Skip to main content

Sable has the best sound design you’ll hear in a game this year

I’m soaring across the desert on my glider. I don’t know where I am or how far I am from my destination — I’m not even sure I know what it’ll look like when I get there. All that matters, at this moment, is the whine of my hoverbike’s engine. With nothing to do but drive, I listen to its constant mechanical wheeze closely. I can’t decide if I’m sitting on an advanced piece of sci-fi tech or a total lemon. All I know is that it sounds like it’s putting all its efforts into getting me where I need to be.

Then I notice the music. It’s a minimalist track with steady percussion thumping like a heartbeat. Is it actually music at all? Or am I hearing my own body as it tries to put a beat to my bike’s engine, providing it a tempo to breathe along to? The barrier between human and machine melts away for the rest of my ride; my bike and I are one.

Little moments of audio bliss like that happen all the time in Sable, if you listen closely enough. The indie game may immediately draw attention with its striking art style, but its sound design deserves the best pair of headphones you can find.

The language of machines

Developed by Shedworks, Sable is an open-world game set in a sprawling desert. Players control the titular Sable, a girl who sets out on a coming-of-age ritual that separates her from her clan. Armed with a bike, a newfound gliding power, and the ability to climb any surface, she travels the desert in search of masks that will help her complete her rite of passage. The game mostly plays out as a series of loose quests, where Sable finds bugs for distant villagers or scales massive structures.

Sable - The World of Sable

As an open world, the desert is particularly empty. There aren’t secrets hiding at the top of every dune. Instead, Sable will spend a lot of time zipping across large empty spaces until a point of interest appears on the horizon. With so much time spent peacefully gliding, sound becomes fundamental to the experience. There’s not much else to focus on in those moments, so my ear starts to hear every little detail. When my bike passes over a dune and comes swooping back down, I can hear the metal briefly dip into the sand before regaining its composure. It’s like the machine is talking to me as I drive, always assuring me that it’ll keep plugging along as long as I need it to.

That level of detail exists even when I’m off my bike. The sound design blends the mechanical and natural, creating an otherworldly, but familiar soundscape. By pressing Y, I can call my bike and summon it to my location (like a horse in Ghost of Tsushima, though it returns to me with much less grace). When I do that, Sable puts two fingers to her mouth and whistles, but it’s not the sound I expect to hear. Rather than a high-pitched melody, she emits a sharp sound, like a piece of malleable metal wobbling after getting hit with a hammer. At first, I’m not even sure if I’m making that sound or if it’s coming from my bike.

Sable drives across the desert in a glider.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

The machine quickly responds to my robotic call. I hear its engine excitedly fire up far in the distance before it softly glides over to me like an obedient dog. I feel like my bike and I are speaking the same language, one that I somehow understand, too.

A desert symphony

Another major piece of the soundscape is the game’s original soundtrack, which was composed by Michelle Zauner of indie rock band Japanese Breakfast. Most of her work here is instrumental, though she lends her voice to a stunning track called Glider. The song drops when Sable first leaves her village and the game’s title splashes on screen. A shimmering synth line bubbles up and Zauner sings, “I’m caught between the wind and parts of the unknown; a door between two worlds.” It’s a line that sets up the game’s entire audio motif as natural sounds start to blend into a world full of machines and unexplainable phenomena.

Summer Game Fest 2021: Japanese Breakfast performs Glider

Just as the sound effects give life to my glider, Zauner’s subtle compositions turn each sector of the sprawling desert into its own character. In Sable’s village, a gentle acoustic guitar track is warm and comforting, like home. Elsewhere, I stumble into an abandoned spacecraft filled with machinery. The music is much more unfamiliar here. It’s more scattered, with backwards synth textures indicating that I’ve stumbled on something alien (and as the music foreshadows, I do end up making a surprising sci-fi discovery here).

The music and sound effects are often in concert with one another. In the mechanical area I just mentioned, I use power cores to turn on some heavy machinery. A giant cube heavily juts out of a device with a metallic thud that echoes through the abandoned ship. It’s almost like a distorted bass drum joining in with the music. Everything is one living desert ecosystem functioning together as one.

Sable slides down a desert hill.
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Sable is a lo-fi symphony that rewards those who keep their ears perked. Climb to the highest point you can find and listen to the flocks of birds squawking above. Stand next to a village’s rudimentary windmills and hear them creak as they rotate. The open world may seem desolate, but it’s busier than it looks. Just listen.

Sable releases on September 23 for PlayStation 4, PS5, PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. It will be available as part of Xbox Game Pass on day one.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Giovanni Colantonio
Giovanni is a writer and video producer focusing on happenings in the video game industry. He has contributed stories to…
The best indie hidden gems of 2022: 10 excellent games you can’t miss
An OlliOlli World skateboarder stands in front of text that says 2022 Indie Hidden Gems.

