 Yes, yes, yes, yes. All right, please introduce yourself and what do you do? Hi, my name is Kevin. I do music and audio and I'm here with the rest of the audio team and we're just kind of taking requests from the other teams for what they want, audio-wise and music-wise. I've been working mostly on sound effects today, but I have one song that I'm working on for an introduction sequence and I'm hoping to sync that up with some voiceover. We've also been recording that in the other room and that's been really fun just to see what the teams have been bringing to us because it's a whole wide range of different projects that we're doing. Can you tell me a little bit about how the work system has been going because you're not like a traditional team where you have a team of five people working on a game. You are working on mini games. Exactly. So the audio tree is set up so that we can kind of do a variety of different tasks all at the same time. The teams will send us lists of audio sounds that they want and like music cues and things like that. And we just kind of get to work breaking those down and getting more specific sounds from that. The part that I've been kind of like, I've been sort of the mother hand of the document, trying to make sure everyone checks off and signs off on what they've done so we don't have anything being made twice or anything that people don't need being made because this is an iterative process. So we have a lot of stuff changing as we go. Typically, when people come in and talk to me about what they want for audio, I ask them kind of what is their minimum viable product? What are they sort of aiming to get done by the end of the jam? And I sort of politely request that they only ask for audio for that as opposed to audio for the really big picture thing, which I've done that too. When I'm in a team, I usually try to do too much at game jams. So it's kind of a process of targeting the most crucial moments in the game and providing audio for that encounter. And another trick that I've been sort of like making use of is trying to make more generic sounds. And I know that sounds kind of strange or sort of bad, but it's really actually quite useful. You get a lot of utility from sounds when they're not tied to a specific encounter. For example, if you were to get sick, I could make a sound of someone coughing or sneezing or something. But then you could only use that sound for someone who sounds or looks kind of like me getting sick. And if you're like a small kid getting sick, you wouldn't be able to use that sound anymore for that instance. So instead, I try to go for a sort of more open, more symbolic sound to signify that exact instance of getting sick. And then you can use it for anybody. Yeah, any other questions? Kind of reminds me of when they had a big sound effect for 8-bit games because they couldn't make the sneezing sound. So it was just like sound. But then they could use it for a person's stopping that you see the little dust cloud come up. Yeah, in those situations where you have such a limited pallet of sounds, everything is pretty symbolic. And one thing that's kind of cool is the way that game audio has sort of retained some of that. And pop culture at large kind of knows what does, for example, the mushroom sound when you get a mushroom in Super Mario. Like that is synonymous with getting bigger, right? Like that is just kind of a sound that everybody sort of recognizes or most folks do. Yeah, and so even though we have, you know, hi-fi, you name it, audio is available to us. We can create stuff and composite things. That sort of more symbolic style is still really, really relevant. And in situations like this, really useful. Nice. What do you think about the theme of this game jam? Yeah, the social justice game jam. I was super excited to see them announce it and even happier that I can make it out and fit it in my schedule. Cause it's the kind of thing where in this moment, it's really important to be plugging in and staying tuned into kind of modern history, current events and the movements of different groups to, you know, whether it's be recognized as people or, you know, have access to the rights or to justice in general, like we need to have a sort of artistic side to any movement that is there to kind of support and empower people to make their political voices heard and as far as where do video games come into social justice? I think it's a kind of interesting combination and maybe not one that you would think of right away. Like, but it's, I don't know, for me, like I consider video games such a passive thing normally, like I'm kind of either with my friends or on my own just kind of at home enjoying myself with a video game. So when there's a game that asks me questions that I don't know the answers to right away or challenges my assumptions, that usually catches me up guard and that makes me think and that's, I guess, an example of sort of a way of building empathy, I think, is something that games can do really well, especially ones that place you in the shoes of someone not like you or ask you to do something that you won't get to do in your everyday life. Yeah, that's a way that games let us kind of explore those different possibilities and that, to me, is something that's really powerful and I think that games let us do that so kind of tuck myself into a circle where I lie. No, it's good, it's really good. I mean, it sounds like video games as an entertainment media can evolve and become more, especially if they challenge you to think differently or to explore new ideas that you're not used to. What do you think about this game jam compared to some of the other game jams, like what makes this one unique? So my impression of social justice game jam right now is that it's been very intimate. I think there's been some good conversations just from the sort of teams that I've seen designing their games, they seem to be doing a good job of really thinking through the issues that they want to explore in their game because it is right at the outset focused on kind of creating awareness and beyond that creating empathy or just providing more information about legal circumstances and things like that. So with that kind of like goal, your game suddenly has to be accurate if you're gonna do a game about the law. You need to have, you know, you can talk to the lawyers in hand that they've had here. That's a new thing, I haven't seen that before in a game jam, legal advice. Yeah, so on top of having legal advice at the game jam, it's also been kind of small compared to some other ones. So it's been nice getting to talk to people and getting to know them. And then also being in this really awesome space, the living computer, it's been really, really nice and just cozy for us to settle into. Nice. Do you have anything else to add that, you know, novel experiences with any of the teams or just any other thoughts about the game jam? Let's see. I'd like to say that game jams are still something that I believe everyone can participate in and benefit from, especially newcomers. I think it's a really special environment and it's very welcoming. And it's a really great place to learn about the different skills that are required to make a game. And not having those skills when you walk in the door isn't necessarily a barrier to entry. When I got started doing game jams, which is maybe a year ago, I wasn't very confident at all. And it's just been a process of working with people who have different skills than mine and kind of putting those puzzle pieces together to make some crazy little idea start to work. And that process is just so rewarding. I think it's something that anyone who's interested in it really should give it a shot. Awesome. Thank you very much, Kevin. Thanks, Kaz.