Virtual acoustics with game engines

Architectural acoustics have a new direction as virtual acoustics. There are in literature several studies which have investigated the ways to obtain immersive acoustic environments. Beside the endeavours to achieve more successful point-based auralizations, scholars are trying to reproduce real-time immersive-3D acoustic environment. In addition, today we know that audio and visual perception cannot be analysed separately and it is a well-known fact that the visual perception is significantly augmented by matching sound stimuli. Through the different methods, this preliminary study will focus on utilization of the game engines in acoustic studies to create 3D immersive models and to work both visual and audio dimensions. Visualization of the virtual environment is the primary purpose of the lots of game engines. Whereas they achieved serious progress on quality of visuals, they need time to attain more successful audio realism. The most leading game engines basically work with their own audio engines that provide real-time synthesis, dynamic DSP effects and physical propagation models, but their compliance with outdoor and indoor physical acoustic laws need to be verified. Nevertheless, there are interesting developed audio features especially by the middlewares like Wwise, Steam Audio and other plugins. This paper investigates these developments and the audio features of Unreal Engine 4 and its related audio tools with focus on sound propagation. Comparisons between simulated audio phenomena and physical based acoustic models are presented.