Spellborn was a learning experience in a multitude of roles. Primarily looking after the games audio needs, designing and implementing a rich soundscape across the many different worlds and environments. Secondary roles on the project included game-design (with Ron Kamphuis) which saw us redesign and overhaul quests and presentation. Level and game design experience from working on Alpha Black Zero and Eurocops proved useful when polishing. This included creation of new zones, caves systems, foliage, particle-fx, settlements and redoing the lighting in many of the games zones and areas. Finally, in a PR type role I helped create the promotional videos, our first website, the community environment and have acted as a spokes-person to press and public alike during several games conventions.

The result is an art style wildly different to other MMOs. The shards are enclosed worlds; when you look up, you see the roof of a stone cavern far overhead. with light streaming through holes in the firmament. Huge slabs of stone. tossed about casually in the Sundering. erupt from the landscape. while shards of glowing crystal provide ghostly illumination for the many forest glades. Combined with the truly lovely environmental art, the unique setting makes for a game that's a joy to explore. Soft edges and diffuse lighting abound. with beautifully composed incidental music and background sound giving the whole game an evocative twilight feel. On occasion, Spellborn tries to wow you with spectacle - the epic home buildings of the High Houses being a perfect example - but it's usually more interested in a delicately woven atmosphere. And it's all the better for it

MMORPG.COM

... TCoS has one of the. if not the best soundtrack I've heard yet. The music is top-notch and very suiting to the environment. It's clear that much effort was put into this aspect of gameplay and I must say that I didn't realize music could have such an effect on immersion. Sounds is also very well done. The world feels alive. Chickens cluck. wolves howl. loud inexplicable noises randomly occur ... it takes the experience to a whole new level ...

.... every review i read said sound blew them out of the water and i wasn't sure what to expect. this game has AAA sound. both music and sound effects. they sound realistic and they are well synchronized. the music is epic ...

... The aesthetics are outstanding. The subtle sound effects and mellow music all contribute to this. It's probably the most relaxing MMOG I have ever played ...

... I'd also like to take this time to compliment the sound-track. which is just beautiful ...

... I loved it. As I said. the soundtrack was beautiful. and combined with the local ambient noise. it really contributed to the overall feel the game seems to give off. Every-thing seems to feel sort of, quaint. It's hard to describe. Like it would feel nice to stop fighting for a second and just look at the sky and listen a bit. It's a rather calming game surprisingly.

STUDIO VISIT MMORPG.COM
Recently, Managing Editor Jon Wood visited the offices of The Chronicles of Spellborn in The Netherlands. Today, we present an article about the use of sound in the game as Jon sat down with Sound Designer Matthew Florianz. Here at MMORPG.com, we often talk about a number of different aspects of the games that we cover. We talk about graphics, animations, gameplay, combat and more, but rarely, if ever, have I had the opportunity to spend an entire article talking about sound.

Fortunately for me, during my recent trip to their studios, the folks over at The Chronicles of Spellborn were kind enough to grant me some time sitting down with Matthew Florianz, the game's Sound Designer who was kind enough to talk with me about sound's contribution to their game.

Florianz himself is friendly, knowledgeable and has a real passion for what he does. Occupying one of the few personal offices (a necessity when you're working with sound) that I saw on my tour through their studio, Matthew is responsible for the overall sound of the game.

Present, but not irritating
The most important thing, I was told, is that players should be able to ignore the sounds in the game (or any game, really) if they want to. According to Matthew, sounds in a game should be, "present, but not irritating". It's happened to all of us at one point or another, we've been playing a video game and the sounds are jarring enough that you're always aware of them. Not sub-consciously, but right there, annoying us and tending to force us to turn the volume down or off entirely. It can be a frustrating experience for the player. So, how does Spellborn handle its sounds so that they are "present, but not irritating"?

TCoS uses non-looping music. That means that any song in the game is going to play through once and then, stop rather than looping endlessly as you make your way though a zone. As a default, music is set to play when you first enter a shard. Players will also be given the ability to control when the music plays. If they so desire, they can set the music to play at specific intervals. Really,TCoS puts the sound choices in the hands of the players.

` "An assumption that we make," says Florianz, "is that games have to have music playing all the time." Instead, The Chronicles of Spellborn uses their music more sparingly to set the tone of their game, while it's the ambient sounds that really pick up the slack in terms of audio.

Ambient Sounds
According to Wikipedia, a man named Brian Eno was the first to use the term "ambient music" to describe music that "would envelop the listener without drawing attention to itself, that can be either 'actively listened to with attention or as easily ignored, depending on the choice of the listener'." The same description can easily be applied to Ambient Sound. The goal, is to provide sounds from the world around the players that will either, blend seamlessly into the background ("easily ignored") or be "listened to with attention."

Anyone taking the time to listen with attention to the ambient sounds present in The Chronicles of Spellborn will, I think, be pleasantly surprised. The sounds are crisp and vibrant and really do help to make you feel as though you have stepped into Spellborn's game world. From all of the sounds that I heard while sitting on the couch in Matthew's office, I think that my favorite, and the one that made me realize just how intricate a sound design for an MMO can be, is the sound of rain.

