Resident Evil 2 sounds scary as hell!!

The Remake of Resident Evil 2 has possibly got to be one of the most anticipated and well done remakes of the last few years. One factor that makes this game so great is the use of audio visual cues to make the player feel scared and give them the feel of dread. When I was playing the game, what stood out to me the most was the footsteps of our big boy friend T-00 (otherwise known as Mr X). His footsteps are persistent within the sound mix and as soon as you hear that first thump from him, you know he around and you start to really feel a sense of horror. This has been executed brilliantly thanks to the audio director and team of designers that helped make this game what it is! The technique of audio implementation that was used within this game was mostly based around positional audio. This is done using their very own audio technology which is aptly called the Real-time Binaural System. This technology was presented at an Audio Engineering Society (AES) Conference This system aims to fix the problem within games that audio usually sounds far off its own source within a 3D space in some game engines. The sounds would also degrade in quality along with being more quiet then it should be. This audio technology was created to make sure the audio sounds as real as it can be! Resident Evil 2 executes this system as sounds from Mr. X are accurately portrayed with this system. I personally think there is still work to do with the tech as sometimes the audio can be deceptive to a few placements. However this is a brilliant step in the right direction for all games in the industry and it should be implemented into more games to help develop this technology!

If you would like to read about the 3D audio technology used you can read the AES paper here!

Or even better you can read the article I read about Resident Evil 2's sounds from digital trends which includes an interview with Capcom's Audio Director Kentaro Nakashima!