Don’t Miss: Veteran director Khris Brown on the secrets of great voice acting
Producing believable, satisfying voice acting for your game is tricky business. Perversely, the work of voice actors and directors seems to be one of the most neglected aspects of game design; the topic is too rarely discussed within the industry, and it only bubbles up in popular media when a game includes particularly effective — or disruptive — performances.
With that in mind, Gamasutra reached out to voice director, creative consultant and game industry veteran Khris Brown to better understand how high-quality voicework in games comes together from a developer perspective.
Brown has been involved in the business of video game voice acting for over twenty years. While we get into her experience and past projects a bit in the ensuing interview, you should know that she currently serves as both the creative director for Ubisoft Montreal’s Narrative Talent Group and Double Fine’s in-house casting & voice director. She most recently worked on games like Child of Light, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag and Broken Age, and in the following edited correspondence with Gamasutra she shares some practical insights from her work alongside teams both large and small.
How did you get involved with voice acting, and the game industry in general?
KB: The first game I ever played was called Wumpus in about 1976. The first game I ever programmed was on a PET computer in 4th grade. We saved them on cassette tapes. I was working in what was supposed to be a summer job at Lucasfilm Games in 1990 and David Fox asked me to stay. My first credited game is Monkey Island 256 — because 256 colors warranted a “Special Edition” at the time. We were just beginning to explore the concept of “Talkies,” and we officially launched the Voice Department in 1992. Our first test recordings were of Noah Falstein as “Bobbin” in Loom.
One of Brown’s earliest credits is for her performance as hotline operator Chester in Monkey Island 2.
Some of my first casting “finds” were people like Roy Conrad for Ben Throttle in Full Throttle and Nick Jameson for the voice of Max in Sam and Max. We also used Mark Hamill in Full Throttle because he auditioned for us, and we were floored by his incredible acting ability. We were lucky to have been able to work with some of the most well known people today at the beginning of their careers, such as Steve Blum (whose first video game role was as “Sid the crazy biker” in Full Throttle) and Tara Charendoff (now Tara Strong, famous as Harley Quinn in Batman and Twilight Sparkle in My Little Pony).
I left LucasArts in 1998 to work as a consultant on the Star Wars prequels, and began to take on other clients such as EA, THQ, Microsoft, Sony, and film-related studios like Skywalker Sound and Pixar. I’ve been casting and directing actors and consulting on story and character for a little over 24 years and feel incredibly lucky and grateful every day.
How do you go about helping actors deliver their best work?
It’s all about creating trust and a safe place for the actor to find or create whatever memory or moment they need in order to be true to the script. Technically, I ensure that I’m in a comfortable studio and have plenty of time to work. I use engineers I trust who have recorded voice for games and animation for years. They understand actors’ rhythms and needs, and have no desire to be center stage.
It’s always worth the extra 50-100 percent an hour rate to work with experienced, ego-free
“My job is to say without words, ‘It’s safe. I’m with you.'”
studios. In a windowless, sometimes dark, sometimes small room for hours, misunderstandings will happen and “vibes” can pile up fast. I keep it light, and am always ready to laugh things off or be the first to apologize, and to move on. We limit the voice on the talk back mic to only one: mine (okay, maybe two if the engineer needs a technical adjustment.)
If I have a panel of clients (writer, creative director, producer) in the room, they’ll tell me what they think and I will translate it for the actor. This helps retain a consistent emotional lifeline, as the booth can feel quite isolating, even to the pros, and a single voice prevents “opinion dog-piling” that will confuse the actor. I never say snide things like, “That was great. Now can you do it with acting?,” or yell at the actor to create a “real moment.”
Sometimes I’ll model the desired energy (which sounds very hippie-ish but is quite real) by telling a story about how I felt in a similar situation. My job is to say without words, “It’s safe. I’m with you. Here’s a candle. Let’s walk through the dark.”
Brown recommends this Broken Age behind-the-scenes promo clip as an example of the sort of friendly, light atmosphere developers should cultivate in their recording sessions.
An essential part of this is also understanding every detail about the world and the script, so that if the actor has a question, I can immediately explain my request. This also allows me to assess whether their interpretation of a line, if it’s new and surprising, might even be better than what I or the rest of the team had imagined.
In short: know your stuff, be supportive, have no ego, and be ready to laugh. Do not give up after 3 takes. Do give up after 10 takes. We had 27 takes of Indiana Jones saying, “It’s a cup full of lava.” The actor was exhausted, and we ended up Frankensteining the line anyway (pasting two takes together to create our ideal).
I also save “sound sets” (yelling/deaths/battle) for Friday from 4PM-6PM. The actor may have a car commercial that will pay them $60K on Wednesday afternoon. I’m not going to expect them to ruin their voice for $2K on Wednesday morning. Give respect, get respect.
So what would you recommend to your fellow developers looking to improve the vocal performances in their games?
Good performance comes from 3 things: good writing, good casting, and supportive directing.
Everything begins with the script. I try to get the writers involved in the process as soon as a game idea is green-lit. Even if the game is very simple, the writer must intimately understand the rules of the world. This gives them the freedom to play with that world’s boundaries, and those edges can be where the most powerful moments of characterization occur.
Throwing writers at a design at the last minute with the pressure to fill in some type of negative space with narrative is pointless. As a player, I’d rather have no narrative than bad narrative. Supporting the writers by involving them at the outset has a greater chance of giving the actors powerful, interesting material to bring to life.
With casting, the saying that “directing is mostly casting,” is true. I solicit auditions with sides (audition copy) for each individual character with greater than 20 lines. I don’t cast from demos (a cut-together sample reel of the actors’ previous work) unless I know the actor extremely well. For Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, it was a 5-minute casting because I just plugged in favorite
“Do not get caught in the ‘more lines per hour is better’ trap. Quality trumps quantity. Cut your line count and make them good.”
people who I knew could do the job: Grey Delisle Griffin, Phil LaMarr, etc. It worked because I’ve known them for 15 years and because Dean Evans, the creative director, was amazing at describing exactly what he wanted.
