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Writer's pictureEdgar Canelas

Amnesia: The Dark Descent – Cellar Archives

Updated: Nov 23, 2021

How sonification of the invisible provides the best gameplay experience.


Known for its terrifying atmosphere and sanity mechanics (Charles Onyett, 2010), Amnesia: The Dark Descent (Frictional Games, 2010) allows players to control the protagonist named Daniel and go through a series of levels inside a castle in order to progress the main plot while avoiding numerous threats. Amongst these various levels, there is one in particular – Cellar Archives – that puts players in a stressful and threatening experience by mainly presenting mere water splashes while they make up the rest from their own imagination. This post aims to describe how this level uses the audio narrative function to enhance player experience, specifically focusing on how it achieves immersion; shifts player’s focus towards sound cues and emphasises fear through sonification of an invisible threat.


Cellar Archives level starts with a rapid shift from a dry to a flooded cellar and soon the player first encounters an unusual, frenetic water splashes accompanied by screaming-like musical scoring and a rapid succession of water hyper-realistic sounds. These sounds are characterized by exaggerating how they would normally sound in real life and thus, could be one of the reasons sound have an immediate startling effect. Meaning, by enhancing their natural acoustical properties, sound has better processing fluency capability in order to stimuli the brain into providing the corresponding emotion (Inger Ekman, 2014). In this case, the sum of all audio cues with what cannot be seen, provides almost an instant perception of threat.


The process of designing the sound effects for this invisible monster is commented by Tapio Liukkonen (2010), one the developers, and he says:

“Hi, I am Tapio, and I made monster sounds, and vision sounds for this game. Yeah, I just love this monster, and I think it was pretty fun to make, because there was underwater sounds as well as sounds from above. I think I wanted it to sound like a very big monster, but still very fast, and I thought that the voice itself needed to be high-pitched screaming, because water is splashing around and messing other sounds. Actually, a great example is the attack sound – there is a big water splash, as it stands in the water.

At the same time, you can hear a short scream sound which is made from cat sounds, and I think it works great. I think other great sounds, is when it is eating in the level. You can hear it eating meat, and hear the bones crushing under the water. I made the eating sounds by walking in the water and breaking dry wood and sticks.

The sound itself didn’t need much processing or editing because it sounded almost like you hear now. Well, this is the water monster, so I recorded lots of water sounds. For example, bubble sounds are made with a watering can which is sunk in the water. And when it’s chasing the player, its movement is made by a big rock, which I just dropped in a lake. It feels like it is running after you, or hitting its big hands underwater. I think there is lots of power in this monster.”


These can be heard in game throughout the level and for example in the following clip (this clip has start and end time):



As a result, emphasis of the physical actions surrounding this level is achieved alongside the fact that the player must actively avoid being in the water by jumping through floating wooden crates or else the game is lost. Although it is safe while on the move, threat is always constant since the invisible monster follows the player based on the landing sounds.


The concept behind this invisible monster is commented by the developer Thomas Grip and he says:

“At first the creature in the water, affectionately called ´Lurky´ here at Frictional Games, did not have a sense of sound. Later on we wanted to add it, though, so the player could lure it away by throwing stuff in the water. When I added this, something unexpected happened. ´Lurky´ started following me! When you jump on a crate, it hears the sound you make when you land, and it goes to it to investigate. This was a very fun, emergent behaviour, and I think it made him even more menacing. I also wanna add that “Lurky” was kind of inspired by my favourite movie as a child, Tremors. I guess this early obsession might also explain some creatures in our older games.”


Later down the level, the player needs to escape one section by rotating a valve while keeping “Lurky” away by throwing human body parts, however, throughout this process, the player is facing the opposite direction and must rely on carefully listening to audio cues in order to perceive if the water splashes are moving closer or further.


This stress-inducing situation is further accentuated by background music drones and pads, which resemble more screeching noise-like sounds than actual melody and the concept is commented by the composer Mikko Tarmia (2010) alongside two isolated music passages:

“The guardian monster has its own musical theme, which you can hear in many situations in the game, even if the guardian is not physically present. Actually, it’s more like a noise-sound than a certain melody, and I’ve played it with my bassoon. The tune has many forms, and this one is almost the direct sound coming from the instrument. And this noise which sounds like screaming, is a highly modified version of it.”


These elements are shown, for example, in the following clip (this clip has start and end time):


The sum of all of these elements, specifically audio related ones, creates a sense of emotional presence (Przybylski, Rigby, and Ryan, 2010) and sensory type of immersion (Ermi, L., and F. Mäyrä, 2005), meaning the player creates an emotional link to the events happening which translate into the feeling of being physically present and experience fear, adrenaline rush and other threat related emotions. While the aforementioned immersion theories are inserted into their own context (how three sub-categories of immersion provides emotions and how these contribute to video game engagement respectively), the focus on this post is about on what ways those different approaches enhance the player’s attention, temporal and environment perspectives.


I could go further and argue that without all the audio elements, this level in particular would not provide an intense experience as it is with sound. In order to better demonstrate my point, I invite watching the following clip with start and end time which contains a chase sequence while muted and then with sound.



Thomas Grip (2010) also comments this sequence as it follows:

“This level is the high point of the Lurker buildup, which sort of started at the entrance level with the slime appearing. It’s supposed to be a sort of ‘roller-coaster’ ride and is designed to be easy enough to be completed on the first try. Yet, it should also be stressful. Many of the things in a level that seems like you barely make it, are just scripted to be that way. But it’s nothing you notice because they’re blended in with the truly deadly stuff.”


Given these points, I believe by using the expression “true deadly stuff” (Thomas Grip, 2010), it is mentioned that, (besides all the other related elements), the usage of sound in a frenetic consecutive way, indeed, plays an important role for the end goal of providing the most immersive stress-inducing experience possible while not visually showing a monster.

 

Reference List


Amnesia Fandom Wiki (2020) Developer Commentary, 6 October 2020. [Online] Available from: <https://amnesia.fandom.com/wiki/Developer_Commentary&gt; [Accessed 11 October 2020].


Charles Onyett (2010) Amnesia: The Dark Descent Review. [Online] Available from: <https://www.ign.com/articles/2010/09/03/amnesia-the-dark-descent-review&gt; [Accessed 11 October 2020].


coinage23 (2013) Amnesia: The Dark Descent – Developers Commentary – Part 8. [Online video], January 2013. Available from: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cp4ZRyWUtvI&ab&gt; [Accessed 11 October 2020].


Ermi, L., and F. Mäyrä. 2005. “Fundamental Components of the Gameplay Experience: Analysing Immersion.” In Proceedings of the DiGRA Conference, pp.7.


Inger Ekman (2014) A Cognitive Approach to the Emotional Function of Game Sound. In: Karen Collins, Bill Kapralos and Holly Tessier eds. The Oxford Handbook of Interactive Audio. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 7-8.


Mikko Tarmia (2010) Guardian Theme. Available from: Amnesia Fandom Wiki [Accessed 11 October 2020].


Richard M. Ryan, Andrew K. Przybylski, C. Scott Rigby (2010) A Motivational Model of Video Game Engagement. In: Review of General Psychology, Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 154-166.


Tapio Liukkonen (2010) Sound Creation of the Waterlurker. Available from: Amnesia Fandom Wiki [Accessed 11 October 2020].


Thomas Grip (2010) Playing with the Player. Available from: Amnesia Fandom Wiki [Accessed 11 October 2020].


Thomas Grip (2010) The Lurker Hears! Available from: Amnesia Fandom Wiki [Accessed 11 October 2020].


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