Announcement: "CB Radio" with SRS on Combat Box

[Alonzo]

We are pleased to announce CB Radio for IL-2/SRS, featuring Airfield and Command radio channels. We're using Google's "text to speech" API as well as custom dserver log parsing code to achieve these effects. A few examples include:

 

• Command channel says “Under attack” for friendly targets.
• Command channel reports areas of heavy air combat, so pilots have an idea of where the action is.
• Airfields report their weather and traffic cautions if a lot of take-offs and landings are happening.
• Airfields talk to departing formations and welcome wounded birds home

 

There's more to come! We hope that CB Radio will motivate more people to move over to SRS, which features realistic radio effects and a multi-channel radio.

 

New experimental voice recognition feature!

 

• Ask tower for a callsign, and use that throughout your mission.
• You can radio "Command, this is Uncle-3 in grid 1017, request mission" to be directed to the nearest action.
• Or try "Control, this is Wizard-5 in grid 2429, need bearing to home" for a vector to the nearest airfield.
• More coming!

 

As always we welcome your feedback and suggestions to improve this new feature on Combat Box. Also, we did an announcement/teaser trailer, made by @Mordrac and @haluter

 

 

Edited February 11, 2021 by Alonzo
Added voice recognition piece.

[SCG_Tzigy]

brilliant!

[[DBS]Browning]

Any servers using this so far?

[SCG_Tzigy]

Combat Box

[peregrine7]

Jumped on today and didn't hear anything. Is there any user-setup involved?

[SCG_Tzigy]

15 minutes ago, peregrine7 said:

Jumped on today and didn't hear anything. Is there any user-setup involved?

 

yes. not all missions/maps maybe enabled yet?

 

 

Edited August 27, 2020 by SCG_Tzigy
addendum

[[APAF]VR_Spartan85]

WHAT WHAT WHAT!!>> this is awesome!!!!

 

besides having SRS installed, this is a server side function ya?

 

[ITAF_Airone1989]

Great job!!! This is absolutely brilliant!

[Alonzo]

2 hours ago, peregrine7 said:

Jumped on today and didn't hear anything. Is there any user-setup involved?

 

2 hours ago, SCG_Tzigy said:

yes. not all missions/maps maybe enabled yet?

 

2 hours ago, [APAF]spartan85 said:

WHAT WHAT WHAT!!>> this is awesome!!!!

 

besides having SRS installed, this is a server side function ya?

 

It should be working on all maps now. We've had some teething problems but it's now configured for all maps. SRS, if set up correctly, will auto-connect when you join the Combat Box dogfight server, then once you spawn a plane you'll be in radio channel 1 (command channel) for your coalition. If you switch to channel 2 you'll probably hear airfield traffic.

 

It's not constant radio chatter, more like messages every few minutes. But if you fly a sortie on channel 1 or 2 you should definitely hear something during that time.

[WIS-Redcoat]

Awesome, really awesome

[SIA_Sp00k]

Excellent Alonzo thanks

[56RAF_Roblex]

Now we just need people to call when turning finals or joining the runway on Ch.2   and we might get fewer collisions ?     If you could recognise when someone is landing the wrong way and tell them not to then that would be great ?

[[APAF]VR_Spartan85]

I just have to say this is what I’ve been wanting for the longest time..

 

played for the first time Last night since implemented, great experience! 
 

able to coordinate Friendly/enemy target coverage, request support, call out Bandits in sectors....

that’s not eve the atc yet.

 

atc calling out people taking off and landing (especially chirping at you if you get damaged lol)

calling out reported enemy aircraft in area... requesting objectives to be hit/supported..

 

loving it!

[Alonzo]

On 8/29/2020 at 8:16 AM, 56RAF_Roblex said:

Now we just need people to call when turning finals or joining the runway on Ch.2   and we might get fewer collisions ?     If you could recognise when someone is landing the wrong way and tell them not to then that would be great ?

We had some folks calling approach and final last night, on channel two. It’s definitely possible people will do this a bit more. I try to set a good example.

