How Road Not Taken uses natural sounds in its audio

Road Not Taken, Spry Fox's upcoming puzzle game, uses sound recorded from dry leaves, sticks and family members, audio producer Daniel Simmons announced via the PlayStation Blog.

Road Not Taken incorporates roguelike elements into its puzzles in a game "about life and loss." According to the post, the game's world is "made up of magical and natural surroundings," which gave Simmons room to experiment outside of synthesized sounds. The sounds used for children in the game, for example, are recorded from Simmon's kids, ages 2 and 6.

"You can never really tell how audio is going to feel until it's actually in the game, so it's invaluable for me to be able to experiment with sounds in the Road Not Taken engine myself, as opposed to tossing them over the wall to the programming team," Simmons wrote.

"RNT is designed to be played for many hours, so we've also been working together to find ways to provide variety in the background sound, as well as subtle variations in some of the sounds you hear constantly. If we get it right, you'll hopefully feel immersed in the game and won't be tempted to hit the mute button, even after several hours of playing."

You can listen to more of the game's sounds on the PlayStation Blog.

Road Not Taken was announced in May 2013. It will launch for PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita and Windows PC via Steam. For more on the game, check out our interview with Spry Fox's David Edery.