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Ready Or Not Gameplay Reveal Trailer (Spiritual Successor Of Swat 4)

supernova8

Member
What's with all these cut and pasted twitter posts and updates. Is this even allowed on this forum? I'm not here to see an automated news feed. I don't think I've seen many other threads like this. Is this affiliated with the developer or something?

Same as IbizaPocholo. Threads about totally obscure games that nobody asked for or cares about.
 

IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman


So if you want to play the alpha now you have to pay $120?
Yes

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IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman


A work-in-progress snippet of Ready or Not's original soundtrack, featuring vertical layering to allow the music to fit a variety of different situations.

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Vol. 17 Ready or Not Supporter Development Briefing
Content: Soundtrack Design, Composer Q&A
by Guinevere, Community Manager


Introduction

Hey everyone,

It's time for the 17th biweekly briefing for Ready or Not, the first of a three part series stretching over the next several weeks covering the game's audio design. This time around we'll be covering elements of Ready or Not's music, and have the game's composer Zack Bower speak to his vision for the soundtrack.

Soundtrack Design

A game's soundtrack is vital to its identity. The tension it builds, the action it intensifies, the moments it brings to new heights. Each song has to be crafted not only to stand on its own, but to compliment the game's setting, tone, and experience. With this goal in mind, Ready or Not's soundtrack is being made to be as 'vertical' as possible, allowing us to add or remove layers during key moments in gameplay.

For example, the drums on a combat track may kick in when the player engages a suspect, and as the firefight goes on for more time or if more suspects are involved, the track will have more layers of music added in. By contrast, non-combat tracks are made to be unintrusive so as not to distract from the player's ability to gather information from other audio cues: you'll still be able to hear distant footsteps and voices through walls, but you'll have that underlying tension accompanying your actions.
Click the image above to listen to a snippet of Ready Or Not's original soundtrack.
Above: Click the image above to hear a snippet of one of Ready or Not's in-progress tracks, 'Broken Clock'.
Click the image above to listen to a snippet of Ready Or Not's original soundtrack.
Above: Click the image above to hear a snippet of one of Ready or Not's in-progress tracks, 'No More Lights'.

Both of the above tracks are small slices of Ready or Not’s soundscape.

Composer Q&A

Here to talk more about Ready or Not's soundtrack is our composer, Zack Bower, who recently joined our team and has proven himself to be incredibly hard working.

How did you end up joining VOID Interactive?

Believe it or not, two ingredients - A lot of luck, and a ton of persistence in the face of that internal voice going ‘don’t upload, this ain’t it’. I moonlight as a composer when I’m not at the day job, and if I’m not working away on a smaller project, I like putting time into remix tracks where I ask myself “how would I write this piece?” With that in mind, I took a sliver of Ready or Not’s main theme composed by the extremely talented Dan Liston and expanded on it, slowing it down and giving it a darker coat of paint. After a few days of hovering over the upload button and chewing my fingernails off, I finally decided to pull the trigger and post it around. 2 weeks later, I see a message from our Community Manager (the amazing Gwynn) asking if I’m up for a chat with our Creative Lead. The rest is history. I still lose sleep thinking about how exciting the whole thing is. Moral of the story - push against that ‘block’ as hard as you can.

What's your overall vision for Ready or Not's soundtrack?

I love Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory’s plunderphonics style. I think Amon Tobin nailed the atmosphere with this crazy cacophony of sound that perfectly matches the game. Being able to grab some of that style, mix it up with more orchestral music, and spread it out a bit more (a la ambient Eric Brosius) to give players as much situational awareness as possible is the #1 priority. Gritty, dark, hard hitting when it needs to be, these are some of the goals when working through the music for Ready or Not.

How do you tackle creating music for a game where environmental awareness and audio cues are so important? How does the soundtrack serve to enhance the experience?

The tactical shooter genre is tricky with music - how much do you pull back before you don’t have any music at all? In this case, we’re balancing it out through FMOD using a few parameters to mix things up. Busting a door down but not in combat? Let’s turn the ambient intensity up. Have a few suspects ganging up on you? Let’s turn the combat intensity up. Today’s tech lets us take full advantage of crafting a really immersive and intense soundscape, with a lot of expanded nuance. What’s really exciting is that line between ‘this is combat music’ and ‘this is ambient music’ can be blended to a point where there is no line - it’s music catered to how you’re experiencing the game.

