作者：Ariel Gross

上周，我在刚果潮湿的密林中遇到了技术音效设计师Damian Kastbauer。他正在寻找传说中的佩斯利河马。传说，亲吻佩斯利河马的人能够获得巨大的财富。我找到他并向他提出了几个问题：

Damian，除了寻找传说中的河马外，你的工作是什么？

我是个游戏技术设计师，这是个概念不清的术语。从本质上来说，我是音效内容和编程/引擎两者间整合的桥梁，目的在于制作适合音效的系统，或者说让游戏的音效在游戏过程中运转良好。

不错。我的观点是，游戏中的音效设计与其执行有着同等的地位。你对此有何看法？

时常听人说起过，最棒的音效如果执行不当最终也会变成很差的音效，所以大部分时间我都在努力让音效呈现出其最佳效果，这并不总是件容易的事情。因为我不负责内容制作，我也不是个真正意义上的程序员，所以我往往会在制作工具、规划执行过程和制定音频功能策略上花费大量时间，与编程团队配合或利用音频中间件工具来制作出最流畅的整合方案。

那么，你是否觉得自己是连接音频团队和编程团队的信使？这样的工作极具挑战性，因为你需要权衡两种不同的技能。

确实，我成为帮助两个领域连接起来的桥梁。我喜欢让内容设计师按照自己的想法设计，无需担心游戏的音效问题。在这种情况下，他们可以专注于擅长的领域，我努力确保他们设计的内容与游戏背景相符。这种平衡需要频繁的人际互动，但是我在这方面也能够做得很好。

你的工作着实令我敬佩，我在心里为你鼓掌，因为我不希望因此而吓跑佩斯利河马。那么，就你所接触过的开发团队而言，是否发现他们的音频团队和编程团队之间存在某些相同的问题？你是否通过某种方法，同时满足双方的需求？

我觉得，有些工作室缺乏或不重视音频团队和其余团队的直接交流问题。通常情况下，音频与开发过程中每个团队的工作都会产生关联。

音频团队往往孤立于工作室其他团队，所以很难出现默契的配合。

这是个令人苦恼的事实。

我同时参与不同游戏工作室的项目似乎是必要的做法，我需要融会贯通多种不同的技能，才能保持团队间的密切配合。

当我开展远程工作时，我的大部分精力耗费在实现相同项目不同团队间的交流沟通上。无论是通过电子邮件、即时通讯、Skype或开发期间举行的会议，团队成员间的交流总是项目中最重要的层面。

如果我进行的是远程指导，那么现场面见交流无疑更有助于音频的执行。多数情况下，我成了音效恰当执行的关键。

这是否是你工作过的工作室的普遍问题？也就是说，音频团队未受到工作室的重视？

我觉得，因为工作性质的原因，音频团队很难在工作室制定计划时被考虑到，他们的日常工作需要成员待在封闭的隔音室中。

也就是说，人们很难看到你，也很难听到你对团队计划的意见。我的意思是，音频制作者和其他成员之间往往隔着一扇门，外人要找他们甚至要敲门才能进去，一进去迎面而来的就是一阵高分贝的嘈杂之音。我们都知道，人们都偏向于直接听到对方的意见，而不愿意再去打开一扇门。

这听起来确实有点可笑。

你说的的确是事实。在跟随你来到刚果前，我的确很少离开自己的工作座位。你在GDC上看到的就是我在工作时的状态。这是工作室雇佣技术音效设计师的首要原因吗？

我被雇佣的主要原因在于帮助推广游戏。但是，我希望自己能够带给工作室所有成员在各种任务中互相协作的能力。

有时我甚至都不知道自己接下来要做什么，直到我参与到工作室中并评估其当前的形式，其他工作室或许也是如此。他们并不知道具体需要什么，但他们知道需要找个人来填补空白。

这么说来，你是帮助工作室节省时间的英雄了。

如果我在团队中能够减少内容设计师遇到的障碍，帮助他们设计出复杂的物理系统或程序动画，减少内存预算或流媒体的纷争，那么别人的担子就会轻一些，毕竟他们需要做的事情已经够多了。

