There are two main levels you can work in, Indy and AAA. AAA are the games from studios you see on the shelves made with large teams. Some successful indy studios will get on the shelves too, but mainly they are smaller teams and smaller budgets. Competition is high to get into the industry but it can be cracked and there are many things you can do to help yourself and many things you can learn. The best thing about it is, all the software I mention below is free to download and learn (with the exception of the online courses).
Creating the SFX is only part of the job, knowing how to get them into the game and make them sound how you want is another.
Starting with creating the SFX, Every studio will want you to know a DAW at a high level. The most commonly used is Reaper. Its ridiculously cheap and in my opinion the most powerful of all digital audio workstations. It is completely customizable. If you struggle to leave your beloved ProTools/Logic etc there are themes that change the look of reaper and give you the shortcuts you know.
Moving on to getting SFX into the game. Known as middleware. There are two commonly used middleware's. AudioKinetic Wwise and FMod. Wwise is the more commonly used so the best place to start. FMod is a little more user friendly at the start but not as powerful in my opinion. By using middleware you are able to change things about the sound in game, ie; it’s attenuation (how far away it can he heard) and playback parameters. (Note. It can do much, much more than this).
Finally, creating the game. You have made your SFX, you have your SFX into the middleware. Now you need to put it in game. Again there are many game engines but there are two commonly used ones. Unity and Unreal Engine 4 (UE4). Large AAA studios may have their own game engine but Unity and UE4 are a great place to start. (Note. Game engines also have native audio. Middleware is not always used).
My advice (and also what I did). Start with Wwise. Their site has an amazing learning page. They give you a basic game and take you step by step through what Wwise can do and how to do it. You can also do their certification if you want. Reapers learning videos are also great and worth checking out. Another option is online courses. Im not sure if this one is still running but I did an 8 week course with SSR where they teach you how to make your own game in Unity and then implement your sound design into it. Very helpful to better understand game creation and the steps involved with other areas of development. I have heard very good things about School of Video Game Audio. They have a number of courses that are similar to the SSR one. Worth checking out, though bear in mind that everyone that does the course creates a similar showreel and you will want to stand out.
Create a showreel and a portfolio. When you apply to a job they will want to see what you can do and having a website is the easiest way to do that. At the start when you don’t have published games, a common practice is to take a game trailer or two and replace all of the audio. What ever you do for your showreel make it your “Sizzle Reel”. It should only showcase your best work, shouldn’t be longer than a minute (at the time of writing this mine is but only by 20 seconds!) and has to be audio to video. I spoke with a recruiter at an interview, they had 200 applications in one week. She said they went through each one and if they didn’t have a showreel on the landing page of their website they didn’t get looked at. If their showreel was more than 2 minutes long they didn’t look at it. If their showreel was just an audio file…you get the point…Power up Audio do very good break downs of peoples (who ask them too) showreels called Reel Talk. Really worth looking at for content and presentation pointers.
Building your portfolio. I worked freelance for a time while still working a full time job creating SFX for small mobile games and often bedroom start ups. The competition is tough for this type of work as everyone that’s trying to get into game audio is fighting for work. I used upWork for a time but they have recently changed their T&C and its not free to use anymore. I know people that have offered their services on fiver too. I also reached out to small game devs on twitter #gamedev #gameaudio. Another place to look for gigs is indie DB. People here are tying to put teams together to build smaller games but getting paid from them is…tricky.
I write this knowing it is not the same for everyone. I went from never hearing back from applications to getting three AAA offers. I have since learned that what set me apart was my portfolio. I created my own games in Unity and UE4. The second of which, I only used audio assets that I had recorded myself. I know creating your own game is a lot of effort and you don’t have to do that to get into the industry. But, a quick search of youtube and you will see hundreds of step by step tutorials on building games. I recommend Brackeys.
Pete
Reaper - https://www.reaper.fm/
Wwise - https://www.audiokinetic.com/products/wwise/
FMod - https://www.fmod.com/
Unity - https://unity.com/
Unreal - https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/
SSR - https://www.s-s-r.com/online-courses
SVGA - https://school.videogameaudio.com/apply/
PowerUpAudio - https://www.twitch.tv/powerupaudio
My Portfolio - https://www.prsounddesign.com/
IndieD - B https://www.indiedb.com/jobs
Brackeys You Tube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/
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