Voice Directionality

Voice Directionality

Head rotation affects voice and avatar audio range. When a player faces toward or away from you, their voice range changes.

Two Independent Settings

Setting	Effect	Range
ListenerDirectionality	Reduces range when you face away from the speaker	0-1
PlayerDirectionality	Reduces range when the speaker faces away from you	0-1

Both are independent — you can enable one, both, or neither.

How It Works

The system uses dot products between head forward vectors and the direction between players. Each dot is normalised to [0,1] and offset by the directionality value, so the relationship between directionality and range reduction is non-linear.

1. Listener effect: dot(listener forward, direction to speaker) — facing toward = full range, facing away = reduced range
2. Player effect: dot(speaker backward, direction to listener) — speaker facing away = reduced range
3. Both effects are multiplied together for the final range multiplier

The effect is continuous — the range scales smoothly based on the angle between head facing and direction.

Value Behavior

Value	Effect
0.0	No directionality — range unchanged regardless of head rotation
0.5	Moderate — facing away reduces range by ~50%
1.0	Full — facing away can reduce range up to 100%

The mapping is non-linear due to dot product normalisation — 0.5 does not mean exactly 50% reduction at all angles.

Where to Configure

Per-Zone (PlayerAudioOverride)

Set different directionality per zone — e.g., strong directionality on stage, none in lounge.

See PlayerAudioOverride for field details.

Global (PlayerAudioConfigurationModel)

Set default directionality for all zones.

See PlayerAudioConfigurationModel for field details.

Via UI (PlayerAudioView)

Sliders for both settings in the settings menu.

See PlayerAudioView for UI details.

Use Cases

• Stage/Performance: high directionality — audience hears performers clearly, chatter behind them is quiet
• Social Lounge: low directionality — easy conversation from any angle
• Hide and Seek: high directionality — hard to locate players by sound alone

See Also

• Architecture — how directionality fits in the update loop
• PlayerAudioOverride — per-zone settings