The thing is, rain is a sound that we often take for granted. We all know what it sounds like, and often that sound is what we get in games. Spellborn goes the extra mile. When Matthew first showed me the rain, I thought "yup, that sounds like rain". Then, he moved underneath a tent that had been set up along the road. The sound changed. Instead of just hearing the sound of rain outdoors, I actually heard the sound of rain hitting the canvas. It made me think of spending nights laying in a tent, listening to that sound, hoping my cheap Wal-Mart tent would last the night (it didn't). You can find an exclusive video that highlights this point here. This video was created by Florianz specially for this article.

The point is that the ambient sounds in TCoS are very well thought out, created and implemented. According to Florianz, there is currently over eight hours of ambient sound, gathered through either physical recording, or sampled from a sound library. Each zone in the game contains somewhere between 700 and 3,000 individual sound sources, placed strategically to create and maintain the atmosphere of that particular zone.

Music
As has been reported, the music for The Chronicles of Spellborn was composed by Jesper Kyd. For anyone who might not be familiar with that name, Kyd has worked on games like: Freedom Fighters, Kane & Lynch: Dead Men Unreal Tournament 3, Hitman, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and more. He has won awards such as: IGN.com's 2006 Best Original Score Award and The 2005 BAFTA Best Original Music Award. From what I've heard, his contribution to TCoS lives up to his resume. Kyd's music for TCoS has an almost Celtic kind of feel to it, and makes frequent use of single instruments that seem to represent the players and the people of the world.

The design of the game is such that many conventions and expectations are being innovated upon to create something familiar to MMORPG fans, but not the same. Kyd's music is no exception to this.
When they were looking at composers for the game, they were looking for someone to create a "unique sound for music", and Kyd didn't disappoint, presenting wonderfully rich music that makes use of a number of different instruments to capture the essence of the game, of exploration and adventure, discovery and danger.

Wrap Up
As mentioned before, while sound is an important part of any MMORPG, it is often overlooked in discussions of development. I was once told by a technical theatre teacher at my University that you can always tell a good sound design by whether or not it was mentioned in the reviews. If a reviewer brings attention to it, there was probably something wrong. If nothing was said, then the job was done perfectly.

In the case of The Chronicles of Spellborn, the music and the sound are such that they blend nicely in with the game world that the developers have created; present, and actually quite pleasing.

GAMONA

In Sachen Sound hingegen setzt Spellborn neue Maßstäbe. Endlich macht es in einer virtuellen Welt auch mal Sinn. genauer hinzuhören. Zwar fehlt es an gesprochenen Inhalten. doch hat man die zahlreichen Naturgeräusche erst einmal bewusst wahrgenommen. vermisst man sie bei der Konkurrenz. Hier gibt es weit mehr. als nur das Gequatsche mancher NPCs...Die stimmige Soundkulisse hebt Sich positiv vom Genre- Einerlei ab. In Kombination mit der schönen Landschaft bereitet das Erkunden der Welt also auch akkustisch Freude.

Translated: When it comes to sound, however, Spellborn sets new standards. Finally, in a virtual world, it makes sense to listen more closely. While there's a lack of spoken content, once you've consciously noticed the numerous natural sounds, you'll miss them in the competition. There's much more here than just the chatter of some NPCs... The harmonious soundscape stands out positively from the genre monotony. Combined with the beautiful landscape, exploring the world is also acoustically enjoyable.

GAMELOBBY

...auch akustisch haben sich die Entwickler ins Zeug gelegt. Man könnte. wenn man wollte. sogar beim rauschen des Waldes und den Lauten der Tiere entspannen. Es wirkt nicht wie das eintönige. immer gleiche aus den anderen Spielen bekannte. Tiergeräusche Repertoire ...dutch die tollen Sounds macht Spaß dutch die Wilder Streifen und seine Quests erledigen.

Translated: ... the developers also put a lot of effort into the acoustics. If you wanted, you could even relax to the rustling of the forest and the sounds of the animals. It doesn't feel like the monotonous, repetitive repertoire of animal sounds from other games...the great sounds make it fun to explore Wilder and complete his quests ... When creating UI audio, I think of user interaction as a means to organise specific tasks, into particular sequences. The user will associate between actions and the UI screens that accommodates them over time. Sonic branding can reinforce learnings and underline those connections. I've designed all of Elite Dangerous' UI around such principals.

One of the initial goals in designing audio for Elite: Dangerous was to connect different activities that relate together in game play loops. When comparable activities are undertaken, those are accompanied by sound similar sound signatures. The subconscious mind will make connections especially if the sound designfacilitates an appropriate level of repetition. Examples of re-use are:

• Sounds from the system map also present when scanning planets from the ship.
• Equipping scanning equipment, re-use those same sounds.
• Selling data from the scans again re-uses some of the same sounds.