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Wwise101-CertificationCourse

2015.1

Wwise

Audiokinetic Inc. Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences ii

Wwise101-CertificationCourse

Wwise 2015.1 Revision 51

Copyright 2015 Audiokinetic Inc. and Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences. All rights reserved.The Wwise Certification Course documentation (whether in written, graphic or video form) is supplied as a guide for the Wwise product and

is made available free of charge to all users of the Wwise Certification Website. This documentation is the sole joint property of Audiokinetic Inc.

(Audiokinetic) and the Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences (CRAS, and together we or us), and protected by Canadian copyright

law and in other jurisdictions by virtue of international copyright treaties.

This documentation may be duplicated, reproduced, stored or transmitted, exclusively for your internal, non-commercial purposes. You

may compile different extracts of the documentation to suit such internal purposes, but you may not alter the content of any portion of the

documentation. Any copy of the Wwise Certification Course documentation shall retain all copyright and other proprietary notices contained

therein. The foregoing does not extend to the documentation regarding the Audiokinetic Wwise Technology, which is the sole property of

Audiokinetic. Please refer to the copyright notices included in same.

The content of the Wwise Certification Course documentation is furnished for information purposes only, and its content is subject to

change without notice. Reasonable care has been taken in preparing the information contained in this document, however, we disclaim all

representations, warranties and conditions, whether express, implied or arising out of usage of trade or course of dealing, concerning the Wwise

Certification Course documentation and assume no responsibility or liability for any losses or damages of any kind arising out of the use of this

guide or of any error or inaccuracy it may contain, even if we have been advised of the possibility of such loss or damage.

Wwise, Audiokinetic, Actor-Mixer, SoundFrame and SoundSeed are registered trademarks, and Master-Mixer, SoundCaster and

Randomizer are trademarks, of Audiokinetic. Other trademarks, trade names or company names referenced herein may be the property of their

respective owners.

Wwise

Audiokinetic Inc. Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences iv

Using the Master Mixer Hierarchy ................................................ 205

Working with Effects ..................................................................... 218

Using the Schematic View ............................................................. 231

7. Finalizing the Mix ............................................................................. 238

Using Soundcaster ......................................................................... 239

Configuring a Mixing Desk ........................................................... 248

Using Control Surfaces .................................................................. 260

8. Optimizing Your Game ..................................................................... 269

Managing Memory ........................................................................ 270

Processor Optimization ................................................................. 290

Real-time Monitoring with Profiler ............................................... 294

Audiokinetic Inc. Conservatory of Recording Arts & Sciences 1

Lesson 1. Installing Wwise and Preparing LessonContent (Windows)

Table of Contents

Downloading Tutorial Files ....................................................................... 2

Installing Wwise ........................................................................................ 2

Preparing the Tutorial Lessons .................................................................. 6

Playing Cube ........................................................................................... 14

Lesson 1. Installing Wwise and Preparing Lesson Content (Windows)


Congratulations! Youre about to embark on a journey where youll learn

the art and science of integrating sound into video games by using Wwise,

the most powerful game audio integration tool and sound engine available.

Powerful and flexible tools like Wwise can oftentimes feel a bit daunting at

first, but simply follow the step by step approach in this and the following

lessons, and youll quickly become comfortable using Wwise. Youll learn

Wwise by integrating sound into an actual game called Cube. Cube is a

first person shooter game where youll save the world from bad guys while

enjoying the knowledge that you are the one responsible for creating the

soundscape that makes the game come to life!

Downloading Tutorial Files

To get started, youre going to need a few things, including Audiokinetics

Wwise software, as well as various project files that are used to begin most

of the lessons. All of this material is easily downloaded.

First youll need to download the Wwise application and then the lesson

files used for this tutorial.

1. Download the following files:

a. Wwise application: Go to https://www.audiokinetic.com/download/?

id=2015.1#windows and click the Windows Web Installer download

button , found near the bottom of the page.

b. Course Lesson Files: http://cras-wwise.com/lessonfiles/

WwiseLessons_v2015.1.zip

Installing Wwise

Now that you have the files you need, youll need to install Wwise.

1. Go to the folder where the files youve just downloaded are located and

Open the Wwise_2015.1_Setup file.

2. Click Run in the Security dialog.



The Wwise setup will display a window which includes a login area. It

is not necessary to log in with an Audiokinetic user account at this time

as all required files for this class are not restricted and available to the

public.

There are a variety of optional components that can be installed

at this time, including demo content and files related to authoring

games on various platforms. Since the options you select must be

downloaded during the installation process, you should only select the

three components that are needed for the purpose of this tutorial.

3. De-select all components except for Authoring Data, Authoring

Binaries 32-bit, Cube (Demo) and SDK (Common); read and confirm

the license terms and click Install.



Note

While there is a 64-bit computer version of the Wwise

Authoring Binaries, the 32-bit version works on 64-bit

computers and is sufficient for the purpose of this tutorial.

The installer downloads and installs the components that youve

selected.



Upon completion, youll be asked if you want to create a standalone

installer so that you can re-install to other computers without having to

download everything again. This is not necessary.



4. Click Close.

Wwise creates a shortcut on your desktop during installation for the

Wwise launcher.

Preparing the Tutorial Lessons

You now need to launch Wwise to verify success of the installation.

Launching Wwise for the first time will also create the necessary directory

that you will be adding the course tutorial project files to.

1. Launch Wwise from the shortcut that is on your desktop.

The End-User License agreement is displayed.



2. After reading the End-User License Agreement, click Accept at the

bottom of the window.

The Wwise Project Launcher opens.



The Project Launcher opens each time you open Wwise and displays

pertinent information regarding the newest features for the version of

Wwise youre using. In the lower right corner, links to online tutorial

videos are displayed a great supplement to this course. The left

column lists the most recent Wwise projects youve opened and since

you have not yet opened a Wwise project, it is blank.

3. Click New in the lower left corner of the Project Launcher to create a

project.

The New Project dialog box opens.



A Wwise Project consists of various files that allow you to integrate

sound into a game, however, you will not actually be creating a new

project right now. The important thing is that when you opened this

dialog box, Wwise created a folder named WwiseProjects on your

computer which is the default location for Wwise project folders. In the

next exercise, youre going to extract the WwiseLessons_v2015.1.zip file

you downloaded earlier into this newly created folder.

4. Take a note of the path displayed in the Location field, and click Cancel

to close this New Project dialog box.

You can now close Wwise.

5. Click the Exit button at the bottom of the Project Launcher window to

close Wwise.

Youre now ready to extract the course project files to the folder you just

took note of.



6. Open an Explorer window and navigate to your Downloads folder.

Right-click the Wwise Lessons zip file you downloaded, and choose

Extract All...

7. Click Browse...

8. Navigate to the WwiseProjects folder you created earlier and click OK to

store the lessons there.

Note

Since Windows 8.1 the My Documents folder has been

renamed to Documents so your path may be slightly different.



9. Click Extract.

The course project files are extracted to the folder that you specified.



