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为什么声音是社交游戏的杀手锏?

发布时间:2013-11-07 14:44:27 Tags:,,,,

作者:Nick Day

自从《Pong》诞生以来,游戏音频已经取得了很大的发展。现代游戏作曲,编辑,混合和音频工程都具有相同的标准,并且通常是由那些创造风靡全世界的电影和排行最高的单曲作品的人所完成。像Liam Neeson,Martin Sheen,Snoop Dogg和Mark Hamill等家喻户晓的名字现在也将自己的才能带向了AAA级游戏。

游戏已经成为具有数十亿美元身价的世界性娱乐产业,经常模糊了娱乐与高级艺术之间的界限。如今,绝妙的音乐,高质量的声乐表演以及高端音频作品是组成游戏世界与玩家间情感联系的明确元素。照这样下去的话我们甚至有可能在自己的PS10上感受到作为一种互动音频视觉体验的《权利的游戏:第23季》。

之后,社交游戏有可能被称为游戏新范式,也有可能不再是2009年的“下一个大事件”,或被当成主流游戏产业衰败的副气旋,而这都是取决于你的交流对象。

尽管像《旅程》,《骤雨》,《质量效应》,《刺客信条》,《堡垒》和《小小大星球》等游戏已经获得了来自国际上的各种称赞,它们的音频作品甚至还获得了格莱美奖的提名,但是社交游戏仍然尝试着寻找游戏玩法,盈利以及自己在游戏生态系统的位置间的平衡。尽管在近几年取得了巨大的发展,社交游戏和手机游戏仍然在做出各种可能的尝试,并定义什么是真正“优秀的”游戏体验。从很大程度上来看,音频并未成为这种定义的关键部分。

所以音频与其它部分有何不同,音频可以为社交游戏添加什么—-如果玩家保持声音“打开”,那么这对于他们下一次玩一款Facebook游戏是否会有影响?我们认为答案绝对是yes。在本篇文章中我们将基于在Plarium Games的经历(即将音频当成是提升游戏整体质量的一种方法,并使用它去强化我们的最新Facebook游戏《Soldiers Inc.》)去解答这些问题

soldiers-inc(from onrpg)

soldiers-inc(from onrpg)

为什么社交游戏中缺少更出色的音频?

如今,因为种种原因,高质量音频已经不再是社交游戏的首选了。大多数浏览器玩家都是开着多个浏览器窗口而玩一小会游戏,并且通常是伴随着自己选择的背景音乐玩游戏。手机用户的游戏时间就更短了,或者他们有时候是在公共场合玩游戏,并不适合开着声音。(在此我们并未将那些在公共汽车上玩《愤怒的小鸟》,并迫切希望将自己的游戏体验与周边的乘客分享的玩家。)

除了有限的实用性,这里还存在一些现实的技术局限。在浏览器游戏和手机游戏中,储存能力,硬件要求和带宽限制都带有严格的规格要求—-如果你需要在音频和图像内容上做出选择,大家往往都会抛弃音频。

从极大程度上看来,大多数社交游戏都面对这样的情况,但是现在也有许多游戏尝试着去吸引更苛刻的用户,而玩家对于高质量内容的价值标准也在不断提高。有一个好消息便是,如今的技术领域正在发生着快速的变化,之前面临的许多局限性已经不再是问题所在了。手机带宽数据覆盖范围越来越广。手机终端处理内容和储存能力也以指数方式提高着,拥有带宽链接的用户数量大大超越了过去5年的水平,始终保持在线成为了一种标准(不管你喜不喜欢),重新明确存在怎样的可能性成为了真正让人激动的事。

高质量声音的例子

当社交游戏的野心越来越大,并逐渐消除与传统平台游戏间的区别时,开发者就必须更加重视声音的作用。

当Plarium于2011年发行了自己的第一款MMORTS(大型多人在线实时策略游戏)《Total Domination》时,我们公司投入了很大的精力去添加画外音而吸引用户的注意,当这是基于7种语言来说的话真的并不轻松。准确说来这并不是一种开创性理念,但是大胆地使用20世纪90年代的前沿技术帮助我们创造出比同时期其它游戏更多的故事,幽默感和情感内容。在面对着如此多竞争者的产业中,我们能够通过创造出真实的声音而突显自己。

