Engines and Middleware 1 - Assignment 1: Audio Implementation

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One of the big pieces of work I submitted back in April this year was the audio implementation assignment of my Engines and Middleware 1 module. Working in a group with my friends and fellow game audio students Adam White (@AdamRWhitehead) and Aaron Turner, the objective for this module was to take an existing Unreal Engine 4 game with all the original audio assets removed, and substitute them with our own (hopefully suitable) replacements.

The specific game we were given for this task with was the tower defence strategy game from the UE4 example game projects collection.

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Simran Whitham - Sound Design for 'The Stages'

Alongside my core Game and Interactive Audio studies, I had the opportunity to provide sound design help to my friend Simran Whitham with his Unreal 4 game 'The Stages' during my first year studying at Futureworks. The Stages is a first-person platforming game in which the player has to pause the flow of time (using a fancy-schmancy time glove) to navigate otherwise impassable obstacles.

When thinking about how to create interesting sound assets for the time stop mechanic for The Stages, I was heavily inspired by the excellent sound design found in Remedy Entertainment's Quantum Break; a game centred around the concept of time travel. I wanted to come up with something similar to the tinkly, crystalline glass sounds used in Quantum Break to signify the distortion and manipulation of the flow of time. 

Below is the collection of sound effects and variations I put together for The Stages:

I created these audio assets through a combination of recording my own original sounds and editing together and manipulating a couple of pre-existing audio samples. Here's some more detail on each specific sound:

Time Stop

To achieve the core time stop effect, I reversed a glass breaking sample to get a nice glassy 'woosh' effect, and combined it with a reversed lightbulb pop sound to give it a percussive finish.

Glass breaking sample: GN2013, 'Breaking Glass Stereo' freesound.org/people/GN2013/sounds/199906/

Lightbulb pop sample: jorickhoofd, 'Exploding Lightbulb 2' freesound.org/people/jorickhoofd/sounds/179264/

Time Stop (Delay)

For this variant, I added a low rumble to the crescendo of the glass sample to give the effect a bit more of a dramatic, unsettling feel. I also added a tape delay to the glass and pop sounds to give the treble elements an eerie decay.

Wood Footsteps

I recorded these footstep sounds on the wooden floor of Futureworks' Custom Pre studio live room. I enjoy the percussive trebly clack to the these footsteps, but the mic also picked up a lot of trouser rustling noises from my jeans. Need to wear quieter trousers next time!

Carpet Footsteps

These sounds were recorded on the carpeted floor of the Custom Pre studio control room. Struggled to eliminate the background hum from this one; managed to get most of it out with some surgical EQ-ing, but lost some of the detail and top-end in the process.