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Crusader Kings III Dev Diary #54 - A Sound Plan

A Sound Plan

Welcome to another Dev Diary from the Audio Department! Now that Northern Lords is out in the world, we can share some behind the scenes on what went on during development for the Flavourpack.

We are going to talk about Field recording, The Sound design of the Event Images, some 1.3 patch updates, and of course, the music from Andreas Waldetoft.

So if that is your cup of tea (or mead), then be our guest and follow along in this Dev Diary!

SFX
Field Recording:
We decided early on in the production that we wanted genuine ambiences for the event backgrounds, which meant that source recordings were required.
The recordings were conducted over a span of two days in a cold desolate “Vik” (Bay area) in the west coast called Onsala as it is currently known (Coming from “Odin's Sala” which translates to “The Halls of Odin” in Viking times) Which is my home area where I grew up.

First of all, is preparation, what do you need for the recording session, and how light do you need to travel? (You don’t want to carry an entire audio studio on your back if you are tracking through forests and fields. Light is fast, and your back will thank you).

I ended up using two handheld recorders, some lightweight stands, and an Ambisonic Microphone (a 4-way microphone array that captures audio in all directions, not unlike a VR camera, but for audio)

That way I can position the location in post-production, and not worry if I did or didn’t capture something outside the audibility of a regular microphone.

image5.jpg

Picture 1: equipment test and packing day

During the pandemic, there were minimal planes, cars, or any activity for that matter, which made it ideal for recording audio. it was just me, nature, and my recorders.

image7.jpg
Picture 2: Recording rig deployed on one location site.

Placing yourself among Vikings wasn’t hard at all, and at times almost serene. Listening to the waves roll in on the shores is something quite special and I highly recommend it, if you can spare the time.

Northern Lords Audio Field Recording Session

Event-images
After the field recording was concluded, the source material was processed and implemented to be the backgrounds for the event images that appear in the Northern Lords Pack.
Each event image has a unique evolving loop that places you right in the center of the area. Whether it is out on the windy ocean, the stone pebbled shore, or in a pigsty prison!
Videos of the different event images in the game during development:


All of these are crafted in our sound design tools and then “performed” by Fmod.
It can scatter the birds you hear, the insects that pass you by, or how windy the ocean is. All to make each event appearance as unique as possible, while still being in the same “space”.


Map Ambience
As part of the 1.3 update patch, winter now affects the map, and so does the audio, as shown in Dev Diary #49: A cold Embrace. Have a look at how the Winter sprawls with heavy snowstorms, and how the audible townspeople disappear from the outside and into the hearths and the warmth.

We also updated the ambience system to a procedural system. That we call the
Map Ambience System. (Highly technical terminology at play here)

It is driven by the game camera, that scans the terrain of all visible provinces, determines what amount of a specific terrain type the camera can see at any point in time, and generates a percentage value that then gets translated into a Fmod parameter that is connected to the Master Ambience Event.

All this fancy talk boils down to, rather than us having us placing hundreds of audio emitters on the map at strategic locations (we did, and let me tell you, that is labor-intensive!) The game tells the audio middleware (Fmod) what to play, when, where and how much.

And now, over to Andreas, our Senior Music Composer!


MUSIC

Hi all, Andreas Waldetoft here,

I’m glad to be talking about the music that we wrote for the Northern Lords

In this Flavourpack, we recorded authentic old instruments from the time era, like the lovely Mungiga (translates to Mouth-Harp or Jaw-Harp) different kind of flutes, Swedish bagpipes, fiddles such as a Keyed Fiddle and Hardanger Fiddle, a Throat singer and not to forget a Viking Choir singing in Norse.

Recording anything in a pandemic is not an easy feat, especially with varying amounts of lockdown, for example, Kalabalik, our medieval session musicians and skalds for hire, did a fantastic job recording themselves from a home setting. Below are some images of the instruments that made an appearance in the score:


image2.jpg

Picture 1: Mouth Harps

image6.jpg

Picture 2: Closeup Nyckelharpa

image4.jpg

Picture 3: Overview of some of the live instruments included in the soundtrack

image1.jpg

Picture 4: Studio Deepwods, Also known as my composing lair

We are all so happy and grateful for the result and prove that music can be done anywhere, and what matters is that the soul of the music is there.
What you as the player will hear are Three new mood tracks called Drakkar, Scandinavia, and The Feast and One new cue track called The Raid.
The nifty thing with our music system is that both Scandinavia and The Raid have different versions that vary between themselves, so there will be variations that play intermittently during a game-session.