For each of the following lessons, you'll use the game Cube that is

provided with Wwise. Although it was installed when you installed the

Wwise application, you'll need to copy it from its default location to the

Wwise Lessons folder you just extracted in order for the lessons to work

properly.

10.Navigate to Program Files (x86)/Audiokinetic/Wwisev2015.1.x build xxxx, right-click the Cube Demo folder andchoose Copy.

Note

Versions of Wwise have four digit build numbers which may

vary depending on when you've downloaded the software. For

that reason a placeholder of xxxx has been given in this step

instead of the specific build number you will see when viewing

this folder.

11.Navigate back to the Wwise Lessons folder you just extracted and

within that folder right-click and choose Paste.



You're Wwise Lessons folder now contains everything you'll need to

complete the course.

12.In fact, your Wwise Lessons folder now has too much! The final step

in preparing your lessons is to remove the already completed audio of

the Cube game. So, drill down to ...\Wwise Lessons\Cube Demo\cube

\soundbanks\Windows, then delete everything in that folder.



Playing Cube

The game youll use throughout this tutorial is Cube, an open source first

person shooter where your mission is to get the monsters before they get

you. You'll now launch a version of Cube that has two distinct differences

from versions of Cube you might find on the Internet. First, thanks to your

efforts in preparing the lessons, this version of the game has no audio; its

your job to add the sound! The other difference is that this version of the

game has a unique ability to communicate details about whats happening

in the game with the Wwise software as the game is being played. This

gives you incredibly valuable information, as youll learn in lesson 2.

In each of the subsequent lessons, youll be asked to run Cube so that you

can hear how the sound design youve integrated impacts the game. Each

time youre asked to run Cube, youll need to perform the following steps.

1. Navigate to My Documents/WwiseProjects/WwiseLessons/Cube Demo/cube and then double-click the cube-profile.bat file to launch the Cube game.



You may get a notification indicating the Windows Firewall has blocked

some features of the program. This is because the profile version of

Cube uses a network connection to speak to Wwise as youll learn in

Lesson 2. Its important that this capability is not blocked by Windows.

2. If you get a Windows Security Alert window, click Allow Access.

The game opens. Each time you run the game, youll begin in an empty

level, which provides you with an opportunity to run around and

explore your sound design without having to worry about the bad guys

finding you.



The game uses a standard FPS keyboard controls. For this tutorial, the

main controls you need to familiarize yourself with are:

W = Move Forward

S = Move Backward

A = Strafe Left

D= Strafe Right

Spacebar = Jump

Left-Click = Fire

3. Briefly play the game and be sure to fire the shotgun.

At this point the game will be silent as you havent yet integrated any

sounds. The visual animation lets you know that the shotgun has

been fired, but its obvious that without sound, the experience is less

than gratifying. In the subsequent exercises, youll discover the basic

principles of how sounds are integrated into a game using the Wwise

sound engine.

As you explore Wwise, leave this profile edition of Cube running

in the background as you will be moving between it and the Wwise

application throughout this lesson.



Tip

In Windows, press Alt-Tab to jump back to the Windows

desktop or the Wwise program.

Once youre done familiarizing yourself with Cube, youll need to exit

the game.

4. Press Escape and use the up and down arrows to select quit and then

press enter.

Thats it! Youre now ready to move to Lesson 2, where youll very

quickly take a video game from silence to sound!


Lesson 1. Installing Wwise and Preparing LessonContent (Mac)

Table of Contents

Downloading Wwise Tutorial Files ......................................................... 19

Installing Wwise ...................................................................................... 19

Installing the Mac SDK ........................................................................... 25

Additional Support Files ......................................................................... 28

Preparing the Lesson Files ....................................................................... 29

Playing Cube ........................................................................................... 32

Lesson 1. Installing Wwise and Preparing Lesson Content (Mac)


Congratulations! Youre about to embark on a journey where youll learn

the art and science of integrating sound into video games by using Wwise,

the most powerful game audio integration tool and sound engine available.

Powerful and flexible tools like Wwise can oftentimes feel a bit daunting at

first, but simply follow the step by step approach in this and the following

lessons, and youll quickly become comfortable using Wwise. Youll learn

Wwise by integrating sound into an actual game called Cube. Cube is a

first person shooter game where youll save the world from bad guys while

enjoying the knowledge that you are the one responsible for creating the

soundscape that makes the game come to life!

Downloading Wwise Tutorial Files

To get started, youre going to need a few things, including Audiokinetics

Wwise software, necessary support files and the project files that are used

to begin most of the lessons. All of this material is easily downloaded.

1. Navigate to https://www.audiokinetic.com/download/?

id=2015.1#macosx to download the following files:

a. Wwise application: Click the Wwise Authoring (Mac OS X)

download button, , the first of several buttons found near the

bottom of the page.

b. Wwise Mac SDK: Click the Wwise SDK (Mac OS X) Setup

download button, , also found near the bottom of the page.

c. Cube demo game: Click the Cube Demo (Mac OS X) download

button, , listed under the page's final subsection, Samples and

Demos.

2. Additional Services necessary to run Cube: http://www.libsdl.org/

release/SDL2-2.0.3.dmg

3. Course Lesson Files: http://cras-wwise.com/lessonfiles/

WwiseLessons_v2015.1.zip

Installing Wwise

Now that you've downloaded the files you need, youll need to install

Wwise, various support files and the related course materials. Depending

on your browser preferences the .zip downloads may or may not have been

extracted in your Downloads folder.

1. Navigate to your Downloads folder and if necessary, extract any .zip

files and then delete the .zip files.



Your Downloads folder should now contain the five items above.

Note

The Wwise authoring application and SDK have specific

version and build numbers, which will vary depending on

when you downloaded them. To keep our images in this

exercise as generic as possible, we have blurred out these

numbers.

2. Drag the extracted Wwise application to the Applications folder.

Youre about to open the Wwise application for the first time. Since you

did not download Wwise from the Apple App store, you cannot launch

the application by simply double-clicking as usual. Instead, you must

confirm that you want to run this application.

3. Open the Applications folder, right-click Wwise and choose Open.



A message appears asking if youre sure that you want to open Wwise.

4. Click Open.

Wwise opens.

Microsoft Visual C++ is a set of additional files that are necessary to

run Wwise on Mac OS X. If these files are not already installed, youll be

guided through the process of downloading and installing them. If you

already have them installed, you can proceed to step 7.

5. Read the license terms. Upon agreeing, select the acceptance checkbox

and click Install.



6. Upon completion, click Close.

Wwise is now ready to run on your Mac.

7. After reading the End-User License Agreement, click Accept.



Wwise is now installed on your computer, but there are some additional

files you need to install before you can run it for the first time.

The Wwise Project Launcher opens.



The Project Launcher opens each time you open Wwise and lists the

most recent Wwise projects youve opened and, since you have not yet

opened a Wwise project, it is blank.

8. Click New in the Project Launcher to create a project.

The New Project dialog box opens.

