Spatial sound integration in games is quite common these days but normally they are done in the context of surround sound systems while less attention is given to smaller devices like headphones. But Sony is about to change that with the release of the Gaming Virtualiser by 360 Reality Audio plug-in.
In short, this piece of software is going to help game devs produce spatial game sound compatible with wearable audio devices. It is done through Wwise (I’m sure you have run into this logo at least once in some of the games you played) which is used by lots of studios and developers for creating interactive and spatial game audio across various platforms.
Current offerings in the market for integrating spatial sound require quite the amount of processing power from the hardware layer therefore Sony’s new tech helps optimize that process and cut down on hardware load, essentially freeing up more resources for the system to channel toward things like FPS and whatnot while guaranteeing low latency and a natural feel.
From the developer perspective, it helps save some time since the Wwise middleware will automatically take care of both mobile and PC environments so no complicated tweaks are required there. Devs also have the flexibility to adjust different sound elements like SFX and character voices independently or isolate environment noises from the rest to help creators realize scenes and vision more accurately.
At the time of writing, the software is currently undergoing validation by several game developers in Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, and China for integration into their games with some of them being renowned organizations/studios/dev teams including COLOPL, Inc., Cygames, Inc., GungHo Online Entertainment, Inc., Niantic, Inc., and SQUARE ENIX CO., LTD.
