Beginning Game Audio Programming - Beginning Game Audio Programming [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Beginning Game Audio Programming

Mason McCuskey

PREMIER PRESS

GAME DEVELOPMENT

Copyright 2003 Premier Press, a division of Course Technology.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system without written permission from Premier Press, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

The Premier Press logo and related trade dress are trademarks of Premier Press and may not be used without written permission.

Publisher: Stacy L. Hiquet

Senior Marketing Manager: Martine Edwards

Marketing Manager: Heather Hurley

Manager of Editorial Services: Heather Talbot

Series Editor: Andr LaMothe

Acquisitions Editor: Emi Smith

Project Editor/Copy Editor: Jenny Davidson

Technical Reviewer: Heather Holland

Interior Layout: Bill Hartman

Cover Designer: Mike Tanamachi

CD-ROM Producer: Mason McCuskey

Indexer: Katherine Stimson

Proofreader: Sara Gullion

DirectX, DirectX Voice, DirectAudio, DirectMusic, and WindowsMedia are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. OpenAL is a registered trademark of Loki Software, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. Sonic Foundry, ACID, and Sound Forge are registered trademarks of Sonic Foundry, Inc. AmpLib is a registered trademark of AllMyPapers. GoldWave is a registered trademark of GoldWave, Inc. Cakewalk is a registered trademark of Twelve Tone Systems, Inc. Logic Audio is a registered trademark of Emagic. The BASS Sound System is a registered trademark of un4seen developments. fmod is a registered trademark of Firelight Technologies Pty Ltd. MikMod is a registered trademark of Miod Vallat. Ogg Vorbis and xiph.org are trademarks of xiph.org.

All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Important: Premier Press cannot provide software support. Please contact the appropriate software manufacturer's technical support line or Web site for assistance.

Premier Press and the author have attempted throughout this book to distinguish proprietary trademarks from descriptive terms by following the capitalization style used by the manufacturer.

Information contained in this book has been obtained by Premier Press from sources believed to be reliable. However, because of the possibility of human or mechanical error by our sources, Premier Press, or others, the Publisher does not guarantee the accuracy, adequacy, or completeness of any information and is not responsible for any errors or omissions or the results obtained from use of such information. Readers should be particularly aware of the fact that the Internet is an ever-changing entity. Some facts may have changed since this book went to press.

1-59200-029-0

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2002116167

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Another one for my wife—the kind of person songs are written about.

Acknowledgments

Several people contributed to making this book a success. To start, I'd like to thank Andr LaMothe, as well as Jenny Davidson, my editor, and Heather Holland, my tech editor, for making me sound more coherent than I actually am. Also, I'd like to thank Jeremy Martin for contributing some of the sample songs on the CD. And, of course, my family and friends—you know who you are!

About the Author

Mason McCuskey is a software engineer with 8 years of commercial programming experience. He has successfully managed his own game company since 1990. In 2000, his company, Spin Studios, was one of nine world finalists at the Game Developer's Conference 2nd Annual Independent Games Festival. He has also written dozens of articles for gamedev.net and other Web sites. Mason is the author of Special Effects Game Programming with DirectX by Premier Press.

Letter from the Series Editor

If you're like me, you probably appreciate music and sound effects in games, but they aren't your major concern during development. You generate a list of needed sound effects and music segments, set a spec like 16-bit stereo, 44kHz, hire someone, and be done with it. Then in-game you might use some audio panning for "3D" in a plane, or some doppler frequency shifting here and there, and change pitch in tunnels—but more or less audio is hardly something you're going to spend a lot of time on. If this describes you too, then we both are making a big mistake! Audio has matured so much in the past 5-7 years that it's incredible. The built in abilities of DirectAudio on the Windows platform, the technological advancements in full 3D sound modeling by hardware vendors, and the plethora of ultra-high compression lossy and lossless compression schemes for audio literally give audio engineers limitless abilities to create intensely engaging audio environments for games.

I think the thing we all forget is that "sound" is much more important than visuals. In fact, sound can create tension, excitement, anger, and so on. Try playing your favorite game without sound; it sucks, huh? There's no mystery there, sound has a direct and immediate affect on your brain; it's soothing or irritating at a primal level. In any case, it's something that we can't ignore anymore. Just like 3D graphics was a mystery that was figured out, it's time to figure out sound—learn, implement, and master.

Beginning Game Audio Programming is just such a book. From cover to cover you will learn just about everything you need to know to become the "expert" at sound programming wherever you work or play. This book isn't highly technical—meaning, it's not about digital signal processing, or Fourier transforms, impulse response, and subjects thereof; however, this book is a solid foundation and serious treatise on sound engineering for anyone interested in the subject.

Within this book, you will learn to use DirectAudio's features, such as digital file playback, DirectMusic, and audio scripting. In addition, you will learn how to play .MP3 files, and next-generation royalty-free formats like the Ogg Vorbis (like .MP3, but better!).

Of course, little details about how to play a CD through the system, mix sounds, timing issues, and more are all covered. Moreover, advanced concepts such as 3D sound modeling, and the use of the OpenAL system are covered as well. The book rounds out with discussions on audio visualization as well as using tools to generate sound and music.

Finally, content generation, licensing, and tactics for creating a complete ensemble of sounds effects and music are discussed. In closing, if you want to know more about audio programming as a game developer, audio engineer, or simply a hobbyist that wants to write his own .MP3 player, this book is for you. I dare you to find another book on this subject that is in plain "English" with practical examples, and excellent writing. The author, Mason McCuskey, has really taken his time and worked hard on this book to make it fun, informative, and engaging—not to mention the interesting sound effects he has made! With that in mind, don't listen to me, listen for yourself!

Sincerely,

Andr LaMothe

Premier Press Game Development Series Editor