A Wwise Project consists of various files that allow you to integrate

sound into a game; however, you will not actually be creating a new

project right now. The important thing is that when you opened this

dialog box, Wwise created a folder named WwiseProjects on your

computer which is the default location for Wwise project folders. In the

next exercise, youre going to extract the WwiseLessons_v2015.1.zip file

you downloaded earlier into this newly created folder.

Note

While the project folder path shows c:\users\crossover\My

Documents\WwiseProjects\, the WwiseProjects folder was

actually created in the documents folder located in your user

accounts document folder. This is because Wwise for Mac

runs within a Windows emulation system which takes care of

mapping the default file paths normally used when Wwise runs

within Windows, to paths found on a Mac system.



9. Click Cancel to close this New Project dialog box.

You can now close Wwise.

10.Click the Exit button at the bottom of the Project Launcher window to

close Wwise.

Youre now ready to extract the course project files to the folder you just

took note of.

11.Click Exit to quit Wwise.

Installing the Mac SDK

For Wwise to author the code that integrates the sound into a game,

you need to install supporting software known as an SDK (Software

Development Kit) for each platform or game system you are developing

for. Your Macintosh computer system is a game system, so youll need to

install a Mac-specific SDK to integrate sounds into the game youll use

throughout this tutorial.

1. Navigate back to your Downloads folder and then right-click the

(version-specific) Wwise_Mac PKG file and select Open to run the

installer.

A message appears asking if you want to open the installer package.



2. Click Open.

The Wwise SDK installer window opens.

3. Click Continue.

Youll now be prompted to choose a destination where youd like the

SDK to be installed. The Mac SDK must be installed on your Macs

primary system drive. Using the standard install settings, this will

already be selected.

4. Verify that your system drive is selected, and click Continue.



5. When prompted, type in the necessary administrator account

authorization and click Install to confirm the installation.

6. Once the installer has finished, click Close and close any open windows

that appeared after the installation was finished.



Additional Support Files

Another support file called SDL2 (Simple Direcectmedia Layer) is

necessary to run the game Cube on your Mac. SDL2 provides services such

as graphics and keyboard mapping for the game.

1. Go to your downloads folder and double-click the SDL2 DMG file.

The SDL installer window opens.

2. Using your Finder window, navigate to your root partition (usually

called Macintosh HD) then /Library/Frameworks .



3. Drag the SDL2.framework file from the SDL window to the /Library/Frameworks folder. (You will need to specify your adminpassword.)

Preparing the Lesson Files

You now need to move the lesson files you downloaded earlier to the

proper folder on your Mac, but you first need to add the CubeDemo

game folder into the Wwise Lessons folder. It's also imperative that the

CubeDemo game folder be renamed so that it includes a space between

the word Cube and Demo. If this change isn't made, the sound design

you implement in the lessons will not be able to be built into the playable

version of the game.

1. Open your downloads folder and locate the CubeDemo folder andrename it to Cube Demo.



2. Drag the Cube Demo folder into the Wwise Lessons folder.

A Wwise Lessons folder containing all of the tutorial content is

displayed. This folder needs to be placed inside a folder called

WwiseProjects. The Wwise Projects folder was automatically created

and placed within your documents folder when you opened Wwise

earlier in this lesson.

3. In the main menu bar select File > New Finder Window.

A new Finder window opens.

4. Use the new Finder window to navigate and open the WwiseProjects

folder within your documents folder.

Assuming youve never used Wwise on your Mac before, the

WwiseProjects folder will be empty. If you have already used Wwise on

your Mac in the past, you may see project folders already in the Wwise

Projects folder. This is OK.

5. Drag the Wwise Lessons folder from your downloads folder to the

WwiseProjects folder.



Inside the Wwise Lessons folder youll find a folder with the Cube game

as well as folders related to each of the remaining lessons.

6. Click the Wwise Lessons folders disclosure triangle.

You can see at the top the Cube Demo folder. It contains the Cube game

youll be using throughout the lessons. You can also see that each of the

remaining lessons has a folder which contains files related to those parts

of the tutorial.

7. In fact, your Wwise Lessons folder now has too much! The final step

in preparing your lessons is to remove the already completed audio of

the Cube game. So, drill down to ...\Wwise Lessons\Cube Demo\cube

\soundbanks\Mac, then delete everything in that folder.



Playing Cube

The game youll use throughout this tutorial is Cube, an open source first

person shooter where your mission is to get the monsters before they get

you. You'll now launch a version of Cube that has two distinct differences

from versions of Cube you might find on the Internet. First, thanks to your

efforts in preparing the lessons, this version of the game has no audio; its

your job to add the sound! The other difference is that this version of the

game has a unique ability to communicate details about whats happening

in the game with the Wwise software as the game is being played. This

gives you incredibly valuable information, as youll learn in lesson 2.

In each of the subsequent lessons, youll be asked to run Cube so that you

can hear how the sound design youve integrated impacts the game. Each

time youre asked to run Cube, youll need to perform the following steps.

1. Navigate to ~/Documents/WwiseProjects/WwiseLessons/Cube Demo/Mac/Profile/bin and locate theRunCubeDemo.sh file that youll use to launch the game.



RunCube.sh is a script that launches the Cube game. This script needs

to be run from the Terminal program found in your Macs Utility

folder. Youll need to associate this file with the Terminal application

and once this is done, launching the game will be very simple.

2. Right-click the RunCubeDemo.sh file and choose Open With > Other...

A window opens asking you to choose the program youd like to

associate with this file. By default, this window only allows you to

pick from recommended applications, for which Terminal will not be

available.

3. In the Enable field, choose All Applications from the pull-down menu.



The Terminal application is found in the Utility folder located within

the Applications folder.

4. Press Shift+Command+U to open the Utility folder, scroll down to

choose Terminal, and select the Always Open With checkbox before

clicking Open.

Depending on which version of Mac OS X you are using, you will either

see the Cube demo game appear, in which case you can now proceed to

just after the image in step 6, or if Cube does not immediately launch

you will see the following message.



5. Click OK.

The first time you open Cube, you'll need to use the Open command

found in the right-click menu.

6. Right-click the RunCubeDemo.sh file and choose Open.

A confirmation window appears to confirm if you want to launch the

script.

Click Open.



The game opens. Now that youve associated this file with the Terminal

application, youll only need to double-click the RunCubeDemo.sh file

to run the game.

Tip

Youll be using the RunCubeDemo.sh file in each of the

remaining lessons. For easy access, right-click the file and make

an alias file that can be placed in a convenient location such as

your desktop or on the dock.

When Cube first launches, youll begin in an empty level, which

provides you with an opportunity to run around and explore your

sound design without having to worry about the bad guys finding you.

The game uses standard FPS keyboard controls. For this tutorial, the

main controls you need to familiarize yourself with are:

W = Move Forward

S = Move Backward

A = Strafe Left

D = Strafe Right

Spacebar = Jump

Left-Click = Fire

7. Briefly play the game and be sure to fire the shotgun.



At this point the game will be silent as you havent yet integrated any

sounds. The visual animation lets you know that the shotgun has

been fired, but its obvious that without sound, the experience is less

than gratifying. In the subsequent exercises, youll discover the basic

principles of how sounds are integrated into a game using the Wwise

sound engine.