I'll leave you all with this, The cue called The Raid. Enjoy!


That is all from us in the Audio Department, until next time!
 
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Speaking about the music - will there be a Soundtrack DLC collecting all the tracks in MP3/Flac format? (Just as we have one for I:R).
I'll be happy to pay for it even owning Royal Edition.
At the moment you can find our current Songwhip with all the streaming platform, for our OST, HERE.
We are working on bringing the new OST to the list, but it requires some time before we are able to do so.
As soon as we have an update, we will let the community know.
 
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We surely appreciate the music department's work BUT...
I lost track of all the reported bugs since 1.3.1 and I don't even want to start a new game atm, with all these bugs present.
Rest assured, we are working diligently on issues, tracking down them nasty bugs, daily.
The community's feedback & reports are very valuable to us, so thank you for taking the time to raise these. As soon as we can, we will share more details with you.
 
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Rest assured, we are working diligently on issues, tracking down them nasty bugs, daily.
The community's feedback & reports are very valuable to us, so thank you for taking the time to raise these. As soon as we can, we will share more details with you.
@PDX-Nicou
I appreciate your response and I know that you're doing your best but maybe the department needs more hands? I'm not sure.
I also honestly appreciate that you (personally) are usually commenting on most of the bug reports and you deserve praise for that.
Can't wait for more patching and developing news, especially for long pending issues and requests.

@ParadoxGustav
Your work is fantastic, sir and I'm sorry if my previous post came off a little harsh! My gripe wasn't towards your work ofc
I'm taking the chance to raise this, as it's a sound issue that was never answered and it's affecting people since the game's initial release.


PS
The sound-music glitch and the simultaneous fps stuttering are easier spotted around sieges especially if more than one siege is taking place.

Many thanks!
Cheers!
 
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Field Recording:
We decided early on in the production that we wanted genuine ambiences for the event backgrounds, which meant that source recordings were required.
The recordings were conducted over a span of two days in a cold desolate “Vik” (Bay area) in the west coast called Onsala as it is currently known (Coming from “Odin's Sala” which translates to “The Halls of Odin” in Viking times) Which is my home area where I grew up.
Nice job talking the studio into paying you to go hiking and chilling out by the water.
 
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People play with the sound on?
 
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I loved the sound design for Northern Lords. Very immersive audio effects, and the music was absolutely top notch. I could easily listen to another couple hours of the Norse music! Excellent stuff.

Hope all relevant flavor packs also bring excellent cultural music!
 
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What I would love is the ability to buy the sheet music and play it. I would be quite happy to buy a copy of the score for a lot of Paradox music.
 
Speaking about the music - will there be a Soundtrack DLC collecting all the tracks in MP3/Flac format? (Just as we have one for I:R).
I'll be happy to pay for it even owning Royal Edition.
I would love to buy the music from the game in FLAC. I often listen to the CK2, EU4 and Stellaris soundtracks when I'm having my morning run, out walking my dogs or doing the food shopping.
 
A Sound Plan

Welcome to another Dev Diary from the Audio Department! Now that Northern Lords is out in the world, we can share some behind the scenes on what went on during development for the Flavourpack.

We are going to talk about Field recording, The Sound design of the Event Images, some 1.3 patch updates, and of course, the music from Andreas Waldetoft.

So if that is your cup of tea (or mead), then be our guest and follow along in this Dev Diary!

SFX
Field Recording:
We decided early on in the production that we wanted genuine ambiences for the event backgrounds, which meant that source recordings were required.
The recordings were conducted over a span of two days in a cold desolate “Vik” (Bay area) in the west coast called Onsala as it is currently known (Coming from “Odin's Sala” which translates to “The Halls of Odin” in Viking times) Which is my home area where I grew up.

First of all, is preparation, what do you need for the recording session, and how light do you need to travel? (You don’t want to carry an entire audio studio on your back if you are tracking through forests and fields. Light is fast, and your back will thank you).

