Full Transcript
Saundaman:
Well done. I already packed everything, so hop on to the wagon and let’s get going.
Jani Nevaranta:
I’m really satisfied how Audio Wizards stand out in every part that we made. The story, sound effects, the gameplay and everything related to that.
Announcer:
From myTrueSound, the new audio game, Audio Wizards.
David Olivia:
In this game, we didn’t want to make a game just with audio, so the game console saw at least once because blind players, they are asking us to make games which are interesting for everybody. They want to talk with their friends about the games.
Announcer:
Available in the App Store, and the Google Play store, an IO game with 3D sound, swiping gestures and killer audio, you’re dying to survive for.
Jani Nevaranta:
You have a level, you face enemies, they come from three different directions, and you must not have them reach you, so you must defeat them before they reach and attack you.
David Olivia:
This game, it’s not only from the blind, it’s for everybody, so hopefully the mouth to mouth pays off and many people then supports that we keep playing games because that’s what we want.
Jani Nevaranta:
Yeah, it’s really heartwarming, some comments that we get in. Sometimes you can see us smiling really lightly under some kind of words that some people gave us.
Announcer:
If you download Audio Wizards and you like it, tell a friend, let them tell a friend; and if you like Blind Abilities, tell a friend and let them know that you can find more podcasts with the blindness perspective on the web at www.blindabilities.com on Twitter at Blind Abilities and download the free Blind Abilities app on the App Store and Google Play store. That’s two words, Blind Abilities.
Saundaman:
Hello? Saundaman, the Master Wizard, keep it up.
Announcer:
And now here’s the team from myTrueSound. We hope you enjoy.
Saundaman:
Let’s get going.
Jeff Thompson:
Welcome to Blind Abilities. I’m Jeff Thompson and today in the studio I got the team from myTrueSound talking about the new game Audio Wizards. We got David, Jani and Aleksi. How you doing?
David Olivia:
We are doing good.
Jani Nevaranta:
Yeah, we’re fine.
Aleksi Turunen:
Yeah, great, thanks.
Jani Nevaranta:
Thanks for having us.
Jeff Thompson:
Well, congratulations to the entire, myTrueSound team and all the people that assisted you in putting this together. Whether they’d be volunteers or musicians or beta testers. Congratulations. Can one of you tell the listeners a little about myTrueSound’s brand new audio game Audio Wizards?
Jani Nevaranta:
Well, I could to explain it a little bit. So Audio Wizards is an audio game where you play as a wizard apprentice for a wizard mentor whose name is Saundaman.
Saundaman:
Saundaman, the Master Wizard.
Jani Nevaranta:
And to get everything, you defeat distortions that are imbued in element thematics.
Saundaman:
You seem quite good at this. They seem to be retreating for now.
Jeff Thompson:
Oh, cool. How is the interaction with the user to the game?
Jani Nevaranta:
In the game, you can hear enemies make different sounds. For example, there are four elements in the game: fire, water, lightening and earth; and each type of element makes their own distinctive sound. For example, if you can hear a fire enemy approaching you, you must counter it with its weakness, which is water. And elements work kind of in a cycle. Lightning is countered by fire and fires is countered by water. Water is countered by lightning and lightning is countered by earth. It’s like an arcade type of game where you have a level, you face enemies, they come from three different directions, and you must not have them reach you. So you must defeat them before they reach another.
David Olivia:
And it looks and sounds easy but actually, it is not so easy to remember what the spells are and then because you need to recognize them and then also detect which direction they approaching you. And so that is cognitive demand in the game and people have been liking it pretty much think it’s a fun game.
Jeff Thompson:
I really liked the interaction because I’m used to swiping and then with the audio coming from the left or from the front or from the right, he had really had to pay attention to who was coming and the different sounds. Good job on that interface.
David Olivia:
Well we actually simplified the things, so it’s not a game where you can rotate and really get the full immersive experience. We wanted to take more and arcade approach and it has actually succeeded very well. And then there is the singularity that in this game we didn’t want to make a game just with audio. The game because also at the swells, because blind players they are asking us like to make games, which are interesting for everybody. They want to talk with their friends about the games, and we found a very nice way to do it with quite simplistic graphics but actually like it very nice. It makes the game much solid, much better product.
Jani Nevaranta:
We wanted to differentiate ourselves a little up from other audio games by including the graphics, and we tried to find a unique, distinctive look into the game as with the story and audio together. We think that audio results can be quite distinctive from many other audio games.