With most other games, casting is iterative, and requires at least a single audition, and at most a studio callback followed by an in-person callback to see how the actor responds to direction (or to the other actors if we’re recording “ensemble”, which is all the main actors in the room at once). Often, listening to or seeing the auditions will inspire the writers and creative director to go in a different direction with the character. It’s an exciting process of both exploration and honing — you can not direct an actor who does not know who they are into any type of powerful performance.
Supportive directing is a long topic. The brief version is to stop worrying about anything related to what people think of you in the role of the director. I often see people at two extremes: indecisive and intimidated (the, “I’m too scared to tell you what I want, so I’ll just keep asking for more takes” director) or overcompensating and intimidated (the, “I think a director wears jodhpurs and carries a bullhorn and a riding crop, so I’ll be bossy and insulting” director). Both are unnecessary. Take time to review the script (even doing table reads) with your writer(s). Ensure that everyone who will be present (including the actor, if you have time to rehearse with them) knows the “journalism answers” about the script: who, what, why, when and where. The actor must be able to ask the director questions any time about anything.
Do your research and be prepared. Understand the emotional motivations of each character.
Do not get caught in the “more lines per hour is better” trap. Quality trumps quantity. Cut your line count and make them good.
Lastly, if you don’t have a VO director on staff, hire a professional video game voice director. They are few, but worth it. They will ask a hundred questions about the script that will often make the narrative, as well as the level design and therefore the game as a whole, more cohesive and compelling.
Fair enough, but many of our readers are small-scale developers who are working with rudimentary recording equipment and casting novice actors, friends and family members. It sounds like good writing and compassionate direction goes a long way, but are there any specific techniques you can recommend, or common mistakes you’d like to help developers avoid?
As you noted, strong writing is essential. Most players bond with interesting characters rather than feeling compelled by a typical 3-act plot structure (as they would in a linear narrative). Good characterization from the writer will give great support to whomever is performing the voice, even if that actor is a beginner.
For auditions, with a lower budget, I’d seek out and audition local theater students who are looking for credits on their resumes. Have people audition in person to gauge if you get along well and can co-create together. Directing is mostly casting, and the rest of the performance will only be good if mutual trust exists. If someone is a great actor, but a pain to work with, the session will not flow naturally, and the result will be lower quality.
“A quiet room with insulation is crucial. Many voice actors nowadays will record auditions in a hotel room under the bedcovers with an inexpensive iPhone mic.”
Avoid people who are exclusively focused on impressions, mimicry, or accents — these are not the same as acting. Target people who, in their reads, make you feel something personal and emotionally resonant. If you find yourself evaluating someone intellectually (e.g. “I can see how he made an interesting choice with X”), you’re wasting time. Saying, “Holy cow, that person made me feel [happy, sad, creeped out, etc.],” when it’s a match for the feeling you want for that character – that’s the vein of gold to mine. Most humans innately know when a dog or other person feels “sketchy” or dangerous on the street. Follow that instinct, rather than over-intellectualizing.
Once the project is cast, do at least one table read to iterate on the script, but have only one ultimate decision-maker about final line changes, if any. Actors should always be paid for their workshop and recording time, even if it is only $20/hr. Try as hard as you can to find a low-cost but reasonable-quality professional recording studio and engineer. Many community colleges have broadcasting programs — see if one of the engineering students has a space where voices can be recorded inexpensively. Do a test recording in that space first (even 15 minutes with your own voice), and integrate those samples into the game to ensure there is not too much room tone or other technical issues.
In the studio, performers and directors should focus on the actors behaving in a way that feels natural for them. Rather than trying to “act with a capital ‘a’,” acting is about believing you are who you’re portraying, and then being that person wholeheartedly — resonant performances are honest performances. An actor should not pretend or imagine what it would feel like if their character is heartbroken — an actor should remember a heartbreak from their past, live in it, and then say the line.
I heard an actor say to a director once, “Wait, do you mean that you want me to feel this way in the scene, or in real life?” The director said, “Why do you think there’s a difference?” Truth can not be faked. It’s dangerous work, and requires courage. Allow for improvisation and natural language changes in the studio, and allow the actor (within reason) to try a few different versions if an alternate read feels more natural for a few lines (not all lines). Don’t be married to the way the writer or director “heard” the line in their head. Keep clean, well organized notes in the studio of your “selected takes.” They will save many editorial hours. If you’re recording a conversation between people, recording “ensemble” (with the actors in the same room at the same time) can be a great way to keep the conversation natural, as long as the actors do not speak over or interrupt one another.
I think new voice actors can benefit greatly from the advice of well-known actor Dee Bradley Baker on his Studio Etiquette page. New directors can benefit greatly from an excellent book written for stage directors, Notes On Directing, which has many tips applicable to directing for any medium.
Regarding doing good voice on poor equipment or any equipment, a quiet room with insulation is crucial. Many voice actors nowadays will record auditions in a hotel room under the bedcovers with an inexpensive iPhone mic. Dee Bradley Baker’s page is definitely my “go to” for how to record under extenuating circumstances, although the myth that we listen to auditions in our car is not accurate for video games and animation — we’re sticklers for audio detail.
So when it comes to voice acting in games, what could we be doing better?
Before we decide to hire actors, we need to figure out if we’re really committed to character and narrative in a game, and to be very honest with ourselves about how or if it’s truly serving the design. If we’re truly committed, then all the steps mentioned above will help. If it’s just something to put on the back of the box, I don’t believe it’s worth the expense. That’s coming from someone who was a founding member of the first professional VO department in the industry.
I love voice more than anything. I want it to be done well, because it can be life-changing — I have the letters, and I’m not the only one. But when it’s done poorly, it can destroy the experience. Better no voice at all than poor voice. Costume Quest is a great example — we could have done voice and we chose not to. I still think it’s one of the most endearing games of the past few years.
