Suggestion: Mount Music/BGM

I love mounts. One of the coolest things I discovered when I started to play FFXI again, after a couple-year hiatus.

That said, there's a tiny issue with said mounts that I have, and that is the fact that I never get to hear music that certain zones have anymore, because the mount's theme overrides the zone's music.

Could we get an option or something that disables the mount's theme if the zone has music? If the zone has no music normally, then I would like to hear the mount's theme. But if the zone has music, I'd rather hear that track instead of the mount's music.

I miss certain themes... Gustaberg, Ronfaure, to name a couple. I never get to hear them anymore, because I am always on a mount while outdoors. I don't want to have to walk just to hear a BGM, though...

Sorry to resurrect the thread, but I registered an account just to say that I would also really like an option to disable mount music. Hopefully it should not be too difficult, and would allow us to listen to the zone music everyone's grown to love so much.

I just logged in to the forum to post this exact thing! I really miss zone music. Gustaberg's music is especially nostalgic, but now I just hear this whimsical, overly happy mount music.

So let me get this straight: You're in such a hurry to get through a zone that you use mounts, But want to hear the zones music instead of the riding music? If you like the zones music, you could run through it, or is the extra time it takes run through the zone too long for you to enjoy the zone's music?

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Originally Posted by Teraniku

So let me get this straight: You're in such a hurry to get through a zone that you use mounts, But want to hear the zones music instead of the riding music? If you like the zones music, you could run through it, or is the extra time it takes run through the zone too long for you to enjoy the zone's music?

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Uh, considering how wide and empty the zones are, you'd be crazy to walk through them and that's to say nothing about zones that have aggressive-to-99 mobs that you don't want to fight through.

It isn't about me being "in a hurry" or "lazy", but rather using the tools I have available to me. Is it such a bad thing that I not be forced to hear the same music track that always plays while on a mount, when the zone has something unique to listen to instead? Oi.

I really don't know why you are against the idea to be honest. It'd be an option.

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Originally Posted by Aysha

Uh, considering how wide and empty the zones are, you'd be crazy to walk through them and that's to say nothing about zones that have aggressive-to-99 mobs that you don't want to fight through.

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Huh... colour me crazy. :]

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I really don't know why you are against the idea to be honest. It'd be an option.

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I don't think they're actually /against/ the idea, though I could of course be very wrong.

Personally, I might not have a need for this option, but I would definitely welcome it. For years I've wished for an option to disable battle music (not just for when a party member is going at it), but alas, so far no luck on that.

I think it would be nice for when there is a lot of short battles happening, and/or when I just want to hear the music for the area instead.

Mayhap there's still hope for both of these.

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Originally Posted by Aysha

Uh, considering how wide and empty the zones are, you'd be crazy to walk through them and that's to say nothing about zones that have aggressive-to-99 mobs that you don't want to fight through.

It isn't about me being "in a hurry" or "lazy", but rather using the tools I have available to me. Is it such a bad thing that I not be forced to hear the same music track that always plays while on a mount, when the zone has something unique to listen to instead? Oi.

I really don't know why you are against the idea to be honest. It'd be an option.

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Color me crazy as well. I actually enjoy walking through and enjoying zones, including avoiding aggro.

Still remember the fun of initial trek one had to make on foot back in the day when could not rent a chocobo, sneak and invis were unreliable in their duration, and didn't have the funds to spare for their item forms. To me, it kind of ends up a shame that all the fast travel options makes the time put into an entire zone vastly ignored. Not that I don't mind the travel options, but I also don't want to see things boiled down to just warping between mog house, shops/AH, and exp/loot caves (think ambuscade).

After all, when was the last time you took an airship or ferry outside of for quest/fishing reasons once unlocked a fast travel that bypassed them?

So while a toggle for mount music could be nice, I'd rather the devs use their time working on other things first. I just don't see something like this being much of a priority, especially since some zones have never had music since launch.

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Originally Posted by Hawklaser

So while a toggle for mount music could be nice, I'd rather the devs use their time working on other things first. I just don't see something like this being much of a priority, especially since some zones have never had music since launch.

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I doubt much time would be spent, because there is already a mechanic for not playing the mount music already in place for chocobos. The chocobo theme only loops twice (I think?) then fades out, so there is SOMETHING that tells the game not to loop it again. Once it does fade out, you get whatever music would normally be present in that zone (or none, if none).

We already have the mechanic coded in game, all they would need is a config option that would let you turn this on/off and maybe even a "loop once" option like chocobos have, that you hear one loop of the mount music and then it fades out to let whatever else play.

All they need is the config option to turn it on. Everything else is already there.

And I'm a guy who has sleep apnea and works variable hours. I don't have the time, nor the energy to take 30+ minutes to walk across a zone when I can do it in 5 on a mount. I literally don't have the time to do that kind of thing. What little time I do have, I'd rather be productive and get things done. The game has enough forced waiting as it is, long load times, heck just to log on takes almost 5 minutes alone. I can't see myself inducing waiting upon myself voluntarily anytime soon.

So, this thread is like 6 months old. Am I to understand that SE just doesn't want to look at this request? I love the new and adorable mounts we can use but hate having to mute the sound every time I take one out. At this point I'm no longer interested in hearing the mount music and it feels really 'in your face' so I have to use the equally 'in your face' solution of muting the sound.

It feels like back when they stuffed battle music on everyone whether they were engaged with mob or not - a change that wasn't necessarily welcomed by everyone and I believe the feedback was so intense they eventually gave an option to change it back.

It's too bad we no longer have the numbers like those days.

I believe that a large part of the lack of dev feedback on the English side of the forums is due to not having a dedicated staff member to handle us. ATM, the only way to know that you have a good shot at getting their attention is posting on JP side since the devs themselves frequently post in reply to user posts. :(

I lost the link to the job posting for the ComRep position, so don't know if they've filled it yet or not. Anyone happen to remember where it went? lol

If you have a favorite mount that you use all the time, you could always make a macro for it with a line for /mutebgm I guess?

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Originally Posted by Nyarlko

If you have a favorite mount that you use all the time, you could always make a macro for it with a line for /mutebgm I guess?

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Well yea, that's what I am doing right now as stated in my post. It's a silly way to deal with the problem but at the current moment the only way to do it without messing with game files. Just last night I discovered that they added a toggle for displaying hats. That was a priority but the looping, bouncy theme that after the first couple times really gets obnoxious isn't?

I guess XI devs still don't even play their own game. Even if you absolutely love this tune, at some point it's just too much.

Bummer. I wish I knew how to read\write Japanese.

Edit - Just ran the JP forums through google translate and I can't believe how bad the translation is, but I did see that a lot of the requests we've made here are over there as well, like increasing RoE objectives. They also seem to be as worried about the shrinking dev team as we are.