21 Game

21 Game

The rules for 21 is:

- The person(s) who has 21 or is the closest to wins

- If you exceed 21 you are bust and lost 

- The Jack, Queen and King cards all value at 10 points

- The Ace cards can either be 1 or 11

- if a players first 2 cards are either a Jack, Queen or King and an Ace, they automatically win

- if a player using 11 points from an Ace exceeds 21, they will not go bust until they exceed 21 again using 1 point for the Ace.

Mathematics:

The player who gets the first card has a 4/52 (1/13) chance of getting the card they want, and the more the cards get handed out the higher of a chance you will get a card you want, unless it has been handed out.

I will make sure that when the AI gets to 11 points with will be a randomised decision whether to twist or stick, and the higher the AI's points get over 11 the less chance it will to twist. e.g. if the AI had a total of 19 points the probability of it sticking would be 8/10.

Unit 73 sound for computer games

BTEC Level 3 in Games Design

Unit 73 – Sound for computer games

Task 1a

Gustavo Santaolalla - Main Theme (The Last of Us Soundtrack)

In my opinion the song starts off a little eerie with the slow pace and long chords, but not soon after the song turns more into a spaghetti western. The song gives a sense of a lonely journey that has worse to come. The song was most likely recorded in a studio individually, and pieced together using a multi-tracking recording device or software. This song was originally made in 1993 and has been re-vamped for this game.

Little Big Planet 3 Soundtrack - Dead Heat

In my opinion when I listen to this song I get a Ratchet & Clank vibe. The start of the track creates an eerie suspense sort of feel and it has long trumpet notes and long breaks adding the suspense, but when the song kicks in it becomes more pumped up. It gives you more confidence to run around because if you are playing a game with eerie music you are more wary about what’s going to happen, but if you have a song that pumps you up, you are less cautious about what is going to happen and more interested in getting through the level. In my opinion I think this song has been made on a music creating software such as garage band on Apple Macs.

Task 1b

Gustavo Santaolalla - Main Theme (The Last of Us Soundtrack)

The song is most likely uncompressed, with a large bit depth, possibly a 32 bit depth. For the computers that they use to be able to create music that high of a quality, they would need a lot of RAM, most likely 32 GB or 64 GB.

The audio output is most likely to be surround sound due to the high quality of sound in the game.

“He used various instruments to compose the score, including some that he was unfamiliar with, giving a sense of danger and innocence.^”

-         http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_of_Us#cite_note-Grounded-25

Gustavo was contacted in early development for the game to create the main theme music and other pieces. In the quote above it says that he used instruments that he was unfamiliar with, so therefore it was most likely recording using a musical instrument digital interface.

HCI

HCI

HCI - the study, planning, design and use of the interfaces between people and computers.

- Controller

- Mouse and Keyboard

- Touch

- Joystick

Not all games solely exist on one platform. e.g. MineCraft originally was on PC but is now on Phones/Tablets and PS/XBOX. The difference for the player is they were used to playing with a controller and then  started playing PC, the player would find it significantly harder as they would not know the PC controls as well as they do the controller.

PS/XBOX - PC

PS/XBOX and PC share a lot of games such as Call of Duty, i have played all 3 games on both consoles and in my opinion there is no difference between the platforms.

































PC - Phone

the only game that I know of that is on PC and Phones is Minecraft, there are a few differences between the platforms, on PC you can mod the game, change your character skin and change the texture. another major difference between the 2 is that the Minecraft PE (Pocket Edition) has a limited world, the world is restricted to 256x256 blocks

Unit 73 File Formats

Unit 73

File formats

Uncompressed:

WAV – waveform audio file. It is a Microsoft and IBM audio format. A WAV format is used on Windows systems for uncompressed audio.

AIFF – Audio Interchange File Format. AIFF is used for storing sound data for PCs. It can also stream multiple audio files

RIFF – Resource Interchange File Format. A generic file container format used for storing data in tagged chunks. RIFF is the same as WAV but it’s an older version, low quality audio.

