Valheim mod makes deer sound like deer instead of 'crazy duck-monkeys'

(Image credit: Iron Gate Studios)

Valheim proved to be engrossing and enchanting from the moment we started playing, with a massive and mysterious world, beautiful visuals, and compelling combat and activities. And yet I'd wager every single player, no matter how immersed they were in the survival and exploration experience, at some point wondered this:

What the hell kinda noise are those deer making? I mean... what is that supposed to be?

Valheim's deer make kind of a hoot, kind of a honk, and kind of a sad moan, all at once. It's like a trumpet stuffed with mashed potatoes being played by a depressed donkey. It's a bit baffling. Toot toot? Toot. Wahhhh. Hardly the idyllic sound of nature, and pretty distracting until you eventually just agree to accept it. "Fine. That's what deer sound like on the 10th plane of the Norse afterlife, I guess."

But the Realistic Animal Sounds mod is here to make the deer sound more like real deer. In the modder's words, the mod "changes deer idle sounds from crazy duck-monkeys to actual grunts and calls used by wild deer" and "changes deer alert sounds from the sound of a rubber chicken being stepped on to an actual recording of a deer blowing its warning snort."

Those are some very accurate descriptions. The mod also changes deer death sounds "from the simultaneous bellow of a dozen geese through a jet engine to an actual deer bawl."

I've tried the mod and it works well, but I'm going to give you a little warning anyway. You're probably not really going to enjoy the realistic deer sounds, either. Turns out, real deer just kinda suck at making noises. The alert deer noise sounds like a crow being abruptly strangled, the grunts and clicks sound like farts, and the death knell sounds like a young sheep expressing mild disappointment. You can toggle the sounds on in the gif below (sorry about a greydwarf getting into the mix):

The new sounds are definitely realistic! I'm not complaining about that. The modder used actual wildlife sounds and animal calls to make them. And I don't blame the deer, they're doing their best and making the noises they know how to make. In my opinion, they're just not fun animals to listen to.

The mod also improves the noises of boars and wolves, but let's be honest. If you're reading this, you're just here for 100 percent for the deer. You can find the mod here on Nexus Mods.

Chris started playing PC games in the 1980s, started writing about them in the early 2000s, and (finally) started getting paid to write about them in the late 2000s. Following a few years as a regular freelancer, PC Gamer hired him in 2014, probably so he'd stop emailing them asking for more work. Chris has a love-hate relationship with survival games and an unhealthy fascination with the inner lives of NPCs. He's also a fan of offbeat simulation games, mods, and ignoring storylines in RPGs so he can make up his own.