Poniedziałek 8 Cze 2009, 19:27

I, as a seasoned and serious gamer, always say : good music makes people want to play a game. Blizzard, Lucasarts and Bioware (and/or Black Isle) are definitely the leading names in this area. 3DO, Electronic Arts and some other companies are not bad too. I sometimes find myself installing Baldur's Gate, Monkey Island or Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne (Not to mention the constant joy of WoW addiction, arising from time to time) only to live the music and the atmosphere, despite the fact that these are games that I played hundreds of times/hours.

The other day, while listening to the Original Theme Music of Monkey Island 3 (Curse of Monkey Island, a legendary game and equally admirable work of Michael Land ), I extensively focused on this matter, why I constantly play particular games, especially older ones, and found that it's without doubt, the music. Fine music combined with the atmosphere of the game, becomes one with the gaming experience, having the greatest say in a game's quality.

The best composers in this area (to my knowledge) are
Michael Hoenig (Baldur's Gate series)
Frank Klepacki (Westwood's C&C composer)
Matt Uelmen (Diablo and various other Blizzard music, remember Tristram?)
Nobuo Uematsu (whole Final Fantasy series)
Mark Morgan (quite an underrated artist who composed the Fallout series' music)
Michael Land (as mentioned above, composer who is responsible for a great percentage of extreme popularity of Monkey Island series)
Duane Decker (Rise of Nations owe its nice ethnic musical infrastructure to him)
Stuart Chatwood (Prince of Persia)
Glenn Stafford (A genius musician of Blizzard, Warcraft series and more)
Jason Hayes (Another Blizzard veteran : music maker of "Starcraft", what more can I say?)
and of course the famous Level 80 Elite Tauren Chieftain (Storm, Earth and Fire… Heed my Call!)

These are my top composers/artists, and I am extremely confident that they know what they are doing. I admire every each of them, for making the games we play doubly exciting and worthy of playing. And those who mute the music of a game while playing, because it might distract you or diminish your micro or something, you are n00b. You haven't yet digested the true meaning of "Gaming".
As I said, I am a devoted player of PC games, but at the same time, I'm striving in the ways of musicianship and composition, then I ask myself, why don't I get into this awesome job of making games more efficient and meaningful? hopefully I am going to be able to contribute to this great field of both fun and art in the future.

And finally, here's an interview with Blizzard's top three composers, I strongly recommend any Blizzard fan to read the whole story. It's fantastic. I admire these guys.

http://archive.gamespy.com/legacy/interviews/blizzard_composers_a.shtm

Enjoy gaming and never underestimate the effect of music in your gameplay!

"GG"