I thought it might be interesting to talk a little bit about mood development and what’s happening audiowise in a computer game when a situation changes but in the same location. In this example I am using two tracks I composed and arranged for game “HCA – The Ugly Prince Duckling”.
While the first setting is daytime with a peaceful, but not really happy ambience, the other situation is the same location, but at nighttime with an evil and mysterious surrounding. I don’t want to talk and analyze too much, so just simply listen to both tracks and I am sure you’ll get the idea.
Note that the order of the parts on both tracks are actually more or less the same. I am just varying the melody, chords and of course also change instruments to give it a darker or more mysterious mood on the evil track, while staying light and more neutral at the first one. Enjoy and if you have questions or suggestions, feel free to leave a comment!
“HCA – the second quarter” (day & peaceful)
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“HCA – the second quarter” (night & evil)
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Please note that the original melody on this particular example is written by Edvard Grieg.
The background by using the music of Edvard Grieg for the game was, that Edvard Grieg and Hans Christian Andersen inspired each other in their works. The developer Guppyworks and I thought it might be a funny idea to use elements and melodies of Grieg in a game about Andersen. I used Grieg’s melodies and compositions of the “Peer Gynt suites” for the game, but also additionally composed music and had the demanding but honorable “mission” to compose the whole score as if Grieg himself would have composed music for this beautiful game.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 4th, 2008 at 12:36 am
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Thanks for sharing. Really great atmospheres!
aases death!
quite differently arranged!
What vsts did you use to compose the two pieces? I want to learn how to compose at this level, what training has served beneficial to you in composing at this level? Thanks
Hey Jayson,
for these two pieces and also for the whole project I used VSL Orchestral Strings, Woodwinds and French Horns (Opus Bundle). ProjectSAM Brass and True Strike 1. As for reverb I created the mic distances with Quik Quaks Rayspace and for the general reverb tail I used Wizooverb.
In case you want to study that style I would get the score of the “Peer Gynt suites” written by Edvard Grieg and check it out. Besides my general music training which you can check out in my bio, I studied the “Peer Gynt” score before I started to work on the project in order to “slip into Grieg’s skin” :)
Alex,
Great stuff. You’re an inspiration for me to keep at this. Thank you for posting it. Great site, too.
Very nice! And a super job incorperating the Grieg melodies and mood. Went to the publisher’s homepage, and the game catches my attention, too.
Mahlon