Document id

Title

\greed: Greed Sounds

Authors

Jan Jona Javorsek

Gregor Pirs

Document history

8.7.2008 - initial version.


Greed Prototype Sounds (32)

This is a short list of fist sound effects requested for the Greed Prototype

Ambiance and Athmosphere

The ambience of the game is dicated by the fact that units are essentially in an atmosphere-free environment. Even the inside of the units has no atmosphere, since no unit is designed to support life. (Technically, there are tanks and pressurized storage compartments, but a unit never has all of its internals pressurized since that would require a different design of the unit body.)

In practice, this means we are entirely limited to sounds emmited by the Q-Comm interface. However, audio is a very suggestive interface that can convey a lot of information, and so all units are fitted with pick-up mikes attached to the unit frames. Most units have a single mike at the center of the frame, while larger units can have several mikes (and so the direction of the sound can be distinguished).

For the sound design, this situation can be summarized as follows:

Synthetic sounds (8)

  1. unit select A click, possibly sound channel selection hiss (very delicate)

  2. group select Slightly diferent from the above (click + confirm)

  3. attack alarm Siren-noise when major units or structures are under attack.

  4. structure integrity loss Three nasty beeps emitted by a unit that has the time to say it thinks it is about to end its final transmissions.

  5. contact notification A soft ping notifying a sensor recording a foreign object in an area no such things were notified before.

  6. event detected An annoying buzz indicating a foreign faster-than-light transfer or major military device use.

  7. q-comm online White noise followed by a happy noise.

  8. q-comm offline White noise followed by a sad click and silence. Note that this effect on the last (or, more usually, the only) q-comm device indicates game is over for the player.

Unit and subsystem sounds (16)

Eventually, some of these sounds could come in three varieties, depending on the size of the subsystem or unit frame in question. (Lower noise - bigger variety, posibly more reverb etc.) But not yet.

  1. manipulator motor start A soft, short engine buzz, used when repositioning parts of the unit's structure. Also used for crawler leg motion.

  2. door openinig Similar, but with a clonk effect at the start. Used for unit bays, constructions facilities, larger missile siloses etc.

  3. door closing Similar, but with the clonk at the end.

  4. crawler leg down Possilby something to indicate the contact with ground? Possilby another version when crawlers crawl over other units or structures (more mettalic).

  5. rocket engine start hiss The sound of rocket engines starting. Used for main rocket engines and missiles.

  6. higgs-field on A low-cue vibration coming online. Used for near gravity object motion of space units.

  7. higgs-field background

  8. higgs-field off

  9. higgs transfer link on (HTL) A higher buzzing think indicating juiceware transfer commencing.

  10. HTL bacground

  11. HTL off

  12. unit/structure online The sound of connection establishing on a spinning-up sound fading away. (Could be split in to to permit the spinning-up sond to be louder and longer depending on unit size, or perhaps repeated in parallel for unit with several subsystems etc., but that should be handled in-game.)

  13. unit/structure offline Things spin down when the juice runs out.

  14. harvesting This is actually done using a number of very pricize HTL's, so it could be based on that sound, but as a stream of overlapping connects/disconnects.

  15. processing No ideas at this time.

  16. factory production/construction Based on a stream of manipulator motor and field effects.

  17. structure integrity loss Three nasty beeps emitted by a unit that has the time to say it thinks it is about to end its final transmissions.

  18. q-comm online White noise followed by a happy noise.

  19. q-comm offline White noise followed by a sad click and silence. Note that this effect on the last (or, more usually, the only) q-comm device indicates game is over for the player.

Weapon sounds (8)

Fatal hits get cut off by possible struture integrity loss singnal and communication interrupted white noise.

  1. beam weapon A soft buzz followed by the tinkling of metal cooling off.

  2. rocket/missile departure Combination of door opening and rocket engine start?

  3. beam weapon hit Slight hissing followed by increasing metal deformation under heat.

  4. impact Sound of hitting at metal and metal deformation.

  5. explosive impact Sound of hitting at metal and metal deformation with added vibrations and tiny post-impacts.

  6. major explosion wave Vibrations and metal deformation. Used for bigger explosions and nukes.

  7. major explosion wave on ground More vibrations and scratching and metal deformation. Used for bigger explosions and nukes from crawlers.

  8. communication interrupted. (unit deastroyed) Sudden white noise fading out quickly.