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Sound Principle Concepts
Sound Principle Concepts
There are a number of sound principles that come into play in games. These concepts are by no means unique to games, they're largely based on things that happen in the real world, but as most are reactive and based on relative positions in space they become things which within games we're actively dictating and which our players will be manipulating, and so we need to be conscious of them.
The main concepts are:
Attenuation, the way a sound's volume falls off based on distance to the source.
Spatialisation, which gives the impression of sound within a three-dimensional environment.
Occlusion, how a sound changes when obstructed by an object and how that object changes the sound.
The Doppler Effect, how the pitch of a sound changes when the source is moving towards or away from you.
and, Reverb, how the sound bounces around in an environment creates the acoustics of the environment.
Whilst it's an Unreal demo, the below video covers these core audio concepts and principles applicable in other engines.
Sound in Games
Sound in Games
Audio has a major impact on the experience of game, so it is best to factor in your intended audio style and tools early in your project.
During Studio Units it is common to ask Audio students to help with your projects, but you should have some understanding about how to source, modify and generate audio FX and music. Even if you don't consider yourself a sound designer or musician, sound is such an important part of the player experience that you should develop a library of commonly used sounds for the sake of prototyping.
The Importance of Sound in Games
Unity
Unity
Unreal Engine
Unreal Engine
Audio Middleware
Audio Middleware
There are certain software tools, such as FMOD and Wwise, which can be used to make your sound even more interactive and adaptive. These tools can do things like handle your adaptive soundtrack and allow you to have a single audio cue in engine translate to a pool of samples with random tweaks and adjustments to give you thousands of possible subtly distinct variations (very good for repeated things like footsteps).
Both of these tools have become very common in development and both can integrate with Unity and Unreal.
Binaural Sound
Binaural Sound
CW: Hearing Voices.
In Hellblade: Senuas Sacrifice, Binaural audio recording was used to create unnervingly believable voices in the characters head. Video one covers the concept itself and video two, as well as covering why they used this approach creatively, gets into the process and shows some interesting behind the scenes.
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