就远程协助方面而言，可以在项目进展期间的任何时候为团队提供帮助，我在连接VPN的家庭工作室中工作，使用源控制。

当我到现场工作时，往往项目已到达最终阶段。

你提到了内存和流媒体。这些东西有些人可能无法理解。音频团队的工作室往往在内存预算和带宽不稳定的情况下工作。这确实是项技术性很强的工作。

在雇佣音频设计师时，这一点往往没有被考虑到。我发现，工作室更强调求职者所制作的音效质量，但对技术层面并不是很重视。

“熟悉中间件工具和执行”这类要求时常会出现在招聘内容中，但是我从中看到的是，多数公司将80%的精力放在创意上，对技术层面的关注只有20%。这样的公司适合你吗？还是说我的理解完全错误？

我认为，大部分到工作室来的成员都有音效设计背景。但到目前为止，几乎没有人在学校中接受过游戏音频技术层面的教育。

新进入行业的人往往从“音频执行者”开始做起，随后慢慢成长为音频设计师，甚至成为游戏音乐师或作曲，这已成为在这个领域提升的唯一途径。

当我进入游戏行业时，我自己很清楚，自己只想做技术层面的东西。幸亏在过去数年时间里，我从许多只对技术感兴趣的人那里学到了许多东西，这使得我能够得以在行业内立足。

在《黑道圣徒2》中，我们使用游戏内置编辑器来放置外围音频发射器。有时，当我移动外围发射器时，帧率会受到影响。我想将这些发射器对象放置到其他游戏中，比如《红色派系：游击战》。

这样，用户界面物理效果会随之改变。

你是否曾经历过音效丢失的情况？比如，音频团队确定音效正处在播放中，但事实上并没有听到。你会很经常碰到这种情况吗？

是的！有人进行的模式转换却忘了将音频连接，或者将放置在编辑器不同层次的音频发射器中的整个关卡几何移除，这些情况都会导致上述结果。

现在，人们可以通过多种不同的方法接触到游戏音频，比如mod、Unity、UDK、FMOD、Wwise、SDK文件、Max/MSP或pd，所以团队中经常会出现新面孔，他们已做足应对挑战的准备。

我知道，许多音频设计师都不愿意做执行工作。他们认为这项工作乏味无趣。然而，我猜想有些音频团队想要雇佣你作为全职员工。你是否收到过这样的邀请？你是否认同多数音频设计师的看法？

很长时间以来，我一直在做的是远程辅助类工作，帮助团队完善游戏中的内容。我与Bay Area Sound有过大量的合作，帮助他们提供包括音频和音乐内容制作的外包音频解决方案，结合我在技术方面的技能，我能够为小型开发商和团队提供完美的解决方案。

我也为Telltale工作了5年时间。我将Bay Area Sound和Harmony Machine提供的内容整合到Pandemic Studios的《破坏者》中，帮助提升工作室内部的音频团队，包括在Wwise中构建车辆系统，与负责设计在开放世界中行驶车辆的模拟团队相配合。

近期，我又开始同Bay Area Sound的合作，结合使用Hero Engine和FMOD将许多内容和工具整合到些许MMO游戏中。

你对记录文件有何看法？我发现自己在这方面很缺乏。你是否发现自己需要在缺乏记录的系统中工作？你最终是否会制作记录文件，作为你所提供服务的一部分？

记录总是件繁琐的事情。许多重复使用工作室内部引擎和工具套件的开发者都拥有适合本工作室的知识，但往往并不会记录下来。在项目开始之初，我会尽全力来完善记录，这往往会令工作时间变得紧张。

最近我同一家公司合作，评估了他们的音频中间件整合情况，此外还推荐他们通过某些关键的修改来改善音频。在这种情况下，就需要通过文件和判断来提出不同的建议，此外还要通过教育公司内部员工来让他们明白自己的责任。

你是否发现自己的多数合作公司都会有个恭维你的音频程序员？这种恭维包括工作上和生活上。

确实，开发商在项目进展过程中会愈发意识到需要音频编程的支持。尽管我认同这种趋势，但是我觉得工作室普遍的错误认识是，找个UI程序员经过数个月的培训后让其完成音频编程工作。

随着我们在当代逐渐用高质量的服务说服开发商，这种专门音频程序员的需求也日渐旺盛。

所以，我猜测，拥有音频程序员是恭维音频设计技术层面的必要举动，尤其是寻找专注于音频编程的程序员。他们的能力不仅能够为团队的编程做出贡献，而且对音频的了解能够同时让游戏音频和音频团队的质量获得提升。

