soundgarden

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Post mortem 💀

I still don’t like this term to talk about a finished project. First of all, Soundgarden is not fully finished yet - and even if it was, the result is not something dead but rather something that is very much alive. The way I see it, developing a project does seem to present some parallels to birthing: It may take a long time, it may be painful, but the result is (hopefully) something new, alive, breathing. So I would prefer an alternative term that incorporates that idea. Post natalis would be the closest to my idea. However, post partum sounds more in the vein of post mortem and is actually a commonly used term in the context of birth, even if it may carry a slightly more negative connotation: Postpartum depression, the type of depression that happens after having a baby. But then again, the feeling of emptiness, of falling into a hole when finishing a project or meeting an anticipated deadline may not actually be unfamiliar to some. Also, deadline… another one of these death-themed terms… For now, let’s not get caught up in semiotics too much, but perhaps the “undeadening” of design and project management terminology might be something to think about in more depth in the future.

Post partum 👶

As already mentioned, Soundgarden is not fully finished yet, however, it has reached a state where all the essential elements are there and working. Moving on, I would like to leave the project at its current state open to be studied, examined, dissected, with all development resources up to this point being available for anyone to access. I also plan to develop this into a more polished version, where I will further explore and develop some ideas that are already implied in the existing project, finish the remaining empty areas on the sound-led island and lagoon, and perhaps fill in the gaps in between everything else, in addition to technical improvements and overall polish as well as a (cheap) commercial release on online platforms such as Steam. Perhaps “professionalization” would be the appropriate term here? Looks like the baby will be growing up over the next foreseeable period of time. But between the last journal entry (back in February!) and the baby’s first steps that will follow, let’s shed a light on what has actually happened - a small, or maybe not so small interlude.

The interlude 🎶

A lot has happened in a relatively short time, triggered by the fact that I had been busy with another project but then Soundgarden was about to be presented at Ludodrome, an experimental video games exhibition that took place on May 15. Many additions emerged in the three weeks leading up to it. In that time, there were only two (large) commits, even though the changes, big and small, were countless - I was certainly playing a risky game here, but I was also deep in the flow of adding new things, fixing, finishing, polishing. The accompanying commit messages don’t really exude a reflective mind, being merely lists of “new stuff”. Still, I wouldn’t say that this period was completely devoid of reflection - but let’s say, reflection happened more between the lines here… So while perhaps this period of rapid additions and improvements may not have been the most reflection-driven, I realized that sometimes being in the flow of development can be liberating - if used in moderation. Looking back, this phase was like opening a valve, releasing all the ideas that had accumulated in the back of my head (and the project board) over time, while I was busy working on other things. So maybe this was not a period where reflection was absent, but rather that the reflection had happened ahead of this phase - via past rumination and ideation, as can be (partially) witnessed in the previous journal entries and commit messages. Perhaps sometimes it can be healthy to not interrupt “the process” once in a while - spontaneity may also facilitate experimentation in the moment and a closeness to one’s inner world, that - while more raw at times - may facilitate a big leap forward, just like these weeks of rapid additions. Still, I wonder if the fact that I re-introduced an agile-style board with high-level task titles had also something to do with the fact that I was journaling less and writing more simple commit messages. The tasks provided a thread to stick to, even though I feel like in the rush of preparing Soundgarden for the exhibition, I might also have just been working from what had already been floating in my head. Most likely, it’s a bit of everything - still, I need to treat the task board with caution, to not risk falling into old patterns. But then again, I’m not - otherwise I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this journal entry. But let’s move from the vague into the concrete and look at the content I had not described previously, as well as what I have added more recently.