A hot topic at the moment is celebrity voice in games. Because I’ve personally worked with so many celebs, people often assume I’m automatically in favor, but it depends on the situation. A long time ago, someone in a AAA publisher’s marketing group did a study about whether having celebrities in games if they weren’t already attached to a brand (e.g. John Madden in Madden or Patrick Stewart in Star Trek) was worth the cost. The answer was, “no.”
The “butts in seats” model (whereby an A-list celeb in a film guarantees a certain amount of box office proceeds) simply didn’t apply to games. When celebrities are perfect for a role, the results can be amazing. When they’re not, there’s a danger that the industry can be seen as trying to take narrative and characterization shortcuts by hiring typecast actors instead of doing the hard work of creating innovative, powerful characters of our own. It can also make us look as though we’re trying to assign ourselves borrowed credit and glamour by hiring celebrities. This can backfire doubly when they’re wasted on rushed scripts or uncertain direction.
If we truly believe in our art, we don’t need any external validation. When we put story and character first, the best actors will knock down our doors, and the best scripts will be recorded with laughter and joy.
The latest Nintendo Download update for Europe has arrived, and it’s bringing new games galore to the eShop in your region.As always, be sure to drop a vote in our poll and comment down below with your potential picks for the week. Enjoy!
Switch Retail eShop – New Releases
Code: Realize ~Future Blessings~(Aksys Games, 23rd Apr, £35.99 / €39.99) – The Romance(s) Continue! – Experience new scenarios taking place after the main story as well as more in-depth looks at events that happened in the shadows of Cardia’s previous adventures. Further your relationships with the charming literary figures of the first game. Choose to deepen the connection with your previous beau, or explore exciting new relationships with gentlemen you bypassed the first time.
NARUTO SHIPPUDEN: Ultimate Ninja STORM 4 ROAD TO BORUTO(BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment, £44.99 / €49.99) – The latest game in the Ultimate Ninja Storm series is finally here for Nintendo Switch! It features all DLC, including the latest “NEXT GENERATIONS” DLC Update Pack. Relive the Fourth Great Ninja War that unfolded in Naruto Shippuden, and experience the story of Boruto: Naruto the Movie featuring Naruto’s son, Boruto Uzumaki. Plus, choose from 124 ninja—the most in the series! Join in action-packed battles, whenever and wherever you want!
Trials of Mana(£44.99 / €49.99) – A remake of the (previously Japan-only) third entry in the Mana series. When the world was shrouded in darkness, the Goddess of Mana drew forth the Sword of Mana to smite the eight Benevodons, monsters of destruction. She sealed the horrors inside the eight Mana Stones, bringing the realm back from the brink. Weakened from rebuilding the world, the Goddess changed herself into a tree and fell into a deep sleep for many years. – Read our Trials of Mana review
Switch eShop – New Releases
Animal Fun for Toddlers and Kids(winterworks, 23rd Apr, £5.99 / €6.99) – Tap the different animals to interact with them and hear their common sounds or other funny noises. Some animals and little surprises are hidden within the game. Can you find all secrets? The game features FIVE different locations: FarmAntarcticaNorth AmericaAfricaAustralia The game makes use of the touch screen functionality only. So the menu and every scene can be played with touch controls only.
Arcade Archives TUBE PANIC(£6.29 / €6.99) – “TUBE PANIC” is a shooting game released by Nichibutsu in 1984. It is considered to be the first game circuit board to have a 3D rotation function. A mysterious tube net appears before the command ship Marcus as it cruises through space. Use 360 turning to battle enemy ships hiding in the depths of each stage, and face off with the mother ship’s fleet waiting at the end.
Archaica: The Path Of Light(£13.49 / €14.99) – As the Light Bearer, your quest is to walk the legendary Path of Light and explore an ancient and beautiful world. The light is the key to open the secrets of this mysterious civilization. You have to understand how various devices work to manipulate the lasers and direct them into the right triggers.
Broken Lines(Super.com, 23rd Apr, £22.49 / €24.99) – Broken Lines is a narrative-driven tactics game where a group of soldiers ends up deep behind enemy lines after their plane crashes. In this alternate version of WWII, enemies are both mysterious military units and the soldiers’ own hopes and fears as they confront the mental and physical horrors of war during their struggle to return to friendly territory.
Damaged In Transit(Everook, 23rd Apr, £12.19 / €13.59) – Split your attention in Damaged In Transit! This brain-splitting action-puzzler will leave you cross-eyed! Simultaneously pilot your two drones and help them deliver their precious cargo. Spikes, pitfalls, flamethrowers and enemy robots will threaten your shipment as you trek across 125 levels of desert oases, coal mines, ports, oil rigs, and the core of the Earth! Deftly pilot your drones around the map and use the items you find to open pathways and get those packages delivered safely! Embrace the miracle of automated delivery!
Debtor(£4.99 / €4.99) – Did you just wake up in the afterlife? The only thing you know is that you’re tasked with a strange mission – collect all your debts! Pick all the coins in 30 levels full of riddles, lethal traps, ruthless enemies… and time pressure! Be smart, be fast and make the best use of your hero’s assets: a rock-solid head that can crush blocks and some good ol’ explosives. You also need to take advantage of your environment by pushing and placing boxes in a clever way. Just like in the golden days of gaming, enjoy some nice chiptune music, silly characters and pixel graphics and challenging puzzle-platforming action.
eSports Legend(Coconut Island Games, 23rd Apr, £9.99 / €10.99) – Esports Legend is an Esports club simulator. You are here to make an unknown amateur team world-famous within several seasons! Hundreds of members with unique personalities and skills are waiting for you to recruit! Else than the four major leagues, there are dozens of cups to challenge. Be the winner, win the prize and make your team legendary!
Guard Duty(£9.99 / €9.99) – Tondbert, loyal Guard to the Castle of Wrinklewood has a lot to answer for. Under his watch someone has snuck into the kingdom and kidnapped the princess — an event that will have consequences well into the future. A thousand years later, humanity is on its last legs before being wiped out by an evil dark force.
