If you're on the fence about the lesson videos in Patreon, this one might be a good one to join for! Lots of tips on making crazy effects using Ableton stock plugins.

Yep, my first thought was, this needs to be used in moderation. The real weight in this effect comes not from the effect itself, but the contrast of it between the rest of the sounds going on. That's what gives it the feeling of power.

"More like hot sauce than salt" is the perfect way to phrase it. I noticed a strong rumble effect for the first time 4 years ago in an anime, and it made everything sound _so_ good. But recently, I've noticed it being used as a crutch in a lot of media. It gets turned up to 11 and used on everything. I think a lot of people say "well EVERYTHING has this weight, so every thing should have the same, consistent sound effect to show it all has the same effect on the environment." Which has merit, but after awhile it becomes too samey. However, I'm saying all of this as a consumer of media, not a sound designer. This is a great video and it's wonderful to hear the thoughts of a professional on something not talked about too often.

Dude, so happy that you are back making videos again. I'm one of the majority of watchers you mention who isn't a sound designer but have always found your videos super eye opening.

I consume a lot of Game dev content even tho i never intend to become a Game dev. And you fit a niche within that spectrum barely anyone covers. And then you always do it in such an engaging way. I Truly get exited any time i see that Marshall McGee Notification. Love your stuff 💙

I hadn’t played a Halo game since Reach from 2010 until I played Halo Infinite a year or so ago. It was fun and played like a Halo game, but at the same time felt very separate from what I remember them being like. Now I realize that it’s the rumbly, worbly undertones that almost all the sound effects have!

Love that you included a critique of the sound you made. Gives us a frame of reference for what professionals expect.

0:34 I love this sound and imagine it was made by someone nice and very cool

Soundtoys Crystalizer is fantastic for this stuff. I spotted it in the effects chain of that Mortal Kombat sound design Vice documentary and started using it the same way myself.

Lot of designed banks from Boom Library recently has been designed with this punchy intense crunch in mind. Sometimes it's too much indeed, where everything is pushed to the max already, leaving not much room for the rest. But when well executed it does sound great of course.

I call it the 'Disperser' sound from the kilohearts plugin! I hear it everywhere hahaha

So happy to see a new video, i've just finished watching every video so perfect release time. Keep doing the Audio gods work @Marshall McGee

absolutely nuclear vulfpeck cameo, didn’t expect you to hit me where I live like that

Good job on creating that rumble sound! To think that you didn't even need a synth was quite cool. Just a sample, a heavy fx chain, and modulation!

YEEEES! I've been looking for a video like this, for sooo looong!

As a part of the non-sound designer majority, this has shed light on the fact that I've really enjoyed scenes with this rumbling effect but I never knew what it was I liked about them until now.

And he's back! As a beginner sound designer - please come back more frequently with those uploads, been a dry season for a while =)

Great video Marshall! This is a topic that I've been thinking a lot about since I started hearing this sonic style cropping up more often over the last number of years. As a sound designer for games myself, I'm very cautious about when and where I use these techniques because honestly, I'm starting to feel like this style of sound design is already becoming overused, especially in games. I hear it so often when reviewing show reels on job applications that my ears have become tired of it. The pitfall I see many aspiring sound designers falling into is leaning much too heavily on this technique to define the character of a sound and not exploring other parts of the frequency spectrum. As a result, sound designers are probably not showcasing their own unique voice/style as much as they could. The plugin I see most often associated with these types of sounds is Disperser by Kilohearts. It's kind of a one stop shop, and usually if you put it on any sounds with rich transient detail and lots of low mid range frequency content like rock falls or explosions it'll get you very close. Your point of treating this less like salt and more like hot sauce is so good! A little goes a long way :)

absolute banger of a video, as always

Thanks for making this!! This is something I’ve noticed in a lot of spaces but didn’t know what to call it. Truth is, I struggle with it/have rarely achieved it, so thanks for sharing!

Another awesome video! I like the envelope modulation technique! Gonna have to try this one

Really enjoying your vids dude! As a new game composer and sound designer these are super helpful for me. Currently working on my first OST and sfx!

Wow this is awesome. I’m at school for sound design, composition and audio implementation right now. I’m going to utilize this on some projects I’ve got coming up for sure

TOP 10 best sounding indie game? Yes GO for it 🤝

Great to have you back!

Oh man im so glad ur back. Banger video

I hear a lot of this in Neurofunk / Neuro sound design. A lot of really technical drum and bass music does this and of course in other electronic genres of varying bpm.

Hey man, Met you many moons ago! Glad you're still at it! Hope you've been well!!!

back to say god you really struck something with that phase rotation/shifting idea I've been getting so much good + varied stuff from sessions based around it over the last couple months, thank you !!

