TF2 Custom Hitsound Not Working

In spite of its age, Team Fortress 2 (TF2 for short) remains a popular game that attracts a wide range of players around the globe. One of the appeals of TF2 is that it supports customization: For instance, players could freely modify hitsounds instead of sticking to the default ones. Usually, players would be able to install custom hitsounds and add something new to the gaming experience with relative ease. Nonetheless, the installation is not always smooth-sailing and reports about TF2 custom hitsound not working appear from time to time.

An In-Depth Troubleshooting Guide 

Unable to get your TF2 custom hitsounds to work and have no idea what to do? Then it’s strongly recommended that you take a look at this article. Down below is all the information that you should keep in mind about custom hitsounds not working in Team Fortress 2.

The Usual Suspects

Generally speaking, the setup process of custom hitsounds is a straightforward affair that involves little time and effort. However, if you cannot enable custom hitsounds in-game, you may want to consider these possibilities:

Hiccups 

Stability is one of the strong points of Team Fortress 2 but the game can still act up every now and then. In most of the cases, hiccups in TF2 don’t impact the gameplay to a great extent so people barely notice them. That being said, certain hiccups disrupt operations of the game and the loading of hitsounds is not an exception. Hence, if you notice TF2 custom hitsound not working, you need to add hiccups to your list of suspects.

Settings 

Team Fortress 2 regulates the playing of hitsounds, default and custom alike, via a series of settings. By tweaking the hitsound settings, players could manipulate aspects of hitsounds as they see fit. Nonetheless, if people make mistakes as they adjust the settings, it may be impossible to play the game with custom hitsounds. Needless to say, articles that talk about issues with TF2 custom hitsounds mention settings all the time.

Location

To play TF2 with custom hitsounds, you must download sound files and place them in the correct folder. If you nail the location for the sound files, you should be able to enable custom hitsounds with relative ease. On the other hand, if you mess up the location, Team Fortress 2 won’t even recognize the presence of custom hitsounds. Depending on the version of the game, the folder for sound files changes so you have to be careful while installing custom hitsounds.

Format 

In layman’s terms, for Team Fortress 2 to play a custom hitsound, the associated sound file needs to be in the right format. That means if you run into trouble as you set up custom hitsounds, it’s a good idea to take format into account. Fortunately, if format is the one that gives you a hard time, you don’t have to do much to get custom hitsounds working. When you finish reformatting the sound files, your custom hitsounds would play smoothly.

Name 

Nothing is out of the ordinary with the format of sound files but the game still won’t play your custom hitsounds? In that case, you should take a look at the name of your sound files. For your information, you need to follow a rule once it comes to naming sound files of custom hitsounds. If you name your sound files randomly, you cannot enable custom hitsounds in-game.

What You Could Do

Quite a few fixes exist for problems with custom hitsounds in Team Fortress 2 but some prove more popular than others:

Restart 

Exit TF2, restart the computer and relaunch the game. Hiccups in Team Fortress 2 usually vanish after a restart and that permits features of the game to run normally like before.

Note: If you play TF2 on Steam, it’s widely advised that you think about verifying integrity of game files. Sometimes, TF2 hiccups compromise the game files which prevent the game from performing properly.

• Step 1: Open Steam, go to Library and right-click Team Fortress 2
• Step 2: Click Properties then choose Local Files
• Step 3: Hit Verify integrity of game files

The verification would guarantee that game files of your computer correspond to those on the Steam servers. That is going to be more than enough to take care of most TF2 hiccups.

Change Out The Settings 

Go to the main screen of TF2, hit the Gear icon with the plus sign to open Advanced Options and inspect the hitsound settings. To play Team Fortress 2 with custom hitsounds, pay attention to two settings: “Play a hit sound every time you injure an enemy” (set it as Yes) and “Hit sounds” (set it as Default). (popphoto.com) Feel free to change settings such as “Hit sound volume”, “Hit sounds Low damage pitch”, “Hit sounds High damage pitch”, … as you like. After you finish, launch the game and see how things turn out.

Relocate Sound Files 

To set up custom hitsounds of Team Fortress 2, players have to remember two locations:

• tf\custom\customfolder\sound\ui
• tf\custom\customfolder\sound\

If you have trouble enabling custom hitsounds, it’s suggested that you change the location of sound files. For instance, if a custom hitsound won’t work while its associated sound file is in tf\custom\customfolder\sound\, move the sound file to tf\custom\customfolder\sound\ui. In a number of cases, all it takes to enable custom hitsounds in TF2 is to relocate the sound files. With the sound files in the correct folder, you would be able to play Team Fortress 2 with custom hitsounds.

Reformat Sound Files 

TF2 could only play a custom hitsound if the associated sound file meets three criteria:

• The sound file is a 16-bit file
• The sound file is in the WAV (Waveform Audio File) format
• The sound file uses one of three sample rates: 44100 Hz, 22050 Hz and 11025 Hz

In the case that your sound file is not in the acceptable format, you should reformat it as soon as possible. You may use various programs to change the format but if you like to save money, go for Audacity. As an open-source program, Audacity costs nothing to use and it allows you to reformat your sound file without much difficulty. The moment you get the format right, put the sound file back, fire up the game and hope that the custom hitsounds work now.

Rename Sound Files

All in all, once it comes to installing custom hitsounds, the name of the sound files plays a key role. For Team Fortress 2 to load up a custom hitsound, the associated sound file must be named “hitsound.wav”. The .wav is the extension of the file which is why there is no need to add it manually. It’s worth pointing out that if you delete the sound file, TF2 is going to revert to using the default hitsound.

Where Can I Download Custom Hitsounds For TF2?

You can download custom hitsounds from a wide range of websites: Github, GameBanana and so on. For most of the time, websites that let TF2 players download custom hitsounds host files in the correct format. As a result, if you opt to download custom hitsounds, you may put the sound files directly into the Tf2 folder. That being said, for good measure, you should stick to well-known websites.

Is There A Way To Make My Own Hitsounds?

You don’t have to be an expert to create custom hitsounds for Team Fortress 2. All you need is an audio recording/editing program with the ability to export TF2-compatible sounds files. Again, Audacity is a good choice but feel free to use other programs. In any case, by using an audio recording/editing program, you could produce the sound files for custom hitsounds in a matter of moments.

Here is a quick walkthrough:

• Step 1: Open the audio recording/editing program
• Step 2: Import a sound file/record a sound file
• Step 3: Set the sample rate using one of the three sample rates mentioned above
• Step 4: Export the sound file as a 16-bit WAV file
• Step 5: Put the sound file into the TF2 folder

What Is A Killsound?

To put it plainly, a killsound is a hitsound that plays every time your attacks kill an enemy. Similar to hitsound, killsound is customizable.