Hang The Kings(QUByte Interactive, 23rd Apr, £0.89 / €0.99) – Hang The Kings is a chess-inspired puzzle game. – 100 hand-crafted levels with increasing complexity. – Originally composed music to help you focus and relax while solving the puzzles – A fun chess puzzle available to everyone (even to those who never played chess)
Help Will Come Tomorrow(Klabater, 21st Apr, £17.99 / €19.99) – Game focuses on the survival of the characters: meeting their needs, gathering resources, expanding the camp, exploring surroundings. In order to win the player needs to learn the personality of the characters and work out relations between them, mitigating conflicts and taking care of the morale. Manage scarce resources and stay alive in the frosty wilderness of Siberia before help arrives.
ITTA(Armor Games Studios, 22nd Apr, £13.49 / €14.99) – ITTA is a bullet-hell adventure set in a world filled with monstrous bosses. When Itta wakes up and finds herself surrounded by her dead family, her only guide is a strange spirit that takes the form of the family cat who gifts her a glowing revolver for protection.
Legends of Amberland: The Forgotten Crown(Pineapple Works, 20th Apr, £16.19 / €17.99) – Nostalgia strikes true with this 90s-inspired, old-school, western RPG dungeon crawler in which you command a party of up to seven characters! Its grid-and-90-degree-rotation-based movement system evokes the classics of the dungeon crawler genre. The game tells many little stories, that help make it’s vast, open-world feel very much alive.
Little Busters! Converted Edition(PROTOTYPE, 23rd Apr, £40.49 / €44.99) – Since its humble beginnings as a PC game, the “Little Busters!” visual novel has continued to evolve. In the past decade, we have seen spin-off games and console adaptations, as well as the release of comic, novel, and anime adaptations. It’s easy to see why; the underlying theme of friendship in this romantic adventure game has had players hooked from the very start. Now, get ready to laugh and cry your way through the “Little Busters! ” story as the game comes to Nintendo Switch!
MetaChampions(Octobox Interactive, 22nd Apr) – MetaChampions is a turn-based strategy game. Experience classic auto battler gameplay on Nintendo Switch! It’s the best strategy battler! A strategy is key, but luck also plays a role! Create your elite formation from a roster of 45+ heroes and be the best player in 8 player online matches. [Fast Matches] Matches that last 10-20 minutes are fully packed with multiple strategic decisions and tactical adaptations to the situation on the battlefield.
MotoGP™20(23rd Apr, £39.99 / €49.99) – Rev up your engines for a new chapter of the MotoGP series! With MotoGP20, experience all the thrills of the more-complete-than-ever Managerial Career mode and decide whether to join a 2020 season team and race together with the official riders or join a totally brand new team. Discover more realistic physics, improved graphics, new 3D models of riders and face scans of official MotoGP™ team managers, plus new animations.
PICROSS S4(JUPITER, 23rd Apr, £8.99 / €9.99) – This is the 4th Picross S Series on the Nintendo Switch! There are brand new puzzles for you to enjoy in all four familiar game modes: Picross, Mega Picross, Color Picross, and Clip Picross. We’ve also added bonus Extra puzzles which are dedicated for Picross S series veterans! There are two 30×30 large Picross puzzles for you to solve. Link the play data from Picross S, Picross S2, and Picross S3 to unlock an even larger 40×30 Picross puzzle for each series played, up to a maximum of three.
Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope(Yacht Club Games, 20th Apr, £13.49 / €14.99) – Enjoy the original standalone adventure that launched Shovel Knight on his quest to discover the true meaning of shovel justice. Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope is a sweeping, classic action-adventure game with awesome gameplay, memorable characters and an 8-bit retro aesthetic. It’s a hot mashup of new and old! You play as the eponymous Shovel Knight, a small warrior with a huge quest.
SmileBASIC 4(SmileBoom, 23rd Apr, £19.99 / €21.99) – (This is the version of “SmileBASIC 4” without Server Tickets. In order to upload your works to the server or unlimited downloading of the published works, you need to purchase Server Tickets in the game. ) This is the programming software, “SmileBASIC 4”, that allows you to create and play games with Nintendo Switch!
Sunless Sea: Zubmariner Edition(Digerati, 23rd Apr, £14.39 / €15.99) – LOSE YOUR MIND. EAT YOUR CREW. DIE. Take the helm of your steamship in a Victorian Gothic roleplaying game of discovery, loneliness and frequent death. Find your father’s bones. Determine London’s destiny. Defy the gods of the deep sea. Build up your story across generations of zailors who braved the sea and lost. Real-time combat against ships and Zee-beasts, spider-crewed dreadnoughts and sentient icebergs.
TaniNani(22nd Apr, £4.49 / €4.99) – TaniNani is a puzzle game where you move parts of the level around to help the characters find the crystal and each other. Explore a unique puzzle experience in your own pace, test your brain with optional challenges and unlock cute outfits for Tani & Nani.
The Copper Canyon Dixie Dash(Black Dragon Studios, 23rd Apr, £5.99 / €6.69) – Help Dixie Davies get her Dad’s western robot theme park back under control. The robots have gone wild! Sheriff Bolts and his deputies have all malfunctioned and taken over. Fight through the town, the canyon and the mines to get to the menacing robot Sheriff and reclaim the park. The deputy robots can be dismantled and destroyed with some swift and well-placed shots from a choice of weapons. Use the special “dash” mode to disarm and destroy the mad robots even quicker! Use the sniper rifle for pinpoint accuracy. Be ready though, for battling that robot Sheriff, he is a really tough one!
Valfaris & Slain Double Pack(Big Sugar, 23rd Apr, £14.39 / €15.99) – Experience two of the most metal games ever made in this gore-drenched double-pack from Big Sugar and developer Steel Mantis. This bundle contains cult hit Slain: Back From Hell, and the critically acclaimed Valfaris. Slain: Back From Hell: A heavy metal inspired arcade combat game with stunning pixel art visuals, challenging old-school gameplay, and a brutal soundtrack. Fight through a Gothic world and face the deadly overlords that reign over each of its cursed realms.