As you explore Wwise, leave this profile edition of Cube running

in the background as you will be moving between it and the Wwise

application throughout this lesson.

Tip

Press Command-Tab to jump back to the Mac desktop or the

Wwise program.

Once youre done familiarizing yourself with Cube, youll need to exit

the game.

8. Press Escape and use the up and down arrows to select quit and then

press Enter.


Lesson 2. Quick StartFrom Silence to Sound

Table of Contents

Launch Wwise ......................................................................................... 39

Profiling the Game .................................................................................. 44

Creating an Event .................................................................................... 48

Importing a Sound .................................................................................. 53

Applying an Action ................................................................................. 59

Integrating Sound Into the Game ........................................................... 62

Play the Game! ........................................................................................ 74



In the last lesson you installed and briefly played Cube, the game youll use

throughout this tutorial. At this point, Cube is a silent game and thats not

very exciting. Youll soon fix this! By the end of this lesson youll bring the

game to a point where one of the games most noticeable visual animations,

the firing of a shotgun, is supported by a shotgun blast sound.

Launch Wwise

Youll begin by creating a new Wwise project. Wwise projects are not

a single file, but a folder with a number of sub folders that collectively

contain the various resource files needed to carry out the instructions of

how youve integrated sound into a game.

1. Launch the Wwise application.

Note

For Windows double-click the shortcut that was added to your

desktop. On Mac youll double-click the Wwise application

found in your applications folder.

The Wwise Project Launcher opens and all available Wwise projects are

displayed.

Tip

On Windows, the right side of the Project Launcher displays

new features from the latest release as well as links to additional

resources. This will not be displayed on the Mac platform.



The number of projects you see here will vary depending on what other

projects you may have opened on your computer. Most likely you see

nothing in this area at this point. In this case it makes no difference

because you are going to be creating a completely new project for this

lesson.

2. In the lower left corner of the Project Launcher, click New.

A dialog window opens asking what you want to call your new project

and indicates where the project folder is located. The Original files

field indicates where the audio asset files youll import in this later

lessons will be stored. Other optional preset examples within Wwise

also use supporting files which are indicated in the lower box with the

checkmarks. Its OK to leave these selected.

3. In the Name field, type Wwise Project Lesson 2. Click the [] button

to the right of the location field, navigate to your WwiseProjects folder

and select the Lesson 2 folder.



Note

Mac users: Youll navigate to your documents folder and

choose /Documents/WwiseProjects/WwiseLessons/Lesson 2. Upon selection, the path inthe Location field will be displayed as Y:\Documents\WwiseProject\Wwise Lessons\Lesson 2\. The Y:path designation occurs because Wwise for Mac runs within a

PC emulator and it uses this letter as a drive designation.

4. In the Platforms panel, click Add.... The Add Platform dialog pops up.

Select Mac as your Base Platform.



Click OK in the Add Platform dialog, then again in the New Project

dialog.



5. Theres a brief pause while Wwise builds your new project folder. When

complete the Wwise License Manager window opens and explains that

Wwise is running in an evaluation mode. The evaluation mode version

of Wwise is identical to the fully licensed version with the exception that

there is a maximum of 200 media items across all Soundbanks. Youll

learn more about Soundbanks later in this lesson, but be assured that

this is more than sufficient for you to gain an understanding of Wwise.

6. In the License Manager window, click Close.

You now see the Wwise software interface.



Depending on your screen size and resolution, it may look slightly

different, but across the top youll see a main menu bar, with toolbars

below. These are static and will always be visible. Below youll see

multiple areas called views. Each view provides functionality that can

be used to visualize and manipulate how sound is integrated into your

game. There are around forty different views available within Wwise.

This may seem a bit overwhelming, but it is not imperative that you

know what all of these views do to make Wwise work for you. In fact,

rarely will any one person use all of these views as Wwise is used by

teams of people, many of which have specific jobs that only require

them to use specific sections of Wwise.

Profiling the Game

To integrate sound into Cube, you need to first evaluate the kind of

information that is being sent from the game to Wwise. To do this youll

need to run the special profiler version of Cube that you tested in Lesson

1.

1. Launch the Cube game.

Note

If youre not sure how to launch Cube, review the Playing Cube

exercise at the end of Lesson 1 written for your computers

operating system.

Youll need to now return to Wwise. In fact youll be switching back and

forth between the game and Wwise quite often throughout this tutorial,

so youll want to become familiar with using Alt+Tab on Windows, or

Command+Tab on a Mac to switch between programs.

2. Press Alt+Tab on Windows or Command+Tab on Mac to return to

Wwise.

There are a number of views that work together to show you

information related to reviewing information being received from the

game, but rather than opening them one at a time you can quickly open

them in one step using a layout. A layout is a predefined collection of

views that are commonly used together.

3. In the main menu click Layouts and choose Profiler or press F6.



The Profiler layout is displayed. You can use the views in this layout

to evaluate information about messages generated in the game and

monitor details about sound engine performance.

Youre going to use the Capture Log view in the upper left to display

information that is being generated in game. To access this information,

you need to connect Wwise to the Cube game that you should still have

running in the background.

4. In the toolbar, click Remote.



The Remote Connections window opens displaying computers on

the network ( including your own local computer) that are running a

version of the game that uses the Wwise Sound Engine and are designed

to communicate with Wwise.

5. Select your computer from the list and click Connect.

The window closes and because the Start capture on connect checkbox

was selected, youll see the capture button in the toolbar turn red, while

a counter ticks next to it.

Capturing is the process of recording, in real-time, a log of any

information coming from the Wwise Sound Engine in your game

related to the game play, an invaluable asset as you develop the sound

for your game.



6. Return to the Cube game and fire the shotgun one time.

7. Go back to Wwise to view the Capture Log.

In the Capture Log view youll see a few lines of information,

confirming that Cube transmitted information to Wwise when you

fired the shotgun.

When connected to a game, some Wwise parameters cannot be

adjusted, so once you have the information you need, you need to

disconnect from the game.

8. Click Disconnect.

The capture process stops and Wwise disconnects from the game. You

can now evaluate what just happened.

The information displayed represents errors that were generated

because Wwise does not know what to do with the messages it has

received. These message are generically referred to as game calls and

there are a variety of different types of calls that may be triggered. Youll

learn more about the different types of calls later, but for now you need

to take a closer look at the error description.

9. Drag the right side of the Description column header to the right so you

can view the entire error message.



The messages in the description area refer to something called events.

Events are a type of Wwise game calls that the game engine sends to

the Wwise audio engine, indicating that something has occurred in

the game. Usually when an event is transmitted to Wwise, its used to

trigger a sound, to modify one of its properties, or even to stop the

sound from playing. Events are given names to identify what the event

is being used for. In this case the Fire_shotgun_Player event name thats

being referenced makes it clear that it is associated with the act of the

player firing their shotgun.

