MUSIC+SOUND AWARDS TALK TO...
2020 Game Sound Design Juror
JAMES MAGEE
Lead Sound Designer, Creative Assembly
June 2020
James Magee is in-house Lead Sound Designer at Creative Assembly in the UK and has worked in the games industry for the past decade, previously for Sony Computer Entertainment and Relentless Software.
James has worked as a sound designer on a wide range of AAA video games, including the BAFTA winning horror 'Alien: Isolation', console strategy 'Halo Wars 2', J.K. Rowling's 'Wonderbook: Book Of Potions' and 'Killzone: Mercenary'.
MASA: Can you tell us how you got started in the world of audio production? How did you get your foot in the door of the industry and what was it about gaming, as opposed to other media, that attracted you?
James: I think similarly to most people working in professional audio careers, my path into audio production began by playing and enjoying music. I learned piano as a kid which led to studying music at A level, encountering recording kit, playing in bands and music production for the first time. I was also into video games and programming, so I was drawn towards Music Technology. I ended up studying Music Technology and Computer Software Engineering at De Montfort University in the UK and took some modules in post-production sound design which got me hooked. I spent a lot of time recording music, programming synths and music software, but once I discovered careers in video game audio were a thing, I was set on it as my dream job!
After my undergrad I worked in a few local recording studios doing music production and picking up post-production work on low-budget film projects, trying to further my skills in sound design. I did a lot of audio re-designs on game footage and trailers and started networking as much as possible, writing to games companies and trying to get my foot in the door. I received lots of good advice from industry professionals and decided to attend the MA Sound Design course at Bournemouth University to really improve my skillset. The course was invaluable at expanding my knowledge, I learned a lot of techniques and approaches to the relationship between sound and moving image.
I was determined to get into game audio more than ever and post-graduation I got involved working with game-modding teams to get more relevant experience. This gave my showreel loads more content and allowed me to demonstrate both my sound design chops and my technical ability, which is key in interactive video game sound design. I continued networking like crazy as entry level jobs are rare and my big break came in late 2009, with my first in-house job at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe working on PlayStation exclusives.
MASA: Big break indeed! It would be great to hear about your current role at Creative Assembly.
James: I’ve been working professionally in the games industry for a decade at a few different large studios across lots of different projects. I am fortunate to have recently been promoted to the role of Lead Sound Designer at Creative Assembly, prior to that I held a Senior Sound Designer role.
My role as a video game sound designer in the audio department is wide-ranging and involves creating sound and implementing it for many different areas of the games we work on. Sound designers identify and create audio that increases believability and immersion in a fictional game world, supporting gameplay feedback or reinforcing emotional cues. One day could be spent designing creepy surround ambiences for a horror level or creating sound and technical systems for a multi-layered interactive car engine, through to inventing bombastic weapon sounds. I often go out on field recording sessions to capture raw audio to use in my work.
Designing video game sound is different than in most other forms of audio-visual media because of the interactive and emergent gameplay experience. The player is in control of their progression and actions, my job is to build an interactive soundscape that can respond to their behaviours while keeping them engaged in the fictional game world.
Nowadays, as a Lead I spend some of my time working with the creative direction team to help support and understand the wider creative aesthetics of the game and how we can reflect that in the sound and music. This involves managing an audio department, scheduling work, mentoring and holistically mixing the game.
MASA: At what stage of game development do you tend to get involved?
James: When developing a video game, the audio team are involved throughout the whole development cycle, although what we are focused on changes through each phase. The initial phase is called pre-production during which we collaborate closely with other disciplines in the game team to plan and experiment with the audio we will need to create and how it fits with the design and tone of the game. This involves brainstorming to define high-level audio direction for both sound and music, using concept art, grey-box level designs, narrative storylines and prototype gameplay mechanics to inspire us. We also use this time to figure out a lot of the technical sound design systems we will need to develop with our audio programmers. Towards the end of pre-production, we create a vertical slice of the game which is a kind of polished demo that shows what the final game is going to be like.
The next stage is full production, it’s an exciting and busy time where the audio team are creating and implementing sound for all areas of the game. These tasks can vary massively depending on the areas and pipelines you’re working in. I may be collaborating with game designers to provide sound feedback for an interactive game mechanic, level design to create ambience for their level, the animators to bring a creature to life with vocal or Foley sounds, or the narrative team to highlight a climactic emotional moment in the story. We aim to get everything covered with a good sound design pass during the production which helps indicate whether the audio is doing its job in supporting other game elements and making the whole experience feel richer and more believable.
The final part of development is where the audio team polish sound content, refine technical systems, fix bugs to raise overall quality. Game development can be fluid and things may still be changing at this stage to improve the game, so we may have to adapt or re-design sounds to accommodate. When the game is finished, we usually spend a few weeks mixing, this involves critical listening and making broad-stroke decisions to make the audio experience fit together as a whole.
MASA: Looking back on your 10 years of working as a sound designer, what has been your favourite and most challenging projects to work on?
James: I’ve had the privilege of designing sound on some fantastic projects over the last 10 years of being in the games industry, across different genres and scale. These include sci-fi, horror, first person shooters, racing, real-time strategy, and children’s games. I’ve enjoyed all of them for the variety and challenges they’ve brought which helps you to grow as a creative audio professional.
