"Did you hear that? It's... it's coming!"

[Rhianni32]

If you want sound in your game this will help a lot.
http://www.rpgsoundmixer.com/

Its a program that can play and loop multiple sound files and music files and play them at the same time. The forum has links to free real life sound effects. then you can bind them to various keys

So what can it do?
Shift-1 to load up a forest environment.
It loops chirping birds and sound of wind through the trees. You can set a delay on the loop so a bird chirps then wait 20 seconds and it repeats.
Press W for a Wolf howl. Press B to stop the birds that are now frightened. Press C to start combat music as the wolves attack and roll initiative.
Then shift-2 for in the city atmosphere etc.
All the keys you bind and choose and keys can do multiple sounds.
It takes a bit of work to setup but it adds some great atmosphere.

They have a free demo to try out

 

[Rechan]

That's pretty interesting.

 

[Terwox]

2x accident.

 

[fba827]

Me, personally, I would say to just describe the effect of imitate it if you are good at that.

Playing some clip of a sound effect has been anticlimatic in the past when group's I've been in have used it. It takes 5 seconds to say "as you approach, you hear <fumble to hit the play button, make sure it's in the right spot, etc>" all for a 1-2 second sound of feet shuffling. Basically, it just turned in to a distraction by the end of it. However, the one time it worked really well as when the party was going through this long cavern approaching a large monster (they didn't know what) and on the CD player we had the sound of heavy breathing (on continuous repeat). The volume was low to start but every few rooms, the volume went up one notch until the breathing was very loud near the rear of the cavern.

But, yeah, the pay off for taking the trouble to do this may not be worth it when all is said and done.

There was also some AD&D adventure back in the day that came with a CD of sounds for you to play in different rooms... everything from rat scurries to goblin screams, to undead moans, etc... don't remember what it was called though. But, yeah, that too just became a distraction once the novelty wore off by the third room.

Edit: mood-effecting background music (creepy/climatic/etc) on the other hand is all good.

 

[Oni]

Personally I think I prefer verbal descriptions. Because while they can be evocative and descriptive they do leave more to the imagination.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

Mostly I've done either descriptions or simple stuff like wolf howls. But once, just once, I played something. (On a tape recorder, this was before PCs, pretty much.)

The game: A GURPS space adventure.
The Setting: The PCs uncovered a long buried Martian Tripod.

I described the the thing stirring, and raising a menacing looking something in its tentacles. Then I hit 'play' on the recorder and the first several seconds of build-up music, followed by the heat ray firing from the '53 War of the Worlds came on. Before I finished asking what they were doing, everyone described their character diving for cover! (Before the heat ray fired, that is.)

 

[The_lurkeR]

I have tried to sound-track the game -- and while it seems great in theory and planning -- like others expressed here, I've found the actual experience to be distracting and disjointed. Describing the sounds, and sometimes making them yourself I find is the best way, like in old campfire story style..

 

[Thunderfoot]

While I agree that EVERY sound effect being used is a little overboard, there are occasions when describing it and hearing it create different vibes. Hearing a dino roar has a much more bone chilling effect than saying you hear a roar.

Also there are just some things that can't be described without either seeing them or hearing them. As for effects I use, I find recorded water (waterfalls, rivers, rapids, etc.) played with any increasing volume as a water trap is sprung or as a race against rising water is happening seems to increase the stress of the situation, making for some very interesting role-play. It becomes pretty realistic. The sound of a burning fire behind a scene of a burning building played at low level really brings the action to a head (also if you have a piece of burnt wood sealed in a container until you play the effects and start describing the scene the effect is REALLY memorable.)

Of course both of these examples are long effects, which are more of a progressive background sound than a single push and play effect. Of course sound used in conjunction with visual or olfactory seems to be better than just plain sound on its own and as an audio technician, that's saying something. YMMV

 

[Ruined]

I usually just do vague vocal sounds myself, and allow the players' imaginations to tell them what they truly hear.

That said, I'm seriously considering breaking out God of War I this weekend and recording some of it. I'm siccing a hyrda on the players, and I wouldn't mind grabbing the super roar from the hydra near the beginning of that game.