As you might have gathered from our 2022 game of the year list, this year delivered some indie heavy hitters. Games like Immortality and Vampire Survivors completely redefined what video games could be in 2022, rejecting the industry's biggest trends in the name of creativity. Other hits like Stray even broke into the mainstream, landing a coveted Game of the Year nomination at this year's Game Awards. Elden Ring may be king, but plenty of smaller games captivated us just as much throughout the year.

Even after including a handful of highlights on our list, we still found ourselves eager to talk about more games we loved this year. 2022 was a wide and varied year for the gaming industry, which saw some indie titles breaking out of genre limitations to create entirely new experiences. We may not be able to highlight every single game we loved this year (try as we might), but we'd be remiss if we didn't spotlight these 10 indies that just missed our game of the year cut. If you're looking to catch up on some of this year's highlights before 2023's busy season kicks off, give these games a try. You'll be glad you did.
Neon White

Read more
Demon Throttle is an awesome retro shooter you’ll probably never play
The Gunslinger and Vampiress fight off enemies in Demon Throttle key art.

Demon Throttle is an 8-bit retro throwback from Gato Robato developer Doinksoft and Devolver Digital that would feel right at home alongside other retro-inspired indie games on any digital game storefront. But Demon Throttle will never be available digitally. Like the NES games it’s inspired by, Demon Throttle is only available physically at launch. And right now, only 10,000 people are getting copies of the game after pre-ordering through Special Reserve Games last June.
Following the removal of lots of digital exclusives from HBO Max, it feels odd to play a game that’s only available physically. It’s the antithesis of the current state of digital media. Instead of letting anyone experience something digitally until it’s gone forever, a limited number of people can treasure a physical experience that won’t go away. I can take pride in having copy 1,651 of 10,000 alongside a well-produced instruction booklet and some stickers. That said, dealing with absolutes is not the best route for media preservation.
Having Demon Throttle’s Nintendo Switch cartridge physically does mean it will never disappear like An American Pickle or The Witches have, but it’s still limiting in its own way. Demon Throttle is an enjoyable retro throwback that I wish more people could play it. While this physical-only game technically circumvents one of the most significant issues facing all kinds of digital media but also negates the benefits of digital releases in the process. 
Demon Throttle | Nintendo Switch | 2022 | Physical Exclusive
A retro romp that goes full throttle
It feels like Doinksoft and Devolver Digital ripped Demon Throttle straight out of an NES cartridge. Especially when playing with the in-game CRT filter and no dynamic backgrounds are on, you’d be forgiven for looking at Demon Throttle and thinking it is actually an NES game. As a result, its story is quite simple, with a Gunslinger and a Vampiress trying to take down a Dragon Lord after he kisses the Gunslinger’s wife and takes the chalices that can turn the Vampiress back into a human.
The little narrative here is irreverent, played for laughs, and vocalized through bitcrushed audio, so it’s quite charming. The soundtrack also features some of my favorite chiptunes of the year. Most importantly, Demon Throttle is also really fun to play, even if it is intentionally super hard. Demon Throttle is like King’s Knight as players continually walk forward through one of four upwards-moving autoscrolling levels, shooting the enemy and destroying the environment in front of them.
It’s part bullethell as players must dodge the barrage of enemy fire constantly coming toward them and part action RPG as the player can defeat enemies to level up and pick up upgrades for each character's stats. Demon Throttle is a simple game once you learn how to fire, jump, and switch characters consistently, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Each character dies after just a few hits, and you have to start from the beginning after a game over like many games from the NES era. Even after hours of play, I still struggle to get far on most runs. Plus, it’s impossible to get the true ending if you don’t find the secret chalice in each level during a run.

Despite its intentional toughness, Demon Throttle is a really satisfying game to perform well in, and the repeated runs make it feel like a roguelike in the way most difficult retro games without save states do. I’d wholeheartedly recommend Demon Throttle to fans of retro games … if they can ever get their hands on it.
Physical foibles
Being a physical-only release is limiting in its own ways. I haven’t seen much discussion online about the game since it rolled out in July, outside of people being frustrated that Devolver Digital will eventually sell it in a non-limited fashion at places like Amazon and Best Buy. It doesn’t feel like it got a physical edition to ensure it never becomes lost media again, like Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game - Complete Edition. It feels more like a gimmick that limits its availability in a different way than a digital delisted, in turn increasing the game’s value.
There’s no denying that I’ve immensely devalued this game by opening my copy to write this article. But if you don’t play a game because it’s a rare physical release, that’s almost just as bad for interested fans as delisting something from a storefront forever? Being physical means Demon Throttle will never truly go away, but this King’s Knight-inspired experience might also never have the reach it potentially could have with a physical and digital release.

Read more
Itch.io’s indie bundle for abortion funds lands you 792 games for $10
Characters walk uphill in Wanderhome.

Following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, itch.io is now selling an indie game bundle with proceeds going toward abortion funds.

Hypnospace Outlaw Trailer

Read more