David Olivia:
What is true also is that it was good that the design is started from the audio part, so it was an audio game where finally we added each one. I think it was very important to realize from the beginning that this is an audio game. And so the sounds have to provide you all the information to play and act only when you at send to those enemies who are approaching you. And if you can see the screen, and you might not see those enemies, and think they are like very close to you. So in that way we compensate the extra at the site the players might have. So what we are actually doing, it’s like we encourage them to play the game by the listening and actually I’m playing the game by the listening, and I think it’s much more fun to do it than just by staring at the screen.
Jeff Thompson:
So in the creation of AudioWizard. So how did the story for Audio Wizards begin?
David Olivia:
Actually to start, it was a university project. myTrueSound asked the students from the university, Okay we want to do an audio game and it has to be fun, it has to be interesting. We explained to them what an audio game was and then we kind of let them free to sign the game. It was a process that it took some few months and nine students were participating on that project and after that they actually made a demo, a prototype and then it was so good that I ask some of them, do you want to continue? And perhaps Jani is the one that can tell us but that like how then they continue.
Jani Nevaranta:
Yeah, after the university project, five of us from the original group of nine continued on the game. At that point I think we really found the focus in the audio of this arts. Before that it was kind of more like a demo, a tech version, demonstrating what kind of original idea we had. But after that we really wrapped onto the vision we had during the project. The last three months on the development has been trying to polish that vision on the game.
Jeff Thompson:
Oh, that’s great. That’s great. Your responses have been good so far and I think it’s exciting that you guys are doing this for the blind and visually impaired.
Jani Nevaranta:
It’s really hard to arming some of the common stuff we get. Then sometimes you can see us smiling really widely on the some kind of words that some people give us. I think that’s one of the best parts of being a game developer, especially for a niche audience that you’re getting this kind of heartwarming response.
Jeff Thompson:
What kind of passion does it take as developers of games like this to focus in and try to create games for such a niche audience?
David Olivia:
As you know, like this company, I started a bit from my background in acoustics and when I thought that I wanted to start that research project in university where I’m working full time. Where the implying people will come as audio experts like to help us fix the onboardings that we were using in games. That’s how actually it came to the idea of, okay, what about if we do audio games? We ask people to join the team, and we are able to satisfy the hearing of blind players with them, we will be able to satisfy the hearing of everybody. And that’s a bit how it came and then really soon it came like the feeling that we were doing something, special something that many people have been trying and it’s pretty hard to become a developer of audio games since it’s niche and it’s a small market, but then on the other hand the feedback that we get, it helps out a lot. In this game there it has been about 50 blind people participating in one way or another.
David Olivia:
We have had all the beta testers, but we have had a 33 new CCS that have sent the music to us and try to get their music into the game, and the feedback that they were saying like, Oh, I’m so happy about this. It doesn’t matter if I win or not. I’m just happy to have help sending [inaudible] . And then when we all who are the, we never say what by wow. I may see now when the game is in there, some of those messages have started writing and saying, I can’t believe my music is in that game. Like thank you so much. Sure. We would probably put it in the, in the Spotify and so on so everybody can listen and those are more themes I think gives quite much of a sense what we do.
David Olivia:
Sure we need at the end to want to make a profit. It’s impossible to continue if we are not, they want to pay the salaries of those guys but then let’s see how the thing goes. At this moment we are super satisfied of what has been the response from the public and all the messages we’ve got. So it has been great.
Jeff Thompson:
Well that’s great that you involve so many blind and visually impaired people in the beta testing, and to get that many submissions for music. That’s awesome.
David Olivia:
Well it’s a goal.
David Olivia:
Now for instance, we know that a Spanish market, it’s difficult because some don’t speak so much Spanish and they want to listen their characters in their own mother tongue. So definitely one we translated and it’s going to be a very hard work because this game has a lot of dialogues. Saundaman, the main character, he just loves to talk and but for sure the voice actor is going to be black. And the translators who are helping us at the moment or credit to translate it or supplying, we try to give like a small payment, a small compensation to everybody who is helping us, the new CCS, translators, actors and so on and see where it goes.
David Olivia:
We also want to involve the community with the next project we have. We really want to make out there with such a multiplayer, and we really need to listen to the community, what are their wishes, how they would like that game to be. Also as we say the game is for iOS and Android, but we were thinking to make the computer version and we want to ask the players how the controller system should be changed from a haptic X screen to a mouse or keyboard.
David Olivia:
So while all of these themes, like for sure the people wants to help and just takes time for sure to make it the whole process. But we really would like to make this with right people, I’m sure that they come to work, and they get a payment for, for all that work.
Jani Nevaranta:
I think this game audio is really, it’s from us to the community. We want the game to feel like that many people have been part of it and we reached up to, we want the game to please the audience as much as possible, and we think that community input is really important in that park.
