Gaming

Well in terms of taking advantage of really good headphones. Senua's Sacrifice

Elite Dangerous has some amazing sound design.

Both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom have fantastic sound design. The environmental sounds of wind, water, trees and wildlife accompanied by that understated soundtrack makes you feel out in the wilds even though the graphics are minimal.

Subnautica. Sound takes you to fear:)

The sound designers at Bungie deserve double their pay.

Destiny has plenty of issues but sound design is not one of them. Some of those gun sounds are orgasmically good, and so satisfying to shoot.

Doom 2016 - remake of a classic that everyone loved, with the soundtrack being a very large part of it.

Not the gun sound effects, not the sound track, problably not a lot of things - but the atmosphere the sound effects in Control created, man it's like 50% of what makes the game what it is, and it's a truly great game.

I haven't experienced anything quite like HuntShowdown. It's a slower-than-most extraction shooter with several objectives on each map.

Every sound matters. You can hear people shooting in the next compound over, but you can also hear someone crouch behind the wall next to you. You have to watch for sound traps like birds, horses, dogs, etc. Always be on the move because if you stop, someone might already be taking aim to shoot you through the wall.

Hellblade was already mentioned (prime example imho), so I'd give shoutout to the entire Supergiant's game catalogue. So much time and effort went into sound design and music in all their games, it's remarkable.

Hi-Fi Rush, Doom 2016 and Eternal, Hades, and Warhammer 40K: Mechanicus, off the top of my head. All very different games but all with exceptional music.

NieR:Automata and Cyberpunk 2077 have phenomenal soundtracks

Given that you asked for guns specifically I'll go out on a limb and say we are very different gamers!

But Subnautica would be my suggestion. Crazy good sound design.

Squad always got me with its sound design. Nothing too fancy, just guns and explosions. But they DO sound amazing.

Well, there is a game that's been designed specifically for that. Metal Hellsinger, you can play a demo for free. It's a doom style shooter that rewards you for shooting and reloading to the beat of metal music, which is dynamic to how well you are doing and the situation. Really cool concept and really rewarding to get a combo going.

I'm surprised no one here has mentioned Returnal. On the PS5 with a headset it uses the "3D Audio". It's pretty amazing.

STALKER (Shadow Of Chernobyl or Call Of Pripyat).

Music: off

Headphones: On

Good luck not getting spooked out of your mind by random industrial noises.

I highly recommend you check out scruffy on YouTube. His channel is dedicated to awesome sound design in video games.

https://youtube.com/@ScruffyMusic

Warframe has great sound design, and it's f2p. The Corinth shotgun sounds like God slamming a car door.

Both of the new Star Wars Battlefronts had me feeling like lasers were actually flying past my head.

Hi-Fi rush.

Thank me later.

While not the greatest games, I've found that the newer Star Wars Battlefront games have some of the best sound design in any game I've ever played. Especially the thermal imploder. Definitely a highlight of an otherwise alright game.

Bad Company 2 always comes to mind for me whenever this question comes up

spoilers for the game hi fi rush but it has hands down the coolest transformation https://youtu.be/cU5utimmtkg?t=92

As much as I dislike them the gun audio on both the 2019+ call of duty modern warfare games is very well done.

The Hotline Miami series and Katana Zero really stand out to me. Hollow knight and Persona are also fantastic.

Tetris Effect on VR (ps/quest). think hypnotic trance

assetto corsa competizione

or really any quality racing game. its almost like 50% of my enjoyment

@[email protected], you're going to want in on this conversation.

Darkwood

Never played it personally, but I remember being really satisfied with the sounds from Hawken watching the gameplay trailers. https://youtu.be/udEAEARD-Fo

Edit: reading up on it, the final game was pretty lame, and it’s apparently dead now.

I really really really liked the theme music and all sound design in the Red Alert 2 and Generals Zero Hour games. Those were excellent, to the point I'd listen to the theme alone when working or driving.

Elite Dangerous is still the GOAT of sound design IMO. That game would be nothing without it's sound.