[56RAF_Roblex]

I was watching Sheriffs most recent video, 'Butchering The Butcher Birds', and there is even more to this new SRS addition than the video above shows.   I heard people being warned of 'multiple aircraft in the pattern' (21:30), current active runway due to bombing of other runways(22:00). Smoking P51 blocking runway (24:20) and active runway instructions amongst other things (I probably missed more because I was concentrating on the action)  Great stuff!

Edited August 31, 2020 by 56RAF_Roblex

[Alonzo]

4 hours ago, 56RAF_Roblex said:

I was watching Sheriffs most recent video, 'Butchering The Butcher Birds', and there is even more to this new SRS addition than the video above shows.   I heard people being warned of 'multiple aircraft in the pattern' (21:30), current active runway due to bombing of other runways(22:00). Smoking P51 blocking runway (24:20) and active runway instructions amongst other things (I probably missed more because I was concentrating on the action)  Great stuff!

 

The great thing is that now the system is in place, I can add stuff to it fairly easily. On Standoff in the Lowlands for example, you now get radio calls during the recon process and when a new target is identified. On Mitchell's Men the bomber flights radio their position and ask for escort. I have a whole notebook of additional things that we'll try to add over time.

[RedKestrel]

12 minutes ago, Alonzo said:

 

The great thing is that now the system is in place, I can add stuff to it fairly easily. On Standoff in the Lowlands for example, you now get radio calls during the recon process and when a new target is identified. On Mitchell's Men the bomber flights radio their position and ask for escort. I have a whole notebook of additional things that we'll try to add over time.

This is all great stuff! Hope to have more time soon to get some flights in, I've been AWOL from playing for a month or so.

BTW, I know you mentioned that the standard suggestions for which SRS channels to use changed. Right now the website's Info section still notes that the SRS options are divided into North/South CAP and attack channels. Could that be updated with the current recommendations for the channels?

[Alonzo]

13 minutes ago, RedKestrel said:

Right now the website's Info section still notes that the SRS options are divided into North/South CAP and attack channels. Could that be updated with the current recommendations for the channels?

 

Good suggestion, I've made this update. I'd actually forgotten about the website, I think we changed most of the mission-briefings though.

[FlyingNutcase]

I'll get flying again when the visibility update arrives and will def be getting SRS sorted now. This looks potentially groundbreaking gamechanging. It's def groundbreaking. And very darn cool!

Edited September 17, 2020 by FlyingNutcase

[von_Tom]

On 8/27/2020 at 4:03 PM, Alonzo said:

We are pleased to announce CB Radio for IL-2/SRS, featuring Airfield and Command radio channels.

 

Excellent - if you want any British voices for this I'd be happy to help.  Tried to pm you but you can't accept any messages.

 

von Tom

[Mad-Moses]

Question on the CB Radio...

 

Is the accent of the radio broadcaster calling out targets adjustable or is it just set server side?

 

Wondering if I accidentally hit a hot key or something... my guy now talks in an Asian accent, would be cool to have a German accent on the Axis side and an American or British accent on the Allied side.

 

Thanks for any help.

 

Cheers,

Mad

[Alonzo]

12 hours ago, Mad-Moses said:

Question on the CB Radio...

 

Is the accent of the radio broadcaster calling out targets adjustable or is it just set server side?

 

Wondering if I accidentally hit a hot key or something... my guy now talks in an Asian accent, would be cool to have a German accent on the Axis side and an American or British accent on the Allied side.

 

Anything coming over SRS should be generated by our "CB Radio" code and the Google APIs and piped as an audio stream into SRS itself. So I don't think anything you did client side should have changed it. Something might be buggy, I can take a look. But in terms of accents you should hear British, Australian and American for the Allies, and German for, well, the Germans.

[FTC_Snowy]

I just experienced this for the first time yesterday. Setup was easy and it really does add to the immersive atmosphere quite a lot. I landed in a damaged P38J and the tower says to me  “Lightning .... try not to scratch the paint next time’. Made me smile.  
 

Now I just need to learn some correct radio comms protocols.

