Company of Heroes 3 - Audio Overview

Though I’m posting today’s CoH-Dev post, this Audio Overview is coming right from our Principal Audio Designer. So be sure to leave your feedback and comments and I’ll pass them on! - JohnT_RE 

Hello everyone! I’m AJ (aka Aaron Janzen) and I’m the Principal Audio Designer on Company of Heroes 3. 

First, I have to say how excited I am to be working on this game! I really believe working together with this community will help us deliver the best CoH possible. I truly look forward to hearing your ideas and feedback! 

Let me kick things off by outlining a few assurances as we continue to build and hone the Audio experience in CoH3. 

My hope is that the sound design in CoH3 captures the spirit of the best audio elements from CoH past, and that it carries the legacy of those incredible sound designers and the franchise forward. At the same time, I also hope to create a sonic experience that rivals any AAA Gen 5 / PC equivalent product/game/media in terms of Audio content, performance, mix, and behavior.  

What that means is that players who love the franchise will instantly feel back at home when they put their headphones on (or crank up their HTPC!). But they should also instantly feel and hear the difference in quality. 

AJ working on CoH3’s mix.

We are building the sound experience from the ground up in WWise. We have a huge library of content from the franchise to re-visit, to re-implement and re-imagine. 

Regarding the Music of CoH3, it is my sincerest hope to capture the tone, quality, and spirit of the Music from CoH1 and CoH2.  We are returning to a more heroic tone overall, and I hope the new theme song in the Pre-Alpha Preview helps illustrate this direction! 

A behind-the-scenes shot of our orchestra in Budapest working on content for the trailer. This is the same team working on the main game. 

Of course, one of the most endearing, fun and entertaining aspects of COH are the soldiers and the stories they tell. We are very aware of this and plan to continue allowing them to tell their stories. We are working very closely with historians, writers and cultural sensitivity experts to help us shape the voiceovers. 

There are some lines that we want to keep (lines you’ve heard in CoH past) but we are also re-writing a vast majority of the content. Every unit in the game has an authentic biography/backstory created to inform our casting and performance. We will target approximately 70 characters/unit types for launch. 

The sound design in the Pre-Alpha preview was, well, very unpolished! My first goal, with any game in production is to build the extensive framework required for playback across the entire game. But of course, I want the playback to sound as good as possible, even in the early stages as it is being built. This is what you would have heard in the Pre-Alpha Preview. The framework for vehicles, weapons, impacts, basic dialog, environments and music, is in place. The content that is playing is already sounding pretty good! What is missing and won’t be there until the very end is polish, a focused mix, a “depth of audio behavior” (that could be its own topic of discussion!) not to mention a bug-free experience! Please keep this in mind as we work together. The audio in the game will ramp up in quality exponentially as we get closer to launch.  But we must be alright with it being “rough” for most of the development!  

There are lots of technical issues to solve as well, but perhaps we can discuss those in future posts if there is interest. 

Now, what I would LOVE to hear from you are: 

• In Terms of Voiceover, or Sound Design: 
  • Some of your favorite units from CoH1 and CoH2. Can you describe why you connect/enjoy/are entertained by certain units? 
  • Something funny they say, or certain vehicles or weapons you just love hearing etc. 
  • And conversely, units that TO YOU stuck out like a sore thumb a bit, in terms of sounding annoying, dumb, wrong, problematic? 
  • Are there any units in the Pre-Alpha preview that stood out? Negative or positive, we’d love to hear some feedback. 
• Do any of you listen on anything other than headphones? I suspect it’s the majority, but I’m still curious! 
• What are some of the ways you’d like to engage with the sound team at Relic to help us achieve sonic greatness together?  :) 
• Feel free to ask me anything about the Audio Vision and Direction for CoH3.  

Andrew D., our Commonwealth Medium Armour actor, in his VO session. Losing his voice for the cause!  :)

I hope we can have many discussions and feedback sessions in the future! I have to say, I am pretty busy building the game, but I will make time to engage with help from the community team as much as possible. 

