Native Audio SDK for Spatialization VS Alternative Plugins

Hello,

I am currently trying to implement 3D Audio into my project. There are quite a number of options, and there is a great article about some of the commercial solutions here:

http://designingsound.org/2015/04/3d-audio-weighing-the-options/

However I noticed that Unity appears to have a native plugin for specialized 3D sound. Has anyone had any experience in comparing it to at least 1 commercial solution? I'm just trying to decide purchasing one would be worth it at all.

Thankyou forums

 

I think the term 3D sound is a bit vague here. The tools linked in the article offer functionality which go beyond Unity's native 3D audio features, like support for ambisonics, room moddeling with spatialized reflections, HRTF filters and control over speed of sound (world scale) etc.. All of these are mostly relevant for VR or projects where full 360° sound is required and you want the localisation to be better than the basic vol/freq roll-off that Unity's standard 3D audio has. If your project doesn't need that you most probably don't require any of these.

 

The project I am working on requires the best accuracy in terms of identifying something in front, behind, left right etc. So perhaps I am leaning towards one the external solutions.

There's a couple of solutions directly available in the Unity Store already... just saw another one called DearVR which seemed to have a similar solution and is cheaper than AstoundSound... Ill see what demo's I can RnD and ill be able to post my results here.