从那以来,我们不断依靠声音和音频向更多玩家提供更多内容和更具沉浸式的体验,实际上,比起图像密集型功能来说,用户端对于技术的要求较低,因此让我们能在拥有足够时间平行开发新图像与游戏能力的同时有效处理故事和生产质量。音频还让我们能够更快速地添加内容,特别是在与CGI动画或游戏内部动画相比时。

在我们于2012年面向Facebook发行的游戏《Stormfall: Age of War》中,我们尝试着整合更多故事到画外音中,并提升音乐的质量,但是我们仍然遇到各种障碍,如高压缩,低质量,加载时间过长,缺少分层的声音渠道以及音频漏洞等等。尽管具有种种缺点,经过完善的画外音的确给玩家留下了深刻的印象—-用户表示这能够帮助他们将游戏机制和主题,世界与故事紧密维系在一起。让演员为我们的主角Oberon配音能够让玩家觉得更加真实,并帮助新玩家更轻松地通过教程(游戏邦注:这是一款复杂的游戏,所以对于第一次尝试的玩家来说穿越所有机制会很艰难)。我们认为他的配音赋予了整款游戏生命力。当我们进入《Soldiers Inc.》的开发中时,我们更是发现投入更多资源于音频中将能有效地完善游戏内容。

当我们的团队承担了《Soldiers Inc.》的开发工作时,我们是从较为简单的理念开始,即保留我们到目前为止所做的,并添加既能补充游戏黑暗主题,也能与伴随着《使命的召唤》,《命令与征服》,《星际争霸》等(将音乐当成是游戏中不可分割的设置组件和情感反应)成长的玩家达成共鸣的音乐。

在与《Soldiers Inc.》的作曲家接触的过程中,我们还碰到一些外部的音乐家,开发者和音频工作室,而他们所提供的所有输入内容都是我们未曾想到的—-利用独立的服务器而无需添加加载时间实时直播音频去提高音频质量,在歌曲循环间添加随机延迟,在音效播放期间拉低音乐声,添加音乐小游戏作为游戏内部音频队列去补充游戏行动,并在游戏互动和画外音中添加更多音效。

最终我们发现,即使带有局限性,Flash的作用比我们之前挖掘到的还要多—-这能够更轻松第将一支资深音频团队组合在一起并帮助他们更有效地使用预算。

找到合适的作曲家

为你的项目,预算和用户寻找合适的音乐很难,而这主要是因为存在各种质量的人才。这是个巨大且多样的领域,你必须在真正进入前明确自己想要什么,你的目标越清晰,你便越有可能找到自己想要的。我们的团队一开始便列出了10个名字左右的名单,其中便包含了Jesper Kyd。

当我们在审视这份名单时,发现每个作曲家都有自己的优势,我们也听取了各种建议,但最终发现了Jesper的特殊能力,即能够直接进入游戏设置,时间段和背景中,并将其整合到自己的音乐中,而最终呈现出来的声音也与别人有所不同。我们需要的是一个能够贯穿黑暗且道德界限模糊区域去缩小军事和英雄主题界线的人,而他能够帮助我们做到这点。

创建一个音频团队

在开始组建一个团队前,你需要基于现实性去思考自己的需求与预算。你需要怎样的能力,并希望维持多长时间?你是否需要画外音记录设施,环境声音和特效?你是否拥有足够的内容去证实创造一个完整的内部能量的必要性,或者你只是需要为独立的内容或游戏发行寻找临时工?创造一个完善的内部工作室需要花费10万美元。而如果加上配备资深音频工程师,授权服务,软件和声音库等内容,成本便会迅速上升。从我们的经验来看,在人员配置节省开支很有必要,即通过与外部承包商合作不仅能够节约成本,同时也能够获得你想要的质量标准。