I would say my favourite project has to be Alien: Isolation (2014), it was a dream title to work on for audio and the horror genre is an especially powerful vehicle for sound design. My audio colleagues and I at Creative Assembly were able to use the cutting edge of interactive technology at the time to create an immersive and frightening soundscape that captured the intense predatory feeling of being hunted, inspired by Ridley Scott’s masterpiece Alien (1979). We were fortunate enough to win a lot of awards for the sound design and music, including MASA Best Sound Design and the BAFTA for Audio Achievement.
There are two more projects I’d like to mention that were very enjoyable and challenging to work on - the first was during my time at Sony Computer Entertainment on an innovative Harry Potter title for Playstation 3 called Wonderbook: Book of Potions (2013). It used a camera and augmented reality book peripheral which displayed imaginary stuff on screen, coupled with the Playstation Move controller. This allowed the player to cast spells, mix potions, interact with creatures out of the Harry Potter universe and move through a rich storyline. The interactivity of the title required a lot of thinking outside the box with sound design and technical systems, along with the fun of working on an IP like Harry Potter.
The second title was incredibly technically challenging, Halo Wars 2 (2017), which shipped on both Xbox One and Windows PC. Halo Wars is a real-time strategy (RTS) game set in the incredibly popular Halo universe, steeped in lore and known for its unique sound design across many different titles. RTS games are about building and controlling many units on a vast battlefield, gaining control of territory and resources, with the player using a floating camera perspective to navigate around. Developing audio technology that could filter the huge amount of sound trying to play at any one time and most importantly, allowing us to dynamically mix the game so the right things could be heard at the right time to create a cinematic experience, was a major challenge. Creating futuristic audio design for the many weapons, vehicles and units while remaining faithful to some of the iconic sounds of the Halo series, was an excellent opportunity and one I thoroughly enjoyed!
MASA: What’s your favourite element to work on, for example weapons, monsters?
James: This is a hard one to answer as I enjoy working on many different elements when creating audio for games. I’ve had the chance to design Foley and vocals for huge mythical creatures, high octane revving engines, abstract subliminal ambiences that affect the mood of the player, through to huge cinematic moments and tiny sharp UI sounds.
Futuristic weapon sound design is a particular favourite of mine because you get to make sounds which are not grounded in realism and you can push them to be crazy and impactful, but still totally believable. It’s also great collaborating with the Animation and VFX artists to make these weapons feel convincing and satisfying to use.
Vehicles are cool to work on too because they need a hell of a lot of interactivity in games to sound convincing. Engines usually require multiple real-time parameters to give the player that instant feedback about the driving experience and designing content to fit these interactive systems is tough but really rewarding when you get it right.
MASA: What tech and software do you use the most?
James: There are many fantastic tools out there for sound design and everyone develops their own personal workflow. For the past few years my multitrack DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) for creating sound is Steinberg Nuendo, although I have used Avid's Pro Tools a lot on many projects. If I want to quickly edit or analyse individual sound assets, I use an audio editor called Sound Forge which is excellent for quick changes and applying batch processing to larger groups of files.
I try to record new source material whenever possible so access to good microphones and recorders is essential, but also having good commercial sound libraries is super useful as it is not always practical to record sound. We never use anything wholesale from a commercial library but being able to combine raw elements to create something new is handy and time efficient.
There are many great plug-ins and synthesisers to name but a few I find vital to my workflow are the FabFilter plug-ins, you can get some really cool and unique results from their Saturn distortion, Volcano filters and Timeless delay effects. I also use Boom and Tonsturm plug-ins a lot, especially for cinematic sound design. For sound synthesis the Native Instruments Komplete package, especially Massive and Reaktor which allow many different ways to create unique modular sequences and signal flows, are incredibly powerful.
In video games another critical technology that manages how sound and music is implemented and played-back during gameplay is the sound engine, Audiokinetic Wwise and FMOD Studio being the two most popular engines in mainstream game development. Sound, dialogue and music behaviours are setup in the sound engine and can be mixed in real-time, this software provides amazing flexibility and creativity when designing interactive audio that responds in real-time to game parameters.
MASA: And lastly, can you give any advice to up-and-coming sound designers in terms of getting into the industry?
James: My advice for aspiring sound designers is to develop your understanding of interactive audio, create amazing sound design and network as much as possible.
Video game audio requires additional skills in creating and implementing non-linear interactive sound that can respond to parameters in the game world. Sound engines such as Wwise and FMOD are free to download for training, along with game world editors such as the Unreal and Unity, which usually have demos you can play around with. Practicing with these toolsets gives the opportunity to learn how to create interactive sound and technical systems. Being able to show your sound working in-game really does help your chances at an entry level job. I also found getting involved in projects with the game-modding community is also an excellent way of gaining experience and unique content for your showreel - www.moddb.com is a good resource for this.
Design a stunning showreel that demonstrates both your interactive game audio working in game, and spectacular linear sound design to either your own projects, or redesign trailers or game footage (just make it clear it’s a redesign). Keep the showreel short (5 minutes max) and show different examples of your work that highlight different areas of audio design and implementation.
Networking is also key and helps to build relationships with people who could be potentially help you out in the future. If you can, attend game industry events which often have a careers sections to hand out your showreel and C.V, or look out for meet-ups on game audio social groups.
Game audio is exciting and challenging, requiring excellent creative and technical abilities. Entry level positions are hard to find but if you are enthusiastic, dedicated and network, it can greatly increase your chances.
Learn more about Creative Assembly here: www.creative-assembly.com
