UPDATE: Forza Horizon 5 won the Best Audio Design award at The Game Awards 2021!
The countdown's almost up, and The Game Awards 2021 looks like it's going to be a night to remember for gamers across the world. The annual award ceremony returns in full force this year, with live performances and reveals taking place once again on a live stage in the Microsoft Theater in L.A. After some controversy surrounding the ceremony and its inclusion of Activision titles, some have been a little tentative to watch the event, but following a statement from Geoff Keighley, it seems as though excitement is starting to pick back up.
Predicting The Game Awards' winners is always an interesting task, especially with so many categories being so full of excellent releases. One such area is the Best Audio Design category. While many gamers may not actively notice the audio design of a video game, it's an extremely important element, and when it's bad, it's very noticeable. But each game in this year's nominee list has a stellar audio design, regardless of what genre or type of game it is.
Returnal
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Housemarque's Returnal surprised a lot of PlayStation fans earlier this year. The third-person roguelike gave players a mysterious time-looping narrative and an unsettling sci-fi setting to blast their way through. With a core gameplay loop that hooked players, the game became a pretty big critical success, but not a lot of people have played it.
Aside from reviewers and the lucky few who have a PlayStation 5 and managed to get a copy of Returnal, the majority of players haven't had the chance to experience Returnal for themselves, which is a shame as the game is, by all accounts, excellent. The game's audio design is a particular highlight; the game makes great use of the DualSense's built-in speaker, enhancing the weather effects of the game, such as the echoing of rain emanating quietly from the controller. The DualSense's Haptic Feedback also enhances the game's audio design, with light vibrations mimicking the drops of rain hitting the player character.
Returnal not only has great audio design in general, with monsters sounding grotesque and weapons sounding powerful, but also uses the next-gen technology in an innovative way, enhancing the experience.
Deathloop
On a similar note, Arkane's Deathloop also uses the DualSense to its advantage, enhancing certain audio elements to elevate the entire experience. Deathloop made waves in the industry upon its release a few months ago. Its unique 60s visual design, its time-looping narrative, and its complex yet intuitive gameplay mechanics that interwove seamlessly with the game's story progression were all elements that were praised heavily by critics and those who got the chance to play the game.
However, the audio design wasn't really the main highlight for those who reviewed the game, but that could be due to the outstanding quality of other technical elements overshadowing the audio design. The audio elements that were praised were the game's excellent musical score, the weapon sound effects, and some of the voice performances. In particular, critics enjoyed the use of the DualSense speakers with Juliana's voice coming through the controller whenever she calls the player. Deathloop is currently predicted to win in at least a few categories this year, but its audio design may not be enough to win this award, especially when compared to the other nominees.
Resident Evil Village
Resident Evil Village may have had its faults when it comes to narrative and performances, but it can't be denied that it was one of the best action/horror experiences of the year, and continues the successful run of new Resident Evil games. And it also can't be denied that the game's audio design is phenomenal. Every single sound effect in Village sounds visceral and off-putting, in the best way possible. Bones crunching, heads exploding, limbs being torn apart all sound suitably horrific, and perfectly capture the tone that the game is striving for.
Despite Resident Evil Village being nominated in quite a few categories, it's up against some very stiff competition. But in this category, Village might just take home the award. It makes sense that the voting committee would want to praise Village where it could, and the Best Audio Design category is full of games that are likely to win elsewhere, therefore leaving Resident Evil Village as a likely winner for this category, as its audio design is widely considered to be one of the best aspects of the game as a whole.
Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart
Insomniac Games' latest sci-fi Lombax-centric shooter was met with an extremely positive critical reception. Where fans enjoyed the narrative, new players enjoyed the tight gunplay and range of weapons, and critics praised every aspect of the game's technical elements. Despite its short length, the game was widely heralded as a technical masterpiece, with one of those technical elements being audio design.
Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart's sound design is varied and vibrant. Each weapon in Ratchet's arsenal sounds unique and suitably powerful, reinforcing the responsive controls and animations of the game. The game's audio design works in tandem with all of the other technical elements of the game to make a first-class video game experience, and after all, that is what good audio design should do.
Forza Horizon 5
Many fans of Forza Horizon 5 think it's been a bit snubbed at this year's Game Awards. While it has received nominations for this category, Best Sports/Racing, and Innovation in Accessibility, it's missed out on the coveted Game of the Year category. Regardless of personal taste in genres, there's no denying that Forza Horizon 5 is an impeccably designed game, from top to bottom. Visually, it's vibrant and impressive, the gameplay is extremely responsive and satisfying, and its audio design is outstanding.
Starting up a car engine, hearing that powerful roar, hearing the gears change, hearing how the metal of the car bends when drifting around a corner, every little detail, every aspect of Forza Horizon 5's audio design has been meticulously researched and hand-crafted to ensure total immersion and realism. And with the vast range of different cars and unique sound effects accompanying them, this technical achievement is all the more impressive.
Final Prediction
The Game Awards 2021's Best Audio Design category is full of games that deserve to win. Regardless of how a player feels about the gameplay or narrative of certain entries, each nominee's innovative and immersive audio elements have brought them here. But only one entry can win, and while Resident Evil Village and Ratchet and Clank have some of the most satisfying and engaging audio design of the year, and Deathloop and Returnal have some innovative ways to elevate the experience via next-gen technology, it seems as though Forza Horizon 5 is taking away the trophy for Best Audio Design this year.
With only three nominations, committee members who want to give the game the credit it's due will have to cast their vote for Forza here. And its probable win is absolutely deserved, with an extensive variety of high-quality sound effects that are unique to each vehicle, realistic audio design that cements the naturalistic tone of the game, and a range of accessibility options to help customize a player's audio levels, Forza Horizon 5 goes above and beyond and should be recognized for it.
The Game Awards streams live on December 9 at 5 PM PST / 8 PM EST.