Finding Cog's Voice

Cog was designed as an emotive character, able to react to events around him in the world of Mechinus. In many games, the player is looking at the back of the protagonists head, or if their face is visible, it's often relatively small on screen.

Cog has a large, expressive face which is always pointing at the camera, providing a golden opportunity to build an emotional connection between player and character through his expressions.

During pre-production, we went searching for Cog's "voice". While Mechinus is designed in the spirit of silent-storytelling, which means no dialogue, we decided this didn't mean Cog should be voiceless. Even if we don't understand his language, we can understand his emotions.

Since Cog is a mechanical being in a clockwork ecosystem, we needed his voice to be distinct and unmistakable. The test we set ourselves for all of the audio design in Mechinus is that if you were to hear, but not see, the game - would you instantly know which game it is? The same applies to Cog's voice.

So, what do you think? Did we capture a unique mechanical voice for Cog? Can you feel the emotions he's expressing? How do you imagine Cog reacting to events in the game as he ventures through the mechanical jungle of Mechinus?