In their weekly interview series Womenize! features inspirational, diverse people who work in the games and tech industry, to share their experiences, give valuable advice and talk about their projects. In cooperation with Womenize! and Madeleine Egger, GamesMarkt is republishing these inspirations.
Womenize! – Inspiring Stories is our weekly series featuring inspirational individuals from games and tech. For this edition, we talked to Kasia Dziekan, Sound Designer at Arrival. She speaks about her journey into game audio, explaining how she creates immersive and emotionally engaging soundscapes for video games through a mix of creativity, collaboration, and technical skill. Read more about Kasia here:
Growing up in Poland in the 90s and 00s there wasn’t much going on culturally. It felt oppressive, grey and uninspiring so it seemed that moving to a big multicultural city was the only choice if I was serious about becoming an artist.
At the time, moving to London didn’t feel particularly courageous – as an 18 year old I was full of dreams and optimism and had no idea how hard it would be, probably for the best! I was hungry for adventure and new experiences. Some of my Polish friends also moved to London at the same time, so I wasn’t doing it alone. I was also lucky that my mom always supported my decisions and believed in me.
When I studied Music Technology at Islington Music Workshop, for one of the assignments I had to create and replace sound effects for an open source game ‘Osmos’. Interacting with my own sounds in a game was so much fun that I wanted to explore it further. But it wasn’t until some years after, when I took up MA in Sound Design for Video Games in 2020 with ThinkSpace Education that I pursued game audio seriously. What helped me creatively in the beginning was the course, as well as online sound design workshops hosted by Game Dev London and finding like-minded people online who I could learn from
What my day looks like really depends on what I’m working on. A lot of my job is creating audio assets for games in Reaper – editing and processing sounds. When I can, I record new sounds as creating a fresh material is an essential part of the craft – it helps with creativity, originality and finding a style. It’s also just tons of fun! A big part of my job is also implementing sound effects into games and making sure that they are in sync with the animations and mixed well with other sounds.
When starting a design, firstly I do research. I consider the style of the game and brief from the client or creative lead. I look for references – examples of sound from other games and movies that I can take inspiration from. I then create an initial design and send it for review. I revise my design until the client or my supervisor is happy with the outcome and then implement my work into the game. Implementation requires a lot of testing and updating the audio content as the game evolves.
The initial inspiration always comes from the visuals – gameplay video capture or game art. I also look for ideas and direction from the game designers and audio supervisors to ensure that my sounds match their vision. I also find inspiration amongst my colleagues – I am very lucky to be working with a team full of talent. Creating audio for games is a very collaborative process.
Ensuring that audio hits the right emotional notes – that happens partly instinctively, partly through aligning my vision with the audio director’s vision. Supporting interactive nature of the game is often about learning the technical possibilities of each project and making the most of them. It’s also about prioritising which sounds are most important to the player, giving them most attention and making them shine through the mix.