Also notice that there is a Game Object column that specifies Local

Player. This identifies which entity in the game the message is associated

with. For example, there may be multiple characters in the game that

carry a shotgun, so the game engine needs to know which character

fired the shot to appropriately play the sound. For example, if the

monster that just fired a shotgun appears to be 50 meters away, then the

sound probably shouldnt be played at the same volume as when our

hero fires his shotgun. This will be explored in greater detail in Lesson

5Creating Space.

For now, the problem is that Wwise is saying that it has no idea what to

do with this event, but youre about to change that!

Creating an Event

For everything that happens in the game that may need an audio response,

a programmer has added lines of code to transmit a message informing

Wwise about what has occurred. This message is referred to as a game call.

Game calls are just simple messages that say things like Hey, the shotgun

was fired, but in reality this message is sent as a string of text or numbers.

When this message is received by the audio engine, any number of things

can happen as defined by you, the game audio designer.

The first thing that you need to do is provide what is needed so that

Wwise can catch an incoming game call. Wwise catches game calls with

something called an Event. Think of it like a game of catch between the

game engine and the audio engine. The ball being thrown from the game



engine is the game call, while an event is a type of object within Wwise

designed specifically to catch game calls. The important thing to note is

that each game call needs an identically named event to be received by

Wwise.

1. From the main menu select Layout > Designer or press F5.

2. In the Project Explorer view, click the Events tab.

Its in the Events tab where youre going to allow Wwise to understand

the incoming event game calls that Wwise should expect to see

transmitted from the game engine.

Within the Project Explorers Events tab you see a folder titled Events

and within that folder there is an object called Default Work Unit.

Work units serve as the foundation for Wwise. Work units contain

information related to a particular section or element within your

project and help you organize your project.



In many games, many people or even companies are concurrently

working on different parts of a game. For example, one team may be

working on all of the weapon sounds, while another focuses on ambient

sounds. In this scenario, each team could have its own copy of Wwise

and create their own unique work unit that houses their assigned

events. Later in the production, multiple work units can be brought into

a single project in order to bring all of the elements in a game together.

Note

Work units are actually XML files created within the project

structure of Wwise.

Anything you create in Wwise is referred to as an object. Be careful

not to confuse this with the Game Object term discussed earlier in this

lesson which relates to items within the game. Objects in the Wwise

interface are represented by small square icons. There are over 20 types

of objects, each providing unique functionality for how you can create

and control sound within Wwise. Objects exist within a hierarchy and

typically work units are at the top of this hierarchy. Like the bricks that

make up a building, these objects are building blocks that can be used

for purely practical applications, or they can be arranged in intricate

and creative ways. For now, youre going to create a single Event object

within the Default Work Unit that will serve as a glove that will be used

to catch the shotgun game call that is being transmitted from the Cube

game engine.

3. Click the Default Work Unit within the Events folder.



When an object is selected, an icon bar is displayed in the Project

Explorer that shows which other types of objects can be housed within

the selected object. When you hover over the icon, a tooltip indicates

the type of object represented by the icon.

4. Hover over the fourth icon to identify it as an Event object.

5. Click the Event icon to create a new Event Object within the Default

Work Unit.

A new event object is created and you are prompted to type its name.

How you name an Event object is critical. It is imperative that the name

of the Event object perfectly matches that name of the game call being

transmitted from the game engine. Just like dialing a phone number, if

youre off at all, it wont connect.



To ensure that this works well, typically the sound designer decides

what kinds of things the sound engine needs to be aware of, and creates

the events for each of these things in Wwise. The sound designer

then informs the programmer of the event names so that they can

program the game engine to transmit game calls with the same

name. In our scenario, the game engine for Cube has already been

programmed, and the names for the calls have already been defined,

and Fire_Shotgun_Player is the name for the call used each time a

shotgun is fired.

6. Type Fire_Shotgun_Player and press Enter.

Note

Wwise will later create software code based on your project. In

that code, all object name references are handled in lower case,

therefore object names are not case sensitive.

Tip

Selecting an object reveals its associated properties in the

Event Editor to the right which you can confirm by the

Fire_Shotgun_Player - Event Editor in the view's title bar.

Different objects have editors of varying complexity. Most

have a Notes field that is incredibly important because you

can add extra information to avoid any confusion about the

event name. With a name like Fire_Shotgun_Player, the event

likely relates to the shotgun being fired, but not all events

are intuitively named. Notes provide a way to provide more

information to help you and others who might be reviewing

your work better understand what youve created.



Importing a Sound

Now that you have an event setup to catch the incoming shotgun game

call, you need to bring in the sound that you want to hear when that

event is received. Wwise can create sounds in a variety of ways, including

synthesizing sounds from scratch; however, the most common way to

generate a sound is to use a recorded audio file. Theres no need to go out

and record a shotgun as an audio file of a shotgun blast is already provided.

You simply need to bring it into your project.

Sounds are usually managed within the Audio Tab of the Project Explorer

which is found in the Designer layout.

1. In the Project Explorer view, select the Audio tab.

The Audio tab of the Designer layout is where youll spend most of your

time when designing your games soundscape. The audio tab has three

different hierarchies that each provide unique objects to accomplish

various tasks related to triggering or manipulating how audio works in

Wwise.

With the exception of music, youll keep your sounds within a work

unit within the Actor-Mixer Hierarchy.

Tip

The Factory SoundSeed Air Objects work unit contains objects

related to Audiokinetics SoundSeed sound synthesis tools

that can be used to create various types of sound in place of

importing audio files. SoundSeed offers a lot of diversity in

sounds without using much memory in the game system.

There are many different objects that can be created within the

Actor-Mixer Hierarchy that youll explore over the next several

lessons; however, if you simply want to play a given audio file, this is

accomplished via the Sound SFX (Sound Effects) object.

Note

It is also possible to play sounds through Sound Voice objects;

however, they are generally used for spoken dialogue as they

have specific localization features used when releasing a game

in multiple languages.

2. In the available object row, click the Sound SFX icon.



3. Name the Sound SFX Object Shotgun_Blast.

The object name appears in red.



The red lettering represents that there isnt an audio file associated with

this SFX object. Youll need to add the audio file in just a moment, but

before you go any further its important to understand that an SFX

object does not directly represent an audio file. It instead represents

the channel that the audio file will play through. You can equate it to

the idea of a channel on a digital audio workstation. The channel has

various controls that manipulate the actual audio files that are stored on

the audio track that feeds through the channel. Once you understand

this, youre ready to add the audio file to the Sound SFX object.

Right-clicking an object provides many different options related to what

can be done with that object, including importing an audio file to a

Sound SFX object.

4. Right-click the Shotgun_Blast SFX Object and choose Import Audio

Files.



5. Click Add Files

A dialog box opens prompting you to select the file you want to import.

The file youre going to import is a .wav file. Wave files are relatively

large and you may well think that youd first want to convert the file

to something like an .mp3 file or even reduce its sample rate or bit

depth to reduce the amount of information you are bringing in. This

is not the case. Actually, you want to import your best quality original

into Wwise as a Wave file and dont worry about the size at this time.

