This past week the I attended the East Coast Gaming Conference with others from the DSA Game Design pathway. We had a lot of fun doing everything from attended keynotes and talks to playing some of the most cutting edge VR games in the industry. I really enjoyed being able to get a closer look at the industry and the people who work in it. By attending talks I was able to expand my knowledge on many different sides of the industry from the serious applications of gamification to interactive radio plays.
One talk that was particularly interesting to me was a talk given by Bonnie Bogovich about how to make games for smart speakers such as the Amazon Echo. Being a relatively new technology, smart speakers are still ripe for exploring new game concepts especially in the area of choose your own adventure style games which are perfect fit for the new technology. The lack of graphics helps game designers think creatively in order to emerge their players into the game through sound. After the talk I approached Bonnie to ask her about how she started down her track of becoming an audio designer. I was surprised to find out that she had started in high school doing tech for theatre shows. She also told me that her love for audio and radio plays dated all the way back to her childhood when she and her brother would record talk shows of themselves reacting to the Ninja Turtles TV show. I then tried to find out how I could make one of these cool audio only games and was shown how you could find templates for Alexa based programs in the Alexa developers portal which Amazon he'd set up to encourage people to make software for their line of smart speakers. At the end of the conference I was tired but happy. It had shown me how working in the game industry was a real thing I could do and not some small dream. However it also showed me that in order to achieve that goal I was going to need to work hard in order to succeed.
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First off let's start with a little introduction to the music I've experienced in my life. When I was in first grade my mom started me with my fist piano lessons. Piano lessons are a fact in my house, not an option. This forced march may not seem to be the best start for a deep love of music but in fact what started as a requirement soon grew on me especially after I discovered a talent for singing and began singing in several choirs. In middle school I again expanded my musical repertoire by beginning the double bass. Truth be told my passion for games may be in part because of the beautiful, exciting, and even emotional songs games use to bring an experience to their players.
Why are sounds and music so important to games though? Well think about it. Your life is filled with sound from before you even open your eyes in the morning to long after you close them at night. Imagine an old soundless movie flick. Without sound emotions are lost, large collisions seem fake, and its hard to truly believe in the action happening right before your eyes. With this kind of weight it's no wonder why games like the Legend of Zelda series, with their iconic sound tracks, do so well and have such a large fan base. Sounds serve many purposes when making games. They help add to the background with music meant to strike emotions into the players' hearts. Collisions, breathing, footsteps, and other actions are accentuated with music helping them pop out. These add clarity and realism to action sequences. After all sounds surround us in normal life so why should they be left out while playing a game. Sounds can even have games based off them as seen in rhythm games. The best part is this; we, in the game design industry, probably haven't even scratched the surface of how we can use sounds. Now tell me that isn't amazing. |
AuthorSamuel Henry is a Senior at DSA in NC. He has 3 years of prior experience in the game design pathway and he's looking forward to becoming a great game designer. The views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Durham School of the Arts or Durham Public Schools Categories
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