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The Fat Man, George Alistair Sanger
[Back To] Game Audio Resource Guide This article originally appeared in the February 2001 issue of:
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The Sound of Money (Down the Potty): Common Audio Mistakes in Kids' Games Somebody Stop Me!O.K., the knife is in. Now let's get down to the twisting. Picture this typical scenario: Mom works very hard at the office, then barely has the energy to cook. Somehow she manages. "Dinner! NOW!" shouts Dad, feeling guilty that it wasn't he who cooked it. "But I'm right in the middle of my game!" comes the kid's answer. Good. The game is interesting. The makers of the game can be proud. But the parents -- the customers -- are getting angry. "DINNER! Get in here right now or I'll throw that damn thing through the window." "O.K.! O.K.! O.K.!" answers the kid, if the parents are lucky. The kid comes to dinner. What do we hear from the other room all through the meal? Music! It's the ice cream truck, parked in our living room, clanking out "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" over and over and over and over and over again. And what's worse, every 45 seconds, a shrill voice yells out, "HEY! ARE YOU THERE? HEY! ARE YOU GONNA PLAY OR WHAT? SNORE!!!" Oh, yeah, the parents are going to love that. Why isn't there a "fade to silence after two minutes of inactivity" feature? Were the designers never in a human family? Are they designing for kids who don't eat, go to school, or play soccer? Is the target kid one who buys his own software and sets his own bedtime? And do you know why these games sell as well as any other games for kids? It's because even the greatest games in the world have these design problems, and the parents' choice is either to buy no games for their kids or to buy annoying ones. Can you imagine what would happen to sales of kids' games if some of them stopped being deathly annoying?
And Another Thing I should end the article here, but it is my duty as a Texan to go into areas I know nothing about. Here is my non-audio gripe: Who in the world decided to let this happen: "Mom, I can't come to dinner now! There's no place to save my game until I get out of this battle!" One game even makes you earn a certain object that allows you to save your game more often. (Long pause, Texas voice, one eyebrow raised.) Now I'm no game designer, but I know financial-suicide-by-greed when I see it. The kid has simply got to be able to save instantly at any time. Whatever the justifications are for having designated places in the game from which the player can save, trash them. If you have to hit your lead designer with a cattle prod until he admits that he screwed up, do it. I'll buy you a new cattle prod. If it's a hardware problem, and you'd have to solder another chip into every last cartridge yourself to rectify the problem, do it. I'll hold the soldering iron. Because that one element of game design has done more damage to our industry than any other. Parents might say that the problem is the violence, but it's not. It's the fact that games have committed the unthinkable crime. They have made parents' lives even more difficult than they already are. And they have done this by making it impossible to get a kid who is playing a game into a car, into his clothes, to school, to the dinner table, or even out of a burning building if that kid is in the middle of a game with no save screen. And what are the parents' choices? They can say, "O.K., I'll wait for you," which leads to untold misery and a quick undermining of the family dynamic, because now the sister, who was all ready to get into the car, asks if she can start a game too. The parents can say, "Quit without saving," which even parents know is a mortal sin -- besides, it can easily lead to an hour of tears. Or the parents can say, "No more games for you anytime within an hour of when another activity is planned." Which is, when you think about it, exactly what happens, because it's the only option available. Given the mistakes I've seen and heard, I think it's a damn miracle that games are even allowed in homes with kids. So pay attention to the lessons of your industry's history, and maybe you can make a bundle and save the world and a family or two. Discuss this article in Gamasutra's discussion forum. ________________________________________________________
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