After our VR students completed most of the visuals, I set about creating the sound effects. For the initial interface menu of the game, I designed two sound effects, the first being the sound when we navigate through the menu is crossed, while the second is the sound of a click. This is because I observed that many games have a sound when the menu bar is navigated but not clicked so as to add to the richness of the game’s menu sound effects.

The first act of our game was a very peaceful and comfortable indoor scene. So I recorded the sound of birds chirping outside the window and the corresponding sound of the characters stepping on the wooden floor. I also sampled an upbeat jazz track, setting up the scary atmosphere later. For the footsteps, I used mix pre6 to help me record a higher-quality footstep sound.

When the character finishes drinking the water, the scene changes to a nightmare scene. I added some samples of crow calls and some thunder samples. And in the indoor space, I recorded some footsteps with creaking wooden floors. And I turned the upbeat jazz into a staccato recorder sound. I knew that the steering and position of the character in Unity would affect the size and orientation of the sound heard from the vocalist, so I added some pan and volume automation to the DAW to make the video presentation fit the sound better, and so simulate the realistic effects of the game. However, it is much more complicated to do this automation directly in the DAW than in Unity or Wwise.

For the subsequent skyscraper scene, I recorded some ambient city sounds and some wind sounds. This creates the impression that the character is in a very high environment, making the player feel more in danger. This scene has many different textures of footsteps, such as wood, glass, and iron. So I have recorded three different types of footsteps. I think footsteps are very important, especially in an adventure game like this. Because the realism created by the footsteps makes the player feel like they are in the world. Unfortunately, in the group’s version, footsteps were not included in the game due to time constraints and technical complexity. Let’s be more efficient and expand our technical capabilities.

For the later playground scenes, I recorded a lot of footsteps on the grass and recorded some natural ambient bird calls. I used an alchemy synth to create a few dark and low tones for the background music. I also sampled some waterphone and cone tones to add to the creepy atmosphere. I think the most difficult sound to record and produce for this part was the sound of the clown crawling past because at the beginning, I didn’t imagine what kind of sound to overlay or how to record the fast crawling sound directly. Because I tried to record a few, but none worked very well. So I recorded the sound of a quick shaking of clothes, which was similar to the sound of a clown crawling.

For the final confinement phobia section I followed the previously recorded concrete footsteps and sampled some pick up and throw away sounds. I didn’t do much with the sound effects in this section, as the other group members’ background music was already the best in this scene to make the game more puzzle solving and meaningful.

Anyway, I put all the sampled and produced sounds into the film, and I think the result is still excellent and we can continue to work on the game if we have time. This project also gave me the experience of working with students from different disciplines and prepared me well for my future career direction.