Where Angels Cry(Ocean Media, 23rd Apr, £8.99 / €9.99) – Strange events are taking place in an isolated medieval monastery, set high in the Alps. Monks are vanishing without a trace, mysterious persons are being sighted running through the dark passages of the monastery in the still of the night, Templars have now been assigned to stand watch and there are even reports that a statue in the centre of the village is crying the tears of blood! A Vatican Cardinal has chosen you to travel to the monastery, undercover, to investigate these bizarre occurrences.
Yumeutsutsu Re:After(DEGICA, 23rd Apr, £44.99 / €49.99) – To answer the requests of the fans, here are five new stories of what happens After. Yumeutsutsu Re:Unification: Follow Ai and Kokoro as they find themselves in charge of the creation of a fan disc for their successful game. This time, Ai is tasked with the SD arts, while Kororo is tasked with the plot!
Yumeutsutsu Re:Master(DEGICA, 23rd Apr, £58.49 / €64.99) – Yumeutsutsu Re:Master is a girls-love adventure game set in a small Japanese game studio. The story is set in the town of Koenji, not far from the imperial capital of Tokyo, where a small game studio called Eureka Soft has set up shop. The heroine Ai, a country girl, joins her sister Kokoro who works there, after receiving a mysterious email from studio head.
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Xbox Series X: What Do Game Devs Think Of Microsoft's Next-Gen Console
The Xbox Series X is set to usher in the next-generation of console gaming in just a few months--along with Sony's PlayStation 5. Microsoft has already shared plenty of details about its upcoming console, detailing the Xbox Series X's full specs, storage solutions, and more. To gain a better understanding of what this all means for game developers and architects, Windows Central spoke to Microsoft and various third-party game devs and asked them all about the Xbox Series X.
"As a game developer, one of the most exciting improvements that far exceeds expectations is the massive I/O improvements on Xbox Series X," explains Mike Rayner, Studio Technical Director at The Coalition. "In the current generation, as the fidelity and size of our worlds increased, we have seen download times and install sizes grow and increasing runtime I/O demands, which have made it challenging to maintain load-times expectations and meet world streaming demands without detail loss. The Xbox Series X has been holistically designed to directly address this challenge.
"With the Xbox Series X, out of the gate, we reduced our load-times by more than 4x without any code changes. With the new DirectStorage APIs and new hardware decompression, we can further improve I/O performance and reduce CPU overhead, both of which are essential to achieve fast loading." Microsoft has been toting the Xbox Series X's faster loading speeds, and it sounds like the console's new SSD and DirectStorage APIs are clearly having an effect on The Coalition's Gears 5 port.
The latest Nintendo Download update for North America has arrived, and it’s bringing new games galore to the eShop in your region. As always, be sure to drop a vote in our poll and comment down below with your potential picks for the week. Enjoy!
Nintendo Switch
Trials of Mana(Square Enix, Fri 24th April, $49.99) A remake of the (previously Japan-only) third entry in the Mana series. When the world was shrouded in darkness, the Goddess of Mana drew forth the Sword of Mana to smite the eight Benevodons, monsters of destruction. She sealed the horrors inside the eight Mana Stones, bringing the realm back from the brink. Read our Trials of Mana review.
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 Road To Boruto(Bandai Namco Entertainment, Fri 24th April, $49.99, Fri 24th April) Pre-order NARUTO SHIPPUDEN: Ultimate Ninja STORM 4 ROAD TO BORUTO and get the following content: – Early unlocks for 11 ninja costumes from the Boruto era – Early unlocks for 22 playable characters – Early unlocks for Momoshiki and Kinshiki Otsutsuki.
Switch eShop
Moving Out(Team17, Tue 28th April, $24.99) Are you ready for an exciting career in furniture? As a newly certified Furniture Arrangement & Relocation Technician, you’ll take on moving jobs all across the town of Packmore. Smooth Moves may not be the biggest moving company, but there’s no task too dangerous or strange for this busy team of go-getters.
Picross S4(Jupiter, Today, $9.99) This is the 4th Picross S Series on the Nintendo Switch! There are brand new puzzles for you to enjoy in all four familiar game modes: Picross, Mega Picross, Color Picross, and Clip Picross. We’ve also added bonus Extra puzzles which are dedicated for Picross S series veterans! There are two 30×30 large Picross puzzles for you to solve.
Active Neurons – Puzzle game(Sometimes You, Wed 29th April, $4.99) By controlling the power of thought, you must charge the neurons. The more the neurons are charged, the healthier the brain becomes. The healthier the brain becomes, the more of a fully-fledged life the person will live. It may seem simple, but it won’t be as simple as it seems.
Animal Fun for Toddlers and Kids(winterworks) Tap the different animals to interact with them and hear their common sounds or other funny noises. Some animals and little surprises are hidden within the game. Can you find all secrets?
Archaica: The Path Of Light(Drageus Games, Fri 24th April, $14.99) As the Light Bearer, your quest is to walk the legendary Path of Light and explore an ancient and beautiful world. The light is the key to open the secrets of this mysterious civilization. You have to understand how various devices work to manipulate the lasers and direct them into the right triggers.
Broken Lines(Super.com, Today, $24.99) Broken Lines combines a tactical RPG with story-driven gameplay. As your soldiers battle the mental strain of war, you’ll need to command them in combat— will they avoid the enemy, or go head to head with their foes? Combat is similar to that of a turn-based tactical RPG, but soldiers move only when the action phase starts.
Code: Realize Future Blessings(Aksys Games, Today, $39.99) The Romance(s) Continue! – Experience new scenarios taking place after the main story as well as more in-depth looks at events that happened in the shadows of Cardia’s previous adventures. Further your relationships with the charming literary figures of the first game. Choose to deepen the connection with your previous beau, or explore exciting new relationships with gentlemen you bypassed the first time.