我们所有的非音乐音频工作都分成了画外音和声音设计。尽管有许多公司提供了有关这些设计的服务,但是随便的合作最终只会换来糟糕的质量。我们与纽约一家优秀的工作室始终保持着密切的合作关系(在所有的画外音工作方面),他们是将所有角色分配,录音,工作室时间和处理VO内容等工作作为捆绑服务。因为我们正同时支持多款游戏,所以与了解我们需求,熟悉我们的项目的人合作是再好不过了,并且他们的本土化和角色分配经验还能帮助我们基于多种语言汇聚一个巨大的人才库,这也是非常大的优势。我们曾经着眼于与一些提供综合画外音服务的不同本土化公司合作,但是他们却不能做到管理费与质量的同步。我们的大多数项目都是基于长期发展,所以基于这种关系,我们便不需要进行一些重复工作。我们仍然拥有直接的创造性控制,实际上我们也可以在Skype上让内部创造性和本土化团队与演员进行直接联系,从而削减了旅程和再录音成本。你最好能够找到一家优秀且小型,关键是自己信得过的工作室,然后与他们保持长期的合作关系。

关于我们许多早前的声音设计,我使用了在线预授权程序库,并让我们的一些程序员基于现用软件赋予其双重功能。如果这适合你,就用起来吧。这一方法虽然较为简陋,但却非常适合刚开始创造并只有几百美元的预算的人。如果你希望在一开始就做好这些,那么花些精力与游戏产业中带有经验的人合作便非常有价值—-但是千万别把自己局限在加利福尼亚或主要的产业中心。像西班牙,加拿大,以色列,波兰以及亚洲的其它国家也能够为你提供巨大的价值,但前提是你必须做好投入时间与这些国家的相关人士建立起密切合作关系的准备。在VO和声音设计方面,我们发现最有效的节省方法便是让团队内部去协调并监管项目,同时直接与技术人员进行合作。你可以通过网络而利用世界各地的资源。

结论

是否所有的音频都能创造出巨大的差异?在这一阶段《Soldier’s Inc.》还未能真正做到这一点,但幸好游戏最初的反馈都是正面的。我们的玩家表示音乐能够帮助他们投入于游戏故事中,并摆脱许多社交游戏所避免不了的“卡通感”。他们是否愿意从现在起1个月内都开着音频?我们当然希望他们这么做—-而我们也正在添加着更多音频内容。

技术能够帮助我们添加更多优秀的声音内容并完善游戏和玩家的期待值与标准。社交游戏正快速发展着,并始终走在产业的前端,当用户越来越习惯于免费模式之时,他们便会开始期待自己的消费能够换来更高质量的内容,并能够面对越来越多的选择。随着连接速度的加快,引擎的完善以及硬件能力的提升,我们的未来也将变得不可限量。

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

Turn It Up! Why Sound in Social Gaming is a Killer Feature

by Nick Day

It’s 2013. Players Expect High-End Sound, Voiceover, and Music.

Game audio has come a long way since Pong. Modern game composition, editing, mixing, and audio engineering, are now held to the same standard – and often are done by the same people – who make our global blockbuster films and top singles. Household names like Liam Neeson, Martin Sheen, Snoop Dogg, and Mark Hamill (who we all know and love from his defining breakout role as the Joker in Batman: The Animated Series) now regularly lend their talents to AAA titles.

Gaming has officially transcended nerdom to become a worldwide billion dollar entertainment industry, often blurring the lines between entertainment and high art along the way. Stunning music, quality vocal performances, and top-end audio production are now established, expected elements in forming an emotional connection between a game world and the player. At this rate, odds are that we’ll all be experiencing Game of Thrones: Season 23 as an interactive audio-visual interactive experience streamed right to our PS10s.

And then there’s social gaming – alternately hailed as a new paradigm for gaming, dismissed as “next big thing” of 2009, or eyed suspiciously as the mainstream game industry’s seedier (and brazenly capitalist) little brother, depending on who you talk to.

While games like Journey, Heavy Rain, Mass Effect, Assassin’s Creed, Bastion, LittleBigPlanet, etc. have been garnishing international acclaim and Grammy nominations for their audio work, social gaming has still been trying to find a balance between gameplay, monetization, and its proper place in the gaming ecosystem. While enjoying incredible growth in recent years, social and mobile games are still experimenting with what is possible, while defining what a “good” gaming experience is. For the most part, audio just hasn’t been a key part of that definition.