I also love this style, especially in UI. It was really interesting to get some more technical insight like what frequency range these sounds are in! So happy that you've been making videos lately :)

After all of the sound design processes you mentioned, try putting Max4Live Conflator (free ableton version of Oxford Inflator) at the very end of your chain. Full dry/wet if you don't want to clip; play with the input gain to change the flavor. The Curve values have very specific sweet spots so hold down shift while adjusting it; left for more low emphasis, right for crisp highs. It really brings out every detail of a sound & is potentially the step that will bridge the gap between your example and the examples you cited.

Well put at the end there. I feel that this technique really pulls away from the context of the thing. I think the gratification and allure of this flashy trend is subtracting from some of the narrative thinking about what a sound could describe. Like every trend though it’s just overused at the moment and in some of the biggest games out there, given time it’ll settle down and be more tastefully used.

This is so interesting for you to bring up, because I've noticed this too! The first time I noticed it was Doom 2016. I remember even the reloading sounds were so.... crunchy? Or something. You can also hear it in the Force Awakens when Finn ignites Lukes lightsaber.

Finally someone else has noticed and talked about this! I feel heard. It was so cool hearing it be dissected and explained.

you have no idea how great it is to see more stuff from you :D your content has made me appreciate sound design in media wayyy more than i used to, and has honestly kinda changed my perspective of the world around me a little bit... like there's been quite a few times I've heard a sound and gone "ohh... i bet that'd be a great sample for something" lol

Great video!!!

7:15 "But I also hope that we don't start to hear it so frequently in games and movies that it loses its power and novelty" Oops, too late. Everything everywhere sounds like swallowing food underwater now.

Mortal Kombat 1 audio is a on a different level!

Mortal Kombat 11 (and now 1) as well as the more recent Star Wars games are where I've noticed this the most and, frankly, it really impressed me. To me there are two elements; punch and crunch. Punch are fast impacts that sound a lot like the fast pitch decay sine wave transients hardstyle producers are adding to their kicks (probably because of phone listeners). While crunch sounds like they're scrubbing through grain tables of crumpling cans and paper while more slowly ramping pitch.

This is soooo interesting. Being a music producer for 4 years now and I am only now seeing that I can use my skills to make game sound effects? Sick video! Made me motivated.

It's great to see you again!!!!!!!!!

We're living through the, "Post-Deenan" era of sound, has been my bit 🤣

i love sound design and am a gamer, but somehow i never thought to look at game sound design on youtube. great vid :)

Love the video. I've literally been thinking the same thing with Mortal combat and EA Battlefront 2. It's cool to see I'm not going crazy.

Yup, I'm very familiar with the low rumble. My roommates love to keep the surround sound cranked outside my door while I'm trying to sleep. All movies and games are constant rumbles now

Great video, packed with information as usual :) I feel like this area of 180 - 400 Hz is the most tricky one.. It can make or break the sound. When I started out mixing music I learned from bunch of youtube tutorials to cut a lot of the frequencies in this area resulting in flat, weak sounding mixes. It took me a loong time to make purposeful moves, reference a lot and just trust my ears.. don't do anything just because a tutorial says so. The magic truly is in the midrange!

the multiple EQ Three trick is common in EDM, particularly dubstep. mimics the Disperser fx from kiloheartz. Its cool to see this used in other ways. Also cool to see that producers like myself implement this in music.

Fascinating to learn about!

Very interesting topic! And love the classy vulfpeck reference 😎

I just applied for my first real Game Sound Design job yesterday and immediately thought about your channel! Glad to see you're making new videos!!

Great content as usual. Just subscribed. :)

I can't bellive! You back!

Awesome video

Yes! Yes! Yes! I adore these sound design videos

Sound designer (nonprofessional) here, and yeah the main thing that came to mind was that it's a very full-spectrum thing. Matches with the Gearbox guy's comments on how audio needs to be functional across all output systems. And yeah, that of course is not the entirety of the factors.. something needs to sound good in the first place for the task of making it sound good across all audio systems to be worth doing. Also yeah, bouncing audio and re-processing it is so key, for so many different techniques.

This is what I listen to on a daily. This specifically sounds like Snails. Your process reminds me of Mr Bill, Kompany, Virtual Riot. You can also try Parallel Processing and stacking lows, mids and highs to give it that crisp and well-rounded texture.

The Vulf quote had me rolling on the floor laughing. Saw it coming when I saw Vulf looking at Darts bass. Gotta love that clip lol.

This video is so vindicating -- I knew I wasn't crazy! I've noticed that "steady waves of pops and rumbles" are the Next Big Thing in sound design and I can't stand it when they're overused. My personal nicknames for these rumbles include: - Bubble wrap - Rice crispies - Wibble warbles - Earthquake ASMR

To me the most noticeable thing about the trend is the sound of the disperser. Was it just me, or did it sound like every sound in that Mortal Kombat trailer had a phase disperser on it? It kind of makes everything sound squishy

Lol I’ve used that Ableton EQ Three side effect to achieve this sound, nice to see someone else had that idea too

it really reminds me of the spectral smearing that naturally occurs as the sound of thunder propagates through the atmosphere

I knew what the sound was going to be before I even clicked on the video.