最后一个问题，回答后你就可以继续进行你的探索。你认为下一代的主机在技术音频方面会有何改变？

我认为，行业整体会进一步拉近预渲染和内置引擎之间的距离，继续往即时的方向发展。

此外，随着游戏音频和音频引擎的发展，这两个方向间的融合和交流会逐渐加深，这将会进一步推动可用工具套件的开发。这样，易用的工具便会渗透到音频制作的每个角落，同时提升技术，使其更能够满足游戏音频制作的需求。

希望新一代主机不会令我们失望。

游戏邦注：本文发稿于2012年4月17日，所涉时间、事件和数据均以此为准。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Opinion: The role of technical sound designers

Ariel Gross

I caught up with Damian Kastbauer, technical sound designer, in the sticky jungles of the Congo last week. He was questing for the fabled paisley hippopotamus. Legend says that when the paisley hippopotamus is kissed upon its patterned lips, the kisser is granted a treasure of immense value.

I found him hiding behind a giant leaf, wearing a giant leaf. He was pressing binoculars against his eyes, gazing towards a nearby algae-covered pool. I crouched next to him and started asking him questions.

Ariel Gross: So, Damian, what is it that you do? Aside from questing after fabled beasts of yore?

Damian Kastbauer: I’m a technical designer for games, which is a somewhat nebulous term. It’s defined pretty well by Rob Bridgett in this article. Essentially, I try to serve as a bridge between sound content and programming/engine-side integration in order to create systems for sound playback, or just plain getting sounds in the game working and sounding right.

AG: Nice. My opinion is that sound design in games is only as good as its implementation. What do you think about that?

DK: It’s often said that the best sound can end up sounding bad if it’s not implemented properly, so, a lot of the time I’m trying to let the sound do its thang… which is not always easy. Since I don’t create content, and I’m not a programmer by definition, I usually spend a lot of time either building tools, streamlining pipelines, and strategizing audio features with the help of the programming team or working with audio middleware tools to similarly create the smoothest integration possible.

Damian finally released the binoculars, which then fell and dangled around his neck, but kept his hands in place, and continued to look off towards the pool with his hand-noculars. It was an interesting technique that I had never seen used in the field before. He made a refocusing gesture and continued to peer out through his hand holes.

AG: So… do you find yourself being a middle man between Team Audio and Team Programming? That could be challenging, what with all the unrequited love and/or red-hot rage between those two disciplines.

DK: Definitely, I’m helping to bridge the gap between the two worlds. Whenever possible, I like to enable content designers to just “design in the box” all day from the DAW without having to worry about the sometimes-labyrinthine pipeline to get sound into the game. In this way, they can focus on what they’re really into and I can go to town with making sure it all works within the context of the game. It’s a balance that requires human interaction, but I’m pretty keep on that as well.

AG: Wow, you just said labyrinthine. I’m golf clapping right now. In my head. And in my heart. I don’t want to scare off the paisley hippo. You’re welcome. So, have you found any common issues between Team Audio and Team Programming among multiple developers, and do you take measures to help both sides see eye to eye?

DK: I think one of the missing or underdeveloped pieces of some studios is the direct communication between Team Audio and the rest of the teams. It’s common for audio to touch almost every corner of the pipeline and development process.

With Team Audio often sequestered within a sound-proof cave deep within the bowels of a studio, it can be hard to get the kind of happy accident or magic moment that can come from being out in the pit or lined up in a hallway.

AG: This is painfully true.

DK: One of the things that has always seemed right about my involvement with different game studios on-site is the necessity of being “on the floor” with the other disciplines… which has always been a positive in bridging that gap.

When I work remotely, I put a tremendous amount of effort into achieving a high level of communication between the different teams on a project. Whether it’s e-mail, IM, Skype, or occasion on-site visits during development, the communication between people is among the most important aspects of working on a project.

If I am outside the fence, having an on-site advocate for audio is a definite plus, and in most cases, it is key to making my role as a facilitator for sound actually happen.

Some foliage near the murky pool began to shake. Damian dropped his hand-noculars and placed one hand over his mouth to ensure complete silence. He placed his other hand over my mouth, too. I resisted the urge to lick his hand. A rabbit bounced from the foliage. We both sighed deeply.

