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mr-no-life · 2 years

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Three Games that have Creative Sound Design

When it comes to video games, I think that sound and music are the biggest make or break for me (second that to the story, but we are not going to worry about it). One of the core components of a video game that I feel gets ignored all too quickly (especially in the Indie Game scene) because Graphics are what people worry about the most. I was going to write a post about how the lack of sound/music in a game can drive a game… but I had a meltdown trying to write the opening paragraph, so instead I am going to talk about three games that I feel like have the strongest and most creative sound design and why. I will link all of these games at the end of the post for you to enjoy. As a reminder, I am no industry professional and this is by far not professional commentary on the state of how video games are made. I am a filthy casual that is a sucker for things that sound good. Oh, there may be spoilers for these games, this is your only warning.

To start, all three of these games have the following in common:

The overall sound design (from levels, to timing, to being able to set the tone etc.) are pleasing and engaging.

The music whether it be original score or licenced music fits the tone of the game

It strived to do something unique (I know that is a broad category, I’ll do my best to explain it)

The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe

This game… An enigma gameplay wise with a quite interesting take on the narrative as a whole. But, what sets it apart from most games (and even from the other two on this list) is how the lack of sound and music are used to drive the story along. What makes this game so charming is how while the designers could have easily gallen to the trope of having music constantly playing in the background throughout the whole game, they instead chose to only have music at key moments and endings depending on the choices you make.

One ending that stood out to me is what is known as the “Space” ending where after a series of choices you end up in a black room with a nice little ambient track and a quick quip by the narrator and that’s it. Speaking of the narrator (who is voiced by Kevan Brighting) he is the only voice throughout the game and depending on your choices he will judge or praise you. At times he is the only thing you hear (outside the dulcet ambient humm of the office around you) and (at least for me) that alone can be a drive for the player. This “search for the next cue” may seem not fun for some people, but for others, finding the next cure or a different cue is the fun part of the game. It’s almost hard (for me at least) to describe how the lack of music is actually a good thing and how most of the time you only hear the ambient noises of the office around you, the dull hums of computers and what I can only assume is the HVAC system in the background as the narrator occasionally quipping at you as you run in a continuous loop trying to find something different each time.

As for the soundtrack, there is only about 90 mins worth of notable music cues, that is not bad considering games like Skyrim and Red Dead Redemption (1 and 2) easily clock in with 3+ hour long soundtracks, which isn't a bad thing I just find it impressive when games with little to no soundtrack can still be this enjoyable. I almost have a hard time describing any more because at the time of writing this I still haven't even gotten to any of the newer endings and I'm just scratching the surface with finding the little easter eggs.

Favorite song track: Control by: Yiannis Ioannides Favorite Sound Effect: Clicking with nothing to interact with

Fallout: New Vegas

One of my (and many others) favorite RPGs out there. There is honestly nothing I could say about this game that over twelve years of gaming journalism hasn't already covered about this game. I will say this, it amazes me that through the years, New Vegas and the rest of the Fallout games as a whole have managed to stay consistent (for the most part) with their sounds and music scores. From the iconic bottle cap sound to the entire ambient score by Inon Zur, for a game of the Xbox360/PS3 era, it surprisingly holds to this day. The ONE nitpick I have (as with most Bethesda games) you will at one point encounter all five voice actors at some point playing every named and unnamed NPC in the game… kinda strange but it is what it is.

Speaking of voice actors, the voice levels are surprisingly crisp, and the fact that the levels change if the NPC is wearing a hazmat suit or a helmet (an obvious notice but a tiny detail I love). A couple key voice actors that really stand out to me are Ulysses voiced by Roger Cross and Mr.House voiced by Rene Auberjonois (may he rest in peace). As much as the internet likes to meme it to death, Ulysses’ ramblings are by far the most catching of the named NPCs. It’s his overall tone and demeanor that despite all the bullshit that has happened to him, he still manages to stay calm and let his words do the real damage. Mr. House, for a robotic A.I this snarky asshole definitely oozes that “Mr. Vegas/big money CEO” persona. I actually appreciate the fluctuations (which are subtle but they are there) that he has throughout the game. The thing that seals the deal for Mr. House as my favorite NPC is the fact that depending on who you side with in the game, you see Mr.House’s shriveled body, and he actually sounds how he looks. They could have easily made his human form sound like his A.I persona, but they didn’t, and that is an amazing touch. Outside of the voice acting, the rest of the ambient sounds are actually mixed pretty well for the most part, no one sound overpowers the others (and I usually have my master volume set to about 50% because I play with speakers).