So why the disparity and what can audio really add to social games – does it really matter if players leave the sound ‘on’ the next time they play a Facebook game? We think the answer is an absolute yes. In this piece we’ll address these questions based on our experiences at Plarium Games as we’ve embraced audio as a way to improve the overall quality of our games, and how we’ve tried to use it to enhance our latest Facebook title, Soldiers Inc.

Why Isn’t There Better Audio in Social Gaming?

Up until recently, quality audio has been a low priority in social gaming for a number of very good reasons. Most browser players usually play for short periods of time with multiple browser windows open, often with their own music playing in the background. Mobile users play for even briefer sessions, or while in a public setting inappropriate for audio. (For the purposes of this piece, we’re not counting that guy on the bus who desperately wants to share his Angry Birds experience with his fellow commuters in stunning lo-fi smartphone mono.)

In addition to limited practicality, there have been very real technical limitations. In browser and mobile gaming, storage capacity, hardware requirements, and bandwidth limitations have demanded strict size discipline – and if you have to make a choice between audio and graphic content, it’s usually a pretty easy call. (Before you all comment, yes – there are some noteworthy exceptions.)

For the most part, this state of affairs has been enough for most social games, but with many titles now trying to appeal to a more demanding audience, the value players place on quality content is rising. The good news is that in today’s rapidly changing technological landscape, many of the limitations have become less of an issue. Mobile broadband data coverage is a reality and is only getting faster. Mobile handset processing power and storage is increasing exponentially, the number of people with broadband connections has exploded over the past five years, and with always-online becoming the norm (like it or not), it’s a very exciting time to reexamine what’s possible.

The Case for High Quality Sound

As social gaming becomes more ambitious, and moves slowly towards bridging the gap between traditional platform offerings, it’s become worthwhile for developers to take a good hard look at sound again.

When Plarium launched its first major MMORTS (massive multiplayer online real-time strategy) title Total Domination in 2011, our company invested a lot of effort into adding voiceovers to draw in our audience, which was not an easy thing to do in seven languages. It was grainy, buggy, and not exactly a groundbreaking concept, but the bold move of mastering cutting-edge 1990s technology helped our game carry more story, humor, and emotional content than many of the other titles out at the time. In an industry crowded with a lot of competitive noise, we were able to stand out by making, well…. actual noise.

Since then, we’ve increasingly depended on sound and audio to offer more content and a more immersive experience to more players – and the fact that the technical requirements are less demanding at the user-end than graphics-intensive features has given us a lot of room to play with story and production quality while buying us time to develop new graphics and game capabilities in parallel. Audio also allows us to add content relatively quickly, especially when compared to CGI cinematics or in-game animations.

On our last Facebook release of 2012, Stormfall: Age of War, we tried incorporating more storytelling into the voiceover work, and upping the quality of the music a bit – but we still ran into hurdles with high compression and low quality, loading times, the lack of layered sound channels, and audio bugs. Despite the downsides, the improved voiceover work made an impression – users told us that it helped to tie the game mechanics to the theme, the world, and the storyline. The actor who played our main character, Oberon, made the world feel more real, and helped get new users through our tutorial (it’s a complex game, so slogging through all the mechanics can be rough for first-time players). We felt that his performance really breathed new life into what could have been just another genre title on a similar engine. As we went into Soldiers Inc., we knew that devoting more resources to audio could only improve things.

When our team took on Soldiers Inc., we started with the simple idea of keeping what we’d done so far, and adding music that both complemented the game’s darker theme, and would resonate with a hardcore audience that grew up playing Call of Duty, Command and Conquer, Starcraft, and other titles where the music is an inseparable component of the setting and emotional feel of the game.

In the process of getting in touch with our composer for Soldiers Inc., we contacted outside musicians, developers, and audio studios, all of whom offered great (and in retrospect, kind of obvious) input that hadn’t occurred to us – live streaming audio from a separate server to improve the quality without adding to loading time, adding random delays between song loops, ducking down music during sound effects, adding musical stingers as in-game audio queues to complement game actions, and adding more sound effects to both the game interactions and the voice-over performances.

