see all the interest in audio and suggestions for new features that will help the community. I can’t wait to see more of what everyone here builds! Have a great rest of the week!