Metal Squeaks

Today I recorded this incredible little contraption for some metal squeaks.

It was given to my wife for Xmas for her to hang jewelry from, who knows where her aunt found it. As soon as I layed my hands on it, I knew we would need to have a session together.

I don't know yet if this could end up being a new SFX library that I would put on sale through JordanFehrFX or not, there is a lot of material to go through.

Here is just a short clip of one take of a slower spin, and then it slowed down to 50% and 25% (recording at 96k originally).


Note, this is an mp3 for ease of upload to soundcloud.

Gamasutra's Top 10 Indie Games of the Year

Jamestown clocks in at # 8 and The Binding of Isaac grabs spot # 2

10. Atom Zombie Smasher (Blendo Games) [Windows/Mac/Linux, paid]

9. Dig-N-Rig (DigiPen) [Windows, freeware]

8. Jamestown: Legend of the Lost Colony (Final Form Games) [Windows/Mac/Linux, paid]

7. Bastion (Supergiant Games) [Windows/Xbox Live, paid]

6. Dungeons of Dredmor (Gaslamp Games) [Windows/Mac/Linux, paid]

5. Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP (Superbrothers, Capybara Games) [iOS, paid]

4. Frozen Synapse (Mode 7) [Windows/Mac/Linux (iPad soon), paid]

3. Terraria ( Re-Logic) [Windows, paid]

2. The Binding of Isaac (Edmund McMillen and Florian Himsl) [Windows/Mac/Linux, paid]

1. SpaceChem (Zachtronics Industries) [Windows/Mac/Linux/iPad, paid]

End of the year lists.

It has begun. I have worked on quite a few games this year, most, if not all of them independent developers, and so in the past you would not expect these lists to have anything to do with me. This is hardly the case anymore. Last year saw a huge number of great indie games make the cut on some mainstream lists, and this year is already proving to be no different, especially for the absolutely wonderful "Bastion". Every person who worked on that game is a fabulous human being, and it was a pleasure to be next to them at PAX '10 with Super Meat Boy.

The Binding of Isaac is up for several awards so far, but this is the first top-whatever list I have spotted it on, taking # 10 in PASTE magazine's top 20 of the year.

Binding of Isaac is up for 2011 VGA award

Best Independent Game

Bastion
Minecraft
Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP
The Binding of Isaac

http://www.spike.com/events/video-game-awards-2011-nominees/voting/best-independent-game

DLC reveal #3 - Robert Catesby - The Sword (Ghost)

Robert Catesby - The Sword (Ghost)

http://www.finalformgames.com/jamestown/treason/

DLC reveal #2 - Guy Fawkes- The Seeker!

http://www.finalformgames.com/jamestown/treason/

Jamestown DLC Announcement - Gunpowder, Treason & Plot.

We will be rolling out information over the next few days. But the coming out party, and first details are today!


http://www.finalformgames.com/jamestown/treason/

I present a new ship, The Gunpowder:

Remember remember...

"Remember, remember
The fifth of November
The gunpowder treason and plot.
I know of no reason
Why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot."

Wooden Wick Candle

My wife got this candle with a wide wooden wick in it (say that three times fast!). I can't really have it on while I am working because it is so loud so I decided to record it quickly this morning with my Zoom for everyone to enjoy. It could be used to sweeten all sorts of small fire effects, a cigarette intake, or even spice up a vinyl effect with all the little crackles. One day I will get a better mic on it in a quieter place, the RX2 took some of the meat out of it, but I wanted to make it useful for people so I had to clean it up a little. Enjoy, you can download the file from soundcloud.

Candle, Fire, Crackle, Wood, Wick, Cigarette, Pops by JFehr

The Binding of Isaac release day!

Binding of Isaac comes out today on Steam for PC and Mac. It is only 5$ (cheap!) and we hope everyone enjoys it. The game started off as a prototype Edmund McMillen was working on to take a break after Super Meat Boy and toss around some ideas he had for Team Meat's next game. He realized he had something and hooked up with former colleague Florian Himsl to start making Isaac. Through out its few months of development the game got much bigger than anyone intended because adding more content was what really made it shine. The game is short and hard, and meant to be played over and over and over again. The more you play, the more content gets unlocked and added to the random pools of loot, and bosses. The dungeon is randomly generated every time you play, and two playthroughs are never the same.

I was lucky enough to get my good friend Michelle to do the voiceover for Isaac's Mom, which came out perfectly and is terrifying. She is a wonderful actress here in Columbus and and fellow company member of Available Light Theatre with me.

The sound design is mostly organic and a good deal of it is pretty gross. I have to keep pace with Edmund's crazy art. The game's scale kind of ballooned past it's budget in terms of content and assets, and I do wish I had a little more time and resources for the sound design, but I am pretty happy with the results. The monster vocalizations were fun to make with demon processing chains, and as I said I am very proud of the voice of Isaac's mom (you can catch at glimpse at the end of the launch trailer). DannyB provided the music and, as always, gave Edmund exactly what he wanted and more.

BUY THE SOUNDTRACK HERE: http://www.BindingIsaacMusic.com

The game is really fun to play, and Edmund learned a good deal about this type of design. Check out his series of blogs about the game design over here:  http://edmundmcmillen.blogspot.com/

Fall Projects/ Where you can find me

I have been designing sound effects for 3 phenomenal independent games, and you should check them all out when they release. 

• Desktop Dungeons - QCF Design
• Currently in live beta for those who pre-order. Play it now!

• The Binding of Isaac - Edmund McMillen & Florian Himsl 

• Wind-up Knight - Robot Invader 
• coming soon to iOS/Android mobile devices including the Xperia Play!

Desktop Dungeons!

Yes, indeed I am working on the award winning rouge-like from QCF Design. Already the winner of best design at IGF2011 when only in alpha, the game is getting an entire overhaul. It is being rebuilt in Unity with new art, new sound, new music, new code. Get ready!

http://www.desktopdungeons.net/

Going deeper in UDK

So my wedding is in a couple weeks, and I am between contracts, so I am taking some day-time when I am not getting wedding things done to really try to learn more tricks with audio in UDK. I picked up the GameAudioTutorial which when used properly is an exquisite tool for learning Unreal 3, and some great concepts about optimization that can be applied to any middleware. The combination of the book, the UDK exercises and master level, and the videos and PDFs makes for a comprehensive class you can take at your own pace.

I want to also plug, for anyone else diving into this, another blog by Graham Gatheral  who has done some great UDK explorations on his own, and blogged quite a bit about the process of creating what you see in the videos on his portfolio.

If I have anything worth talking about I will perhaps post about it, for now I am just trying to create my own sandboxes and figure some of the more complex kismet things out, while I follow the GAT chapters.

couple of useful tidbits for the console when you play-test your levels:
stat audio
stat soundwaves

New Blog

Greetings folks. It was time to kill my old blog yet again, and align something new and clean to go alongside my professional site. Sometimes cleaning house is a good thing. You can expect posts about sound design, posts about video games, announcements about work I am attached to, or new SFX libraries that are going on sale over at JordanFehrFX.

I think this new clean look is classy-er-er.