Damaged In Transit(Everook, Today, $14.99) Split your attention in Damaged In Transit! This brain-splitting action-puzzler will leave you cross-eyed! Simultaneously pilot your two drones and help them deliver their precious cargo. Spikes, pitfalls, flamethrowers and enemy robots will threaten your shipment as you trek across 125 levels of desert oases, coal mines, ports, oil rigs, and the core of the Earth!
Debtor(Drageus Games, Fri 24th April, $2.99) Did you just wake up in the afterlife? The only thing you know is that you’re tasked with a strange mission – collect all your debts! Pick all the coins in 30 levels full of riddles, lethal traps, ruthless enemies… and time pressure!
Dread Nautical(Zen Studios, Wed 29th April, $19.99) Your cruise was so relaxing until the monsters from another dimension showed up to kill everyone. A tactical turn-based RPG with roguelike elements, Dread Nautical combines immersive gameplay with a cartoonish—yet captivatingly eerie—tone.
eSports Legend(Coconut Island Games, Today, $11.99) Esports Legend is an Esports club simulator. You are here to make an unknown amateur team world-famous within several seasons! Hundreds of members with unique personalities and skills are waiting for you to recruit! Else than the four major leagues, there are dozens of cups to challenge. Be the winner, win the prize and make your team legendary!
Guard Duty(Ratalaika Games, Fri 24th April, $9.99) Tondbert, loyal Guard to the Castle of Wrinklewood has a lot to answer for. Under his watch, someone has snuck into the kingdom and kidnapped the princess — an event that will have consequences well into the future.
Hang The Kings(QUByte Interactive, Today, $0.99) Hang The Kings is a chess-inspired puzzle game. – 100 hand-crafted levels with increasing complexity. – Originally composed music to help you focus and relax while solving the puzzles – A fun chess puzzle available to everyone (even to those who never played chess)
Little Busters! Converted Edition(PROTOTYPE, Today, $44.99) Since its humble beginnings as a PC game, the “Little Busters! ” visual novel has continued to evolve. In the past decade, we have seen spin-off games and console adaptations, as well as the release of comic, novel, and anime adaptations.
MotoGP 20(Milestone, Today, $39.99) Rev up your engines for a new chapter of the MotoGP series! With MotoGP 20, experience all the thrills of the more-complete-than-ever Managerial Career mode and decide whether to join a 2020 season team and race together with the official riders or join a totally brand new team.
Offroad Racing – Buggy X ATV X Moto(Microids) Offroad Racing offers a huge choice of all-terrain vehicles to get away from everyday life. Bomb along in a quad bike, buggy or motocross race and enjoy the change of scenery as you explore immersive offroad tracks.
SmileBASIC 4(Smileboom, Today, $24.99) (This is the version of “SmileBASIC 4” without Server Tickets. In order to upload your works to the server or unlimited downloading of the published works, you need to purchase Server Tickets in the game. ) This is the programming software, “SmileBASIC 4”, that allows you to create and play games with Nintendo Switch!
Sunless Sea: Zubmariner Edition(Digerati, Today, $19.99) LOSE YOUR MIND. EAT YOUR CREW. DIE. Take the helm of your steamship in a Victorian Gothic roleplaying game of discovery, loneliness and frequent death. Find your father’s bones. Determine London’s destiny.
Telling Lies (Annapurna Interactive) Four private lives. One big lie. Search through secretly recorded video conversations to discover the truth. The successor to the acclaimed Her Story.
The Copper Canyon Dixie Dash(Black Dragon Studios) Help Dixie Davies get her Dad’s western robot theme park back under control. The robots have gone wild! Sheriff Bolts and his deputies have all malfunctioned and taken over. Fight through the town, the canyon and the mines to get to the menacing robot Sheriff and reclaim the park.
Where Angels Cry(Ocean Media) Strange events are taking place in an isolated medieval monastery, set high in the Alps. Monks are vanishing without a trace, mysterious persons are being sighted running through the dark passages of the monastery in the still of the night, Templars have now been assigned to stand watch and there are even reports that a statue in the center of the village is crying the tears of blood!
Yumeutsutsu Re:After(DEGICA, Today, $49.99) To answer the requests of the fans, here are five new stories of what happens After. Yumeutsutsu Re:Unification: Follow Ai and Kokoro as they find themselves in charge of the creation of a fan disc for their successful game.
Yumeutsutsu Re:Master(DEGICA, Today, $64.99) Yumeutsutsu Re:Master is a girls-love adventure game set in a small Japanese game studio. The story is set in the town of Koenji, not far from the imperial capital of Tokyo, where a small game studio called Eureka Soft has set up shop.
So that’s your lot for this week’s North American Nintendo Download. Go on, be a sport and drop a vote in the poll above, and comment below with your hot picks!
The free Modern Warfare trail will allow players to play the game's multiplayer mode on five different maps. This includes Season 2's Khandor Hideout, Season 3's Hovec Sawmill, and three others.
PlayStation 4 players can play Modern Warfare online without an active PS Plus account. It's unclear if Xbox One players must have an Xbox Live Gold account to play during the free trial weekend.
Posted by: xSicKxBot - 04-24-2020, 03:19 AM - Forum: Python
- No Replies
Python sum() List – A Simple Illustrated Guide
Summing up a list of numbers appears everywhere in coding. Fortunately, Python provides the built-in sum() function to sum over all elements in a Python list—or any other iterable for that matter. (Official Docs)
The syntax is sum(iterable, start=0):
Argument
Description
iterable
Sum over all elements in the iterable. This can be a list, a tuple, a set, or any other data structure that allows you to iterate over the elements. Example: sum([1, 2, 3]) returns 1+2+3=6.
start
(Optional.) The default start value is 0. If you define another start value, the sum of all values in the iterable will be added to this start value. Example: sum([1, 2, 3], 9) returns 9+1+2+3=15.
Exercise: Try to modify the sequence so that the sum is 30 in our interactive Python shell:
Let’s explore some important details regarding the sum() function in Python.
Errors
A number of errors can happen if you use the sum() function in Python.