Jeff Thompson:
Yeah, it’s, it’s neat to have that feedback and the satisfaction. Like you said, you’re smiling when you get some of that feedback. That’s awesome. So all the people Google Play, download Audio Wizards and if you haven’t gotten it on your iOS, get it now and there’s more to come. I like the fact that you’re talking about multiple player and stuff like that. It just seems like this could grow and grow.
David Olivia:
Absolutely. At least from the beginning. It’s what people were saying that we want to talk about the same players with our friends. We are tired that they played Fortnite, and we can’t play Fortnite and we want to talk the same thing. So that we need to let the multiplayer is like a challenge that we need to solve it but we need to make it in a way that it’s super interesting. It’s not only about fighting against your friend but how to be there should be semester at the G some thinking going on. It’s not only about the reaction time, how fast do we then find the sound. So we really need to think about it but I think it’s the future and me as a game developer and the whole team, we for sure would respect the work at all like multiplayer areas like Oh like big words, but it’s where we are aiming actually. If we hand them to show we need this response from the community.
David Olivia:
If people don’t allow the audio especially I’m like it’s going to be difficult to prove to ourselves that yes we should do the multiplayer. Yeah. I mean if we get fewer numbers, small number of allowed to then it’s quite difficult to continue but so far it’s going quite good. There has been very good attention and people are always loving the game and now what we just wait is that they talk about the game to their friends they call and the mouth to mouth starts to pay off because we know that there are millions of people interested in gaming and as we say this game it’s, it’s not only for the blind, it’s for everybody so hopefully the mouth to mouth pays off and many people then support that. We keep doing games because that’s what we want. We actually simultaneously preparing a second game called Music Maze that have visuals. It’s an audio game. It’s done by a separate team. We are also very excited about it, so ideas and energy we have hopefully we can make them
Jeff Thompson:
Who actually sat down with Audio Wizards and started writing the story like came up with the idea. Is that how it starts? You write a story and then you figure out how you can implement it, go through that process.
Jani Nevaranta:
I’m probably the most responsible for the story. I wrote the script while I’m not a script writer by myself. I like writing a lot. I really liked that challenge to write some kind of script for the game. One of the focus that I had was that I want the layers to feel like Saundaman, especially as a character. It’s a little, goofy kind of guy that seems all a bit dark and sometimes might give a stupid joke but still feel relatable for the player.
Saundaman:
Oh, my tea is almost ready. Can you hold on to this stations while I go get it?
Jani Nevaranta:
It was a hard process to write when the levels for a script for a mobile game where stories aren’t usually that big of a focus. Its own challenges but thankfully he had a great team, and many of the inputs in the scripts are. While I might have written them down first, I got a lot of feedback from my team, and they’re things that didn’t work. They’re written out and modified to give a better feeling about it.
Jeff Thompson:
Once you have the story then who takes over building the code to make this come to life?
Jani Nevaranta:
We have three programmers, two of them stayed, one left and one of them focused mainly on the audio side, and I think all of them did a really great job implementing the story into the game. A large part of the gameplay elements and the feel the player gets are from the programmers and the sound effects are really something that gives the script a proper life. The script feels more than just words and voice acting. It also feels like the world is alive and more things are happening in audio, which outstand just Saundaman’s words.
David Olivia:
I want to say something about those guys, and it’s the emotion, and the passion that they put in the work. Before the lands, like the previous two weeks I had some chats with them really late at night, and they were still in the office they were working on, and they loved their work. This is their baby, and they created the game that they will also love to play in regarding to the script. I think it’s super fun, and I should like meet that. When I played the game at the end just two days before the launch, I was laughing so much because it was the first time I was actually listening to the script.
Saundaman:
Unfortunately I didn’t find any tea, just the golden gun.
David Olivia:
And there are a lot of jokes, if you like humor you are going to laugh by some of the jokes. You will listen. So the script has been wonderful. And then how the process of the programming also one for the three programmers as Jani said, one is stuck on the middle way, but it’s not because he didn’t like the work, he’s just a student. And it was summertime, so if you wanted to do other things. They did a very good work, not only because they did the game, but they led the platform ready, so we can continue the game and add more levels without needing any programming skills. So they first concentrated on really doing very strong platform or body of code where then you could make more levels. So we actually, we want to make more levels now. We only need the script, we need to record it and then we can just add more levels and more levels for some future updates and that’s super valuable for us, and it shows that those guys, even though they are super down, they are talented, and they put all their passion on it.
