Corn!

Corn! is an audi-based horror game, utilizing spatial audio to find your friends in a dark and eerie cornfield. Armed with a flashflight and your god-given courage, you return to try and find them or hints to their whereabouts. It turns out that you and your friends aren't the only things in this maze. For this project, I handled all the SFX and foley work. I also delved into spatial audio, it being the focal point of how to compelte the game!

Wwise Spatialization/RTPC Walkthrough

Spatial Audio

One of the vocal points of the game was the spatial audio, which led to the player's objectives. The player would call out to the field of corn, and would hear responses from either their friends or the monster, trying to mimic their voices. I was tasked with setting up the spatialization in Wwise, and used RTPC (or real-time parameter control) to control how far the voice sounded, as well as control how "creature-like" the voice that came from the monster sounded when trying to trick the player.

Field Work Experience

One major takeaway I had from this project was actual field experience recording sounds in the environment. In this game, there were many SFX that required nature-like layers, and there was no better place to go than the woods to get them! I went out at night to gather ambience samples, as well as make my way to a wooded area to get the footstep samples for the player character. I had a blast doing it, and I loved getting in touch with the outdoors for something like this! It was an amazing change of pace.

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Footsteps Example

Ambience Example

Monster SFX Creation

Monstrous SFX

When creating the SFX for the monster, I wanted to make them feel imposing, but also disgusting to match the way their face opened up within the game. To do that, I had to get creative with my Foley, using objects like an apple to get samples for the monster's creaky body movements. I also emphasized the creature's footsteps, making them bassy and heavy to intimidate the player as they heard them moving about the cornfield.

Conclusion

This project was a project I look back on fondly, thanks to the experience it gave me in both spatial audio use and field work. I now feel more comfortable using spatial audio in games I work on, and I have also gained the drive to get outside and do some recording, pushing me to listen to everything around me. After all, who knows? The next thing I hear could be the perfect sample for something I've been working on.