Sound Design in Bayonetta
July 30th, 2009 by PlatinumGames
Filed: Bayonetta, Community, Games, PlatinumGames
Hi. My name is Daisuke Sakata, and I am in charge of the sound effects on Bayonetta. I’d like explain some of the sound effects we are using in the game.
With Bayonetta, we approached sound design from the concept that it should be “Real and Powerful Sound.” Even though we say real, that doesn’t mean that all the sounds are sounds we hear on an everyday basis, instead we mean that they are the real sounds that would occur in the Bayonetta game universe.
For instance, Bayonetta is able to summon a giant crow within the game, but since it is a crow, if we were just to slap on the real cry of a crow, it would be completely incompatible with the scale of the creature on the screen. That’s why we are after real sounds that would exist in a game’s virtual world – so they will live up to the graphics on screen.
This is an example of the kind of design process that went into the production of the final sound effect:
A powerful bird cry -> A cry that has an attack-like quality -> The cry of a falcon or an eagle -> Then I combined these but found they didn’t match up with the picture on screen.
I make sounds that compare to the world of Bayonetta via this repeated process of trial and error. For instance:
A crow sound -> A ravaged, sad sound of a cry (or my idea of one) -> A cry that would perk the ears even more -> (This doesn’t have to be a bird!!) -> Let’s try wild animal sounds like a lion or a tiger or something -> No, that doesn’t work at all…
After listening to numerous different animal sounds, I would pick the ones that struck me as fitting, even if it was just a little. As a result, I used a pig’s cry as a base for this cry.
But a pig is a pig no matter what you do, so I had to work on the cry to make it sound more bird-like. I added other sound elements, or placed on some effects, etc…
The cry I ended up with was this:
At present, we are using several thousand sound effects in Bayonetta, many of which we have spared no amount of effort or compromise. I want you to enjoy Bayonetta not only with your eyes but also with your ears. (And definitely on a surround system!)
Lastly, the staff here is working hard day and night to make something that we hope that everyone will enjoy! Keep looking forward to the game!
