IAM CIRMMT Series - Abstracts

Through this talk we will explore how the audio design process of game can be influenced when taking into account psychoacoustics. How does the player perceive the game's soundscape and music and what can we gain from that knowledge ? How can you also apply those concepts to game design and to make the game's experience better as to keep the player entertained.

Guy Whitmore: Creating highly adaptive spatial and surround music for nonlinear media

When composers talk about delivering spatial or surround music for nonlinear media such as games or VR, they most often are referring to multichannel (4.0, 5.1, 6.0 etc.) pre-mixed assets. The advantage being, familiarity of format, and the use of an offline linear DAW and all its plug-ins and processing to mix. Yet there are severe limits to this approach; first, the ability to mix/blend the music along with all other audio elements within the game/experience and second, multichannel mixes limit the adaptability of the music. This talk will demonstrate examples of real-time spatial mixing of music using Audiokinetic's Wwise audio engine, leading to an open discussion about the possibilities and potential of these techniques.