Sound is Not a Simulation - Game Sound Technology and Player Interaction: Concepts and Developments - page 53

often used to refer to a previous part of the film
causing a kind of anamnesis in the listener (Augo-
yard & Torgue, 2006; Chion, Gorbman, & Murch,
1994). Sounds become tied to experiences and
therefore have a meaning beyond a description
of sound and effect. Our participant, in having a
longer time to record or document these kinds of
experiences will allow for a further insight into
what certain sounds can trigger.
Riessman (1993) argues that in the act of telling
there is an inevitable gap between the experience
and the telling: the sound methods allow for the
participant to embody themselves in the narrated
space, as they are situated in the environment to
which they are referring to. What these combined
methods may reveal lie not in how we listen to
sound but what we hear when we actively think
about listening. That in itself may highlight how
much active listening happens in a person's life
and if it turns out that there is, quite a lot heard
in an individual's day to day experiences we
must consider sound more actively in the design
of digital soundscapes conversely, if we reveal
that sound plays only a minor part in a person's
relationship to his environment we may have to
re-think how sound, beyond music, should be part
of a digital game space.
Sequeira, Specht, Hamalainen, and Hugdahl's
(2008) research on the hearing impaired noted
that clarity is essential in picking up the minutiae
within the complexity of sounds, as issues can
occur when ambient sound levels are too high.
The comprehension of language becomes more
difficult when we try to distinguish dialogue which
is surrounded by high levels of background sounds.
Equally, Sanchez and Lumbreras's (1999) research
in the design of digital gameworlds for the blind
highlighted the need for 3D audio interfaces as a
method in which to navigate space. They argue
that users, when deprived of the sense of sight, are
able to recognise spatiality and “localise specific
points in 3D space, concluding that navigating
space through sound can be a precise task for
blind people” (1999, p. 1).

For digital game sound this does not necessarily
seem an important issue, the ambient soundscape
rarely includes high levels of conversational sound
and game designers rarely design for the blind.
Yet in cities and urban centers, vocal sounds and
directional sounds are one of the dominating
sound and spatial characteristics of the environ-
ment. There is interplay between vocal sounds
and architecture; they will resonate at different
frequencies depending on the construction of the
space. Thus understanding how people distinguish
sounds, such as vocals amongst a variety of other
sounds may be relevant if a designer wishes to
include this soundtrack of reality into sound design
for gaming. Equally we can make choices in what
direction we choose to go to based on acoustic as
well as visual information. This could be explored
through a series of listening projects whereby a
focus group must listen to different sets of sounds
while trying to engage in other activities. If the
level of information and not volume is increased
over time, one could ascertain how much informa-
tion we can process simultaneously while trying
to complete tasks.

contextualizing Game space

Understanding that there are a variety of ways
to experience the gameworld is a necessary con-
dition to deciding what soundscape should or
could be placed within this virtual space. What
is the operant behaviour of the gamer, what is the
participation level and how much control in the
gameworld does the player have? Finally how
does one contextualise oneself within the world?
Grimshaw and Schott (2007) noted that there
was a feedback “for operant behaviours (panting
breaths is a good indicator of the player's energy
level) (2007, p. 475). In examining FPS games,
we see that sound is predominantly responsive
and reactive, rather than passively situated in the
background, and this is a key component to this
type of gaming. We may hear the dying groans of
another wounded warrior in FPS games, but we