Cheers! 

- AJ 

Battlechats :P It was somewhat funny when german soldiers talked about Feldwebel Steiner or Neuschwabenland. This are the small side stories and elements that makes u smile. 

And for the ambient sound: someone here who can remember the "old" Nebelwerfer sounds? Man, i was so happy when they were replaced by the more "known from the Wochenschau" sounds and not the old "synthetic sound". Thats something i prefer at most; Sure. It is difficult to get engine sounds of a real Maybach 230 Tiger engine. But any "real" sound will pay off - compared to "out of the box" sounds ^^

For ambient/ingame sound: Well. I think anyone wont be mad when u mix in some "out of the time music" ;) Some lines of the Panzerlied or "Heia Safari" somewhere for the Germans, the good old Tipperary song or "Handging our washing on the Siegfried line" for the British ^^

And Wilhelm scream! We need the Wilhelm scream somewhere (sry. Hardcore STAR WARS fan here :P)

Former German Fallschirmjäger, gun nut and hopeless audiophile here!

First of all, thank your for asking to get in touch with ppl! Appreaciate it!

What did/do I really love about CoH's sound? Nothing short of best, most authentic audio in all of RTS! I remember first booting up BF: Bad Company 2 and being blown away how an MG42 in the distance sounded *exactly* like an MG3 does sound in reality from afar. That game's sound blew my mind. Ofc it was all a bit cranked to a "Hollywood 12/10" to be more in line with perceived listening habits..

I got similar vibes from COH/COH2. Especially spatial sounds clearly were a mix of different recordings of the same thing, which I REALLY dig. The immersion good sound design can bring to a game is still criminally underrated imo,

So aside from an excellent audio fidelity and recoding quality (which has become a staple of COH at this point) what do I like most and wish for COH3?

Being German: 

* I hoep for German Landsers to be, at times VERY snarky and humorulsy critical, at times  overly excited/correct (green). Like in prior titles. Veterans appear at times nihilistic, borderline unwilling, with biting remarks,  

* The "cool as a cucumber"-style, somewhat "I've seen this all before, so calm down kids!"- often seemingly bored sytle of rseasoned NCOs.

* The less colloquialism'heavy way of German Infantry officers. Yet way less distanced from their NCOs compared to US/UK troops.

tl;dr - from what I read/heard The relationship between Landsers, NCOs and officers is (and supposedly also was) comparable to a family triangle. Loving yet, more strict Moms (NCOs) and the Dads (officers), who weren't quite accustomed to dealing with the daily shit. Officers seen a bit stiff compared NCOs yet were also usually more forgiving and educated, thinking about the bigger picture. Tho Moms and Dads still function like any good marriage. If that makes any sense to you. 

So that's my rough input towards which relation these 3 (quite different) "classes". Which should provide oppostunity for a LOT of banter. As it is in RL in the (most active) German forcres today.

Snarky and maaaany lewd and at times even indecent comments aren't/weren't uncommon in the German forces. So an NCO (privatlely) questioning his officer's ordered tasks, is neither uncommon nor unwanted. Rather the opposite. Yet on the other hand, they're constantly suffering from boredom. Exhausted Mom, somewhat disconnected Dads and grouchy Kids. That's imo the trinagle for German voiceover and interaction.

What I also REALLY like and I don't mind it being copied into COH3 are some of the absolutely excellent German comments and voice-bits. Often enough stellarly researched containing real old-sounding German slang like "Schweinepriester!" (which my granny also used to say).

On a technical level; I'm honestly hoping we'll have true positional audio (once again) in Windows, once COH3 hits. Windows' native 3D sounds still sucks balls in games imo.

Boy where do I begin, almost every unit in CoH was loveable, at least from a VA and SFX perspective. 