The beauty of Wwise is that you can later decide how you want to

optimize the files size before integrating into the game. In fact, Wwise



has extensive features related to this which youll explore in Lesson-8.

Think of it like a photographer wanting to always keep his 25 megapixel

original and only worry about how to crop or compress the image based

upon the need at the time he needs to send someone the image.

6. Navigate to WwiseProjects/Wwise Lessons/Lesson 2/Audio files for Lesson 2/, choose the Shotgun_Blast fileand click Open.

The Audio File Importer opens confirming which audio file you want to

import to the SFX object.

7. Click Import.

The Audio File Importer window closes and you now see that Shotgun

Blast SFX object has turned blue.



The blue color indicates that an audio source, in this case a wav file,

is properly associated with the SFX object and that the audio file is

currently being referenced in its original imported format.

Note

As you work, you may notice some Sound SFX objects names

are blue while others are white. The color communicates if

the associated file has been optimized through a conversion

process which usually happens when you generate a

SoundBank which youll do later in this lesson. White object

names indicate that the conversion has already taken place,

where blue objects have yet to be converted. At this point, dont

worry if you see the color change from blue to white. Youll

learn more about optimization and the conversion process in

Lesson 8.

Now its time to test your sound and make sure its playing through

your system.

8. Click the Shotgun_Blast Sound SFX object to make sure its selected.

Notice that the Property Editor view displays audio controls for the

Shotgun_Blast such as a volume fader.

Also, look in the Transport Control view and youll see the name

Shotgun_Blast. This indicates that when you press the play button,

youll hear the sound as its going to be played in the game.



Tip

Spacebar is the keyboard shortcut for the play button.

9. In the Transport Control view, click the play icon or press the spacebar.

You should hear the shotgun blast sound. Youll also notice that theres

a meter in the toolbar as well as a meter view on the right side of the

layout showing you the level of playback.

Applying an Action

Earlier you created the event object that catches the game call transmitted

from the game engine, and youve just created the Sound SFX object that

contains the audio file you want to hear when that event is received. Now

you are ready to connect these two objects together. This is accomplished

via Actions that are created in a selected events Event Editor.



Earlier you worked with the Event Editor when you created the

Fire_Shotgun_Player event within the Events tab of the Project Explorer.

Although not currently in the Events tab, you may have noticed the Event

Viewer view in the lower left corner is displaying the Fire_Shotgun_Player

event you created earlier. There you see your Fire_Shotgun_Player event

is indicating that it is missing associated actions and therefore isnt doing

anyone any good.

1. Click the Fire_Shotgun_Player [Missing] event in the Event Viewer.

The Fire_Shotgun_Player Event Editor is displayed containing an empty

list with an empty row 1. This is where you indicate what Action you

want to have happen when Wwise receives the Fire_Shotgun_Player

event from the game engine.

2. Click the selector menu button [>>]on the first row.

A list of possible actions is displayed. As you can see, there are a lot of

options, but all you need for now is the first option Play.

3. Select Play from the Action list.



The play action is added, but the objects column indicates that the

sound associated with this action is missing and play.

This is where you need to indicate that you want to play the

Shotgun_Blast Sound SFX object that you created in the previous

exercise. You can add this by simply dragging it from the Project

Explorer to the first action in the action list.

Tip

To save a step you can drag an object to an empty line in an

action list and it will automatically add a Play action.

Youve now connected the Fire_Shotgun_Player Event to the

Shotgun_Blast SFX Object. Wwise lets you simulate what will happen

in the game by allowing you to play not just Sound SFX objects, but also

the events themselves. Playing the Fire_Shotgun_Player event should

trigger the shotgun blast sound. Before you can do this, you need to

make sure that the Fire_Shotgun_Player event is visible in the Transport

Control view.

4. Look at the title bar of the Transport Control view and verify that it says

Fire_Shotgun_Player. If it doesnt, click the Fire_Shotgun_Player event

in the Event Viewer.



5. In the Transport Control view, click the play button or press the

spacebar.

Bang! You should hear the shotgun blast, confirming that the

Fire_Shotgun_Player event is linked to the Shotgun_Blast sound you

imported earlier.

Integrating Sound Into the Game

While playing the shotgun sound in Wwise is getting you closer to your

goal, its not complete until you can play the game and hear the result of

your work. In many respects, this last step is like the process of bouncing a

playable mix of a music project, with the exception that there is a lot more

going on than simply generating a single audio file. This is where you get

to see the real benefits of the Wwise sound engine, as it essentially writes

the code necessary to apply your sound design to the game for you.



Adding an Event to a SoundBank

SoundBanks are the collection of both the code and the audio assets

used at the time the game is played, also known as run-time. Every game

created by Wwise has at least one SoundBank and, in larger more complex

games, there may be many SoundBanks. In this case, youll create a single

SoundBank and place it into the directory where the Cube game engine

expects to find it. In order to achieve this, youll use a different layout.

1. In the main menu, click Layouts > SoundBank or press F7.

In the upper right area of the screen you can see the SoundBank

Manager and, like other areas of Wwise, it contains a Default Work

Unit. Cube has been coded to look for a SoundBank called Main, so

youll need to create that within this default work unit.

2. Click New.



The New SoundBank dialog box opens.

3. In the Name field, type Main and click OK.

4. Click the [+] symbol to the left of Default Work Unit.



SoundBanks need to be populated with the events that you intend to

have as part of that Soundbank. Events can be assigned to a SoundBank

by simply dragging them to the desired SoundBank.

5. Drag the Fire_Shotgun_Player event from the Event Viewer to the Main

SoundBank in the SoundBank Manager.

In the lower right view, youll see the event you just added in the

SoundBank Editor.



Wwise can simultaneously generate SoundBanks for multiple languages

(if youve provided dialogue content and used Wwises localisation

features) and multiple game platforms simultaneously. This is a huge

time saver considering that different game platforms have different

ways in which audio code must be implemented. In essence, Wwise is

like having multiple codewriters that know the specifics of each game

platform working for you. Because of this, you need to specify which

language and game system you want to author SoundBanks for.

Because there are differences in the code written for Windows game as

opposed to a Mac game, Windows users will need to follow a slightly

different set of steps than those used on Macs. Choose the appropriate

version of this next exercise that applies to the system youre working

with. The Windows exercise is immediately following while Mac users

should jump ahead to the exercise called Generating a SoundBank

(Mac).

Generating a SoundBank (Windows)

Because multiple SoundBanks can be generated for a single game, you

must first select the SoundBanks that you want to be generated.

1. Make sure the Main SoundBank, Windows Platform and English (US)

language checkboxes are selected.



Next you must define the path indicating where the SoundBanks should

be placed within the games file structure. This information would

typically be given to you by the game programmers.

2. In the SoundBank Manager, click User Settings.

3. Select the Override Project SoundBank Paths option, and then click the

path selector button for Windows.



4. Navigate to your Wwise Lessons folder, and then proceed to CubeDemo\ cube\soundbanks,choose the Windows folder and clickSelect Folder.



The updated SoundBank path appears for the Windows platform.

