lifehacker.com: Every part of a video game is designed to evoke specific responses from players. The user interface, the level design, and—most importantly—the soundtrack all impact your emotional state while playing. While that can be great for immersion, high-intensity music elevates the player’s sense of tension, making difficult sections of a game even harder.
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This is interesting to me, because I’ve found that I like taking video game soundtracks (specifically the Undertale soundtrack) and listening to it while I work or even read, maybe because it helps me focus or drowns out background noise or something. So it’s interesting to think that in the game itself, the music is actually holding you back. Although it may be true that turning down the music helps you focus on the fight and level up faster, I think your experience probably takes a hit. After all, from my point of view, I think it’s way more fun to get fully invested in a game and hear that boss battle music (as it plays over and over again each time you have to reset) than it is to sort of passively observe without the sound. I wonder what this says for my studying habits, though. Maybe since it’s a different activity, if it causes any adrenaline spikes, they’re actually helping me stay on task.
As a sound designer, reading this article makes a lot of sense to me in the grand scheme of things. When considering video game music and sound design, there are so many different ways to play with elements such as keys, tempo, and even rhythmic patterns that can not only hinder the player, but could also help them as well. I am not a super big fan of rhythm games, but there is a huge relationship between sound design and mechanics in rhythm games that create interesting and sometimes complex gameplay, and I can therefore absolutely see how having music in games can also inherently hinder your ability to perform well, especially under pressure. One of the points made is that taking out sound altogether can actually help you improve in your game experience, and I think this is a perfect example of showing how being fully immersed in an experience can really make you vulnerable to doing worse in games.
While I’ve never truly understood sound and how it works, I’ve always been fascinated by it. I’ve always wanted to know more about how sound impacts us on a subconscious level and how our emotions and even thoughts can be impacted by different sounds. Reading this article only made me more interested in this idea. The way that with the right soundtrack, our minds can be made more anxious, overwhelmed, and stressed while we are at the same time made to feel suspense and tension is incredible. While this specific example was in video games and had nothing to do with theater, I think that this would have great use in theater. While I may not understand how to do it, I’ve always wanted to explore sound in order to subconsciously influence the audience into feeling how I want them to feel. I think that a production that is supposed to be creepy or discomforting in some way would benefit greatly from sound in order to create this effect.
This is something I’ve actually thought about on multiple occasions—but in the case of horror movie trailers, which the article mentions. I never really liked horror movies, so when the trailers would pop up in my YouTube ads I would often just turn the volume off, and not be frightened by the visuals. The same is true vice versa for me—plain sound without the accompanying visuals also isn’t very scary. I imagine this could be related to a phenomenon that only occurs when ALL of your available senses are being stimulated. And in addition to that, in theory, you’re not able to focus as intently on your necessary hand-eye coordination (which the author speaks about in terms of attack and parry timings) if your brain is receiving intense audio simultaneously. You know a game that I feel like this trick would influence? Mario Kart. Except that wouldn’t be ideal because the music is so good.
As an epic gamer, I often get that intense, high stake feeling when I’m gaming because of the music. Sometimes I even have to mute the music so I can focus without becoming anxious about messing up. Sometimes it isn’t even music that gets me, instead it being sound effects. When I’m in caves in Minecraft I get scared and have to turn down the sound, so I don’t have to hear the mobs or creepy cave noises. (Yes, I know I’m a chicken. Make fun of me all you want). As a result, I’m able to focus easier and stay in caves longer. When I’m playing other games, after I turn down the music I can get more kills and achieve more without playing with stress and messing up. I’ve been doing this strategy for some time now so it definitely is a life hack, and it does indeed work.
Often, one of my favorite things about a video game is the music. I love the intricacy and arc in each individual track and then when listened together. One of the first examples I saw of music making a videogame harder was the Sans boss battle in Undertale (the origin of Megalovania - that video game has great music). Many of the tips online for beating the battle included turning off in-game audio in order to minimize the distraction of it. Many people turned off their lights as well - the less distraction there was from the audio and outside distractions in order to focus on the challenging level the easier it was to beat the boss. As this article explains, video game music often is designed to make adrenaline rush and the player stress. Some of our most important sensory input is from auditory sources and videogames often exploit that successfully. Overall, I love video game music and this article underlined the importance of it even more.
This is definitely an interesting concept albeit one that makes sense. I find myself listening to and enjoying a lot of video game soundtracks, but I can definitely see where the author is coming from. I think personally, if I tried playing games without sound it would feel all too empty and that it would feel too underwhelming. In addition to evoking emotion, video game scores can also give good sound cues that are very important for me when I play. The video game that I was thinking about the most while reading this was Skyrim, a video game that is very dear to me. The music that plays in combat situations can be stressful, but personally I feel like having that difference between the regular soundtrack and the combat scenario is useful. Video game scores as well as movie scores are very enjoyable to me as a listener, so I am more interested in learning about them functionally as well.
I have had to sit in audiences that were rowdy and know that from an audience perspective, crowds like that are not ideal for having an enjoyable viewing experience, let alone how disrespectful they are to the performers, crew, and staff. The part that really stuck out the most to me was that upper management doesn't do anything out of fear of losing customers. It really says a lot about what people's priorities in the world are when making money comes first over the safety of your employees. The amount of hard labor and frankly danger that is shoved off onto these front of house employees is sickening. The safety of the actors and crew also should be a concern too since one of the anecdotes in the article mentions people trying to get into the dressing rooms. I hope that soon there will be a change of heart and that people will be prioritized over profit.
To me video games can be such an immersive and intimate experience. This is shown by how lost in time you can be while playing some video games. I gather that is why lots of games take numerous hours to complete. Audio is another medium that is incredibly immersive as well. Audio brings another one of your senses into the narrative and is part of worldbuilding. Specifically, the way that reverb in audio may invoke nostalgia and how sound effects add layers to the piece. I think that video games greatly benefit from the immersive element. I personally have most been affected by games that figure out how to be meta without being tacky. For example, calling out the viewer when you don’t expect it. There are some games that play with spacial awareness features and truly make you trigger the fight or flight response. It must feel too real that your energy goes into fear more than gameplay.
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