What would you say are your greatest musical influences?

When it comes to sound textures and sheer experimentation, Amon Tobin is definitely my main go-to. Again, his work on Splinter Cell was so raw and visceral that it stuck with me long after release. He really nailed down the atmosphere just based on whatever textures he was exploring. On a more melodic note, Jonny Greenwood steals it. He dabbles in a lot of experimental stuff too, but his orchestral work on Phantom Thread is out of this world. Anyone with a command of emotion like that in the orchestrator’s chair gets a gold star from me.

What has been the most difficult, but most rewarding, part of working on Ready or Not's soundtrack so far?

It’s terrifying sitting on a track that’s about to go public - you really wanna please as many folks as possible, while maintaining that personal overall vision that encompasses everything. At the same time, that fear totally washes away working on some new tracks and being pumped to finally show ‘em off. It’s a game of balance that keeps my blood pressure in a good spot.

Conclusion

This concludes our 17th biweekly briefing, the first of three which will focus on elements of the game's audio design. A big thank you to our composer Zack Bower for taking time out of his busy schedule to talk to us a bit about his work. I hope to see you all next time for more development news!
 
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IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman

Ready Or Not - Development Update!
Hey everyone,

Today we’re sharing with you an update on the state of play for Ready or Not!

We know you’re all eager for information so let’s breach and clear our way through today’s news…



Beta Access Date Changes
Having been diligently reviewing the current status of Ready or Not the team has made the decision to push back the Beta access.

What does this mean for you? Beta access for Ready or Not will still take place later in the year, but later than originally planned. We know this will be disappointing for you to read, but we will continue to be open and update you with more information as soon as we can.


Why the delay?

Moving back a date, whether it's Beta access, Early Access or ‘full launch’ is never an easy decision, but we know it’s the correct one to make.

Everyone at VOID Interactive and Team17 wants to give you an amazing, unique experience with Ready or Not, and we don’t want to compromise that vision by sharing sooner than it’s ready. We owe it to both the game and to you, our awesome community.


Let’s get on the same page, what is Beta access?

Beta access for Ready or Not is a snapshot of the core gameplay loop. In this loop, you’ll get to peek through the window and glimpse the direction we want to take Ready or Not. We know this will also spark constructive feedback from our core fans, and it’s you the community we want to hear from.

Beta access has always been exclusive to anyone that has purchased Ready or Not through the VOID Interactive site, this has not and will not change.


What happens after Beta access?

For the weeks and months following Beta access, we’ll be taking your valuable constructive feedback, analysing the data and then weaving our learnings into our future production plans. At this stage, we’ll be evaluating what needs to be done and when we’ll be able to deliver on the next stage of our journey: Steam Early Access.

It’s worth noting that there’s a lot to do in-between Beta access and Early Access. We’re aware that the Ready or Not community is more accepting of seeing rougher versions of the game. Early Access will open us up to a wider fanbase, and we must prepare to deliver to a broader audience without compromising our core fans’ expectations.


So, what can I expect when Ready or Not launches into Early Access?

Current plans are for Ready or Not to launch into Early Access with the following –
  • A selection of co-op / single-player levels
  • A range of authentic weapons and equipment
  • A pre-planning mechanic
  • And more…
Of course, that’s just the beginning. Once we’re in Early Access we’ll be regularly updating the game with more content including new levels, weapons and characters. During this process, we’ll be talking to and listening closely to you all as we proceed through the Early Access journey together.

Your feedback matters and we look forward to collaborating with you!


Every cloud…

We know today’s news may come as a bit of a disappointment to some, so we’re sharing an early look at what we’ve been working on over the past few months. In the following section, we’ll discuss how we’ve re-evaluated the design of our most publicly shown map, Hotel.

Our artists have done a stunning job of crafting Hotel into what it is today, so we’ve snuck into the designers filing cabinet and acquired some insightful design feedback screens.