The Sherman was be far my favorite unit: "Hit 'em hard and hit 'em fast! Goddamn steel ghost!" and Thwump sound from the cannon, the bass was so thick you felt it in your heart. We can't forget the tank tread squeals, simply iconic.

The King Tiger also had a deep bass cannon that I'm pretty sure was almost identical to the Sherman. 1:17 for sound. 

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  • Some of your favorite units from CoH1 and CoH2. Can you describe why you connect/enjoy/are entertained by certain units?
• 
  
  • CoH 1 (Grenadiers, Tiger Ace crew, Nebelwerfer, Volksgrenadier, Pioneers)
  • Coh 2 (MG42 team, Soviet Shock Troops, Ostheer Pioneers, the entire British Forces roster)
  • I think the reason why I felt entertained and connected by these units in particular is that they had an appropriate voice actor, with just the right amount of charisma, tone, and accent. Their lines weren't over the top or cheesy either, and they don't always make jokes.  They react to the battlefield environment appropriately with the right amount of dry humour. A well written script and the right voice actor is the perfect combination.
  • Also, in the sound files for Company of Heroes 1 - there are rumours/gossips for units, when they chat about personal life, their observations of the war, or soldiery things about running out of ammo or wanting bug cream.

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  • Something funny they say, or certain vehicles or weapons you just love hearing etc.
    
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  • "Do you see how thin this steel is?", "if you are not inside in 5 seconds you're walking Muller!" - Grenadiers entering a halftrack
  • "I'd rather walk anyways"  "Come on, I think this driver's drunk!", "You expect a tip for dropping us off in combat?!"- Infantry exiting a halftrack
  • "You're paid to kill, not dig trenches with your face!" - Grenadiers recovering from suppression
  • "That MG42 is worth its weight in gold, lose it and its your ass", "I love the Panzershreck" "Damn Shermans will open like tin cans now" - Grenadiers weapons upgrade
  • "Who shall we wake up?" - Nebelwerfer deployed.
  • "We see you G.I.!" - German StuG or Panzer IV sighting Infantry
  • "Are you worried about the warranty? Move it!" "Driver. wake up the hamster and get us going", "Move it, before I make you get out and push" - Jadgpanther moving out.
  • "We've down to 10 points, this is becoming a disaster of the highest order" - Panzer Elite announcer
  • "We're now in peak shape for ass-kicking" - Panzergrenadier maximum veterancy acquired
  • "Destroy ALL Tommies!" "Panzer crew, this is Tiger Ace Voss, we can do this!" "Tommy cooker, FIRE!", "More tin cans to cook" - Tiger Ace commander
  • "You do this right, you do this once." "I expect top performance from you men!" - Tiger Ace crew
• 
  
  • - Opposing Fronts Panzer Elite gossips/rumours
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  • "I heard the Tommies are using captured German weapons, what has the world come to?"
  • "The British are calling this operation, Market Garden, where do they come up with these names?,
  •  "Did you hear that someone tried to kill our commander?",
  • "I heard Voss lost his Iron Cross recently... *scoffs*, officers..",
  •  "Karl, you need a bath, brother",
  • "Hurry up and wait .. the motto of the Wehrmacht,
  • "Does anyone have any bug cream? I'm all out",
  • I'll trade two bottles of the finest French wine for a British officer's drill cane",
  •  "I heard the Canadians shot prisoners."
  • "My brother told me an entire army was destroyed by the Soviets. Do you think it is true?"
  • "Did you hear the one about the cow and the British officer?"
  • "I heard they captured British troops who spoke perfect German"
  • "We do not fight for the glorious empire. We fight for each other. Remember that"
  • "I want the first Tommy we see. They killed my brother last week."
  • "I'll give any man who can find me a paratrooper's dagger, six bottles of Dutch beer."
  • "Two days leave to anyone who brings me a British Warrant drill cane."
  • "I heard the British are carrying umbrellas to stop their snipers from killing them"
  • "If I were a Tommy schwein, I might booby trap that cow."
  • "Another cow. Where are all the sheep?"
  • "Hey you AT schwein, make sure you're ready when we bring you back some tanks."
  • "Do you have a cigarette? Mein Opa says they're bad for me, but I believe Tommy bullets are worse."
  • "I heard after the war that Porsche will make sports cars, can you believe that?"
  • "I've heard the war is going badly, we'd all better brush up on our English"
  • "Did you know that Eisenhower whips his soldaten to keep them from retreating?"
  • "Aufpassen! That Kuh could have a Sprengfalle!" (watch out, that cow could be booby-trapped)

