expanding on that part about sound, It would be very neat should a redo of the voice commands be done, if different levels of cap ships had different commands based on level, giving the feel that more experienced crews are actually more seasoned and ready to fight.

I can't say I agree with the second part of your suggestion.  anything to lengthen the game, especially the early game, is generally bad for Internet play.

strike craft need chatter like in homeworld 2!

I agree, especially about the strikcraft chatter!

I like this game, but I've always really, REALLY hated the voices. They came very close to keeping me from buying it in the first place.

I play Advent, and I don't mind little girls, but every time I hear the voice of the guy who did Starscream, or the Ninja Turtles (no lie) I want to claw my own ears off.

And who can forget a unit that responds to you with "What NOW, commeaander?" (TEC Carrier)

"What now? You're fired, that's what now."

When you install Homeworld 2, there is a file called “Music.big” in the “Data” folder. I used Finalbig to extract all the files. Every “.fda” file is an audio file. I renamed the “.fda” files to “.aifr” and opened them in Winamp with the Relic AIF plugin. Then I used the Filewriter output plugin, set it to output to mp3 with the LAME mp3 encoder, and played through all the “.aifr” files (which caused Filewriter to make MP3 files from everything that was played). Then I just renamed my MP3s how I wanted and presto! - I have the Homeworld 2 Soundtrack!

I completely agree about the sounds.  And while reading your post I thought you were going to go in another direction with it.  I'll explain what I was picturing before I finished your post.

When I zoom in enough to see the contents of a planet I'd like sounds that give me an idea of what's going on, not just fleet to fleet combat.  I'd like to hear the sounds of freighters talking amongst each other (ala Freelancer), I'd like to hear the voices of my exploration vessels when they covering previously undiscovered territory, and I'd like to hear the background "hum" of many voices and machines on orbital structures when I zoom in on one.

As far as combat goes, it would be cool to hear warning sirens and evacuation orders on capital ships when they are very low on hull.  I love the idea of battle chatter from strike craft and sounds when launching squads n' such.

Other sounds that could add to it would be adding a very low rumble when zoomed in near a sun, some eerie noises in magnetic clouds, and some kind of barely percievable distant sounding undertone when zoomed way out of the solar systems.

programmers are generally visual artists. So developing sound and music is actually often a difficult process for game design teams.

I' fine with background sounds and you know there is always the argument that is space there is no sound. of course in space there also should not be explosions like this I guess, but whatever.

what I would to add and what I saw here mentioned as well is that apart from purely artistical value, unit sounds and battle chatter may in fact become an important element in gameplay. because it can and should comment on the course of a battle. for example, if you heard one of ships go 'the enemy has received reinforcements, requesting new orders!' or 'looking good, we have the upper hand here' or 'the enemy is starting to pull back, shall we pursue?' then it not only adds flavour to the game, but also gives you important information. when you think about it, most strategy games rely solely on visuals to display information. healt bars, damaged looks on units, but there are relatively few acustic cues as to what is going on in battle. most of the cues are on a more strategic level such as finished stuff, incoming enemies, pirate notices or new diplomatic offers.

of course, a counter is that too much information on too many channels creates information overload and there is the choice what messages and information get priority, but surely that can be worked out too.

Could you add something like that to sins? I know most sound right now is triggered by clicking or giving orders. Is it possible to have them give off different sound clips all the time?  ie. a sound clip is triggered when an enemy ship enters your gravity well. Could we change it so that units give off sound clips when they engage enemies, spot enemies, take too much damage, destroy an enemy?