Hey everyone! o/

This week the devlog is about the audio of the upcoming case.

A lot for the audio at the moment is going on "behind the scenes" with development of the VN-engine as I outlined in an earlier post. I'm making great headway there and it will be done in time for a beta by end of the year.

Talking about the actual audio content, some parts will likely take more time...

VoiceMoticons

I really like the idea of playing VoiceMoticons with lines of dialogue as it underlines the feelings and motivations without the need for a complete voiceover for everything and they can later be used with automatic visual representation of emotion through the engine.

So, I've decided to go with this for the time being. That said, to not feel too repetitious, there need to be a LOT of individual voice emotes of different sounds and short words. Recording a full set doesn't take too long, a few hours, but cutting and editing is a lot of tedious work.

I have one pack finished so far but of course there need to be a few more male and female voices.

To make doing these recordings attractive to talent I go with the same idea as for the rest of the collaboration work: A talent does the recording, I do cutting and editing. The talent retains all rights to the audio and Wacky Melange gets to use those sound files in games.

The "packs" can be released separately wherever or however chosen, believe me when I say there _is_ a demand for these, and being used in our games is a fine first application people can have a listen to if they are interested.

*So, if you'd like to do a recording, drop me a line here and we'll talk!*

Background Music

While writing the cases I usually listen to old-timey chill jazz, film noir like, to get me in the feel for the setting. I'll choose something fitting from filmmusic.io and go with that, works out great!

Background Ambiance

In past productions I really did nerd out with the background ambience sounds. Like three or four separate tracks, repeating with different lengths, so it never sounds like one track on repeat.

Sadly I won't be able to afford a production like that for a hobby project. On the other hand, nowadays there are a lot of great ambience mixers available on the net which let you download and use a mix for an affordable fee.

Used sparingly any repetition won't be too noticeable and that even heightens the impact on individual scenes.

Still needs a bit of cash flow to afford even that, sure, but hopefully it will be possible soon?

Sound Effects

I got a list of great resources I use often and I'll find the eventual door, duck, telephone or motor engine. So, yeah.

Generally story and script are best nailed down a fair amount for audio research and production to start.

And of course I need to find voice talent open for collaboration. So if you know someone or know someone who knows someone...

Expect the quickest progress on audio after the initial betas are released. I'll keep you updated!

Cheers /Dagget