All of this is just the vanilla base game with DLCs that sound this good, I have neglected to mention the years of mods from the community that add their own sounds and voice acting to the game (and I am not going to talk about it here cause that is a blog post for another day). Speaking of the DLCs, the wealth of unique characters, and sound effects I could gush about for a while (But I have to leave something for a future blog post ;) ) I could proceed further, but to summarize, 10/10 sound quality from a different era.

Favorite song track: Serenity/Dream Town by: Mark Morgan Fun Fact: This was first featured in Fallout 2 Favorite Sound effect: The ambient sounds of the K9000 Cyberdog gun from the Old World Blues DLC.

Left 4 Dead (both 1 and 2)

This game is one of the few exceptions I will make to play multiplayer with. Something about grabbing three other friends and fighting hordes of zombies is just… **Chef's kiss** delightful. BUT, I have never played a game (or seen a movie) that does Leitmotifs as good as the Left 4 Dead games… For thoughs who do not know, in short a Leitmotif (or more commonly a Music Motif ) is a song or sound cue that is recurring with a specific character, idea or place. What makes this game stand out (even to this day) is the almost god-like timing and placement of these cues. For a game that came out two years (for the first one, one year before for the second) before Fallout New Vegas, the techniques used and the style they are mixed stand out far above the other games of the time (in my opinion, and that is not to say the other games were not bad, hell, Super Smash Bros Brawl and Fallout 3 came out the same year, 2008 was just good as a whole).

Let’s start with how Leitmotifs are used: both games have what are known as “special infected” zombies, and are usually there to spice up the game and either force your team to work together, or panic and split. Each one of these special infected have their own sound cues and music stings to alert the player(s) that they are coming. What I like about this is that when you first play these games you’re initial reaction may be “What the fuck is that?” and then BOOM all hell is breaking loose. But, as you play them more and more the confusion turns into “Everyone start running shit is going to hit the fan.” But, a nice little detail I actually learned from another review of this game, is that a lot of the audio cues (not necessarily the music stings) have there own built in Doppler effect (witch I fucking hate, but more on that later) witch makes it all the harder to pin point were the zombies are coming from. It adds a nice little touch to something that could easily have been a bland generic one cue note.

Speaking of musical stings, there are FOUR (Yes four) music stings for when you are hanging off a ledge, and they get louder and more intense as time goes by, witch just makes me giggle like a child because it is a clear indicator that you are gonna die unless someone saves you. While I was doing research for this post, I noticed another interesting detail I did not notice until now, when a hoard of zombies is approaching in Left 4 Dead 2, the song that plays during the hoard is different depending on witch of the six campaigns you are playing, and I think that is absolutely BRILLIENT it makes it seem like each campaign is unique and fresh. This may seem kind of an odd praise, but each of the campaigns (in Left 4 Dead 1 and 2) have their own unique song attached to them (that is separate from the Hoard songs in the case of L4D2). As with the other two games I have gushed about, I could spend a lot more time going on and on about how each of the sound cues for the special infected have both a piano and a string variant, how the sound goes mute and dry when you are almost dead, but I feel like I have gotten my point across, this is a solid game for it to have come out in ‘08.

Favorite song track: Dead Air (the self titled theme for the L4D1 Campaign of the same name) by: Mike Morasky Favorite Sound effect(s): The entirety of the L4D2 Dark Carnival campaign.

In Conclusion. These are just three games I feel like have some pretty solid sound design, but as with most things, they are not without their flaws. Stanley Parable gets a tad frustrating because you are sometimes left wandering around in a quiet empty space with no cues from the Narrator, Fallout New Vegas and the famous “crash every two hours” issue, and the Left 4 Dead games sometimes gets a bit TOO chaotic at times and some of the details are lost. But in the end, that’s what makes these games great, there flaws are often put to the wayside because the strengths shine that good, and to me that is the sign of a good game, where the nitpicks and issues are still there, but it makes the game that much more enjoyable because it is essentially a flawed masterpiece. In the era of “everything has to be 4k graphics and flawless and bug free day 1” the charm of an indie game taking its first baby steps into the world is often seen as “lazy” because we have sadly shifted the focus from “quality” to “quantity”. But, that is not my place to talk, we are here to celebrate the Music and Audio Design in games (both AAA and indie). I will most likely be doing another one of these types of posts later in the year talking about three more games’ audio I love. If you have any questions, feel free to DM me here on Tumblr or on Twitter (links in the bio). Below is a list of resources for you to check out the games mentioned here today (and the kind people who inspired me to do this). Stay safe everyone! (^_^)

Games:

Fallout: New Vegas

Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe

Left 4 Dead & Left 4 Dead 2

Resources:

Left 4 Dead Wiki

Nukipedia

What keeps Left 4 Dead 2 so GREAT even 12 years later? By: Bricky on Youtube

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