Time for New Terminology? - Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments - page 85

speaking non-diegetic music of approaching en-
emies. However, even though Grimshaw's theory
emphasizes all sounds that have relevance for
player actions in the gameworld, it is confusing
that he still insists on using the concept diegetic
also for sounds that appear to have no source in
the game environment and that the avatar should
not be able to hear. In any respect, Grimshaw's
extension of what counts as diegetic, and his focus
on the player in relation to the concept, are strong
arguments for exchanging the existing terminol-
ogy with new.
In my Ph.D. research (Jørgensen, 2007a, 2009),
I developed a model of categorization that took
into consideration functionality with respect to
usability and type of information, location with
respect to the gameworld, and referentiality with
respect to the relationship between sound signal
and the event it refers to (2007a, pp. 84-87). In Jør-
gensen (2008), the model was further developed to
include what generates a specific sound. However,
in describing the location of sound with respect
to the gameworld, these models both included
references to the diegetic/non-diegetic divide by
the use of the neologism transdiegetic sounds
(Jørgensen, 2007b). This approach described
sound as transdiegetic by way of transcending
the border between diegetic and non-diegetic:
Diegetic sounds may address non-diegetic entities,
while non-diegetic sounds may communicate to
entities within the diegetic world. Such sounds
have an important functional value in computer
games by being an extension of the user interface
and providing information such as feedback
and warnings to the player. Utilizing the border
between diegetic and non-diegetic, transdiegetic
sounds merge game system information with the
gameworld and create a frame of reference that
has usability value at the same time as it upholds
the sense of presence in the gameworld. Using this
terminology, I argued that apparently non-diegetic
music that provides information relevant for player
action in the gameworld is external transdiegetic
since the musical source is not found within the

gameworld but is external to it. The same goes
for the disembodied warning “Our base is under
attack!” in Warcraft 3 . It is external transdiegetic
because it provides information relevant to player
action, but is not produced by anyone within the
gameworld. When the avatar in Diablo 2 (Bliz-
zard, 1998) claims “I'm overburdened”, however,
I called the sound internal transdiegetic because
the avatar as a character existing in the gameworld
communicates to the player situated in an external
position. The strengths of transdiegetic as concept
are that it emphasizes the functional role of the
sound in relation to player action in the gameworld,
and it points out that the spatial origin of the sound
is often relative. It is also able to describe all game
sounds by using the same framework. However, it
is confusing that it is based on the term diegesis,
which creates connotations to the mechanisms of
narratology and storytelling. Also, the internal and
external variations are flawed as they appear to
be two variations over the same theme, while in
reality they are not. While internal transdiegetic
sounds can easily be interpreted as abstractions of
“diegetic” sounds since they are partly integrated
into the game environment, external transdiegetic
sounds are externally situated but with clear impact
on the game environment.
Inger Ekman's approach to game sound (2005)
is closely related to that of transdiegetic sounds.
Common to Ekman's and my account is the idea
that the space of the gameworld is not absolute,
and that information is carried across its boundar-
ies. Another common ground is the idea that game
sounds are used to integrate the game system into
the environment in which it is set. From a semiotic
perspective, she observes that game sounds that
traditionally would be labeled diegetic, often have
non-diegetic referents, and vice versa. In this re-
spect, computer game sound is not limited to being
diegetic or non-diegetic, but creates two additional
layers that may be used to integrate non-diegetic
elements connected to the game system into the
diegetic world of the game. Masking sounds is her
term for diegetic sound signals with non-diegetic