Ultimately we found that Flash, despite its limitations, can do a lot more than we had been using it for – and that putting together an experienced audio team is easier and more budget-friendly than one might think.

Finding the Right Composer

Finding the right music for your project, budget, and audience can be daunting – but mostly because of the staggering variety of quality talent out there. The field is so large and varied you absolutely need to have an idea of what you want before you go in, and the more specific you are, the better your odds are of finding what you want. Our team started out with a wish list of roughly 10 names, with Jesper Kyd being one of them.

As we went through the list, each composer had great strengths, and we heard some incredible submissions – but Jesper had an amazing ability to tap into the setting of the game, the time period, the surroundings, and incorporate it into his music in a way that it simply comes out sounding unlike anything else. We needed someone who could offer that to us in order to bridge the gap between military and heroic themes across a darker, more morally ambiguous landscape, and he completely got it, a perfect match.

Building an Audio Team

Before starting to assemble a team, you need to realistically think about your needs and budget. What kind of capabilities do you need, and for how long? Will you need Voiceover (VO) recording facilities, environmental sounds, and unique effects? Do you have enough content to justify building a full in-house capability, or will you just need periodic work for individual content or title releases? Creating a full-featured in-house studio can easily cost $100,000. Factor in the cost of staffing it with an experienced audio engineer, licensing services, software, and sound libraries and that number will go up very quickly. For most work we’ve done, we found that you can save on staffing and setup costs by working closely with outside contractors and still get the quality you’re looking for.

All our non-musical audio work is split between voiceover and sound design. While there are some companies that offer to do all of this, we’ve found that usually the quality of one ends up suffering. We have a very close relationship with a great studio in New York for virtually all of our voiceover work, and they bundle all casting, recording, studio time, and mastering for our VO content. Since we’re supporting multiple games simultaneously, working with one person who knows our needs, is familiar with our projects, and whose location and casting experience allows us to tap a huge pool of talent in multiple languages is a huge advantage. We looked at working with several different localization companies that offer comprehensive voiceover services, but couldn’t justify the management overhead with the quality we were seeing. Most of our projects are long-term and ongoing, so with this relationship, we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. We still have direct creative control, and the fact that we can link performers directly with our in-house creative and localization teams over Skype cuts down on travel and re-recording costs. Find a great small studio you trust, and stick with them.

For much of our early sound design, we used online pre-licensed libraries and had some of our programmers doing double-duty with off the shelf software. Some people have been able to get great work from “Our designer’s cousin’s former bandmate Jeff. He’s got ProTools!” If this works for you, go for it! This approach was barebones, but worked well enough when we were getting started and only cost a few hundred dollars. If you want to get it right the first time, spending the extra to work with someone with experience in the game industry is worth it – but don’t limit yourself to California or major industry centers. There are great studios in Spain, Canada, Israel, Poland, and all over Asia that will offer excellent value for money if you’re prepared to invest the time into a close working relationship across time zones. In both VO and sound design, we’ve found the biggest savings in keeping project coordination and oversight in-house and working with the technicians directly. You’ve got the internets – use them to give you a global studio.

In Conclusion

So, did all that audio work really make that much of a difference? At this stage Soldier’s Inc. has only been up for a short while, but the preliminary feedback is pretty positive. Our players told us that the music helped to draw them deeper into the game story, and countered that “cartoony” feel that many social games seem to be unable to shake off. Will they keep the audio switched on a month from now? We certainly hope so – as we’re in the process of adding a whole lot more.

The technology to add great sound is here, and is improving every day – along with player expectations and standards. Social gaming is evolving so quickly that staying ahead of the next trend in this industry is as much a matter of survival as anything else, and as users grow accustomed to free-to-play models, they will rightfully begin to expect more quality for their money, and have access to an ever-increasing array of choices. With faster connections, better engines, and increasing hardware capabilities, the sky’s the limit.(source:gamasutra)


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