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The Sonic Environments of Medieval(ist) Games

First author: Cook
Year: 2024


Abstract

What did the medieval world sound like? In recent years, significant attention has been given to that question, with regard to both the historical European Middle Ages and the various medieval or medievalist worlds created in literature, television, film, and video games. The latter group, however, has focused primarily on musical elements; John Haines, for example, tackles the soundtracks of medievalist film, while Bradford Lee Eden unpacks music and musical references within Tolkien's many novels. Ubiquitous by nature in modern representations of the medieval, but much less frequently analyzed in scholarship, is the diegetic soundscape itself—the sounds of nature, of buildings, of human or animal activity, and the like. This chapter builds on recent scholarship in ecomusicology, sound studies, video game music studies, and medieval history to unpack how modern sound designers and Foley artists create soundscapes for medieval or medievalist video games. It focuses on three main parameters: the sounds of nature (wind, water, and flora), the sounds of fauna (both human and animal), and the sounds of buildings or other spatial constructs (acoustical spaces, building material timbres), with a particular nod to the intersections of any or all of these categories.


Details

Language: English
Country of affiliation: United States


Published in: Music and Sonic Environments in Video Games: Listening to and Performing Ludic Soundscapes
Publication type: Book chapter


Source: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003275305-4


Games
No Results

Franchises
No Results


Studies

Description: Content analysis of how game audio depicts ''green medievalist'' stereotypes of nature, ecology, and the past

Research type: Non-experimental
Data type: Qualitative


Comparator: none
Control group: no
Pilot study: no
Pre/post measures used: no
Follow-up: no


Sample type: Game(s)
Sample size: 45
Power analysis: no
Sample countries: null


Games studied: The Sims: Medieval, Stronghold Crusader, Medieval Games, Medieval Dynasty, Life is Feudal: Your Own, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth, Hood: Outlaws & Legends, The Guild 3, Hero of the Kingdom, Graveyard Keeper, Mordheim: City of the Damned, Iron Lord, Crusader Kings III, The Battle for Wesnoth, A Plague Tale: Innocence, Foundation, Conquests of the Longbow: The Legends of Robin Hood, Grand Ages: Medieval, Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia, Gloria Victis, Robin Hood: Sherwood Builders, Besiege, Conqueror A.D. 1086, Going Medieval, Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars, Sid Meier's Civilization IV, Banished, Castle Flipper, Assassin's Creed, Apocalipsis: Harry at the End of the World, Northgard, Bad North, Assassin's Creed: Valhalla, The First Templar, Anno 1404, Mount & Blade, Ancestors Legacy, ArcaniA Gothic 4, Conquests of Camelot: The Search for the Grail, Valheim, Age of Empires 2, War of the Roses, Age of Empires 4


Franchises studied: Mount & Blade (F), Total War (F), The Sims (F), Sid Meier's Civilization (F), Kingdom Come: Deliverance (F), Grand Ages (F), Stronghold (F), Life is Feudal (F), Gothic (F), The Guild (F), Hero of the Kingdom (F), Anno (F), Crusader Kings (F), Broken Sword (F), Assassin's Creed (F), Age of Empires (F), A Plague Tale (F)


Study outcomes: Representing nature