Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
The sound designer
The sound designer is the person responsible for creating all music and sound effects
for a game.
The thing that is most expected from the sound designer is to provide the game with
a unique and distinct sound that can make a difference in the player's involvement in
the game he's playing.
There is one distinctive factor that makes the job of a game sound designer different
from that of his closest relative, the audio designer for movies, which is randomness.
In games, there is never (or should never be) a total control on the exact sequence
of events that will be triggered by the player. This is the reason why sound design in
games tends to be based on things that may or should happen, rather than what will
happen next. As a fact, sound in games is usually broken down into chunks that can
then be played as needed.
Though audio is an important feature in games, there are two main reasons to con-
sider the sound designer role less relevant for the purpose of this chapter on the mo-
bile development team.
The first is that the sound designer is rarely a permanent member of the development
team working on a game, and audio in games is generally added during the final steps
of production. For the most part of development, games are worked on and tested
with just audio placeholders. More likely, the audio designer is hired as a contract em-
ployee during the last phase of development.
The second is that audio is not as important as other features of a mobile game due
to the distinctive kind of fruition of mobile games. As they run on handheld devices,
mobile games are likely played outdoors or in crowded locations, such as bus and
metro stations. Unless the player wears headphones, the music and sound effects of
the game are not very much appreciated. In many cases, the player himself/herself
will deactivate sound and sound effects to not bother other people around him/her (or
be caught playing by his/her teacher, for example!).