Added brushing 🪥

To further build on the idea of embodiment, I have added a system that simulates the player’s body brushing against surfaces. It does so by fading in a noise. When the player passes closely along walls or other objects on their side, the noise gets louder based on the players movement speed. To gain inspiration for the system’s functionality, I brushed my real shoulders and hands along surfaces. For lack of fitting audio samples and the means (or rather time) to record them, I just used synthesized white noise, with some frequencies filtered out, that is then played back from audio sources placed to the left and right of the player rig. I’m actually surprised how well this simple approach is close to real-life brushing things. I had also hoped that this might make it easier to navigate the dark tunnel, since players would be able to “hear” walls being on the left or right of them, however, the existing wind sounds do seem to mask this. I should still consider simplifying the dark tunnel gameplay by adding clearer auditive c(l)ues, but this is a topic for the future (and yes, there is a future! But more on that later…). Further, I can imagine enhancing the brushing mechanic by adding light controller vibration, although this would only be most effective if we had means to differentiate between vibration coming from the left or right. And this feature is not available in most gamepads, to my knowledge. Still, I should check what’s possible here. The PS5 DualSense controller might be able to do something like that. Note to self: Get one of those.

Lagoon 🌊

In lieu of adding a third island, as mentioned in the past, I had decided to make a lagoon that would connect the two existing islands, filling the oceanic gap in between them - and removing the teleport that was meant as a tentative solution anyway. After gathering some inspiration by looking at pictures and videos of real-life lagoons, I sculpted wavy lines of sand that connected the two islands. I then applied the same process I used for the two islands, tracing these lines of sand by copying, pasting, rotating, and scaling of one and the same 3d model of rock along them, to give it more structure and improve the visual look. Very happy how this turned out! I also like the idea of the lagoon because it provides a good excuse of featuring various ocean sounds more prominently, so that the player can hear all this beautiful splishing and splashing all around! (INCLUDE LAGOON PICTURE HERE)

Night sky 💫

I have reworked the day-night cycle, fixing the previously stuttering sun - something I’m not sure I have mentioned before, but yes, the sun was stuttering and now it isn’t anymore - and I have also added a starry and colorful night sky, along with a moon. Beyond its aesthetic value, the reason for adding an illuminated night sky and moonlight was to create a reasonable origin for an additional light source during the otherwise pitch black night, which in turn allowed to diegetically avoid complete darkness that made it otherwise difficult to navigate the environment of Soundgarden at night, without having to add countless light sources all over the environment.

Reworked interaction system 👆

While on the surface it may not seem much different from before, I’ve reimplemented the interaction system that allows the player to pick up rocks and press the buttons in the Odd One Out gameplay area. I have actually transferred this new and more versatile system (one unified system for all interactions) from another project I had been working on at the time - and now I’m happy to have something I can consistently and reliably use across all my projects. Something that also seems bug-free, compared to what I had implemented before. This is also demonstrative of my increased (and still increasing) proficiency with Unreal Engine. With the new system, it’s now much easier and quicker to add more interactions in the future, including the one I will describe next.

Sea Organ 🐚

Inspired by the sea organ in Zadar, Croatia, I’ve created an object that is more akin to a sound installation, albeit in virtual form, located in the lagoon area. This object, at least at the time of writing, might pose one of the visually more distinct objects in Soundgarden’s environment, clearly removed from the otherwise natural look of most other elements in its environment. A white, concrete-looking object that emanates layers of sine waves that provide an auditive interplay with the surrounding ocean. Designed to melodically mirror and interact with the sounds of the waves. For comparison, here is a video of what inspired this object:

I think if I had more time on my hands, I would’ve worked out a more complex sound setup, to create something that would sound closer to what can be heard in the video - I like the more “organic” (no pun intended) sound of the Zadar sea organ. Perhaps I can think of something more elaborate in the future. To keep with the “influencing sound” focus of the lagoon, and differentiating my sea organ from its source of inspiration, the player can press one of a set of buttons to change the tonality of the emerging sines, ranging from more harmonic to atonal outcomes, where the pitch of each resulting sine wave will be chosen from the selected predefined scale, originating from a different position across the installation. Pitches are derived from various 12-tone scales - however, as I am writing this, I wonder if I should also introduce at least one microtonal mode here…

Musical marbles ⚽

I had been imagining this idea of large glowing marbles for a long time. Perhaps I just like the glassy look, and the idea of how they would refract the light passing through. Reflecting on this now, perhaps another reason I went with marbles is how they suggest a sense of playfulness: Marbles are meant to be rolled around, pushed, clashed against each other, so their look would invite players to do exactly that. The player can interact with the three marbles by bumping against them, rolling them around. The marbles are located in a pitch in the middle of the lagoon, its walls dampening the sounds of the surrounding water, to allow them to be fully heard. The speed at which the marbles move affect the ensuing pitch. I designed the underlying sound generation such that if the marbles clash with each other or with the boundaries of the play area, the height of the notes they play will wobble, creating an initially fast vibrato, that quickly slows down, musically mirroring the sound that one would hear when clashing marbles with each other. Writing this, I wonder, if the clashing sound should differ, depending on whether the marbles hit each other, or the play area walls.

