: Well, there's the reality of weapons, and then there's what you want them to
: do in a video game context. Guns are overpoweringly loud, and that's not
: something you're going to actually want in your video game, for instance.
: You have to make choices that are probably by necessity going to alter the
: "true" sound—simply decreasing the volume on an untreated
: gunshot and it's going to sound weird and wrong.

Right, and it may not be feasible to record every weapon's natural sound in every possible in-game environment. Recording a 'raw' environment-less sound and added environment effects dynamically in-game is, afaik, much more feasible and flexible.
Sort of like when games moved from animated sprites to 3D entities :) Some programmers make sprite animations of realistic images, but they'd have zero flexibility in the game actions. Making it 3D meant better dynamics, and eventually brought on the IK concept for more believable motion and physics. Not sure what if there's a direct analogy to an audio system for believable sound, other than just adding environmental effects... but anyway.