 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Software |
| Founded | 2000 |
| Headquarters | , Canada |
| Products | Wwise |
| Parent | Sony Interactive Entertainment (2019-present) |
| Website | audiokinetic |
Audiokinetic Inc. is a Canadian software company based in Montreal, Quebec [1] that develops audio software for the video game industry. Its main product is Wwise audio authoring software. On January 8, 2019, Sony Interactive Entertainment announced that they had acquired the company. [2]
Audiokinetic was founded in 2000 by Martin H. Klein, a veteran of the music, film, and gaming industries. [3]
In 2003, Audiokinetic was granted funding by the Alliance numériQC, the Quebec digital industry network. [4]
In 2006, Microsoft Game Studios (MGS) signed a long-term licensing agreement with Audiokinetic. The first game to use Audiokinetic's software was FASA Interactive's Shadowrun. [5]
In January 2007, Audiokinetic entered into an educational partnership with the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences. [6] The Conservatory will teach Audiokinetic's Wwise software platform in its Audio for Games curriculum and will further develop an authorized Manufacturer Certification for the product. [7]
In November 2007, Audiokinetic joined the Emergent Game Technologies Premier Partners Program. As part of this exclusive agreement, Audiokinetic became Emergent's only audio premier partner, and Wwise was integrated with Gamebryo, Emergent's game development framework. [8]
In November 2008, Audiokinetic released SoundSeed, a family of sound generators for game audio that uses digital sound processing (DSP) technology. [9]
In February 2011, Sony announced that the PlayStation Vita will be the first portable device to support Audiokinetic.
In February 2013, Audiokinetic opened a Japanese office in Tokyo. [10]
In January 2015, Audiokinetic and CRAS announced the creation of an Online Certification Program for Wwise. [11]
In March 2015, Audiokinetic and Steinberg announced a partnership to integrate Wwise with a new DAW, Nuendo 7. [12]
On 8 January 2019, Sony announced that the company had entered into a definitive agreement for Sony Interactive Entertainment to acquire Audiokinetic. [13]
Sony Group Corporation, formerly known as Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo K.K. and Sony Corporation (ソニー株式会社), commonly known as Sony, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. The Sony Group comprises entities such as Sony Corporation, Sony Semiconductor Solutions, Sony Entertainment, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Financial Group, and others.
Sound design is the art and practice of creating soundtracks for a variety of needs. It involves specifying, acquiring or creating auditory elements using audio production techniques and tools. It is employed in a variety of disciplines including filmmaking, television production, video game development, theatre, sound recording and reproduction, live performance, sound art, post-production, radio, new media and musical instrument development. Sound design commonly involves performing and editing of previously composed or recorded audio, such as sound effects and dialogue for the purposes of the medium, but it can also involve creating sounds from scratch through synthesizers. A sound designer is one who practices sound design.
Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC (SIE) is a Japanese-American video game and digital entertainment company that is a subsidiary of Sony Group Corporation. It primarily operates the PlayStation brand of video game consoles and products. It is also the world's largest company in the video game industry based on its equity investments.
Gamebryo is a game engine developed by Gamebase Co., Ltd. and Gamebase USA, that incorporates a set of tools and plugins including run-time libraries, supporting video game developers for numerous cross-platform game titles in a variety of genres, and served as a basis for the Creation Engine.
Junction Point Studios (JPS) was an American video game developer based in Austin, Texas founded by Deus Ex creator, Warren Spector, in 2004. Disney Interactive Studios acquired Junction Point Studios in July 2007 to develop a property based on Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, a character created by Walt Disney but owned by Universal Studios until the character was acquired by The Walt Disney Company from Universal in 2006. The studio was closed in 2013.
Native Instruments is a German company that develops, manufactures, and supplies music software and hardware for music production, sound design, performance, and DJing. The company's corporate headquarters and main development facilities are located in Berlin, with additional offices in Los Angeles, Tokyo, London, Paris, and Shenzhen.
