FDGD105 - Audio For Games
Audio in Games, A History.
When the first video games where coming around, such as Pong, sounds did not exist in video games. Sounds in video games were first introduced in the 1970's with games like Asteroids, and Space Invaders. These sounds were simple bleeps and bloops, although Space invaders had a sound track that increased speed the more enemies you destroyed. In asteroids it was a simple explosion noise for when the player died.
As years went on and video games developed more, so did the audio within them. Games like Pac-Man and Donkey Kong Featured more sound effects than previous arcade games. Around about this time game console like the NES(Nintendo Entertainment System) where being sold. These consoles Included games like: The Mario Bros, The Legend of Zelda, Mega Man and Castlevania. These games included simple 8-bit soundtracks that the hardware was limited to. But being limited helped create rememberable theme tunes. These new soundtracks were the first to help indulge the player into their games and help bring the experience to life. |
During the 90's video games advanced into 3D realms and the audio capability increased from 8-bit electronic sounds to a much higher quality. These sounds and soundtracks are detailed enough that they'd work well with movies, which really helps immersing the player into the video game.
The audio in video games have always been on par with the graphics of them, The older 8-bit graphic games have 8-bit music, but as time went on and graphics got better, so did the audio. This Could have been a good thing because the 8-bit graphics and the 8-bit sounds go well together, they make the other seem more related. So if somebody wanted to make a retro style game today, they would use electronic 8-bit sounds instead of realistic sounds. |
To reduce file size of the sound effects in Super Mario 64, they used Bowser's laugh and sped it up a few times to great the sound effect for the Boos.(Video Link) Today, the people who make sound effects in video games often do something similar to this, re-using sound effects in different ways, to create more outcomes with fewer resources.
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Resources:
Zoom recorder
SM58 - Dynamic, Omni directional mic For louder vocals/sounds sm86 - Condenser, Omni directional vocal mic Shotgun mic - MCE86 - This mic's aim is a spread shot, it will pick up sound Rifle mic - ME67 - This mic is more precise than the shotgun mic, where the shotgun mic's aim is spread, the rifle's is more Record voice for radio effect, record monster noise -High, Mid, Low Get a name of a game sound artist/ game composer |
Editing Sounds.
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At first we recorded our own sounds. One of us saying a sentence and another 3 for monster sounds, one mid, one low, and the last high.
First off we edited the first sound to sound like it was coming from a radio. To the left is the sound files, the first being the original, and the second being the edited. |
Composers.Some of my favourite music that are in video games mainly comes from 'The Legend of Zelda' series. The main person for composed the music for 'The Legend of Zelda' is Koji Kondo, He also has done Mario music as well. I really enjoy listening to his music.
Koji Kondo is a video game composer and sound directer, and works for Nintendo. He Is mainly known for his works in 'Super Mario Brothers' and 'The Legend of Zelda'. A video games score is one of the most important aspects of a video game, It creates the mood and immerses the player into the game play, Koji's music does this exact thing in 'The Legend of Zelda' and because of that I really love these games. |
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Project
For this project we had to find a 15-20 second clip of video game footage for us to add sounds and music to. I chose Footage of the game Grand Theft Auto V, The footage is from a YouTube channel called Let's Play, I chose this footage because When I first watched it I was amazed and what they had done.
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The first sound on this project that I worked on was explosions. Making this sound was tricky to do. At first I recorded an electric air soft gun, edited it so it was deeper and slower. The final result was close to an explosion but it was lacking bass and more of an impacted. I decided to take another go at it with different sounds, I recorded slamming a book shut, made it deeper added some tremble and I had an explosion sound that was almost real.
PresentationWhen presenting the work, I first showed the original footage(giving warning for the language) Then went on to show the edited footage with my sounds added. Then once I played it another time, went in-depth and showed the sound files themselves.
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Audio Game - Deep-Sea Trench Adventure
For the next task we had to group up and create a game involving audio. Our team decided to make a side scrolling game, where you'll have to avoid hitting obstacles, we had a few ideas on what the theme would be. In the end we chose to do a submarine game.
We split up to do different tasks. One person would make the art, another the 3D models, another to make and edit the sounds and the last (Myself) will do all of the coding and put the game together, using Construct 2. The basics of the game is, you use the arrow keys(or press buttons on the screen when using mobile devices) to avoid mines. you have to avoid them because if you hit them, they blow up and damage you, which you have 3 lives. As time goes on during the game you collect score, the more score you have, the faster you will go. Another small mechanic of the game is Oxygen, as you play your Oxygen will go down. If it goes down all the way, the screen blurs out and after a small while, you blow up. To get more Oxygen you have to collect the bubbles. Feedback:
High score system is great. Good fast pace when you get into the flow of the game. Nice ambient audio. Could you add more controls in the future like a boost? Submarine is a bit sluggish when you try to move it. Control overview? Submarine is extremely cute and animation is smooth. Controls were unclear. Sounds were well made. No life counter or ways of telling how much health left. Good graphics. Intense and fun as the game progresses and the submarine speeds up. The response from people playing the game is that the controls were unclear as they were not displayed anywhere, and that the player health could be better displayed than just from a damaged submarine . |
When the game was under way, we had to decide what type of sounds we would need, we thought about background music, but in the end decided not to. The type of sounds we added were:
We decided to call the game Deep-Sea Trench Adventure. |
Final Game.
Sounds
These are the sounds that I plan to create for the game:
The style of the sound effects will fit the pixel theme of the game by using 16 bit sounds. To generate these sounds, I used this site - http://www.superflashbros.net/as3sfxr/- once the generated sounds are to my liking I'll then take them into Audition/Audacity to mix the sounds together to edit and finish them. The sounds will be based off of both 'The Legend of Zelda' and 'Skyrim'. I would like to recreate the music of 'Skyrim' in a 16 bit style, and recreate the sounds from the original 'Legend of Zelda' games.
