Top game producer

After Wang Jian provided a general framework and explained the worldview and main character stories of "Night of the Full Moon," he left the card design, numerical balance, and art development to the tool people.

Without pausing for rest, he hastily completed the script for "Unheard: Voices of Crime." As a deduction game, the script was naturally the most crucial element.

Because "Unheard: Voices of Crime" adopted an innovative "listen and solve" mode, recording could only begin after the script was finalized. Otherwise, script revisions would necessitate extensive changes to the plot structure and recordings, especially later modifications, which could easily lead to errors and omissions.

After finishing the script, Wang Jian summoned his voice acting director and instructed, "This is the script for 'Unheard: Voices of Crime.' The upcoming voice acting is critical to this game, so there must be no carelessness."

He had already held a meeting and explained the design concept of "Unheard: Voices of Crime" to the team.

The voice acting director solemnly accepted the script, carefully reviewed it, and looked slightly troubled.

The characters seemed to have only textual descriptions, without any character design images!

Xiao Xu: 24 years old, a female police officer, standard Mandarin, strong and forceful voice, full of a sense of justice.

"Boss, are there no image settings for the characters?"

Wang Jian was taken aback: "No, no character images will appear in 'Unheard: Voices of Crime.' It's all sound. Why would we need character images?"

The voice acting director explained, "Without images, voice acting is still possible, but it relies more on the voice actors' interpretation, allowing for greater freedom. For example, the voices of a large-chested older sister and a flat-chested loli are definitely different. Generally speaking, the voice of a large-chested woman will be more lazy and magnetic, while the voice of a flat-chested girl will be more energetic and high-pitched. Skilled voice actors can even make people feel the specific size from the voice..."

Wang Jian looked enlightened: "There's such a thing!"

"Specifically for the game, take this thug for example. He speaks very rudely. But what level of rudeness is it? Is it the kind of blustering rudeness of a delinquent teenager often found near school gates, or the arrogant and dismissive rudeness of someone who follows a powerful boss, or the selfish and insidious rudeness of someone who speaks through gritted teeth?

Character stories combined with character images act like anchors for the characters, giving voice actors a general idea and making their performance more consistent."

The voice acting director suggested, "Should we create simple character image settings, like adding avatars in the game? This would facilitate voice acting and allow players to feel more immersed."

Wang Jian shook his head and rejected the idea: "It's better not to add avatars. I want to preserve the players' imagination, rather than imposing our imagination on them. Moreover, not providing character images in the visual information is to create blank space. Without character images and visual performance, the effect of the sound performance will be highlighted, making the experience more interesting."

After considering it, Wang Jian said, "How about this? During recording, we can try several different styles first, then compare them to see which one is better. By the way, is there anything else to pay attention to?"

The voice acting director added, "Based on my previous experience, in addition to the lines, we can also have the actors provide some interjections expressing emotions. These materials can be very useful during final integration. Also, although it's a basic skill for voice actors to play multiple roles, we should still avoid situations where they are talking to themselves, as it can easily break immersion..."

...

The settlement rewards for "Night of the Full Moon" were released one week after its launch, totaling over 4000 points plus one lottery ticket.

After drawing the lottery, Wang Jian obtained a packet of "Lucidity Red Tea": allowing the drinker to have exceptionally clear and flexible thinking within one hour, performing at 120% of their ability when making games.

After voice acting began, he listened to the actors' performances with the voice acting director every day, making selections.

Another problem besides voice acting, the game's sound field design, also troubled him.

After all, the game's scene is just a flat floor plan. If you want players to have a "immersive" feeling, you need to create a vivid 3D sound field based on 2D visual information and technically ensure that players can obtain enough information to advance the game.

The game proposal only allowed Wang Jian to know the game's content, but he had to explore the specific technology and how to implement it himself.

After discussing with Luo Shuai, the first solution tried was to attach a scene microphone to the protagonist's little black man in the game, with his front as the microphone's direction, supplemented by distance-volume attenuation and other modulation methods.

Although the effect was okay, there were subtle differences between the screen and the sound field's left and right, requiring players to react and distinguish for themselves, which was not intuitive. Moreover, when the player manipulated the little black man to continuously change direction, the sound field would also change due to the change in direction, making the actual experience very unfriendly.

Therefore, the final solution adopted was to still attach the scene microphone to the little black man, but the orientation always pointed to the top of the screen, avoiding the confusion caused to players by the difference in sound and image orientation.

The goal of "Unheard: Voices of Crime" is to give players a "immersive" feeling, so the auditory rules of real life must be reproduced in the sound field. For example, the closer to the sound source, the louder the sound, and the farther away, the softer the sound.

However, it is very complicated to achieve a realistic effect in the game. Many factors will interfere with the result, and different sounds themselves will change differently during the propagation process. It is not as simple as the sound being louder when it is closer and softer when it is farther away.

For example, when two people are talking in a hall, it is easy to hear clearly what the other person is saying when they are close, but when they are far away, if the speaking volume remains the same, what you hear more is reverberation and echo.

Luo Shuai and other programmers tried many algorithms, but they still couldn't achieve a particularly ideal effect and recently felt a little obsessed.

Wang Jian scratched his head: "Wow, I feel like the difficulty of making this game is a bit high!"

In fact, the highlight of "Unheard: Voices of Crime" is all in the performance of the sound. The required technology is relatively unpopular, and there are no suitable games to refer to, so the programmers can only study the algorithm themselves.

So Wang Jian first took a bunch of experience books in the field of sound technology for the programmers, and felt that they had absorbed almost enough, and then gave Luo Shuai the "Lucidity Red Tea" he had just drawn.

After Luo Shuai drank a cup, he suddenly felt extremely clear-headed: "Surround sound modulation...convolutional reverberation...I understand!"

He started typing code frantically!

After that, the game's sound field performance was greatly improved, and the degree of realism could be described as incredible, reaching true "immersion"!

If you want to know how realistic it is...

That day, Bai Li Ao was playtesting the game, sitting near the door, when someone suddenly pushed the door open. Coincidentally, the door in the game's plot also opened in the same direction, scaring him so much that he jumped up!

Time flies, and the production of "Unheard: Voices of Crime" is finally complete!