AU – a simple audio file format presented by Sun Microsystems. It was used mostly on NeXT systems and early web pages.

SMP – SmartMusic Performance. Used in SmartMusic, it is a music practice application for a band, orchestra and voice.

Lossy Compression

MP3 – an audio coding format for digital audio which uses lossy data compression. MP3 file are most used for just audio just as a song or voice.

RA – a propriety audio format made by Real Networks. It was used for streaming audio by the BBC

Audio Sampling:

Resolution and bit-depth can constrain file size by the amount you use

E.g. if you look at the 2 pictures above you will see on the first one that the resolution is 72, the bit-depth is 8 and the image/file size is 452.2K. The second one is a blank A4 template, the resolution is 40, the bit depth is 32 and the image/file size is 1.77M. The further you lower the bit-depth and resolution the lower the file size will be.

Sample Rate – the number of samples of audio that are carried each second.

Mono – this means alone, so a song with a guitar solo is Mono

Stereo – Sound that is forced through 2 or more speakers so that it becomes surround sound.

Surround sound - Surround sound a realistic effect that makes you able to hear where sound is coming from. E.g. if you have headphones in playing a game and there’s an enemy to your right, you will be able to hear their footsteps through your right headphone.  

Unit 73 Exercise 3

Unit 73

Sound for Computer Games

Exercise 3

https://machinimasound.com/

https://soundcloud.com/

https://www.freesound.org/

http://audiojungle.net/

 

Kingdom Hearts 2

The mood of the music in this game is calming, they have slow rhythms until you get into battle, then the music changes to the complete opposite, it turns to an upbeat fast paced piece of music. Boss battle music is different to ordinary battle music, the boss battle music is still upbeat but it’s a bit darker and more ominous.

InFAMOUS: First Light

The mood of music in this game is upbeat when you’re just running around, but when you get into battle the music turns slightly ominous. I believe that when in battle in this game the music adds suspense.

Battlefield 4

In my opinion Battlefield 4 has the best music for a game I have played, as the music slowly builds up you get more and more into the game, but when you get into gun battle the music total changes the battle to a full out war.

 

The legal considerations when using Music/FX are that you need to make sure that it is not copyrighted because if it is, it may become a legal matter where you end up being sued.

“The UK copyright law fact sheet outlines the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, the principal legislation covering intellectual property rights in the United Kingdom and the work to which it applies.”
http://www.copyrightservice.co.uk/copyright/p01_uk_copyright_law

Unit 73 Exercise 1 & 2

Unit 73: Sound for Computer Games

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDmZo4vEsBo

Advanced Warfare (Jack Trammell – Compelled)

The game maker has used this music because it builds suspense and you do not know when the song will kick in fully. The music did work because as it is a military shooter game, it’s always full of suspense and the music adds more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG1pRNQAByI

Kingdom Hearts 2 (Dearly Beloved)

I believe the game maker has used this piece of music because it fits in with the game play and sets the mood for the game. I would not choose any other music for the game because this ne fits perfectly

Music and sound FX is one of the most important aspects of a game, without the music personally I would find it hard to keep an interest in the game.

A wave form is a curve showing the shape of a wave at a given time

 A Foley is a concern about an addition of a recorded sound effect, the concern can be anything from not liking the sound of it to thinking it doesn’t fit.

Timbre is the quality of a musical sound or voice as distinct from its pitch and intensity.

    

   Part 2:  

When you are playing the campaign mode on call of duty, the only times in game when you hear music is when something is about to go down, such as someone getting shot, breaking into somewhere or just in a gun battle. The game has been made so that as soon as you get into gun battles it will start to play music to add suspense.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyi-xmdCG1s

The sound designer/engineer may have used this music to add suspense and to put life into the game, because a game without music would be boring, it’s the music that pumps you up to play the game. One thing I have noticed is that the whole game is able to use.

YouTube link for Wanye's Assignment

http://youtu.be/bFxHLwWqgD0