[1./KG4_EKat]

I've been using the SRS CB Radio on Combat Box MP server for about a month now and must admit that it really does add to the immersion factor of this sim. From the use of Google voice APIs to the coding of in-game reporting, it provides helpful audio information to pilots about the current combat situation. The bot's voice even had me initially fooled that someone was acting as a command controller. I would like to see more IL-2 BoX MP servers employ this feature with SRS. Well done!

[DserverJG26]

Hi guys,

great job and I have only one question it's exclusively only for CB or you will share your "holly grail"  with another servers because this .. can move another servers to another dimension.  

 

Thx 

Achileus

[[DBS]Browning]

On 2/12/2021 at 8:02 AM, DserverJG26 said:

Hi guys,

great job and I have only one question it's exclusively only for CB or you will share your "holly grail"  with another servers because this .. can move another servers to another dimension. 

 

I would also like to know if this is available for other hosts to use if they wish.

[Alonzo]

19 hours ago, [DBS]Browning said:

I would also like to know if this is available for other hosts to use if they wish.

 

At the moment it's exclusive to Combat Box. This is a tricky one; one the one hand I think sharing and being community minded is good, on the other hand there's still quite a lot of competition between the servers and we all like to try to do things that differentiate us. As of now, the voice features are a differentiator and a bonus for pilots flying on CB, so we're keeping the feature exclusive at the moment.

[DserverJG26]

Yes it makes sense but I had to try

[[DBS]Browning]

2 hours ago, Alonzo said:

 

At the moment it's exclusive to Combat Box. This is a tricky one; one the one hand I think sharing and being community minded is good, on the other hand there's still quite a lot of competition between the servers and we all like to try to do things that differentiate us. As of now, the voice features are a differentiator and a bonus for pilots flying on CB, so we're keeping the feature exclusive at the moment.

 

I understand why someone with their servers interest at heart would take this stance, but it's a shame.

I like this feature, but not enough to move to combat box's restricted maps and plane-sets.

If a feature as good as this is invented in the future, I hope it isn't invented by a server host.

Edited February 23, 2021 by [DBS]Browning

[kestrel79]

I really want to give this a try. Sounds right up my alley for IL2 online.

 

Is there anything specific I have to download to get it to work? 

[itsbillyfrazier]

@kestrel79 - Alonso is doing God's work with this thing...it really adds to the sim and gets better after every update.

 

All you need is SRS installed and follow the commands published on the CB website (see "info" section).

 

 

Edited February 24, 2021 by itsbillyfrazier

[Alonzo]

18 hours ago, [DBS]Browning said:

I understand why someone with their servers interest at heart would take this stance, but it's a shame.

I like this feature, but not enough to move to combat box's restricted maps and plane-sets.

If a feature as good as this is invented in the future, I hope it isn't invented by a server host.

 

Combat Box only exists because people fly on it. If no-one flies on it, I'm not going to pour dozens of hours into implementing speech recognition for pilots or building new maps. I'll just fly more so I can rage quit a little less often when ubergamer777 shoots me in the head... Again, I think it's very sad that apparently the multiplayer population is a zero-sum game -- if a server 'wins' more players, another server 'loses'. This should be a welcoming, growing community and we should aspire to fill lots and lots of 84-slot servers. The jet simulator has 2000+ concurrent online players on a week night.

 

If you have suggestions around the map set, we're happy to hear them, but we experimented with a more liberal mid-war plane set and map set and many people felt it was losing the differentiation that we currently have (late war, Bodenplatte focus).

 

Also, you're allowed to play on more than one server. Nothing stopping you playing CB once in a while. Given that Bodenplatte has been on sale 85% off I would be surprised if any IL2 enthusiast didn't already have the plane set.

[[DBS]Browning]

22 minutes ago, Alonzo said:

If you have suggestions around the map set, we're happy to hear them, but we experimented with a more liberal mid-war plane set and map set and many people felt it was losing the differentiation that we currently have (late war, Bodenplatte focus).

 

 

I think you should keep your current plane set. It might not be to my taste, but it gives combat box an identity, as you say.

