Soundelux Design Music Group Delivers Nuanced Sound Design for Latest Fable Xbox Game

Nov. 30, 2010 - PRLog -- HOLLYWOOD – In a project spanning nearly a year, Soundelux Design Music Group provided sound design services for Fable III, the latest installment in the enormously popular action-adventure game franchise from Microsoft Game Studios and Lionhead Studios, and available exclusively for Xbox 360.
Supervising Sound Editor Shannon Potter headed the Soundelux  team of sound designers who, working under the direction of Microsoft Games Studios Audio Director Kristofor Mellroth and Sound Design Supervisor Kristen Quebe, helped to create a cinematic and richly immeresive sound environment to support the game’s reimagining of the Kingdom of Albion.
“The Fable series is unique among games in its blending of gripping action with an impish humor; it covers great emotional range,” said Soundelux DMG Creative Director Scott Gershin who provided creative oversight and added his mixing talents to the cinematics . “The visuals are amazing and we wanted the soundtrack to have that same detail, precision and creativity. We needed to sonically deliver the kind of experience that the fans are expecting.”
Fable III is set several decades later than Fable II and depicts a civilization that has evolved and matured.  The weapons, for example, are more sophisticated and morph to suit the player’s style of play. “In this game, weapons can be good or they can be evil, made of exotic materials  or any number of different things that give them their own personalities,” explains Potter.  “This presented quite a challenge for the team.  It meant experimenting with different frequency ranges, textures and tones, some organic and some otherworldly to give each weapon its own sonic identity.  It was crucial that they feel natural, yet unique. Our goal was to creatively craft them into  the fabric of the Fable universe.”
The sound treatments applied to the game’s creatures, including the small pests known as Hobbes, have also evolved. “We wanted to give each different Hobbe set its own personality, so we used more vocal variation,” Potter recalls. “We manipulated the pitch, formats, and tone of each character. For other creatures, wedid some design Foley on the Foley stage.  We recorded some really great material for the wolves and thankfully all crew and equipment made it back alive.”
Having worked on Fable II was a great advantage to the Soundelux DMG team. It meant that they had an established  body of work to build on, as well as an established rapport with the audio artists from Microsoft Game Studios.  Communication was key, recalled Potter.  “We received updated builds on a regular basis from the Microsoft team allowing us to audition our work  in context and helping us to further customize each sound,”  she says.  “That is our preferred working method, short of doing the implementation ourselves.”
“We worked together as one team,” Gershin says. “We developed a great workflow that allowed us to support one another and take Fable III to the next level.”

About Soundelux Design Music Group
Soundelux Design Music Group is a full service audio post-production facility specializing in sound design, voice over recording and original music composition.  The company is located at 7080 Hollywood Blvd., Ste. 100, Hollywood, CA 90028. For more information, call (323) 603-5100 or visit www.soundeluxdmg.com.

# # #

About CSS STUDIOS, LLC
Hollywood, California-based CSS Studios® is a wholly owned subsidiary of Discovery Communications (NASDAQ- DISCA, DISCB, DISCK), the world’s number one nonfiction media company reaching more than 1.5 billion cumulative subscribers in over 180 countries. CSS Studios provides creative services to major motion picture studios, independent producers, broadcast networks, cable channels, advertising agencies and interactive producers. The services of CSS Studios are marketed under the brand names Todd-AO®, Sound One, Soundelux®, POP Sound®, Modern Music, Soundelux Design Music Group and The Hollywood Edge, with facilities in Los Angeles and New York. With more than 50 years of experience in providing creative sound services and technical solutions, the companies, collectively, have garnered more than 50 Academy Award nominations and won 26 Academy Awards®.