Spatial Audio and the PS5
Do you have questions about Dolby Atmos for console and PC games? Learn more on Dolby Developer.
developer.dolby.com
After Ray Tracing it is tech that I really really want to see on next gen games.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Dolby Atmos dev talk about Sony 3D audio "Tempest Engine"
- Thread starter GING-SAMA
- Start date
developer.dolby.com
After Ray Tracing it is tech that I really really want to see on next gen games.
We've already got it in games though this gen? I mean, sure, I want to see more of them but its not exactly a next-gen feature.
I thought it was a Shakespearian reference given PS5's other codenames (Ariel, Oberon, Flute).
I mean, when people use 20 bucks stereo headphones, Dolby Atmos already does all this in a way.Spatial Audio and the PS5
Do you have questions about Dolby Atmos for console and PC games? Learn more on Dolby Developer.
After Ray Tracing it is tech that I really really want to see on next gen games.
I use Dolby Headphone with external mixers on PS4/360 using optical out. Only one I can get Atmos built in after the fee atm is XBO.
It'll be really interesting to see Atmos vs Tempest next gen. I find it really cool how there's gonna be so many technologies being pushed forward next gen.
The implementation seems pretty different compared to the 3D audio we have today. It's akin to ray tracing in the way they're attempting to simulate how sound actually propagates in a physical space.
That's exactly what Dolby Atmos and Windows Sonic already do though (both available on PC and Xbox). It seems only Playstation is behind in this department (though I vaguely remember hearing about a headset that enabled 3D audio on PS4).
I'm only taking them at their word that they're doing something fundamentally different. Nobody knows enough at this point to say they're "catching up."
They don't have it on their current console, while the other and PC already have something like they described for their next console.
Catching up. Like I said, finally.
Would have liked the question, Do you feel like Sony developed Tempest to skirt around licensing Dolby Atmos? Do you think there is a benefit to developing a proprietary 3d audio engine versus your Atmos tech?
Instead of these softball questions. While I'm happy that Sony is dedicating hardware to 3d audio, I am not sold on the proprietary engine. It would be like creating yet another HDR spec instead of using the ones available.
Instead of these softball questions. While I'm happy that Sony is dedicating hardware to 3d audio, I am not sold on the proprietary engine. It would be like creating yet another HDR spec instead of using the ones available.
I wonder how 3rd parties will approach it. Is porting 3d audio from one platform to another easy? Like can Ubisoft ship the next AC with both a Tempest audio profile and an Atmos profile? It seems like Windows Sonic and Atmos are relatively interchangeable so maybe it's not a big issue to have it work in an 'open' way.
Didn't PS4 have that AMD TrueAudio?
This literally sounds like TrueAudio Next
"True Audio NextEdit
A new version of TrueAudio, TrueAudio Next, was released with the AMD Radeon 400 series GPUs. TrueAudio Next utilizes the GPU to simulate audio physics.[5] The move from a dedicated DSP to GPGPU breaks compatibility with the previous TrueAudio implementation.[6] The TrueAudio Next SDK was released as open source through AMD's GPUOpen suite in August 2016.[7] It also clarified that TrueAudio Next uses the GPU's ray-castingtechnology to do the audio computation, and can also reserve GCN compute units for lower latency. Support for True Audio Next was added to the beta Steam Application programming interface in February 2018.[8] "
AMD TrueAudio - Wikipedia
So they just implemented TrueAudio Next and called it something else? Barf
That's the thing though, 3D Audio has existed for a couple years, Sony is just making their own implementation (much like Microsoft made their own with Windows Sonic). Dolby is currently the industry standard though THX recently introduced their own as well. Its not new technology. For some reason Sony didn't add support for it to the PS4 (it appeared a few years into the generation and Microsoft added it to the Xbox) so this is just them catching up.
Hopefully they also enable support for Dolby Atmos on the PS5 because its quite amazing in games the support Dolby Atmos and even games with Surround Sound are supported as well (though not as amazing, obviously).
Sonys solution works with any hardware. Isn't that part of why they did it this way rather than using Atmos? Does that not make Atmos more 'proprietary' if it needs specific/licensed hardware?
Didn't PS4 have that AMD TrueAudio?
This literally sounds like TrueAudio Next
"True Audio NextEdit
A new version of TrueAudio, TrueAudio Next, was released with the AMD Radeon 400 series GPUs. TrueAudio Next utilizes the GPU to simulate audio physics.[5] The move from a dedicated DSP to GPGPU breaks compatibility with the previous TrueAudio implementation.[6] The TrueAudio Next SDK was released as open source through AMD's GPUOpen suite in August 2016.[7] It also clarified that TrueAudio Next uses the GPU's ray-castingtechnology to do the audio computation, and can also reserve GCN compute units for lower latency. Support for True Audio Next was added to the beta Steam Application programming interface in February 2018.[8] "
AMD TrueAudio - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
So they just implemented TrueAudio Next and called it something else? Barf
No? Did you even listen to the Cerny presentation?
