Brink made a huge splash (pun intended) at recent stops in LA, NY, and parts of Europe. We already covered off on some coverage last week (as has Splash Damage on their site), but there’s plenty more to share. To get started, watch the GameTrailers video (above) with the game’s creative director, Richard Ham.
Elsewhere, Lee Bradley of Play.tm recently played the game, and it sounds like Splash Damage’s goals for the game spoke directly to him. Here’s a snippet of his preview:
“Because the truth is, an FPS hasn’t had me that intrigued for a long time. Perhaps it’s timing, perhaps its design or maybe it’s just the infectious energy of the development team. They know they’re onto something good. Brink could be very special indeed.”
We’ve only scratched the surface on the new coverage. After the break, find out why Destructoid claims the game “truly looks to have something for everyone” and more.
Steve ‘Badman’ Hessel at Splash Damage let me know that they’ve got a new Brink team profile up on their official site. This week we meet media artist Jeremy ‘Pinflux’ Hay, who joined the team back in 2009. So what does Jeremy do? Here’s a look…
What do you do at Splash Damage?
I’m the Media Artist, and a part of Splash Damage’s marketing department. It’s my job to assist in encouraging you to drop your hard earned dollars/pounds/euros on our games once they’re released, all through creating shiny images and videos to dazzle and distract. My work ranges from taking screenshots of Brink to realising ridiculous holiday-specific concepts.
For more on Jeremy and the rest of Splash Damage’s team, head here.
After a couple months on hiatus, our developer diaries for Brink return. This week Splash Damage’s audio director, Chris Sweetman, discusses his methodology for Brink’s sound design — covering everything from foley work to getting the perfect gun sound. And oh does Chris love gun sounds. If you’ve ever played the game BLACK (a game he previously worked on), you know you’re in for a treat with Brink.
Chris’ dev diary is accompanied by an arrangement he calls, “A Choir of Guns.”Watch it above.
Introduction
I’m Chris Sweetman, Audio Director at Splash Damage, and this developer diary is all about Brink’s sound design. What does an Audio Director do all day? Well, I’m responsible for the quality of everything that is heard in our games, including music, dialogue, and sound design. This can be broken down into various areas, including in-game gameplay, cut scenes, trailers and tons of other stuff.
I work with composers on music and licensing, actors on dialogue, and myself on sound design. I also have Simon Price – our dedicated Audio Programmer – working with me, without whom none of this would be possible.
Sonic Space
Having played many single player and multiplayer shooters, there was one thing that always concerned me – sonic space. In other words, how do you overcome the problem of having too many sounds all playing at the same time? When you have music, gunfire, dialogue, Foley, explosions, and ambient sounds all going off simultaneously, you’re generally left with aural mush. This was a problem we were determined to solve when beginning work on Brink.
I’d made some progress working on BLACK with the Choir of Guns concept, but it was evident early on that with Brink’s focus on blurring the lines between single and multiplayer, we had to up the ante . We wanted every sound in Brink to be heard perfectly, whether it was a Molotov cocktail exploding, a mini gun winding up, or a heavy body-type player coming round the corner to stomp on your face. These sounds were only going to be heard properly with enough space in the audio mix. If you consider that it’s entirely plausible to have 16 players in the same part of a level, all triggering the same sounds, then the true scope of this challenge becomes clear.
Continue reading the diary on Brink’s official website. Brink is slated for release this Spring.
Introduction
I’m Chris Sweetman, Audio Director at Splash Damage, and this developer diary is all about Brink’s sound design. What does an Audio Director do all day? Well, I’m responsible for the quality of everything that is heard in our games, including music, dialogue, and sound design. This can be broken down into various areas, including in-game gameplay, cut scenes, trailers and tons of other stuff.
I work with composers on music and licensing, actors on dialogue, and myself on sound design. I also have Simon Price – our dedicated Audio Programmer – working with me, without whom none of this would be possible.
Sonic Space
Having played many single player and multiplayer shooters, there was one thing that always concerned me – sonic space. In other words, how do you overcome the problem of having too many sounds all playing at the same time? When you have music, gunfire, dialogue, Foley, explosions, and ambient sounds all going off simultaneously, you’re generally left with aural mush. This was a problem we were determined to solve when beginning work on Brink.
Before we get all festive at our holiday party this weekend, I thought I’d share some compelling coverage for our games.
Recently, there’s been some really great coverage for Brink. If you haven’t already, be sure to read CG Society’s feature on the game’s art direction — complete with never-before-seen concept art for the game (like the image below)
Additionally, in the past week, Time.com’s Techland has had a couple features on the game. Head there to read Evan Narcisse’s quick-look preview, as well as an interview with Richard Ham and Paul Wedgwood.
Earlier in the month, we let you know about the Hunted and RAGE presentations taking place at this year’s Eurogamer Expo (more on that in a bit), but we also wantd you to know we have playable titles at the show. Like QuakeCon and PAX, you’ll have a chance to go hands-on with Hunted, New Vegas and Brink. And with Brink, you’ll even have a chance to chat with with developers from Splash Damage.
One quick programming note, the presentation for Hunted has been moved to 3:30 PM on Saturday, October 2nd. For those wanting to see RAGE, that presentation will be shown each day at 5 PM.
For more details on this year’s show, head to the event’s official site. If you think you’d like to attend, you might want to purchase your tickets now (Saturday’s tickets are already sold out).
Today we have a look back at recent news coverage for Brink — both at PAX and GamesCom. Having attended the former myself, I can tell you the queue for the game was insane… with waits between two and four hours. Still, everyone I spoke to said it was worth the wait.
Apparently Machinima’s Inside Gaming crew thought so, too. This past week they declared the game best shooter of PAX (aka the Boom Headshot Award).
Meanwhile, Machinima Respawn interviewed Creative Director Richard Ham at the show. We’ve got the video embed and plenty more after the break.
Just a reminder that we’re less than two months away (October 29th) until this year’s Golden Joystick Awards are announced. Shortlist voting, which runs through October 25th, includes the following nominees…
One to Watch Award
Brink
Fallout: New Vegas RPG of the Year Award
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition Ultimate Game of the Year Award
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition
For more details on this year’s Golden Joysticks, head here.
Brink Developer Diary #4, Endless Horizon, is now available for your viewing pleasure. In this latest doc, the team at Splash Damage discusses Brink’s unique visual flavor — both for the game’s characters and environment.
If you’ve missed the first three viddocs, head to IGN to watch them.
Another Tuesday, another new Brink video documentary. In this week’s video, The End of Genre As We Know It, you’ll learn more about how Splash Damage is blurring the lines between single player and multiplayer, as well as online and offline play in Brink.