TypeError: Python will throw a TypeError if you try to sum over elements that are not numerical. Here’s an example:
# Demonstrate possible execeptions
lst = ['Bob', 'Alice', 'Ann'] # WRONG:
s = sum(lst)
If you run this code, you’ll get the following error message:
Traceback (most recent call last): File "C:\Users\xcent\Desktop\code.py", line 3, in <module> s = sum(lst)
TypeError: unsupported operand type(s) for +: 'int' and 'str'
Python tries to perform string concatenation using the default start value of 0 (an integer). Of course, this fails. The solution is simple: sum only over numerical values in the list.
If you try to “hack” Python by using an empty string as start value, you’ll get the following exception:
# Demonstrate possible execeptions
lst = ['Bob', 'Alice', 'Ann'] # WRONG:
s = sum(lst, '')
Output:
Traceback (most recent call last): File "C:\Users\xcent\Desktop\code.py", line 5, in <module> s = sum(lst, '')
TypeError: sum() can't sum strings [use ''.join(seq) instead]
You can get rid of all those errors by summing only over numerical elements in the list.
The time complexity of the sum() function is linear in the number of elements in the iterable (list, tuple, set, etc.). The reason is that you need to go over all elements in the iterable and add them to a sum variable. Thus, you need to “touch” every iterable element once.
Python Sum List of Strings
Problem: How can you sum a list of strings such as ['python', 'is', 'great']? This is called string concatenation.
Solution: Use the join() method of Python strings to concatenate all strings in a list. The sum() function works only on numerical input data.
Code: The following example shows how to “sum” up (i.e., concatenate) all elements in a given list of strings.
# List of strings
lst = ['Bob', 'Alice', 'Ann'] print(''.join(lst))
# BobAliceAnn print(' '.join(lst))
# Bob Alice Ann
Python Sum List of Lists
Problem: How can you sum a list of lists such as [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]] in Python?
Solution: Use a simple for loop with a helper variable to concatenate all lists.
Code: The following code concatenates all lists into a single list.
# List of lists
lst = [[1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]] s = []
for x in lst: s.extend(x)
print(s)
# [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]
Problem: How can you sum over all list elements using a while loop (without sum())?
Solution: Create an aggregation variable and iteratively add another element from the list.
Code: The following code shows how to sum up all numerical values in a Python list without using the sum() function.
# list of integers
lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] # aggregation variable
s = 0 # index variable
i = 0 # sum everything up
while i<len(lst): s += lst[i] i += 1 # print the result
print(s)
# 15
This is not the prettiest way but it’s readable and it works (and, you didn’t want to use the sum() function, right?).
Python Sum List For Loop
Problem: How can you sum over all list elements using a for loop (without sum())?
Solution: Create an aggregation variable and iteratively add another element from the list.
Code: The following code shows how to sum up all numerical values in a Python list without using the sum() function.
# list of integers
lst = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] # aggregation variable
s = 0 # sum everything up
for x in lst: s += x # print the result
print(s)
# 15
This is a bit more readable than the previous version with the while loop because you don’t have to keep track about the current index.
Python Sum List with List Comprehension
List comprehension is a powerful Python features that allows you to create a new list based on an existing iterable. Can you sum up all values in a list using only list comprehension?
The answer is no. Why? Because list comprehension exists to create a new list. Summing up values is not about creating a new list. You want to get rid of the list and aggregate all values in the list into a single numerical “sum”.
Python Sum List of Tuples Element Wise
Problem: How to sum up a list of tuples, element-wise?
Example: Say, you’ve got list [(1, 1), (2, 0), (0, 3)] and you want to sum up the first and the second tuple values to obtain the “summed tuple” (1+2+0, 1+0+3)=(3, 4).
Solution: Unpack the tuples into the zip function to combine the first and second tuple values. Then, sum up those values separately. Here’s the code:
# list of tuples
lst = [(1, 1), (2, 0), (0, 3)] # aggregate first and second tuple values
zipped = list(zip(*lst))
# result: [(1, 2, 0), (1, 0, 3)] # calculate sum of first and second tuple values
res = (sum(zipped[0]), sum(zipped[1])) # print result to the shell
print(res)
# result: (3, 4)
Need a refresher of the zip() function and unpacking? Check out these articles on the Finxter blog:
Problem: Given a list. Sum up a slice of the original list between the start and the step indices (and assuming the given step size as well).
Example: Given is list [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]. Sum up the slice lst[2:5:2] with start=2, stop=5, and step=2.
Solution: Use slicing to access the list. Then, apply the sum() function on the result.
Code: The following code computes the sum of a given slice.
# create the list
lst = [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10] # create the slice
slc = lst[2:5:2] # calculate the sum
s = sum(slc) # print the result
print(s)
# 12 (=5+7)
Let’s examine an interesting problem: to sum up conditionally!
Python Sum List Condition
Problem: Given is a list. How to sum over all values that meet a certain condition?
Example: Say, you’ve got the list lst = [5, 8, 12, 2, 1, 3] and you want to sum over all values that are larger than 4.
Solution: Use list comprehension to filter the list so that only the elements that satisfy the condition remain. Then, use the sum() function to sum over the remaining values.
Code: The following code sums over all values that satisfy a certain condition (e.g., x>4).
# create the list
lst = [5, 8, 12, 2, 1, 3] # filter the list
filtered = [x for x in lst if x>4]
# remaining list: [5, 8, 12] # sum over the filtered list
s = sum(filtered) # print everything
print(s)
# 25
Problem: Given is a list of numerical values that may contain some values None. How to sum over all values that are not the value None?
Example: Say, you’ve got the list lst = [5, None, None, 8, 12, None, 2, 1, None, 3] and you want to sum over all values that are not None.
Solution: Use list comprehension to filter the list so that only the elements that satisfy the condition remain (that are different from None). You see, that’s a special case of the previous paragraph that checks for a general condition. Then, use the sum() function to sum over the remaining values.
Code: The following code sums over all values that are not None.