Every time I watch one of your videos it makes me want to go design something!

those sounds remind me of what you can get recording frozen lakes when you strike them hard

Needed this

You're so right to say this. I've noticed this as well and sometimes it feels like it's really overdone, although it does sound insanely cool in pretty much any context.

"You're not versatile" 😂😂😂😂

Oooh, so that's what it's been happening. I remember noticing specially on Injustice. I was wondering how they get that type of sounds, being doing work as sound designer at times ^^ Thanks for sharing!

Dang, Joshua has some sick synths...

good shit!

🤚 also not a sound designer. I used to teach HS music production, though, and I wrote an entire sound design unit around the techniques I learned in your videos. So, fwiw, lots of students got interested in sound design because of you.

I too have been noticing this happening in so much modern sound design. I feel like I really started to notice this trend when DOOM 2016 came out. But I'm glad I'm not the only one noticing this type of sound design popping up everywhere. I think it does add a lot of coolness to certain sounds, but I definitely feel like I'm already hearing it getting way overused. I feel like Shadow Warrior 3 added a layer of "low rumble" to each sound before adding yet 2 more layers. Anyways, very cool video, looking forward to checking out the rest of your channel.

Can we have a challenge at the end of the episode like your older videos? Loved the encouragement to make my own version of these sounds.

Not a sound designer, but you nearly inspired me to become one years ago! I regretted it for a bit too, but I was already too deep into my VFX degree, haha.

And Now modern warfare 3's sound design is just full of this "hot sauce"

BABE WAKE UP NEW MARSHALL MCGEE JUST DROPPED!!

I heard the sound of rumble crunch for the first time in the anime “the time I got reincarnated as a slime at the charybdis chapter” maybe it’s because the last theme for a magic sound was the chimes and sparkles were more so an odd choice for the sound of magic.

preach!!!

Thanks for the video Marshall! Ever mess with bitwig? It doesn’t have video editing but it’s sick with a huge amount of modulators. Some tips to try would be to actually use additive eq to pull out low end of any sound and then actually saturate it. Different distortion types obv will create certain kinds of artifacts but if you get too much intermodular you can run it in parallel. If the sound has no low end then you can try frequency shifting it down first. Oh and fuzz distortions, ring modulators and bitcrushers are great for adding high end crackles back into sounds without ott. Love your channel! Would love to bring you on mine as a guest sometine

5:16 sounds like rocks skipping on a pond of ice

Member of the 5% here and these vids are an amazing source of inspiration and information! ❤

Just started watching and thank you for pointing out the low rumble sound. I'm weird and really hate that sound trope which is probably part of why I dislike most contemporary triple-A games. That sound trope just sucks IMO

The main plugin effect a lot of the big name sound effect houses are using to achieve this sound is Kiloheartz Disperser.

it sounds cool asf when used properly, but it's definitely way overused at the moment haha, appreciate the video as ever, keep up the great work!

The first time I remember hearing low well defined sound design was in Mad Max in an Atmos theatre, and recently Oppenheimer used rumble too. Now when it comes to kickass car engine roaring and atomic bombs it makes sense to use this sound design, but I guess it has become ubiquitous. Transformers, that was also influential in its sound design, also used lowmid punchy rumble everywhere.

Holy shit finally!! I've been wondering for years what's behind that ever since i heard Palpatine's bass boosted voice in the Battlefront II trailer.

As a guy who loves his dubstep too much, please do more on the topic

He lives!

love the vulfpeck reference

I've really been thinking that a lot of sound designers have used this style of sounds for a while. I'm glad I'm not the only one that noticed 😅

I’ve been thinking about this exact thing for the past 7 years

I would call them "glacial rumbles."

It's the "rock bouncing on a frozen lake" sound.

I feel like this style has really been influenced by dubstep and neurofunk dnb. There's surely influence both ways (especially these days) but I think the film and game sound design trend of that particular kind of rumbling morphing bass followed the development of those sounds in bass music as it started getting really hi-fi from around the mid-late 2000s. Feels like there's a clear line between some of these modern game/film sounds and what artists like Noisia and Misanthrop were doing 10-15 years ago. 'Sinkhole' by Noisia is basically a 3.5 minute masterclass in these kinds of sounds 🤤

This is my first time watching your channel. I'm gathering it is unacceptable to ever watch your videos without my headphones on.

I like to call it “Synthetic Velcro”… because there’s something satisfying about it, like Velcro

Granular Synthesis is great for this kind of stuff.

I keep forgetting how powerful a sound design is with just pitching it down.

Takes a dump ... *nuclear low mid rumble

Quality content 🤌✨