OpenAL Combined With Creative EAX ADVANCED HD Provides Developers With the
Ideal Solution for Implementing the Highest Quality Audio in Today's Hottest
Games
MILPITAS, Calif., March 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Creative
(Nasdaq: CREAF), the creator of Sound Blaster(R), the standard for PC audio
and a worldwide leader in digital entertainment solutions, today announced a
significant advancement in gaming audio with OpenAL 1.1, an upgrade for the
free API, OpenAL (Open Audio Library). With this important upgrade, several
top game development houses are implementing OpenAL with EAX(R) ADVANCED
HD(TM) for the highest-quality and most realistic audio possible in-game.
"Creative consistently sets industry standards for audio implementation in
PC and console games, and our work spearheading the OpenAL upgrade is driving
the API toward becoming the definitive solution for supporting
hardware-accelerated audio effects in games," said George Thorn, director of
developer relations for Creative. "We can address the entire game development
community -- providing developers with advanced tools that allow them to
deliver highly compelling audio playback on our Sound Blaster sound cards,
complete with comprehensive, software-based audio mixing as a fall-back for
baseline audio systems."
Streamlined Audio Functionality in OpenAL 1.1
As Creative has worked with industry partners to upgrade and enhance
OpenAL, the API has increasingly become the industry standard in
cross-platform and cross-operating system game development. With OpenAL,
developers can easily transfer audio in a console game to the PC. The newly
proposed OpenAL 1.1 specification will feature three primary improvements over
the current version: audio recording functionality for use with in-game voice
chat; an offset feature that will allow developers finer control over audio
playback; and an additional volume fall off model that will save developers
effort in customizing their audio engine. OpenAL 1.1 will be available for
developers in summer 2005.
Extensive Developer Support for EAX
In addition to improving OpenAL, Creative has been working with game
developers to implement the company's EAX ADVANCED HD engine. EAX ideally
complements OpenAL by offering dramatically increased 3D audio performance and
functionality, delivering superior high-definition audio and rich environment
effects in-game. Currently, there are more than 300 PC games that have
implemented a version of the EAX technology. EAX ADVANCED HD, which is
available on the Sound Blaster Audigy series of products, has been implemented
by developers in a large number of games, including more than 80 EAX ADVANCED
HD 3.0 and 4.0 titles, such as Unreal Tournament, World of Warcraft, and the
upcoming Battlefield 2.
Game developers that use the combination of OpenAL 1.1 with EAX ADVANCED
HD will join development houses like Digital Illusions and Epic in utilizing
the most powerful, hardware-accelerated audio API solution available for their
games.
"For Battlefield 2, we need our audio engine to be fast, robust and
feature-rich. OpenAL was the natural foundation for our 3D sound
implementation, since it offers an elegant and flexible programming interface
and easy access to EAX ADVANCED HD features," said Jonas Kjellstrom,
Battlefield 2 Audio Programmer for Digital Illusions. "In our benchmarking
we're seeing excellent performance on today's PC audio renderers. 3D
positioning, reverbs and filtering are all fast and sound great, particularly
on Sound Blaster cards that have EAX hardware acceleration. Furthermore,
we're confident that OpenAL will maximize performance on the next generation
of PC audio hardware, with its extension mechanism enabling us to quickly
leverage new features as they are introduced."
"OpenAL support is at the core of Unreal Engine 3's audio engine. We have
been very pleased with the results -- it's a fast, efficient API that enables
us to deliver high quality 3D audio with low overhead," said Tim Sweeney,
founder and CEO of Epic Games. "Additionally, it automatically supports 3D
mixing on Sound Blaster sound cards, and exposes EAX environmental audio
effects, which we author in real-time in the Unreal Editor."
Creative will be speaking with developers about the new features of OpenAL
1.1, in addition to demonstrating its EAX ADVANCED HD engine, Interactive
Spatial Audio Composition Tools (ISACT), and GameCODA(R) audio middleware
solutions during the 2005 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, March
9-11, at booth 920 and expo suite ES20.
About Creative
Creative is a worldwide leader in digital entertainment products for PC
users. Famous for its Sound Blaster(R) sound cards and for launching the
multimedia revolution, Creative is now driving digital entertainment on the PC
platform with products like its highly acclaimed MuVo(R) and Zen portable
audio players. Creative's innovative hardware, proprietary technology,
applications and services leverage the Internet, enabling consumers to
experience high-quality digital entertainment -- anytime, anywhere.
This announcement relates to products launched in the United States. The
product names, prices and availability are subject to change without notice
and may differ elsewhere in the world according to local factors and
requirements. Sound Blaster, MuVo, EAX, ADVANCED HD and GameCODA are
trademarks of Creative Technology Ltd. in the United States and/or other
countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
SOURCE Creative Technology Ltd.
 back to top
Related links:
http://www.creative.com
CONTACT:
Amy Stojsavljevic of Creative Labs, Inc.,
+1-408-546-6737, or amys@creativelabs.com
|