I ended up using two handheld recorders, some lightweight stands, and an Ambisonic Microphone (a 4-way microphone array that captures audio in all directions, not unlike a VR camera, but for audio)

That way I can position the location in post-production, and not worry if I did or didn’t capture something outside the audibility of a regular microphone.

View attachment 699246
Picture 1: equipment test and packing day

During the pandemic, there were minimal planes, cars, or any activity for that matter, which made it ideal for recording audio. it was just me, nature, and my recorders.

View attachment 699247Picture 2: Recording rig deployed on one location site.

Placing yourself among Vikings wasn’t hard at all, and at times almost serene. Listening to the waves roll in on the shores is something quite special and I highly recommend it, if you can spare the time.

Northern Lords Audio Field Recording Session

Event-images
After the field recording was concluded, the source material was processed and implemented to be the backgrounds for the event images that appear in the Northern Lords Pack.
Each event image has a unique evolving loop that places you right in the center of the area. Whether it is out on the windy ocean, the stone pebbled shore, or in a pigsty prison!
Videos of the different event images in the game during development:


All of these are crafted in our sound design tools and then “performed” by Fmod.
It can scatter the birds you hear, the insects that pass you by, or how windy the ocean is. All to make each event appearance as unique as possible, while still being in the same “space”.


Map Ambience
As part of the 1.3 update patch, winter now affects the map, and so does the audio, as shown in Dev Diary #49: A cold Embrace. Have a look at how the Winter sprawls with heavy snowstorms, and how the audible townspeople disappear from the outside and into the hearths and the warmth.

We also updated the ambience system to a procedural system. That we call the
Map Ambience System. (Highly technical terminology at play here)

It is driven by the game camera, that scans the terrain of all visible provinces, determines what amount of a specific terrain type the camera can see at any point in time, and generates a percentage value that then gets translated into a Fmod parameter that is connected to the Master Ambience Event.

All this fancy talk boils down to, rather than us having us placing hundreds of audio emitters on the map at strategic locations (we did, and let me tell you, that is labor-intensive!) The game tells the audio middleware (Fmod) what to play, when, where and how much.

And now, over to Andreas, our Senior Music Composer!


MUSIC

Hi all, Andreas Waldetoft here,

I’m glad to be talking about the music that we wrote for the Northern Lords

In this Flavourpack, we recorded authentic old instruments from the time era, like the lovely Mungiga (translates to Mouth-Harp or Jaw-Harp) different kind of flutes, Swedish bagpipes, fiddles such as a Keyed Fiddle and Hardanger Fiddle, a Throat singer and not to forget a Viking Choir singing in Norse.

Recording anything in a pandemic is not an easy feat, especially with varying amounts of lockdown, for example, Kalabalik, our medieval session musicians and skalds for hire, did a fantastic job recording themselves from a home setting. Below are some images of the instruments that made an appearance in the score:


View attachment 699237
Picture 1: Mouth Harps

View attachment 699238
Picture 2: Closeup Nyckelharpa

View attachment 699257
Picture 3: Overview of some of the live instruments included in the soundtrack

View attachment 699241
Picture 4: Studio Deepwods, Also known as my composing lair

We are all so happy and grateful for the result and prove that music can be done anywhere, and what matters is that the soul of the music is there.
What you as the player will hear are Three new mood tracks called Drakkar, Scandinavia, and The Feast and One new cue track called The Raid.
The nifty thing with our music system is that both Scandinavia and The Raid have different versions that vary between themselves, so there will be variations that play intermittently during a game-session.

I'll leave you all with this, The cue called The Raid. Enjoy!


That is all from us in the Audio Department, until next time!
Looking Nice but we need a way to change soundtracks like in stellaris,HOI4,EU4 or even like in CK2!
 
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I won't lie I mute the music and often ambient sound in most games including ck so it's not a big deal to me. But I also know it's hard work so thanks for doing it.
 
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id love a lyric sheet for the norse chanting and stuff actually. lot of them tracks stuck in my head atm, and id like to be able to sing it to myself when the need grabs me. rn all i can do is say silly gibberish things in english that sound sort of similar
 
Those Genelec's tho! What are those things in the corners of the editing room O_O

Also, I'm surprised how relatively light weight field recording can be now (last I seen the industry was when people were lugging around some crazy boxes around their waists and stuff..

I wanted to ask though. Is it tough to get into such an industry for field recordings and such if you would like to work for companies and such on projects of this sort?