This week I have been working on developing the sound for power ups and state artifacts for our game. The one I will describe today is the state-sound for when the avatar lacks of oxygen. Since the avatar is underwater during the entire gameplay, she has a tank on her back that delivers oxygen. The amount of oxygen is displayed on the hud along with ammo and the amount of samples that the player has collected. As time goes, the diver gradually consumes the oxygen and if depleted the avatar dies. In order to survive the player has to find samples that adds to both score and oxygen refill.
The sound effect kicks in when the tank starts to run out. This sound is used to help the player understand that she needs to find a oxygen refill.
When I began to make the sound, one of my first thoughts was: what actually would happen to the body when suffocation takes place. I started to watch some documentaries on youtube that described the symptom. In summary, what I found out was that the heart rate raises and the person starts to hyperventilate, along with other effects. So, this effect consists of two different sounds: Heartbeat and breathing.
Heartbeat.
The first thing I did was to find a heartbeat sound. This sound is quite common in other games to indicate that something bad is happening to the player. We use this in our for the same reason. The heartbeat track duration is 30 seconds. The pace is split up into four different sections. The first section plays with a speed of 95 beat per minute (bpm). The second part plays faster at a pace of 110 bpm and the delinquent two parts contains slower tempo.
With other words, the heart beats fast in the beginning and then it turns slow towards the end.
I decided to design the sound like this in order to indicate the critical state of the avatar. The player understands in the beginning that she needs to provide oxygen to the diver, and if not the pulse slows down and the avatar dies.
Breath.
I actually recorded this track myself, using my own voice/breath trying to simulate the suffocation. But since I am a man and the avatar is supposed to be androgynous I had to manipulate the voice so I did not sound as manly.
I adjusted the voice in a plugin program called Melodyne. This program can distinguish every note value of a track and display them individually. When done so, one can manipulate every note and change its tune. (see picture)
The breath track consists of coughing and wailing breath.
The heartbeat and the breath combined seemed to deliver the feeling that I wanted.
Here it is:
Samuelehnberg 
I like that you have described the way you were thinking when you were designing the sound for the game, and made research on what the sound you are trying to resemble actually sounds like.
The sound itself is very well done with a lot of thought behind it.
One thing that I do wonder is if you are going to play some kind of other ambiance or music at the same time as this sound plays. Or will the music/ambiance get quiet and be replaced by the soundtrack you made?
Which program did you use to add the sound of suffocation with the heartbeats? You did not describe the way you did this so I assume Melodyne supports the feature of adding sound clips with voice recording.
The one complaint I have about the sound design is that it is way more horrifying then the graphical art style of the game. Making it feel a bit misplaced. Also I do not know if you will have a song of some sort playing while the tank is above the oxygen level of suffocation, but try to keep in mind to alter the sound with the soundtrack so that it has a balanced audio level.
Other then that the blog post was a nice read.
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