You now need to generate your SoundBank. Generating a SoundBank

is the payoff of all of your work. Its much like bouncing a file in a

conventional digital audio workstation. The result is what gives you and

everyone else the ability to benefit from your work!

5. Click OK to close the SoundBanks Settings window then click Generate

in the SoundBank Manager.



The SoundBank Generation view is displayed. In this moment, the code

and all necessary files to implement your shotgun sound have been

generated.

6. Click Close.

Youll be generating a SoundBank at the end of Lessons 2 through 8. For

those lessons, the path to SoundBank folder will already be set, so youll

only need to make sure that you check the appropriate SoundBank,

platform and language checkboxes.

7. Skip the next exercise and jump ahead to the Play the Game exercise.

Generating a SoundBank (Mac)

Because multiple SoundBanks can be generated for a single game, you

must first select the SoundBanks that you want to be generated.

1. Make sure the Main SoundBank, Mac Platform and English (US)

language checkboxes are selected.



Next you must define the path indicating where the SoundBanks should

be placed within the games file structure. This information would

typically be given to you by the game programmers.

2. In the SoundBank Manager, click User Settings.

3. Select the Override Project SoundBank Paths option, and then click the

path selector button for Mac.



4. Navigate to your Wwise Lessons folder, and then proceed to CubeDemo/cube/soundbanks,select the Mac folder and click Choose.



The updated SoundBank path appears for the Mac platform.

You now need to generate your SoundBank. Generating a SoundBank

is the payoff of all of your work. Its much like bouncing a file in a

conventional digital audio workstation. The result is what gives you and

everyone else the ability to benefit from your work!

5. Click OK to close the SoundBanks Settings window then click Generate

in the SoundBank Manager.



The SoundBank Generation view is displayed. In this moment, the code

and all necessary files to implement your shotgun sound have been

generated.

6. Click Close.

Youll be generating a SoundBank at the end of Lessons 2 through 8.

For those lessons, the path to the SoundBank folder will already be

set, so youll only need to make sure that you check the appropriate

SoundBank, platform and language checkboxes.

Play the Game!

Now its time to see the result of your work in the actual game. To hear the

changes youve made, youll need to re-launch Cube, so you must first quit

the currently running game.

1. Return to Cube, press the Esc key and then use the arrow keys on your

keyboard to select quit, and press Enter.



2. Open Cube once again.

This time the game will open with the SoundBank you just generated.



3. Click to fire the shotgun.

You now hear the shotgun sound you implemented using Wwise!


Lesson 3. Designing a Soundscape

Table of Contents

Adding Sounds to a Project ..................................................................... 78

Using a Single Sound For Multiple Applications ..................................... 85

Changing Object Parameters ................................................................... 87

Using the Source Editor .......................................................................... 90

Applying Multiple Actions to a Single Event ........................................... 91

Using Randomization .............................................................................. 95

Granulate Your Sounds ......................................................................... 104

Verifying Your Work .............................................................................. 121



Now that youve attached a blast sound to the animation of your character

firing a shotgun, youll now look at other parts of the visual sequence that

accompanies the sound and think about what else you can do to enhance

that experience. As you work through the steps that need to be done,

youll also be looking at how to do as much as possible with as little as

possible, for this is what defines a game audio designer's worth. This is

because while modern game console systems have incredible power, that

power is shared with systems that support graphics, physics, and artificial

intelligence. Also consider that many games are played on mobile devices

where system resources arent as vast. Depending on the games technical

restraints, audio may be given a small budget with regards to memory

and processor usage. Because of this, an audio game developer makes

their mark by learning how to fuse great sound and creativity within the

technical limitations provided. In many cases, its the designer's creativity

that provides unique and interesting solutions for working within technical

constraints. Fortunately, Wwise provides a vast set of tools specifically

designed to help you rise to this kind of challenge.

Adding Sounds to a Project

For this lesson youll start by using a pre-saved project file that already

has the shotgun blast sound effect you used in the last lesson already

integrated.

1. Launch Wwise and click Open Other at the bottom of the window of

the Project Launcher.

2. Navigate to your WwiseProjects > Lesson 3 folder.



A Wwise project is not a singular file, but instead a specific structure of

many different folders and the files contained within. In most cases, you

wont need to directly work with the content inside these folders as the

necessary items will automatically be created and updated as you build a

project. Projects are launched from a Wwise Project file which is located

on the same level as these folders.

3. Select the Lesson 3 project file found within the Lesson 3 folder and

click Open.

4. In the Actor-Mixer Hierarchy, expand the Default Work Unit to reveal

the Shotgun_Blast Sound SFX object you created in the last lesson.



Instead of first creating the Sound SFX object and then adding a sound

to it, youll take a different approach by simply importing the audio

files to the desired work unit, and let Wwise automatically create the

necessary Sound SFX objects.

5. In the Actor-Mixer Hierarchy, select the Default Work Unit.



Note

You may see that the Shotgun Blast Sound SFX object appears

in blue instead of white. Blue indicates that the audio file being

referenced is the original imported file, while white designates

that the file has been converted. Unless the object appears in

redindicating a file is missing, the color difference does not

change the operation of the exercises used throughout this

tutorial. If you prefer, you can convert all of the audio files in

your project at any time by going to the main menu bar and

choosing Project > Convert All Audio Files. Youll learn more

about conversion settings in Lesson 8.

6. In the main menu, choose Project > Import Audio Files or press Shift

+I.

Tip

Using key commands for things you do on a regular basis will

make you much more efficient as you work. Wwise displays

key commands for features found in the menus, so you should

take the time to learn them.

7. In the Audio File Importer, click Add Files.



An Explorer window opens where you can navigate to the file that you

want to import.

8. Navigate to your Lesson 3 folder in WwiseProjects. Open the Audio files

for Lesson 3 folder, choose Shotgun_Pump and click Open.



The Audio File Importer window displays the current location. Youll

also see an Object Type/Action pull down menu indicating that the

imported file will automatically have a Sound SFX object created to

contain it.

9. Click Import.

The Shotgun_Pump Sound SFX object is displayed within the Actor-

Mixer Hierarchys Default Work Unit.

10.Click the Shotgun_Pump SFX object to view the Sound Property Editor

with the parameters for the newly created object.



In the Contents Editor (under the Sound Property Editor), the

Shotgun_Pump.wav file is shown as the source that feeds the

Shotgun_Pump Sound SFX object.

11.To listen to your newly imported audio file, make sure that the

Shotgun_Pump Sound SFX object is selected in the Project Explorer

and then click the Play button in the Transport Control View, or press

the spacebar.

You hear a single mechanical click of a shotgun being pumped.



Using a Single Sound For Multiple Applications

You may have noticed that when you watch the animation sequence of the

player shooting the shotgun that there are actually two phases to pumping

the shotgun. First, the character pumps the shotgun inward, which on a

real shotgun ejects the empty shell and then pushes the pump forward

which loads the next round into the chamber. Each of these movements

makes a mechanical clicking noise; however, the audio file that you just

imported does not contain two clicks.

