A Combined Model for the Structuring of Computer Game Audio - Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments - page 109

is sharp and often pointy. 5 But we also need yet
another dimension and that is loudness. These
primitives have therefore been made in 5 different
sizes designating their relative loudness: A larger
primitive represents a louder sound.
The model is able to show the following
aspects:

Playing a computer game involves the ma-
nipulation of objects within the game environ-
ment in a dynamic, sequential flow of events.
During play, the player will be processing a lot
of data that will need to be made meaningful in
order to proceed within the game environment
and the game as a system. The player will need
to identify the data and turn it into information
by categorizing the graphical as well as the sound
elements. Objects in a game may be connected to
a corresponding sound that carries meaning, that
is, there is a semantic level in the sounds and the
graphics that is fundamental to gameplay as such.
Scripted sounds, or series of sounds, on the other
hand, are the result of a player's position within
the environment rather than a specific gameplay
action taken by the player. For example, a player
reaches a certain point in the game environment
and a sound starts. The player has not taken any
conscious action and hence does not anticipate
any specific feedback. The conceptual spectrum
induces different kinds of anticipation. You might
very well use scripted sounds to make the player
take action, for example, by letting the player
walk in a narrow corridor with glass walls on-
1side. When the player reaches a specific point
of observation, you script a sound event to occur
(Gibson, 1986) also adding a sudden motion seen
through the glass wall. If the gameplay is based
on survival/horror, you might induce the player
to waste a number of bullets on the supposition
that the sound and the motion imply danger is
present, that is, you scare her into action through
a scripted event.
In a film everything is placed in a comparable
scripted order when the editing process has been
concluded and the film is completed. However,
in a computer game, the total environment must
support the gameplay. It may contain cut scenes,
scripted events as well as those based on player
action. In the first case you have the same con-
trol as in traditional movies, while in the second
you preplan an event to occur at a specific point
in the game environment. For the last case, a

• The amount and clustering of encoded

sounds

• The amount and clustering of embodied

sounds

• The amount and clustering of diegetic

sounds

• The amount and clustering of non-diegetic

sounds

• The amount and clustering of Interface

sounds

• The amount and clustering of Effect sounds

• The amount and clustering of Zone sounds

• The amount and clustering of Affect sounds

• The relative loudness between sounds

• The dominant frequencies in each sound.

The parameters above help the sound designer
avoid cognitive overload due to a logjam of sounds.
We have now described how the combined model
is structured. Before explaining how the sound
designer can use it to analyze and/or structure
the sonic environments in computer games, we
need to elaborate on the discussion of the process
of playing computer games and listening to the
sonic component of the environment as part of
game playing.

Playing computer Games and
Listening to the sounds

What is game playing? How does a player act and
why does she act the way she does? What role does
sound have in the playing of a computer game?
Can sound be used to manipulate the player into
acting in specific ways?