- Jumping
- Attack
- Hit
- Chains
- Slam
- Pause/Unpause(select)
- Ambient background music
- Door open/close
- Chest open
- pickups(coin/hp)
The style of the sound effects will fit the pixel theme of the game by using 16 bit sounds. To generate these sounds, I used this site - http://www.superflashbros.net/as3sfxr/- once the generated sounds are to my liking I'll then take them into Audition/Audacity to mix the sounds together to edit and finish them. The sounds will be based off of both 'The Legend of Zelda' and 'Skyrim'. I would like to recreate the music of 'Skyrim' in a 16 bit style, and recreate the sounds from the original 'Legend of Zelda' games.
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When the sounds were completed, I exported them as .OGG files, as that's the sound files Construct 2 uses. Implementing them into the game was simple enough, all you have to do is find where in the code it's best to add them. If you can't find the right spot, then you have to create some code for them. Usually you wont have to create code to add sounds.
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To generate the sounds I used this site - http://www.superflashbros.net/as3sfxr/- The site gives you presets that make similar generated sounds, that you can then edit further by change different settings such as the frequency.
If these sounds don't fit your need then you can mutate the sounds, or create a completely randomized sounds. Once the sound you like is generated you can export it as a Wav and edit/combine them to complete the sounds. |
Below is a screen shot of the ambient music being edited in Audition. It uses a few different types of noises that fade in and out of each other. I used a range of different effects on them, like pitch shifter, and chorus.
This is footage of the game with the sounds implemented.
Evaluation
Overall I am happy with the sounds that I have produced, I feel that they work well with the overall theme of my game (retro pixel) and that they helped create my game as a whole. I have had fun generating these sound effects and then editing them into the kinds of sounds that worked well for my game, for example, the chest opening sound effect. I used the same sounds as with the door opening but added a Winding up chime sound to give it more of a treasure sound. With the setting of the game being in a dungeon/castle environment, I made the background music an ambient set of sounds, inspired by Skyrim's soundtrack.
I created the sound effects using an online 16 bit sound generator, then exported them out to be worked further on using Audition/Audacity, and finally exporting them off as .OGG files and importing into Construct 2. I had to generate the sounds because of the 16 bit theme, and would have achieved a much better effect than if I had recorded sound effects. The people who I showed the sounds too (while playing the game) said that the sounds fitted well with the theme of my game and that they helped improve my game further. Which I was happy to hear.
The sound style I was aiming for was a mixture of 'Legend of Zelda' and 'Skyrim'. I wanted the sound effects of LoZ and the music of Skyrim, I felt like these would have been a nice mixture that would have helped given my game more depth and feel. Other inspiration comes from things like: Mario, Dorkly Animations, and Terraria.
While in Audition/Audacity, the only work that needed doing was adding and mixing sounds together, changing them slightly to create different variations on the sounds for variety.
If I had more time/ worked on this project on its own, I would have focused on adding more sounds that fitted with the game. Maybe adding footsteps, warning sounds for when time was running out, and ambient sounds. I would have added more of a soundtrack to the game (First I would have focused more on leaning how) like for the main menu, different levels, and paused screen. There isn't much I would change on how I created the sounds or the sounds themselves. I feel they work well enough already.
The only challenging part was adding the sounds into construct 2 itself, Finding where in the code you should implement the sounds. For some sounds the coding is already there, like attacking and jumping. But sometimes they aren't, for example, chain clicking sounds that have to click in time with the chain's movement. Also creating special code so the game doesn't spam the sound.
In conclusion I am proud of what I have created, I feel it achieves its goal in helping giving my game life. If this was a more focused on project I would have added a lot more sounds and music to help complete the game, As well as more features I would have added to the actual game that would have needed sounds. Like Boss battles, more enemies, and more wizards to play as.
Dorkly - https://www.youtube.com/user/dorkly
I created the sound effects using an online 16 bit sound generator, then exported them out to be worked further on using Audition/Audacity, and finally exporting them off as .OGG files and importing into Construct 2. I had to generate the sounds because of the 16 bit theme, and would have achieved a much better effect than if I had recorded sound effects. The people who I showed the sounds too (while playing the game) said that the sounds fitted well with the theme of my game and that they helped improve my game further. Which I was happy to hear.
The sound style I was aiming for was a mixture of 'Legend of Zelda' and 'Skyrim'. I wanted the sound effects of LoZ and the music of Skyrim, I felt like these would have been a nice mixture that would have helped given my game more depth and feel. Other inspiration comes from things like: Mario, Dorkly Animations, and Terraria.
While in Audition/Audacity, the only work that needed doing was adding and mixing sounds together, changing them slightly to create different variations on the sounds for variety.
If I had more time/ worked on this project on its own, I would have focused on adding more sounds that fitted with the game. Maybe adding footsteps, warning sounds for when time was running out, and ambient sounds. I would have added more of a soundtrack to the game (First I would have focused more on leaning how) like for the main menu, different levels, and paused screen. There isn't much I would change on how I created the sounds or the sounds themselves. I feel they work well enough already.
The only challenging part was adding the sounds into construct 2 itself, Finding where in the code you should implement the sounds. For some sounds the coding is already there, like attacking and jumping. But sometimes they aren't, for example, chain clicking sounds that have to click in time with the chain's movement. Also creating special code so the game doesn't spam the sound.
In conclusion I am proud of what I have created, I feel it achieves its goal in helping giving my game life. If this was a more focused on project I would have added a lot more sounds and music to help complete the game, As well as more features I would have added to the actual game that would have needed sounds. Like Boss battles, more enemies, and more wizards to play as.
Dorkly - https://www.youtube.com/user/dorkly