Hotel Atrium Level Design Update
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One of our bigger goals within Hotel is to improve navigation throughout the map. One way we can do this is by crafting natural breadcrumbs in the form of subtle signs and maps around the level. These have a compounding effect on improving the atmosphere too, and coupled with added environmental furniture like construction safety signage, the scene is brought to life by telling a story about the past of this room.

Hotel Café (Looking to Reception)
f348c9e9d6bfa9806226e2b832c5eba73824a04c.png


Here’s another example of just how much we can add by evaluating how to improve on level design. This has a huge impact on immersion in other ways too. We wouldn’t need to include UI markers or HUD indicators to direct players through the world. Instead, the focus becomes the world, directed by the subconscious and organic methods that we’re all already trained to do in the real world.

Hotel Gym – New Cover and Collision

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We’ve also focused more on collision and cover for players. Let’s be honest, there’s always a bit of extra fun gameplay to be found in cover, whether it’s sneaking up on the suspects or getting ambushed. In Ready or Not we also take into account cover density, as we have penetration mechanics through surfaces. In this scene, you can see how much extra value we’re going to add to the level design by going through in this second pass. Lastly, we’re improving the location of suspects and civilians in creative ways so that every playthrough is its own challenge.

Hotel Floor 1 – Flow Map

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Here’s a birdseye look at one of Hotel’s floor plans. Let’s break it down further, so skip over this next bit if you want to avoid spoilers...


[spoilers]

Ok good, so you'd like some spoilers... ready?

We want players to tackle challenges from different angles. That’s pretty much been the premise and core of what we want for Ready or Not. However, we’d be fools to ignore good design structure for our levels that show the experiences a player will go through as they traverse this floor.

To take a high-level approach, we’ve broken this floor into three sections. Green for safe, and yellow and purple for the two different encounter loops that are available, each with many different encounters. The encounter loops also have primary starting locations that give our art teams better direction with the steps we covered in the paragraphs above.

Encounter Layout and Overview

93aeac9984e56302500de99107d635503cae35b4.png


Here’s a glimpse of how each of the encounters within a loop is broken down. To avoid nesting spoilers in spoilers let's just enjoy the image and know that we’re working hard at improving the user experience and design on a granular level.

[spoilers over]

Oh, and for those that aren’t into level design, here’s the Krinkov SBR
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Debriefing

We’ll be making the most of this extra time and will continue to keep you all in the loop with our bi-weekly community briefings.

Thank you all for your patience and understanding with today’s news. If you have any questions, feel free to pop them in the comments section and we’ll jump in for a chat.

Thanks everyone!

Keep your feet on the ground.
VOID Interactive & Team17
 

IbizaPocholo

NeoGAFs Kent Brockman


Ready or Not has done a 180 from where they were a year ago. What an incredible experience and its only in Alpha!



Hello Ready Or Not Supporters,

We are happy to announce that our supporters will be getting a co-op content update today. This alpha update will include 5 playable co/op or single player levels. We aim to bring players a challenging AI experience within Los Suenos.

You will spawn in HQ, upon approaching the assignment desk you will be prompted to choose a mission. Once selected, all players must head to the red carpet and the mission countdown will begin.
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If you want to change your loadout or that of your team (if you are using AI companions), just head to the quartermaster station on the first floor.
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Once you've selected your loadout, you can test it in the shoothouse or the firing range.
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We really value your feedback and bug reporting, so please use the in-game tools to let us know when you encounter issues. Press Escape and click Report Bug and be as detailed as possible.
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Building a game as ambitious as Ready or Not with a desire to provide a more realistic experience has been incredibly challenging. Most recently, we had to take some major steps back to ensure the fundamental structures were going to work well and provide for a fun game-play experience. In trying to find this balance, we have created an experience that encompasses all of the lessons we have learnt over the past year.

NDA IS LIFTED on our alpha, meaning you can feely discuss the contents of the upcoming alpha update and share clips of gameplay as you see fit. We accept criticism, but invite you to be as professional as possible, understanding that your words carry weight and that there are real human beings working hard on this challenging game.

Join us for our next Q&A sessions on Discord for those that might be interested in chatting with the dev team. Our first will be scheduled for December 7th.

Warm regards,
VOID Interactive
 
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