# create the list
lst = [5, None, None, 8, 12, None, 2, 1, None, 3] # filter the list
filtered = [x for x in lst if x!=None]
# remaining list: [5, 8, 12, 2, 1, 3] # sum over the filtered list
s = sum(filtered) # print everything
print(s)
# 31
A similar thing can be done with the value Nan that can disturb your result if you aren’t careful.
Python Sum List Ignore Nan
Problem: Given is a list of numerical values that may contain some values nan (=”not a number”). How to sum over all values that are not the value nan?
Example: Say, you’ve got the list lst = [1, 2, 3, float("nan"), float("nan"), 4] and you want to sum over all values that are not nan.
Solution: Use list comprehension to filter the list so that only the elements that satisfy the condition remain (that are different from nan). You see, that’s a special case of the previous paragraph that checks for a general condition. Then, use the sum() function to sum over the remaining values.
Code: The following code sums over all values that are not nan.
# for checking isnan(x)
import math # create the list
lst = [1, 2, 3, float("nan"), float("nan"), 4] # forget to ignore 'nan'
print(sum(lst))
# nan # ignore 'nan'
print(sum([x for x in lst if not math.isnan(x)]))
# 10
Phew! Quite some stuff. Thanks for reading through this whole article! I hope you’ve learned something out of this tutorial and remain with the following recommendation:
Where to Go From Here?
Enough theory, let’s get some practice!
To become successful in coding, you need to get out there and solve real problems for real people. That’s how you can become a six-figure earner easily. And that’s how you polish the skills you really need in practice. After all, what’s the use of learning theory that nobody ever needs?
Practice projects is how you sharpen your saw in coding!
Do you want to become a code master by focusing on practical code projects that actually earn you money and solve problems for people?
Then become a Python freelance developer! It’s the best way of approaching the task of improving your Python skills—even if you are a complete beginner.
Praise the Sun for a DARK SOULS™: REMASTERED Deal!
[www.indiegala.com] It is time to re-experience the critically acclaimed, genre-defining game that started it all, beautifully remastered, at a new historical low price!
Scratchy Spring Sale Day 10: BEST OF BANDAI SALE, up to -82%
[www.indiegala.com] Be on the look-out for some huge discounts on your favorite games & ebooks + a Scratch Card with a FREE secret Steam game for every store purchase. https://youtu.be/KfjG9ZLGBHE
Seems to be only 1 free game on Epic this time. Next two will be Amnesia: The Dark Descent and Crashlands.
We are welcoming everyone to join our discord[discord.gg]. We are more active there on finding giveaways, small or large, and there are daily raffles you can participate.
The Machinery by Our Machinery is a new game engine, currently in beta, by some of the creators of the Stingray/BitSquid game engine. It follows many of the same design prinicipals, being data driven, light weight and extended via a simple C interface. The Machinery is designed from day one to be a framework for creation of your own tools and features, essentially a game engine construction kit.
The Machinery is completely plugin-based. You can pick and choose the parts you need to customize it to your specific needs. You can extend the engine, and the editor, by writing your own plugins. You can even build completely new applications on top of our API, or embed our code into your existing applications or workflows.
Powerful editing model
The Machinery uses a powerful data model to represent edited assets. This model has built-in support for serialization, streaming, copy/paste, drag-and-drop as well as unlimited undo/redo. It supports an advanced hierarchical prefab model for making derivative object instances and propagating changes. It even has full support for real-time collaboration. Multiple people can work together in the same game project, Google Docs-style.
Since all of these features are built into the data model itself, your custom, game-specific data will get them automatically, without you having to write a line of code.
Easy to build tools
The Machinery uses an in-house, lightweight IMGUI framework that sits directly on top of our rendering system. The same UI system is used both by the editor and the runtime, making it possible to run the full editor UI inside a game or in VR. With The Machinery you no longer need watertight boundaries between the editor and the runtime, editing can be done inside the game itself, if you so like.
Using our drawing primitives, it is easy to create custom UI controls. And everything has been heavily optimized to feel snappy and responsive. In fact, the entire editor UI is rendered with just a single draw call.
Modern rendering architecture
The renderer has been designed to take full advantage of modern explicit graphic APIs like Vulkan, DX12 and Metal 2. You can reason explicitly about advanced setups such as multiple GPUs and GPU execution queues. Similar to the rest of the engine, the built-in rendering pipeline is easy to tweak and extend.
High performance
All the code in the engine is built based on data-oriented design principles. We focus on data flows and cache friendly memory layouts. All performance critical code is written to run as jobs, taking full advantage of the parallel processing power of modern CPUs.
Simplicity
The Machinery explicitly aims to be simple, minimalistic and easy to understand. In short, we want to be “hackable”. All our code is written in plain C, a significantly simpler language than modern C++. The entire code base compiles in less than a minute and we support hot-reloading of DLLs, allowing for fast iteration cycles.
Our APIs are exposed as C interfaces, which means they can easily be used from C, C++, D or any other language that has a FFI for calling into C code.
The Machinery is currently in invite only beta, write to them for access. Or you can check out an early build of The Machinery in action in the video below.
Do you enjoy playing games on your Fedora system? You might be interested to know that Stadia is available to play via a Google Chrome browser on your Fedora desktop. Additionally, Stadia is free for two months starting April 8th. Follow these simple steps to install the Google Chrome web browser in Fedora and enjoy the new world of cloud-based gaming on your Fedora Linux PC!
Go to https://www.google.com/chrome using any available web browser and click the big blue button labeled Download Chrome.
Select the 64 bit .rpm (For Fedora/openSUSE) package format and then click Accept and Install.
You should be presented with a prompt asking what you want to do with the file. Choose the Open with Software Install option if you see this prompt.
Click Install in the Software Install application to install Google Chrome. You may be prompted for your password to authorize the installation.
If you don’t see the Open with Software Install option at step 3, choose to save the installer to your Downloads folder instead. Once you have the installer downloaded, enter the following command in a terminal using sudo:
Once you have Google Chrome installed, use it to browse to https://stadia.google.com/ and follow the directions there to create your user profile and try out the games.
