They know exactly how long each musical cue needs to be, when the hit points occur and when the action will take place. Film composers compose their soundtrack to the “locked picture” – the final, edited version of the film. It was this last aspect that I found most interesting. Chance Thomas – composer of a number of video game soundtracks including DOTA 2 – describes the player as the “director and producer” of the soundtrack. The player’s actions determine how long a scene will last, how abruptly a level ends and when the battle will begin.
This is connected to the most important difference between film scoring and video game scoring: the way in which a player reacts in a game has a direct effect on the soundtrack itself. I know more than one person that has turned off the sound on a game in order to help them achieve a difficult level! Think of that time you played a game in which the music grew in intensity: your heart started to beat faster, your palms became sweaty and suddenly your game character died because you couldn’t stay calm enough to succeed. In a video game soundtrack, music can directly affect how a player emotionally reacts in a gaming scenario. There are also a couple of subtle but important differences. The unique problem faced by video game music composers In both genres music plays a similar role: There are a lot of similarities between film music and video game soundtracks. I wanted to have 2-3 video game scoring projects that could be done by students in grades 5 and up.
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Lately I’ve had an interest in adding video game music composing into my workshop “repertoire” so I’ve been doing some research into how to break it down and make it work effectively for students. One of my favourite workshops to run over the years is on the topic of film scoring.