Earlier this week, a zen game about unpacking, which is unsurprisingly called Unpacking, launched on Nintendo Switch. Since then, it's been getting a lot of attention, both for its players who don't know what GameCubes are, and for the stunning amount of detail within the isometric pixel art game.
The latest detail to go viral is one that doesn't usually get nearly enough recognition: the Foley work, done by BAFTA-award-winning composer and audio designer, Jeff van Dyck, who has credits on Total War, Hand of Fate, and a number of EA Sports games.
They say a picture tells a thousand words, but to show off audio design, you need a video, so here's one from a senior sound designer, Francesco Del Pia, which (at time of writing) has over 9,000 likes:
According to fellow audiophile Maximilien SP, van Dyck put together over 14,000 audio files just for these sounds. Again: 14,000 files just for picking up and putting down objects. Here's how van Dyck described the process:
"We had Reaper render the audio files into a deep folder structure that represented the containers & hierarchy in #Wwise. Then used a single template container to map all sounds to the correct surface switches. I felt giddy every time we did this process, it was magical!"
He went on to say that "the game has a lot of space and time for audio," because of the "impressionistic vibe" and low-resolution art. "This gives us an opportunity to add that detail back via the sound design."
Have you been playing Unpacking? Do you keep picking up and putting down items? Let us know what you think in the comments!
[source twitter.com]
Comments 15
Cool. Reminds me of the foley sounds I have at ShoeboxOfGames.com , for lifting, placing and shuffling the cards, moving playing pieces, dropping tokens, rolling dice and more.
Except mine's only a small library of about 40 or so sounds. I tend to rely on adding pitch and volume changes to those, to give the illusion of more variety and more precise range of taps/clicks/etc, rather than actually storing hundreds of such sounds.
I can't imagine how long that must've taken to record/capture/cut/slice all of those effects.
Most of my audio was recorded in the one single session, making use of a single box of Monopoly Gamer (Mario Kart edition, no less!) which happened to be by my side the morning I started writing the collection!!
Jeff van Dyck!? Now that is a name I haven't heard in a long, long time...
that's a lot to unpack...
This news has legitimately moved this game up a few notches on my radar. I can't say I've ever realized how far diligent foley work can go to building immersion before.
Ya'll remember when footsteps in snow, grass, and dirt sounding different was a huge deal? Glad to see audio details are still a priority, at least for some developers.
More and more gamers have reason to play with headphones. Playing Breath of the Wild with headphones is a whole new experience.
It’s a truly remarkable game. It sounds corny, but the game manages to share so much about its character just from the environment. The act of unpacking is satisfying by itself (especially when you find little ways to maximize space), but it’s fun to follow the character’s life based on what she brings with her each move. The sound effects are great even if the music is a bit lackluster.
@Astral-Grain BOTW’s sound design is a fantastic effort. The sound effects are so natural and satisfying to listen to. It’s one of a few games that in my opinion have set a new standard when it comes to sound design.
i was 0% interested in this game until i read this article. Thanks!
ps- Jeff van Dyck is a legend!
I honestly am spending tons of time seeing all the different animations and sounds! It's so Kool!
I’m doing the exact thing, in the exact same structure, in the exact same middleware for a different game 😎
We’re also using surface switches for every object, footsteps etc.
And this one is 3D and physics based… so add about 20000 sounds on top of that.
It’s crazy complicated work, but ending up with this many sound files is actually not that uncommon.
Still, it takes a lot of dedication and the result in Unpacking is amazing!
Saw this on the eshop charts and was like "the hell's this?". Now I'm genuinly interested.
It honestly looks like a really cool game. And, yeah, I think a lot of people underestimate how much good sound can add to a game and really round out the whole package.
Played through it on Xbox as it was released on Game Pass... only started playing planning to take a quick look and see what it was about. Ended up playing through the whole game in one sitting, and got all the achievements in a second play session. Its a surprisingly relaxing experience. highly recommend.
Ok, adding this one to my wishlist immediately.
I like supporting creatives like this, I'll have to pick it up despite my crushing back log.
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