You could load a single recording of two pumps that is pre-timed to

match the animation sequence, but that makes the audio file longer and

therefore takes more memory when loaded into the game. Remember

that preserving memory resources is something that you should always

seek to achieve, so this might not be a good strategy. Its also common

that the timing of animation sequences may change as the games

development progresses, so youll take a different approach and use this

single mechanical click for both the pump in and pump out sounds, using

less memory and providing more timing flexibility. While youll be using

the same sound file, youre going to use two separate Sound SFX objects,

one for pump in and on for pump out.

1. Right-click the Shotgun_Pump Sound SFX object and choose Copy.

You now need to create a copy of the object within the same work unit.

2. Within the Actor-Mixer Hierarchy, right-click the Default Work Unit

and choose Paste.



Wwise creates a duplicate of the Sound SFX object but adds an _01

extension.

One of these Shotgun_Pump objects will serve to create the pump in

sound, while the other will be the pump out so its best to name them as

such.

3. Click the Shotgun_Pump object, pause, and click again to rename it to

Shotgun_Pump_In, and then press Return.

Tip

You can also rename an object by pressing the F2 key, right-

clicking and choosing Rename or by directly entering into the

Name field within the Property Editor.

4. Rename the Shotgun_Pump_01 object to Shotgun_Pump_Out.



The Shotgun_Pump_Out object is now selected, so you can see that this

object that you copied is referencing the same Shotgun_Pump .wavfile.

Changing Object Parameters

While both of the Shotgun_Pump objects indicate they are referencing a

file with the same name, this does not mean that the Shotgun_Pump.wav

audio file was duplicated. It means that the same audio file is being

referenced by two different sound objects, which does not double the

amount of memory necessary to play these objects. Its similar to the

idea of a Digital Audio Workstation where a single audio file may be

placed on multiple tracks to be edited and processed in different ways.

In the same way, youll now make modifications to the parameters of

Shotgun_Pump_Out object to differentiate it from the pump in.

1. Verify that the Shotgun_Pump_Out object is selected and if not, select

it.



The Sound SFX Property Editor view to the right displays settings that

affect how the audio file contained within the selected object will play.

There are numerous parameters available that you will explore later in

this lesson as well as throughout this tutorial, but one very important

parameter in game audio is pitch. Youll find the pitch parameter

displayed just below the volume fader. This is very convenient for

the game audio designer because usually in audio production tools,

the pitch control is not prominently displayed even though you use

it regularly. This is especially the case in game audio where pitch

adjustment is constantly used, oftentimes to create the illusion of

having an abundance of different sounds using only a single sound

played at varying pitches. This strategy preserves precious memory.

Youll use this approach to differentiate the pump in and pump out

sounds.

The pitch parameter value is expressed in musical cents. On a piano,

there is 100 cents of pitch change between any two keys that are side by

side, whether theyre black or white keys. The pitch parameter default

value is 0, meaning that the audio associated with the object will play

back at its original pitch.

To adjust the pitch value, theres a small black dot below the pitch

property that when clicked brings up a slider.

2. Click and hold the slider head (black point) just below the current pitch

value.



You can now adjust the slider to the left or right to adjust the playback

pitch. Start by adjusting the value to 1200, which is a musical octave.

3. Press spacebar to hear the change.

The Shotgun_Pump audio file plays an octave higher, resulting in a

sound that plays twice as high and twice as fast. This is obviously too

much, so now set the value to something thats a little more believable.

This time youll directly enter a value.

4. Click the current value, type 200 and press Return.

5. Play the object once more to hear the change.

Now you have a pump out thats a bit more believable and slightly

different from the pump in.



Using the Source Editor

Although the pump out sound is playing at a slightly higher pitch, its

still identical in every other way. While its a short sound, theres still a

rhythmic pulse created by the pump mechanisms mechanical action.

People tend to notice these subtle cues, so you can give the pump out its

own distinct feel by slightly altering where the sound starts playing from.

This is accomplished using the Source Editor.

1. Make sure the Shotgun_Pump_Out SFX object is still selected and

then in the Contents Editor, double-click the audio source icon for the

Shotgun_Pump audio file.

The Source Editor opens.



The Source Editor provides a way to look at details related to the source

audio generator. Wwise provides several methods of generating sound

including tone generators and the specialized SoundSeed synthesizers.

Clicking the Source Editor when these tools are being used displays the

interface for these particular generators. In this case, since the source

audio generator is an audio file, a waveform view of the audio signal is

shown. This display also serves as a simple waveform editor, which lets

you adjust where playback starts and ends.

For the pump out, youre going to start playback at a later time in the

audio file. You can easily do this by dragging the Trim Start control

to the position that you want playback to start from. By reading the

waveform, you can see where the rhythmic pulses of the mechanical

noise are. Ideally, you want to begin playback just before one of these

sections.

2. Drag the Trim Start control about a fourth of the way into the

waveform, just before one of the peaks in the waveform.

This change to the start position only occurs when the audio file is

played from the Shotgun_Pump_Out sound object and doesnt change

the way you heard the Shotgun_Pump_In object. In summary, the

Sound SFX object may use the same source audio file, but each can have

a unique start time, providing differentiation between the objects.

3. Play the Shotgun_Pump_Out object to hear the difference, then close

the Source Editor window.

Applying Multiple Actions to a Single Event

Now that youve set up the pump sounds, you need to get them to play

at the right time. Visually, when the player fires the shotgun, you see

the blast, followed by a pump-in and finally the pump-out action. You

could ask the game engine programmer to provide separate pump-in and

pump-out game calls so you could then create corresponding events as



you did with the original Fire_Shotgun_Player event used for the shotgun

blast. Or, you could look to see if theres a way to achieve what you need

without programmer interaction, because this saves precious time for

both you and the programmer. Since the shotgun blast and the pumps are

all part of the same visual animation and that animation never changes,

the timing between the blast and the pump-in and pump-out visuals

are predictable. You already have the Fire_Shotgun_Player event for the

shotgun blast, so you simply need to trigger the pump sounds to happen

at a pre-determined time after that event. This can be accomplished by

delaying the Play actions.

1. In the Event Viewer, select the Fire_Shotgun_Player event.

You can see in the Event Editor the Play Shotgun_Blast action you

configured in the last lesson. Theres no practical limit to how many

actions can be carried out for a single event, so youll simply add the

Shotgun_Pump objects into the action list. This time, however, instead

of first creating a Play action and then adding the object to be played,

youll simply drag the objects from the Project Explorer into the action

list. To do this you need to select both of the Shotgun_Pump objects.

2. Press and hold the Shift key and select the Shotgun_Pump_In and

Shotgun_Pump_Out objects.



Note

If you dont hold down shift first, the moment you click on one

of the Shotgun_Pump objects, the Event Editor will change to

the Property Editor and you wont be able to complete the next

steps.

3. Drag either of the selected objects to the action list in the Event Editor.

The objects are now added to the Event Editor below the Shotgun_Bast.

While these actions are listed in numerical order, its important to know

that these act

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