AG: Miv viff fuhm coffm prbflrm…

Damian removed his hand from my mouth.

AG: Is this a common problem at studios you’ve worked with? That Team Audio doesn’t pop their heads up through the manhole enough to be part of the greater discussion?

DK: Whew, well, I think that as a matter of course it is hard to have visibility across the team in the same way as being out in an open floor plan, when part of your daily work requires you to be locked away in a padded room.

That is, people can’t SEE you and demand your attention by rolling up to your workstation. I mean, there’s a door… you have to turn the knob… like, maybe even knock… and then get blasted in the face by high decibel explosions in order to interface. We know how averse most people are to moving in the first place, let alone opening a door.

I chuckled.

DK: A little dry, mid-west sarcasm for you.

I chuckled more, leading to a whole-body belly laugh, leading to a maniacal, snorting cackle, ending finally with a very feminine giggle. Then we sat motionless for what felt like an eternity.

AG: Sorry. What you say is completely true. Before tracking you down in the Congo, I hadn’t left my seat in four years. Not even to use the restroom. I held it. What you saw at the GDC was my hologram. A hologram with mass. I digress. What is the number one reason why a studio hires a technical sound designer?

DK: The number one reason I am hired is to help ship games. Having shipped my fair share, I would like to say that I know all the tricks in the book, but this is absolutely not true.

What I hope that I bring to a project is an ability to work together with people to get things done, through thick and thin, regardless of the task at hand.

Sometimes I don’t even know what I’m going to be doing until I get involved and assess the situation… this can be true of the studios as well. They’re not sure what exactly needs to be done, but they need someone to help pull it off in the eleventh hour.

AG: You’re basically a hero that is brought in to save the day.

DK: If I can come in and take the burden off of content designers, help design complex playback systems for physics or procedural animations, help wrangle memory budgets or streaming look-ahead times, then that is one less thing for someone, who already has too much on their plate, to worry about.

For remote work, it can be at any time during the project, I work from the home studio connected to a VPN using source control while making local builds from day one.

When I do work on-site for an extended period of time, it’s usually toward the end of a project for a few months.

At this moment, the waters of the pool began to ripple as a large, paisley-patterned mound broke the surface of the water. Then, two paisley ears emerged, followed by blinking eyes. Damian fidgeted with excitement, but stayed put.

AG: You mentioned memory and streaming. This is something that some people don’t realize. Someone on Team Audio is usually tasked with wrangling memory budgets and streaming bandwidth. It’s really techy work.

This isn’t always expertise that is considered when hiring an audio designer. I’ve found that studios tend to focus more on whether or not an applicant can make rad sounds, with less emphasis on the technical side of things.

There’s usually some requirement that says, “familiarity with middleware tools and implementation,” but I get the sense that the weighting at most companies is 80 percent creative aptitude and 20 percent technical prowess. Does that seem accurate to you? Or am I totally wrong? And ugly looking?

DK: I think there are a majority of people who come to studios with a sound design background. Until recently, it has been almost non-existent to have someone come out of school with an education in the technical side of game audio.

It used to be that “audio implementer” was the job that someone new to the industry would take on their way to becoming a sound designer… or even a musician or composer for games… that was really the only way to learn the ropes.

When I got into games, it was clear to me that the technical side was the only thing that I wanted to do. Thankfully, in the past few years, it has become a niche that has benefited from a group of people whose interests are purely in the technical, which has helped to establish legitimacy for the specialization.

AG: We used an in-game editor to place ambient audio emitters on Saints Row 2. Sometimes the frame rate would tank while I was moving an ambient emitter around, and I’d fling the emitter object 100 miles away, sometimes into a different game entirely. I think a few of those emitters landed in Red Faction: Guerrilla.

DK: Hahaha… user interface physics lerping… TOOLS!

AG: Do you ever find yourself caught up in the mystery of missing sounds? Like, the audio team is sure that a sound should be playing, but it’s not. Is that something you run into a lot?

DK: Totally! Someone did a model swap but forgot to bring the audio hooks with it, or moved the entire level geometry across the level away from the audio emitters that were placed on a different layer in the editor… happens ALL the time, and the resources to figure it out are sometimes underestimated.

