This week we’ve been working on adding sounds to the game. Mostly we’re using sounds available at http://www.freesound.org/, they have plenty of useful free effects available. As opposed to any of my previous games, we’re really putting an effort to make the soundscape believable. This means we’re using multiple samples for each action, and we’re trying to find sounds for most ingame actions. For example we already have over 30 footstep samples whereas the original Notrium had exactly 6.
Another useful addition compared to Notrium is that we’re using different buses and different attenuations for different kinds of samples. In practice this means the sounds get bogged down a lot less, because we can dynamically reduce the range of heard footstep. In Notrium you used to hear all of the aliens’ footsteps at one go, producing a terrible mass of sounds where you only wished to kill the aliens to quiet them down.
For modders I’m trying to make a lot of things automatic unless otherwise specified. An example, you can drag many objects in the game with your mouse. Dragging a large cupboard produces a lower sound than dragging a chair. I’ve automated the pitch changing to depend on the mass of the object being dragged, so you don’t have to specify a drag sound for each and every different kind of chair you make.
Another helpful feature is that actual sound files are no longer used in any of the game scripts. They’re just referenced with cues. For example my script could say playSound(“eat”) and I would have a cue in my sounds.ini file like this:
[eat]
soundFiles=crunch.wav, gulp.wav.
Well you may wonder where’s the use in that? Simply put, you can now change any of the actual sound files in one place, you don’t have to go into a dozen scripts to hunt them down. And you can have some definitions for each sound, like minimum and maximum randomization volume, plus pitch. Not to mention that you can define any number of actual sound files, and the game will choose one to play at random.
Sounds seriously cool.
Since most of time I do an odd thing (I play with the speakers off while at the same time listen to my MP3) I do not care much about it… However, when I turn it on, I like to hear nice sounds, that is true. In Notrium I do remember that if you went to the hive I turned the speakers off, the reason is exactly the one you mentioned there ville. And by the way, since we now are talking about sound, Will there be any in-game music? In RPGs there are moments when a “music change” can severely affect the atmosphere (which is a good thing).
I am hoping to get someone to make music for Driftmoon. There won’t be full time background music, but I plan to have some music for important events. But this depends on how much of an atmosphere we can create with just ambient sounds and effecs.
That is exactly what I mean — Have you played (or at least heard of) Gateway? I remember clearly that when you were in danger, the music clearly reflected it. Or when you managed to do something important, there too, the music reflected it. Most of the time there is a background music, but you do not notice it. At least I did not pay attention to it.
Which Gateway would that be?
Frederik Pohl´s Gateway.
Really? As I recall, it was a text adventure. I didn’t even remember there was music.
Well, I do not know what version you have played, but if I am refering to this one:
http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/540/Gateway+-+Frederik+Pohls.html
Basically you must use DoxBox to hear the sounds, but they exist in this version. Yes, it is mainly a text adventure game, but it also contains nice “scenes” and sounds & music. And much the same goes to Gateway II: Homeworld.
I like the idea of cues. Should make modding real easy.
I use IBAudio music in my games; it’s not free but it sounds great.
http://www.ibaudio.com/
Music released monthly, 100% royalty free, professional quality, and a good price too.
Lookin’ great and serious.
To make NPC voices differ, you could just change the pitch like how they do in Sims 3.
But I’ve see you’ve already covered that…
Anyway, good job!