Now that Star Wars: The Force Unleashed has been vetted, reviewed, and played umpteen dozens of times by its loyal fan base, players are beginning to find nuances within it to love. Whether it is the epic storyline, incredible Force-powers, or the highly detailed worlds in which it all takes place, gamers love every detail.
In the background, however, are the unsung heroes of game-development. The audio department of any game company rarely takes the forefront of publicity, usually relegated to praise only from those with a keen ear. Sound is quite taken for granted -- usually it doesn't get a mention unless it's bad, since great audio blends naturally with everything else a player takes in. Sometimes, however, great audio does stand out.
The Force Unleashed garnered a great deal of praise from both critics and players thanks to its incredible musical score, skillful voice acting, and well placed sound effects. Behind the scenes, these beautiful moments took years of work, with many sleepless nights along the way.
"Sometimes we would be here so late the air conditioning would shut off," laughs David Collins. As audio lead, David was given the difficult task of shaping the sound of the game, as well as managing the music and voice-over actors. Luckily, he's an actor himself, having voiced the ever-mysterious PROXY within the game.
"This was easily the most complex project (the audio department) has had to work on," he goes on, with Jesse Harlin, the music supervisor, nodding in agreement. "With Republic Commando, we had one team and two platforms -- the PC and the Xbox. With this one, we had a new internal studio with brand new technologies, like DMM and Euphoria, and brand new platforms like the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. We definitely had some hurdles to clear."
With the first foray into next-gen gaming for LucasArts -- as well as the first real extension of the Star Wars saga into a previously forbidden portion of the timeline, fans would no doubt scrutinize every element. The iconic music and sounds would not be spared.
The music fell to the hands of Harlin, who already had Republic Commando, Battlefront 2, and LEGO Star Wars games under his belt. For him, the creation of the soundtrack for The Force Unleashed might be one of the more rewarding experiences of his life.
Venturing into Skywalker Sound, he recorded the score to the game with over 80 members of the San Francisco Orchestra. Composed by Mark Griskey, the main theme of the game went through many changes. The last of these was finished by Jesse while the rest of team was at lunch a scant week before the Orchestra was booked.
With the help of Aaron Brown and Will Roget, sound designers by title, taking apart the various scores and bits of music, re-cutting them, then placing them around points in the game was a lengthy process that came off without a hitch -- reviewers raved about how well the music fit every moment of the story.
Through all this, though, the rest of the game still needed sound. Sound Designer Tom Bible spent a great deal of time on the recurring effects throughout the game. Many sound sources were utilized, going so far as having Brian Tibbits, another sound designer, swinging small bells wildly above his head -- all just to get that perfect whoosh effect.
For Bible, the most intimidating part was re-creating sounds that were already known. "A common misconception," Collins says, "is that these sounds are pulled straight from the movies. But a Jawa getting electrocuted and punted through the air? That did not happen in the films. The films are a launch pad for all this other material that you need to create."
This meant a lightning-fried, soaring Jawa sound needed to be created from scratch. Harlin readily jumped in front of the microphone with some shaking and squealing. Thanks to a few filters and effects, his normal tenor was raised to a screech, and with the help of Tom Bible, the sound effect that made everyone laugh was born.
Other sound effects needed to be created as well. The sarlacc pit within the game was considerably too massive to use the same sound as the Fett-eater from Return of the Jedi. Aaron Brown battled with deciding exactly what to use as the basic sound for some of the noodlier things -- until David heated some pad thai and started eating. They will never look at ramen the same way.
Even the star of the game -- Sam Witwer who played the Secret Apprentice -- got in on the fun. "He must have had a copy of the soundtrack in his car or something, because he would just call and leave these messages. He would be doing a-capella versions of the songs. He even made up his own lyrics for them."
Now that the game has shipped, the team has moved on to other projects within the company. They all had a hand in the recent Holonet News podcast and they all are still working on soundtracks and sound effects for upcoming games. In all, they are simply elated that people praised the audio. They certainly earned it.