I need to rewatch it, but if it is using ray-casting, it's an implementation.
Mind you, it's actually a great thing made by AMD. It isn't bad at all.
It's possible that Sony wanted something more focused on what they require for next gen if Atmos doesnt cover their needs. Maybe something VR-related with number of objects or etc, not really sure on the specifics of Atmos. If it works on any set of headphones/speakers, I dont really foresee any problem on the consumer end tbh
You could use the GPU's RT hw for audio if you want but that's not part of the tempest hardware. It was a Sony/AMD collab taking a compute unit and grafting some SPU characteristics on top. It's not piggybacking on GPU CUs and it's not simply a TrueAudio rebadge.
PC and Xbox kind of get around licensing by straight having the consumer pay for it separate though, at least this would be a PS5 standard.
I'd wager that many of Ubisofts games use Wwise, and Sony bought Audiokinetic, the maker of Wwise a while back. If Sony's planning to use Wwise as a Trojan horse then the tools to take advantage of Tempest will already be built into the software that devs are using.
Definitely this is a step to bypass having to pay licensing fees to Dolby. Sony's been working on their 360 Reality Audio tech for a while now and a lot of what we're hearing with Tempest sounds like it's related to that. Sony's got a very long history in audio so it does make sense that they'd want to push an in-house solution rather than use Dolbys. Just based on music alone, the reception over 360 Reality Audio has been very positive, so I can only imagine what that sort of tech can do for gaming.
If Wwise is their way of spreading support for Tempest then the number of supported titles should shoot past Atmos pretty quickly for both first party and third party titles.
How come nobody seems to care about audio processing in PC games these days? I remember when tech like this was popping up all the time for PCs back when discrete sound cards were popular. Now almost everyone just acts like onboard/video card audio is "good enough" and at most will just buy a high-quality DAC to plug in for headphones. I had come to the conclusion that past a certain point gamers just didn't care if sound was any better or not. I wonder if that's still true.
Did you watch the presentation? There's like 10-15mins of all the tech Cerny put into the PS5 for audio, including a chip that has the computational power of all the 8 jaguar cores in the PS4.
This.
This is just a guy taking the opportunity to mention Atmos over and over.
Exactly. Dolby Atmos is the 3D audio standard. Its in movies, blu-rays, Netflix, games. Tempest is just another also format like Microsoft's Windows Sonic.
If you have Windows Sonic/Atmos, a lot of games take advantage of the multiple channels without saying anything.
You can always tell who doesn't know anything yet complains that it's no big deal.
If it is a derivative of 360 Reality Audio then this may be part of Sony's push for a competing standard. It's already been deployed in music, now games, and IIRC they have talked about it for use in movies. The only difference is their standard for music and games won't require licensed hardware to play it back and their goal seems to have it work on everything from headphones to TV speakers to soundbars to surround sound systems.
I remember turning stuff like EAX on when I played Thief and it simply sounded like reverb was added to everything. I did like my Sound Blasters from back in the day though. You definitely needed those then. But today? On-board audio is truly more than good enough. There's no reason to get a sound card now unless you want some kind of specialized input or output.
I mean, its a big deal for Playstation, who hasn't really had 3D Audio on their platform before, but for those of us on PC or Xbox is just old news as we've been using it for years. Probably the best thing to come out of this is hopefully wider support from developers because now its on all the big platforms.
Sure, Sony is doing some stuff to make it easier on the developers to implement it but for the consumer the end-result is basically the same.
Going by the dolby atmos website very few games actually support it, some are on Xbox only and some are on pc only. Sony solution will be free to use, but I'm guessing devs will actually have to implement it in their games. Sony seems to be going all in on 3d audio, and hopefully Xbox does the same, since they have something similar as well.
That list isn't the full list since Gears 5 definitely supports it but you're right in the fact that it isn't a standard feature yet. Microsoft have already invested in 3D audio on Xbox with Windows Sonic that's been out for years (as a free alternative to Dolby Atmos which costs $15 or something).
Some of you really have no clue what you are talking about. PSVR is really the starting point of all this for Sony, taking what PSVR currently does then applying it to all games and all setups. Not limiting it to specific hardware or peripherals.
I believe Steam Audio has tried to solve some of this in the PC space.
From an earlier reply of mine to this thread:
Please don't try and claim I'm misinformed. Also, you'll notice I said "who hasn't really had 3D Audio on their platform before" because while it existed in limited capacity, it wasn't a widespread feature that any user could use.
Whether the game supports or not. The Xbox One can process all sounds to Dolby Atmos.
I've never used the windows sonic version, but the dolby atmos with headphones on gears 4 and 5 sound amazing. For everything else I've always used dolby headphone, either on consoles or PC.
That's Gears of War 4, not Gears 5. Unless I'm looking at a different page than you.