Michael Anthony McCann is a Canadian composer for television, video games and film. He is best known for composing the scores to the video games Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and Borderlands 3.
Wwise is Audiokinetic's software for interactive media and video games, available for free to non-commercial users and under license for commercial video game developers. It features an audio authoring tool and a cross-platform sound engine.
iZotope, Inc. is an audio technology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. iZotope develops professional audio software for audio recording, mixing, broadcast, sound design, and mastering which can be used in wide range of digital audio workstation (DAW) programs. In addition, iZotope creates and licenses audio DSP technology including noise reduction, sample rate conversion, dithering, time stretching, and audio enhancement to hardware and software companies in the consumer and pro audio industries.
The PlayStation Eye is a digital camera device, similar to a webcam, for the PlayStation 3. The technology uses computer vision and gesture recognition to process images taken by the camera. This allows players to interact with games using motion and color detection as well as sound through its built-in microphone array. It is the successor to the EyeToy for the PlayStation 2, which was released in 2003.
Nuendo is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by Steinberg for music recording, arranging, editing, and post-production. The package is aimed at audio and video post-production market segments, but also contains optional modules that can be used for multiple multimedia creation and audio sequencing.
Sony Depthsensing Solutions SA/NV, formerly known as SoftKinetic Systems, is a Belgian company originating from the merger of Optrima NV, founded by André Miodezky, Maarten Kuijk, Daniël Van Nieuwenhove, Ward Van der Tempel, Riemer Grootjans and Tomas Van den Hauwe and SoftKinetic SA founded by Eric Krzeslo, Thibaud Remacle, Gilles Pinault and Xavier Baele. Sony Depthsensing Solutions develops gesture recognition hardware and software for real-time range imaging (3D) cameras. SoftKinetic was founded in July 2007 providing gesture recognition solutions based on its technology to the interactive digital entertainment, consumer electronics, health & fitness, and serious game industries. SoftKinetic technology has been applied to interactive digital signage and advergaming, interactive television, and physical therapy.
Gaikai is an American company which provides technology for the streaming of high-end video games. Its technology has multiple applications, including in-home streaming over a local wired or wireless network, as well as cloud-based gaming where video games are rendered on remote servers and delivered to end users via internet streaming
The Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences is a private for-profit technical school specializing in audio recording, audio engineering and production education with its main location in Tempe and a satellite campus in Gilbert, Arizona. It is accredited by the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges and approved by the Arizona State Board of Private Postsecondary Education.
Vizerra is a software platform for viewing 3D models which provides its user with integrated additional content, such as video guides. Currently available 3D models are used for demonstration, advertising and educational purposes.
Maximum Games, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Walnut Creek, California. Originally founded in 2009 as a publisher of family-oriented titles for the Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii, the company shifted to publishing games of all genres for all ages across all platforms shortly after inception.
Autodesk Gameware is a discontinued middleware software suite developed by Autodesk. The suite contained tools that enable designers to create game lighting, character animation, low level path finding, high-level AI and advanced user interfaces. On July 12, 2017, Autodesk removed Scaleform, Beast, HumanIK, and Navigation from their online store, and announced the ending of support for the products.
TrueAudio is AMD's application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) intended to serve as dedicated co-processor for the calculations of computationally expensive advanced audio signal processing, such as convolution reverberation effects and 3D audio effects. TrueAudio is integrated into some of the AMD GPUs and APUs available since 2013.
Scaleform GFx is a discontinued game development middleware package, a vector graphics rendering engine used to display Adobe Flash-based user interfaces and HUDs for video games. In March 2011, Autodesk acquired Scaleform Corporation and Scaleform GFx became part of the Autodesk Gameware line of middleware. On July 12, 2018, Autodesk discontinued Scaleform GFx, and it is no longer available for purchase.
MPEG-H 3D Audio, specified as ISO/IEC 23008-3, is an audio coding standard developed by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) to support coding audio as audio channels, audio objects, or higher order ambisonics (HOA). MPEG-H 3D Audio can support up to 64 loudspeaker channels and 128 codec core channels.
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