The Complete Guide to Game Audio: For Composers, Musicians, Sound Designers, and Game Developers

by Aaron Marks

This comprehensive guide gives readers with basic music compositional skills the information they need to become commercially viable artisans. In addition to providing a foundation of prerequisite technical skills, including basic audio considerations and sound file formats, the book teaches the business skills needed to work successfully as an audio technician in the game development business. How-to features take the reader step-by-step, from purchasing the right equipment, understanding the various game platforms, and composing music and creating sound effects specifically for games, to the ins and outs of marketing, producing demo reels, determining fees, bidding projects, and negotiating contracts.

Genres: Music, Art, Game Design

2 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2001

About the author

"Where did we go wrong?" his parents often muttered after discovering Aaron had gone into business for himself. "We had groomed him for the mundane life of government service. We just don't understand." Today, operating from his fully equipped digital recording studio, he divides his time between his wife, daughter, the Clydesdale horse (we refer to him as the 'BIG' dog), the 5 'shorty' Jack Russell Terriers, the Labrador Retriever, 2 cats, 40 chickens, 2 goats, and his first love, music. The constant flow of traffic through the studio keeps this one man band actively creative as he composes and produces broadcast quality scores and sound effects all in the comfort of his own home. "You can't beat working at home. I can get ideas down quickly and work at my creative peak, even if it's 2 o'clock in the morning plus I get to stay close to my family!"

By age 15, Aaron Marks considered himself almost jaded. He had lived a year in Moscow, USSR; a year in Frankfurt, Germany; traveled through England and Europe skiing the Swiss Alps and walking the ancient ruins of Greece. He'd seen belly dancers and Big Ben, eaten "Borsch" and real "Fish and Chips", been tailed by and had ambushed Soviet KGB agents with snowballs. (His father served a time as an American diplomat.) He had even been playing guitar for over 2 years.

Then he wrote his first song...

"It seemed music was always part of my life. My father played organ, piano and accordion; my mother played stand up bass; my brother, drums. Even my grandmother was musical, she played sax." In between jam sessions, he managed to become an Eagle Scout, attend military school, learn to play piano and drums, attain a private pilots license and graduate from college (University of Texas at Austin). Somewhere in there, he grew up a little and decided he had to make a living.

Duty and patriotism called. He received a commission as a young Second Lieutenant, USMC and headed to California. Fellow officers and his troops as well, enjoyed working with him, his creative problem solving and good humor setting him apart from the status quo warrior stereotypical Marine. "The Marine Corps gave me the discipline to see every project through with attention to detail and vigor. It even carries over today in how I run my business." In his off duty hours Aaron played in his cover band "just for fun", organized a small 4 track studio and attended the Studio and Recording Arts program at the local college.

It started with "What do all these buttons do?" and ended with him becoming a much sought after engineer and producer for the yearly college album project. 3 albums later, working innumerable sessions, dealing with the talent, the groupies, the mastering facilities... he was ready to shift gears. With active duty behind him he set off to manage a popular local band for almost 2 years, learning the ropes and the club scene, engineering innumerable live sessions, dealing with the talent, the groupies, the booking agents... until a radio commercial contest piqued his interest. Within a week, he had written and recorded over a dozen 30 second spots. "I really felt like I was on to something, I had found my niche." The seed had been planted.

Fate instead took its own turn. With a pregnant wife in one hand and the fickle music business in the other, Aaron opted for the sensible approach, government service. The steady paycheck and challenge of working as an Air Traffic Controller seemed to satisfy his paternal responsibilities and his sense of adventure until a chance meeting. A jingle writer and score composer rekindled the dream and pointed him in the right direction. "I upgraded my studio to commercial grade equipment, put together a demo reel, developed a marketing strategy and told everyone what I was up to. I wasn't going to let this get away again."

While sitting at a radar scope "moving the metal" at Southern California TRACON (the busiest approach control facility in the world) in San D