With subsequent titles Valve got their act together and their advances in sound design are to be commended. Depending on context the stuttering might not have been too bad, but because of how frequent they were they would inevitably happened during dramatic highs and had the potential on making the scene awkward instead of emotional. If you play older Source Engine games that never had this problem fixed like Sin Episodes or Dark Messiah you can still experience this first hand. ![]() This stuttering was an issue with the Source engine and it took until Half-Life 2 Episode 1 for Valve to fix it. If you had a high end machine you would get a loud popping noise instead of a stutter in that scene change. You might not remember this but in the release version of Half-Life 2 the entire game would stutter for 2-3 seconds at every auto save spot and even during the opening scene with G-Man it stuttered while changing the background scenery. Valve on the other hand managed to do a terrible job with the audio experience in Half-Life 2. The opening scene of Dreamfall, one of the best sounding games ever There are no sharp edges or stutters in the audio experience and this keeps the player engaged at all times. If the next area has a new song the game also gently fades from the old track to the new. When the player is exploring any hub area the music never stops during load screens and instead gently fades the screen to black and then fades back in when loading is done. The load screen together with the music acts as a cliffhanger and the pause adds excitement instead of frustration. ![]() During the opening scenes a man is transported to another dimension in a magical rite and the music builds up to a crescendo that fades during a load screen. Sharply cutting off music at load screens is something that shouldn’t have to happen anymore in games as some have already gotten around this problem.Ī game that avoided the problems Portal 2 has is Dreamfall: The Longest Journey. To betray this expectation that was built up by the music created dissonance that took me out of the experience and ruined immersion. The second time is near the end of the game and similar in that the music does not fade out prior to the load screen and is instead sharply cut off in the middle of a piece that is creating the expectation of forward momentum and climax. What happens though is that in the middle of all this built up momentum the game cuts to a load screen without any prior warning and effectively slams the brakes on the experience. As the player is moving outside of the puzzle rooms towards a showdown the dialogue, the music and the visuals all work effectively to build momentum and excitement that wasn’t present at any point earlier in the game. The first time was about halfway through the game where the story is building up to a dramatic climax. There are two instances in Portal 2 where the music worked to ruin my immersion instead. This attention to detail in how to use music most effectively in a game like Portal 2 impressed me and set a high bar for the presentation in the game. Not only was the approach novel but the execution was without fault as well. ![]() If the player stepped on a jump pad and was thrown across the room the music would temporarily swell in volume and tempo to match the visuals. What Portal 2 did for the puzzle rooms was to have subdued ambient music that built up momentum depending on player action. If the player instead were to leisurely explore the environment to this soundtrack the dissonance in what is heard and what is seen would make the player think he is doing it wrong somehow. By building up momentum and excitement the player will be put in mood where he/she will want to keep moving and live up to the expectations set by the soundtrack. Whether the music is calm, excited or if it’s even present at all frames the expectations of the player on what is about to happen. A critical component of establishing context is music. In an episode of the podcast Irrational Interviews Guillermo del Toro and Ken Levine both agreed that 50% of any story is context.
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