Fading walls ✨

In the vein of improving the introduction phase in the beginning of Soundgarden and giving a stronger visual feedback that also happens to look more visually appealing, I’ve developed a shader that fades away the rock barriers in a flash of light, resulting in an (at least for me) impressive visual play. This also helps to more effectively direct the player’s attention towards the new paths that open up in the tutorial phase of the game, especially when unlocking the barrier leading around the rim of the first island when the player is on the hill outlook. I have also reused this fading effect in the area featuring the Odd One Out listening puzzle. What I find personally interesting is that while I was developing this effect, I had the Ludodrome exhibition in mind, thinking that a nice effect like that may draw the attention of exhibition visitors to the game. This made me think about how different presentation contexts for a project can inform decisions that have an impact on the overall experience.

Et cetera 🔣

Things I would still like to do and haven’t mentioned yet:

• VR support: It would be nice to actually stand on the islands and experience the lagoon from a true first person perspective. I’m also sure this would make for an even more encompassing sound impression and would be more interesting from an embodiment perspective.
• More sophisticated music: I would like to use the insights I have gathered from my electroacoustic explorations over the past months, as well as from the many virtual modular generative sound systems I’ve built to improve the generative music in Soundgarden that is featured on the ecological island, including dynamic changes of tonality, more variations in timbre, and percussive sounds that integrate better with the overall soundscape and music.
• I still need to finish the northern part of the sound-led island. For the exhibition version, I had closed it off but I would still like to add another sound-led mechanic here. In fall of last year, I had prototyped a rhythm mechanic, where the player would move across floating platforms to one or multiple (synchronized) rhythms, however, I had not implemented that because I was looking for a way to do that in a way that integrated well with the given visual aesthetic of Soundgarden - and because I’m not sure if I’d want to implement gameplay that has been sufficiently explored across many existing rhythm games. Perhaps, I will need to think of something new here, inspired by one of the many sound exercises described by R. Murray Schafer, Pauline Oliveros’ concept of Deep Listening, and looking at various (ethno-)musicological studies and musicking practices. These insights will also be helpful - and likely necessary - once I start thinking about a third sound interaction to be added in the lagoon area.

Learnings 🤓

So, what have I learned in the 1+ year of (on and off) working on Soundgarden? First off, Soundgarden was what finally pushed me over to learn Unreal, or rather, to use it productively and learn working with its various aspects over time. I now know various ways of implementing (real-time) audio with the engine: I’ve deepened my understanding of MetaSounds by transferring my knowledge of modular audio systems and electroacoustic approaches, learning how to implement real-time generative music and dynamic sound for all aspects of the game. I’ve both implemented sound in more traditional ways by placing static sound sources around the game environment, and developed, as well as implemented my own approaches for dynamic sound sources that would react to changes in the environment, such as time of day, or world geometry and the player’s relation to it - for example the sound of the ocean moving around the islands, to be positioned closest to the player to give the impression of the ocean sound being present all around, while avoiding placement of many individual sound sources.

Small side note on moving audio sources and multiplayer: If I ever develop a multiplayer game, I should remember to adapt this “moving sound source” approach so that it happens individually for each player. Even if I have never developed a first person multiplayer game before, just putting this here so this thought will one day magically appear in the back of my head when it will be necessary.