Jeff Thompson:
Oh that’s great. David. Jani, what was it like for you when you first played the game as you conceived the script? What was it like when you first open up the game and there it was.
Jani Nevaranta:
I was really happy. Game making has always been my passion and to see something that I created to being an actual game. It’s like a feeling never felt before. The best part is I could make it together with four other guys, four other amazing guys, and I’m really satisfied how the audio stands out in every part that we made the story, sound effects, the gameplay and everything related to that.
Jeff Thompson:
Aleksi, you’ve been kind of quiet. What’s your part in this?
Aleksi Turunen:
Yeah, so I’ve been doing the marketing, so I’ve been doing mostly some trailers and we talk about the music with Jonas , one of our coders and that’s mostly what I do. So I’m more of an online presence basically.
Jeff Thompson:
That matters though. That does, yeah.
Jani Nevaranta:
Yeah. Alexis input has been also invaluable. Like he hasn’t done a lot of things in the background that the player cannot see in the game, but he’s work is really out there.
Jeff Thompson:
Well that’s what teamwork’s all about at myTrueSound. I mean it takes all of you to create all this. Someone comes up with the ideas, then all the input just enhances it. So it’s great that Audio Wizards has dropped now, and you guys are excited. So all the listeners go check it out on iOS and on Google Play.
Aleksi Turunen:
Thanks for having us.
David Olivia:
Wow. Thanks Jeff it has been a pleasure again.
myTrueSound:
Audio Wizards landscape Audio Wizards is an accessible audio game, navigate accessible elements by swiping left and right. You can also explore the elements with touch. Device should be held on landscape mode. Use of headphones is highly recommended. This introduction can be disabled and options tap screen to continue. Title menu play game button music room options; Options; Show Introduction; Check; Toggle; Visual Spell Cue; Check; Toggle; Double tap to change; Toggle Accessibility. Check; Toggle; Speech rate; 40%; Slider; Double tap to activate, then swipe up and down to change the value; narrow stereo field, not check toggle. Double tap to change; music volume 60%; slider; Double tap to activate, then swipe up and down to change the value. Default settings button. Double tap to select; reset progress. Back button. Double tap to select; instructions. Instructions, accessibility controls. One swipe left and right to navigate.
myTrueSound:
Swipe up and down too quickly. Jump between groups of elements. Swipe up with two fingers to read the entire screen from the top. Double tap to activate an item. Tap three times with three fingers to toggle accessibility mode. Read more tap two times with two fingers to pause game during game play you can hover over certain elements on screen top left. Super gauge if available. Top right pause button, bottom left lives bottom ride score in endless mode. Read more; gameplay controls one, swipe up to select fire spell. Swipe right to select water spell. Swipe down to select lightning spell. Swipe left to selector of spell. Read more gameplay controls too after spell has been selected. Cast it towards an incoming enemy by swiping left, up, or right. Selected spelled will automatically cancel itself after a short duration Read more. Gameplay controls three to activate super mode.
myTrueSound:
Press and hold still one finger anywhere on the screen for a short time. Super mode can only be activated when super gauge is at 100% or higher. Reaching 100% charges indicated with sound effect. Affinity system, fire beats earth. Water beats fire, lightning beats water, earth beats lightning. Read more. In endless mode, you can equip a Wizarding hat before starting the challenge. Wizarding hats can grant various beneficial effects such as increased score gain. There are various ways to unlock Wizarding hats. Some can be unlocked via story mode, whereas some require play in the endless mode. Back; button, play date, play game tutorial one; double tap to select.
myTrueSound:
Hello, are you there? We got a small situation on our hands, and I require your assistance. You see, while you were snoozing off, a distortion portal opened. These elements was pouring through. They’re of earth. Swipe up to ready your fire spell. After selecting the fire spell, swipe left up, or right to cast your spell towards the enemy. Remember to act quick or the spell expires. Here they come.
myTrueSound:
[Music][Sound of people’s footsteps approaching]
Saundaman:
You seem quite good at this. They seem to be retreating for now.
Saundaman:
[Music] ][Sound of people’s footsteps retreating] [Sound Effects]
[Music] [Transition noise] -When we share
-What we see
-Through each other’s eyes…
[Multiple voices overlapping, in unison, to form a single sentence]
…We can then begin to bridge the gap between the limited expectations, and the realities of Blind Abilities.
Jeff Thompson:
For more podcasts with a blindness perspective:
Check us out on the web at www.BlindAbilities.com On Twitter @BlindAbilities
Download our app from the App store:
‘Blind Abilities’; that’s two words.
Or send us an e-mail at:
Thanks for listening.
*****
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