[Avetorro-VR]

On 8/27/2020 at 4:03 PM, Alonzo said:

We are pleased to announce CB Radio for IL-2/SRS, featuring Airfield and Command radio channels. We're using Google's "text to speech" API as well as custom dserver log parsing code to achieve these effects. A few examples include:

 

• Command channel says “Under attack” for friendly targets.
• Command channel reports areas of heavy air combat, so pilots have an idea of where the action is.
• Airfields report their weather and traffic cautions if a lot of take-offs and landings are happening.
• Airfields talk to departing formations and welcome wounded birds home

 

There's more to come! We hope that CB Radio will motivate more people to move over to SRS, which features realistic radio effects and a multi-channel radio.

 

New experimental voice recognition feature!

 

• Ask tower for a callsign, and use that throughout your mission.
• You can radio "Command, this is Uncle-3 in grid 1017, request mission" to be directed to the nearest action.
• Or try "Control, this is Wizard-5 in grid 2429, need bearing to home" for a vector to the nearest airfield.
• More coming!

 

As always we welcome your feedback and suggestions to improve this new feature on Combat Box. Also, we did an announcement/teaser trailer, made by @Mordrac and @haluter

 

 

I think it’s great, really adds to the immersion. More people should use it. I always see players type in the chat ‘where’s the enemy?’, yet srs will tell you where to go or where cover is required. I wish it would tell people off for taking off across the runway instead of along it

[Alonzo]

On 1/18/2022 at 5:54 AM, drogo-joystick said:

I think it’s great, really adds to the immersion. More people should use it. I always see players type in the chat ‘where’s the enemy?’, yet srs will tell you where to go or where cover is required. I wish it would tell people off for taking off across the runway instead of along it

That's an interesting thought. We get takeoff positional information -- maybe we could say "if most pilots are taking off from the airfield in this 500m bubble, someone taking off outside of that bubble probably took off crosswise" and get SRS to chew them out. I dunno though, most asshole pilots probably aren't on SRS in the first place....

[Avetorro-VR]

15 hours ago, Alonzo said:

That's an interesting thought. We get takeoff positional information -- maybe we could say "if most pilots are taking off from the airfield in this 500m bubble, someone taking off outside of that bubble probably took off crosswise" and get SRS to chew them out. I dunno though, most asshole pilots probably aren't on SRS in the first place....

I think a lot of players use the airfield like they did in War Thunder. Just switch on and go forwards as fast as you can lol. Maybe we needs signs saying ‘to the runway’ ?

[madcowz]

6 minutes ago, drogo-joystick said:

I think a lot of players use the airfield like they did in War Thunder. Just switch on and go forwards as fast as you can lol. Maybe we needs signs saying ‘to the runway’ ?

I always struggle to know where the runway is and sometimes I seem to spend more time on the ground looking for it than my rather brief time in the air prior to being shot.

[Avetorro-VR]

41 minutes ago, madcowz said:

I always struggle to know where the runway is and sometimes I seem to spend more time on the ground looking for it than my rather brief time in the air prior to being shot.

Usually two fires mark the start of the runway on combat box, not sure if other servers do that. If you have srs ask for an ‘airfield advisory’ for getting the takeoff direction bearing if it’s not obvious, or there are several runways in operation. I’m like you, I spend more time on the ground than in the air

[Ala13_UnopaUno_VR]

I've wanted to try the srs with your CB server for a long time and the truth is that the level of immersion it offers has been super gratifying, my congratulations really, yes, I'm going to have to learn better English to understand myself with the tower xd +1

[Avetorro-VR]

3 hours ago, Ala13_UnopaUno_VR said:

I've wanted to try the srs with your CB server for a long time and the truth is that the level of immersion it offers has been super gratifying, my congratulations really, yes, I'm going to have to learn better English to understand myself with the tower xd +1

its the same for axis, Im irish and I struggle to understand the german accents a lot of the time (and I bet the bots struggle with me), especially over a loud engine  ...but yeah, its a whole extra level of realism and thats what I want.