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  • If every unit in CoH 3 has voice lines as rich as the original Grenadiers -- your studio would win a Golden Globe video game equivalent for best voice acting. Guaranteed!

• 
  
  • And conversely, units that TO YOU stuck out like a sore thumb a bit, in terms of sounding annoying, dumb, wrong, problematic?
• 
  
  • CoH 1 - Wehrmacht Officer, Stormtropers,
  • CoH 2 - the entire Oberkommando West faction roster (especially faction announcer), Ostheer Panzergrenadier & Stormtroopers, Soviet Conscripts
  • These units really annoyed me with their silly and "try-hard" lines, I think the audio team wanted to portray them as aggressive fanatics, but they ended up sounding over the top. I feel that the voice actors just didn't have the right "gruffness' or "salt and dirt" in their tones for these units in particular. It was also blatantly obviously they didn't have a native German or Russian voice actor. Their lines were also quite bad and relied too much on vulgarities or toilet humour.
  • Stupid lines such as, "Shooting! I'll show you shooting", "The cowards are shooting at us, shoot back!", "Marching? We live for fuc*ing marching", "Give your pinkies a rest", "Retreat, but we still have ammo left", "Those p*ssies can't shoot at all!"
  • Campy dialogue aside, I should stress again that the voice actor choice was quite inappropriate and sounded silly!
  • If the soldiers are going to curse, swear, or insult -- they should at least use historically accurate words like Yankees, Yanks, Jerries, Schweinhund, Schwein etc .. they don't use modern insults like p*ssies.
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  • Are there any units in the Pre-Alpha preview that stood out? Negative or positive, we’d love to hear some feedback.
    
  • None were especially memorable, I'd say I have a neutral impression so far, leaning towards negatives. I have noticed the Germans still have silly over the top quips about the competence of their infantry. "We're being shot at, fire back!"

• What are some of the ways you’d like to engage with the sound team at Relic to help us achieve sonic greatness together?  :) 

• More developer diaries would be fully appreciated!
• Would you take suggestions for scripts/dialogue for unit lines?

• Feel free to ask me anything about the Audio Vision and Direction for CoH3.  

• Is there a chance you could bring back Jeremy Soule or Inon Zur please? They both did fantastic work for the music score of the original Company of Heroes and Opposing Fronts.
• Voice actor, Kai Wulff, seems to be the go-to voice actor for Germans in video games, from Call of Duty to Red Orchestra 2 to Company of Heroes. Can you bring him back please?
• Are all voice actors in previous CoH games professionally trained? Is casting some more expensive than others?

I hope I may mention one aspect of battlefield immersion which the original Company of Heroes did well is the voice acting & the high quality of the script writing. The voice acting in the original Dawn of War was the gold standard for Relic also.

There are two key things I wish to emphasize on what made vCoH's voice acting better than CoH2, which comes down to: "casting the appropriate & professionally trained voice actor" & "the script should have the right dose of battlefield humour and seriousness"

I felt that in CoH 2 -- there was definitely quantity, but it was lacking quality when it comes to an appropriate script & casting the right voice actor. The voice actors for the British Forces in COH2 was perfect, they had just the right amount of seriousness and charm with perfectly cast voice actors.

