Game sound programming, what's used most?
Author
Was wondering what you are using for a sound programming API in your games, XACT, FMOD, Audiere or basic DirectSound ...etc
Also, what do you think/know is used in most professional games?
Thanks,
rhuala
It's not really my area of expertise, but I get the feeling that middleware is pretty popular for audio. Most people I know don't want to muck around with things like Xaudio.
For my own little projects I always used FMOD, which I found to be pretty damn awesome. It's got a lot of features, but it's really easy to do stuff like "play this sound N times" or "stream this MP3 and play it".
For my own little projects I always used FMOD, which I found to be pretty damn awesome. It's got a lot of features, but it's really easy to do stuff like "play this sound N times" or "stream this MP3 and play it".
On personal projects I usually choose DirectSound, though I have used FMOD on a few. Sometimes use OggVorbis with DirectSound to get streaming OGG support if I am not using FMOD.
I have currently been taking a dip with OpenAL to get wider experience base. I've always believed sounds are far more important than people give them credit for, in games and movies alike. Typically sound is only thought about during the polishing / final phases of development; which is sad because at least one-third of the players experience is sound. (1/3 audio, 1/3 visual and 1/3 interaction) - of course these can be skewed a bit, tactile feedback could be added for some things, but not just the typical "my controller vibrated when this actions occurred"
I have currently been taking a dip with OpenAL to get wider experience base. I've always believed sounds are far more important than people give them credit for, in games and movies alike. Typically sound is only thought about during the polishing / final phases of development; which is sad because at least one-third of the players experience is sound. (1/3 audio, 1/3 visual and 1/3 interaction) - of course these can be skewed a bit, tactile feedback could be added for some things, but not just the typical "my controller vibrated when this actions occurred"
For my personal projects, Hekkus Sound System
At work, mostly wwise. But they have a much bigger budget for middleware.
At work, mostly wwise. But they have a much bigger budget for middleware.
I think that the most commonly used audio middle-ware is FMOD. Certainly the studio that I work at uses it, and it seems to have some big names using it: http://www.fmod.org/wiki/index.php5?title=Game_List
I would guess FMOD is the most used, but don't mistake that for being the best, because it's not great. It is quite easy to use.
I looked at Fmod and I was a little confused by the licensing terms, so I didn't end up using it. I ended up with OpenAL, but I'm not entirely happy with it (I started off using the LGPL OpenAL-soft, but it does some really dumb stuff*, so I moved back to the "regular" OpenAL). Still, I wish someone would release a decent non-GPL'd cross-platform audio library...
* Like using LoadLibarary to dynamically loading dsound.dll in the DllMain function - I had to delay-load OpenAL.dll to work around the crash that caused.
* Like using LoadLibarary to dynamically loading dsound.dll in the DllMain function - I had to delay-load OpenAL.dll to work around the crash that caused.
Our audio programmers are fiercely loyal to the Miles Sound System and have been using it since the early '90s, but FMOD is clearly giving RAD a run for their money.
At least they still have the in-game video market cornered :)
At least they still have the in-game video market cornered :)
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