With all the different ways that people can approach game audio these days: mods, Unity, UDK, FMOD, Wwise, SDK documents, Max/MSP or pd, it’s becoming common to have fresh faces joining the team who already have a good handle on the tasks at hand and are ready for the challenge.

The fabled paisley beast began to slowly emerge from the algae-covered pool. Watching the water cascade off of its psychedelic hide was glorious. Swirls of color and waves of sweet smells washed over me. Granted, I had also been munching on some random red berries that I’d found on the ground.

AG: I know plenty of sound designers that don’t want to do the implementation. They look at it as a boring chore. A chore-bore. A borch. Anyway, I could see some Team Audios out there wanting to hire you on full time. Do you ever get this? Have you considered an in-house gig?

DK: I’ve worked remotely on a couple of projects for a longer duration (1-2 years) serving as a conduit for getting content in the game. I’ve worked a ton with Bay Area Sound as an outsource audio solution involving their audio and music content creation in conjunction with my management of the technical side in what has been a perfect solution for smaller developers and teams that need supplemental assistance.

I worked for five years in this capacity on the games for Telltale. I integrated content provided by Bay Area Sound and Harmony Machine into The Saboteur from Pandemic Studios for about a year to help augment their in-house audio team, which included building vehicle systems in Wwise to work with the simulation team who was responsible for the cars driving around in the open world.

Most recently I’ve been working again with Bay Area Sound to integrate content and tool the pipeline for a couple of MMOs using the Hero Engine in conjunction with FMOD.

AG: How about documentation? I have seen with mine own eyes the lack of documentation out there. Do you find yourself having to trudge through undocumented systems a lot? Do you end up documenting them yourself as part of your services?

DK: Documentation is always a tricky one. A lot of developers who have been iterating on in-house engines and tool sets carry with them a ton of institutional knowledge… usually within their brains. There’s usually a pretty intense time of education at the beginning of the project where I do my best to document… for my own sanity as well as anyone who might find themselves in a similar position in the future.

I recently worked with a company and provided an evaluation of their audio middleware integration in addition to recommendations for how to move forward with some key changes. In that case, it was documentation and justification for the different recommendations, as well as education in order to get everyone thinking about the possibilities.

AG: Do you find that most companies that you work with have an audio programmer on stand-by to compliment you? Compliment both in terms of assisting you in a complimentary fashion, and also to tell you that your shirt looks very nice tucked in.

DK: It’s definitely becoming more common for developers to recognize the need for audio programming support throughout the project. While I think it’s becoming, I think there is still a false expectation that you can just throw on the UI programmer for a couple of months and sew everything up.

The need for dedicated audio programmers is definitely growing as we continue to scale in meeting the demands in quality during the current generation.

So, I guess, having an audio programmer is necessary to compliment the technical side of sound design, especially a dedicated professional who is invested in sound. Their ability to bring not just programming, but a knowledge of audio to the table can only mean an increase in the quality of the audio and the quality of life for Team Audio.

That, and yeah… someone to tell me when my dashiki doesn’t match my socks.

AG: Last question, and then you can get back to your quest. What do you think will change from a tech audio standpoint with the next generation of consoles?

DK: I think the industry at large will further close the gap between pre-rendered and in-engine… across all disciplines, a continuation to move forward into real-time.

What this means for audio is building on the sample-based methodology that has firmly taken root in the current generation while using more procedural audio, synthesis, and DSP to modify or accent sample-based content dynamically at runtime.

Additionally, increased transparency and better communication in both directions between the game audio and audio engines will develop, which will in turn necessitate a further push towards enabling this functionality within usable tool sets. This accessibility will reach into every corner of the audio production pipeline, simultaneously exposing the technology while making it easier to adapt it to the interactive needs of the game.

Hopefully the new consoles will also make espresso.

AG: Espresso feature would be cool. I’m hoping that someday I can feed a slice of bologna directly into the console. It would recognize the meat as bologna and procedurally create a game called Bologna Quest, where a young adventurer named Ariel, clad in the finest bologna armor, would climb the mountain of… Damian?

Damian, recognizing that I had started my typical bologna-related sign-off, was already planting a kiss upon the lips of the sleeping paisley hippopotamus. Then, a flash of light, and they both vanished, never to be seen again. (Source: Gamasutra)