However, the voice acting for the OKW faction was just plain bizarre -- firstly, the actors do NOT sound professionally cast at all, and the whole faction, especially the OKW announcer sounded mediocre with the equally subpar script provided to them. I am not sure if you can confirm whether the studio used professional actors for OKW; but they all sound like SEGA interns or an amateur trying their best soldier imitation. The dialogue was way too campy, overly-dramatic/serious, and just plain ridiculous in tone.

I can't overstate how a mediocre voice actor can ruin the immersive experience. The other most blatant example is the voice acting between StarCraft and StarCraft II ~ in the sequel the script for the units relies on too much pop culture references, they joke around too much. Furthermore, the voice actors lacked the professional "gravitas" and serious tone in contrast to the original game. Same goes for a SEGA/Creative Assembly favourite; which is Rome Total War & Rome II -- the voice acting for its sequel was also quite terrible and overly-dramatic.

On a related note -- I felt the Panzergrenadiers and the Stormtroopers had the worst lines and inappropriate voice acting. They also lacked gravitas and sounded way too "try-hard". The most glaring examples are the constant swearing & self-abasement, which shows the writer has no creativity or flair. (how often does the stormrooper have to say, p*ssies?) The over-use of toilet humour is seriously immersion breaking, it needs to be tempered. Please look back to the original Company of Heroes voice acting for appropriate battlefield dialogue.

I felt the best of Company of Heroes 2's acting were the Ostheer faction announcer, Pioneers, MG42, Mortar Team & the Soviet Scout Sniper, T-34, & Shock Troops. The mutual qualities they all shared was a properly cast voice actor and their dialogue were appropriate without delving into awkward comedy.

For what it's worth, I understand that Relic's choice for casting the Ostheer Faction Announcer also happens to be professionally trained & starred in the Band of Brothers TV series as the Wehrmacht General, his name is Wolf Kahler. Perhaps it is no coincidence that the professionally trained actor provided the most memorable acting performance in the game, in my view. Which is why I really hope that Relic brings back Wolf Kahler and Kai Wulff  for Company of Heroes 3 please.

On a related note, one audio experience which I really enjoyed was that the Germans soldiers would sometimes say a few lines in German during a battlefield chatter. You didn't have to click on them for them to say it. I think there was programming which prompted the soldiers to chatter during the heat of battle. It was a very nice touch absent in CoH2.

Please consider revisiting the highlights of what made the original Company of Heroes voice acting so memorable -- the Germans and the Americans had a stellar and memorable script.

Also, for what it's worth ~ I thought the Tales of Valor expansion was quite forgettable, but at least it brought a whole new level of voice acting for the Tiger Ace crew. Relic really shined with the voice acting and dynamics between the crew. There is a reason why some games like War Thunder imported Company of Heroes sound files when playing as a German Panzer crew.

I LOVE the banter, crass jokes, and general snarkiness of Company of Heroes 1. Lines like "Conrad, tie your fuckin' shoelaces!" or "They said the army would be an easy paycheck! Damn assholes!" just contained a ton of character.  In contrast, I didn't really notice most of the VO in Company of Heroes 2. It's perfectly serviceable, but lacks the same lovable character of the original game.

Company of Heroes 2 has some funny lines, but they all run a little too long. And not enough swearing. When I'm in an intense match, I probably don't have the attention span to pay attention to a long sentence or several sentence long voice line. The short, snippy quips CoH1 had are the way to go.

The thick german accent was also more pronounced in CoH1. Germans also sweared more. I don't know if it's considered culturally insensitive, but I loved it.

In terms of the sound effects, I loved the spatial "radio chatter" from the first game. I think that's tuned down in CoH 2. Both CoH games have fantastic artillery explosions and tank rumbles and gun shots, so just keep doing that super well.

In terms of music, personally, I preferred the less "orchestral" sound track of the first game. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pdy0n33bZU This track beats the heavy sentimental violin or choir of the second game, IMO. It's very unique and memorable. Tense, exciting, and sets the tone of the game much better.