My lack of posting recently is due to the finishing of all the audio, composition and sound effects for the upcoming release of the Perils Of Man video game for the Apple app store. The release is REALLY close… a weekish?
The jist of the game is:
When sixteen year-old Ana Eberling receives an unexpected gift from her missing father, a “rogue scientist” who disappeared when she was very young, she soon discovers that “her ancestors were inventors of an incredible technology that gave them the power to eliminate uncertainty. Ana needs to know why her family has fiercely kept this potential boon to humanity from the public for generations, and if the answer to that question has something to do with her missing father. Ultimately, Ana must decide if a perfectly predictable world is a curse on humanity, or a triumph for mankind.”
It’s a point and click adventure game, great story, GORgeously designed and hopefully the music and sfx won’t be too shabby. I’m proud thus far at least.
It’s been very, very interesting designing music for a game, especially music that must exist comfortably behind many sound effects, AND, and this is key, not grate on your nerves since certain beds will play on repeat for awhile until you solve certain puzzles allowing the chapter to progress to the next section.
Most music beds run 3 minutes and loop. We all agreed we wanted some great melodies in the music, but of course those very melodies are the thing most likely to grate on you heard over and over. I learned that one play of the melody each sound bed was enough and only for 2 out of the 3 beds in each chapter.That’s plenty.
I’ve amassed a plethora of sound effects, and insuring they will be clear over the music, PLUS dialogue has been interesting. An interesting challenge is the fact that you may have certain fx looping in the background in addition to the music, voice stuff and individual fx. For instance, if the protagonist is in a room, when standing next to a window or a furnace an effect will play the entire time she is in range, and with that is the music, her interacting with objects, opening and shuffling through her inventory, making exclamations, etc. Fascinating to work on.
So i just uploaded all the final fx and of course music beds. While the music beds were technically done already, actual walkthrough testing revealed tweaks which were needed. The last job then was to write out a detailed list of every effect and piece of music, exactly when it’s triggered, whether it’s a loop or a one shot effect, and whether it’s in proximity to something and when it should disappear. With this the programmers can plug everything in properly and not have to read my scattered mind. Certainly some of it has been plugged in to test with already, but this is the full monty.
So there you have it. One last thing, i believe certain games have great potential to bring out a range of emotion in the player far beyond just adrenaline rush. Many games, especially adventures have been exploring this for awhile now, and one thing this game is dedicated to doing beyond just entertainment and cool graphic and fun puzzles and tantalizing storyline is to MOVE you, not just with a story, but using the visuals and audio to do so at a visceral level. At least this is what i have believed the entire time and strived to do. Obviously the director and animators have too because… trust me you only play it for 2 minutes to get it. So on top of this i wanted the audio to be subtly working at you emotionally, immersing you carefully despite yourself.
I leave you with some screenshots from the game.