I still need to learn how to apply audio effects like reverberation in Unreal, including making it dynamic and adapt to its immediate environment, to match its sonic features with the world geometry at any given point, i.e., larger closed spaces producing longer reverberation, smaller spaces, producing shorter reverberation - something to keep in mind for the Steam version. I also would like to implement support for more immersive sound setups, including surround sound and Dolby Atmos - it would be nice to hear the parrots’ cries actually coming from above you as you walk on the beach below. I have learned how to implement all necessary game logic using UE’s blueprint system, and how to develop my own modules in C++, to enhance engine functionality, especially when its more convenient than using visual programming. In that vein, I have learned the downsides of visual programming for certain scenarios, especially dealing with algorithms that require repeated iteration through data structures like arrays. I’ve also learned how to improve and maintain better performance so that projects run smoother (or at all!) on current and older/less powerful hardware, while still improving graphics quality, and in that vein, how gratifying performance optimization can feel sometimes. I’ve also learned to use UE’s procedural content generation system to build my own tools for level design and creating more stylized environments. While I haven’t done the latter in Soundgarden - and I wish I had, had I known how at the time - this will certainly impact how my future projects will look. Overall, these 1.5 years of working on my first released Unreal project has made my transition from Unity complete, meaning that for the time being, UE will be my technology of choice in developing any new games and virtual environments onward.

On a less technical level, this was also the first project throughout which I have consistently employed MDM - the method for design materialization. This was my most reflected upon project and I have come to understand and highly appreciate the power of thorough and constant reflection. I still remember how I had been stumbling through my first reflective journal entries but also how quickly this process became more natural and fluent for me. I find that my design decisions have become far more conscious - or even how I became aware of the in the first place. Where before I would make many decisions from within a flow state, working off vague ideas or repetitions of my own internalized established practices, I feel that now my decisions have become much more informed. This more aware decision making has led to consistent learnings about my own practice, my intentions, about what has already been done, what hasn’t, what path I am shaping with my project, consistently checking in with myself and my internal design map - Where have I been? Where am I going? Am I still on the path I envisioned? Am I even taking the right path? What else is there? Journaling and detailed commit messages have helped me shed a light on intentions that perhaps before were buried in the tacit knowledge of my years of practicing game development, working on music and sound, and the theoretical and artistic knowledge I have absorbed both consciously and unconsciously through my work and experiencing the works of others. I find that the process of putting my finger, or rather a searchlight, on my influences and more consciously decide on my path forward has led to decisions that help me avoid running my project into a seeming dead end. I feel that my decisions now still make sense in the long run and help me to consistently improve the quality of and reasoning behind my work - turning me into a better developer, designer, researcher, artist - and perhaps, applying the practice of constant reflection on other areas of life - a better human being. Working on Soundgarden has also helped me to become more confident in the research trajectory that I am taking and helped me streamline my focus. This project was informed by research I had been conducting and informed more research questions in turn. The feedback that I received from players during the Ludodrome exhibition and after talking about Soundgarden as part of my DiGRA 2025 paper presentation pointed out the innovative paths I am taking with the project. People resonated with the idea of consciously engaging with sound in interactive experiences, they appreciated the contemplative nature of Soundgarden and commended its accessibility - both in terms of playability for people who don’t usually engage with games, as well as showing potential in presenting game interactions that would work for individuals with visual impairments -the latter would certainly present yet another research trajectory to pursue in the future.

Closing off 🚪

This has become by far the longest journal entry for Soundgarden, though perhaps this makes sense, given the final (or not so final??) nature of this writing. While this is one big entry, I have been writing this one over the course of 2-3 weeks. Perhaps I could’ve split this into three parts: What I did between winter and Ludodrome, what I did for Ludodrome, and the actual post partum. So yeah, I’m actually not sure yet if this really works as a good post partum/post mortem - perhaps I’ll have to look back once again on everything that happened and especially what it means for the project, my practice, and myself. With that said, journaling has been extremely helpful to reflect and improve upon my ideas. The development that I do these days has gained in depth, and - I dare to cautiously say - has improved the quality of the work and research I do. I certainly find it easier to put my thoughts in writing now. It has also tremendously helped enhancing my learnings and their retention. I feel like I’ve become a better game developer, perhaps even a better scholar, and I’m excited to see where my future ruminations will lead me. At this point, I would also like to extend my sincere gratitude to the Materializing Design project for putting me on the reflective pathways that enabled the making of Soundgarden and helped me improve upon my artistic/design work in general. I am also grateful to my three supervisors who each presented their invaluable perspectives that helped me shape the project and the trajectory of my research in profound ways.

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