Done! I’ve finished a whole little soundtrack for a made up game:) This is what I was working on earlier with the boss battle theme. Kind of lockdown focus project…
I’ve made a page about it here, or go to bandcamp for more info and to download.
These tracks are available to use for free in non-commercial game projects, with credit and a link back to me.
Playlist on youtube.
based on “Midnight Rendezvous”, a track which only appears in the Remake version of Final Fantasy VII — playing it through though, it does combine very well with other themes, so maybe even that’s where the idea came from…?
Sheet music: download
midnight_fireworks‘Searching for Friends’ from Final Fantasy (Nobuo Uematsu) in as close as possible to the style of ‘What Shall We Die For?’ (Hans Zimmer) from Pirates of the Caribbean 3.
It’s kind of an active/interactive way to analyse a piece’s arrangement/orchestration!
(This is from years and years ago; I’ve done something similar a few other times, but maybe I’ll do more again soon. It certainly will be a lot easier on the old CPU/RAM than it was back then, whew, that was struggle.)
There was an Old Man (Edward Lear)
Dm F There was an old man who said How Dm F shall I flee from this horrible cow? Gm Dm I will sit on this stile, and continue to smile A7 Dm Which may soften the heart of the cow
The Boats Sail Away (Kate Greenaway)
Am CMaj7
The boats sail away like a bird on the wing
Am CMaj7
And the little boys dance on the sands in a ring
F G7 CMaj7
The winds may fall or the winds may rise
F G7 CMaj7
You're foolish to go, you will stay if you're wise
Am CMaj7
The little boys dance and little girls run
Dm Am
If it's bad to have money, it's worse to have none
Lately I’ve been getting very inspired by the Final Fantasy VII hype — as I may have mentioned a few times, it’s one of my favourite games. It’s had a remake (or at least, the very very beginning of it has, but that’s another story) which of course I can’t play on anything I own, but it’s just got me going back to the original and having a big game music mood in general.
I’ve been working on something in particular that I hope to be able to share soon, but in the meantime here’s a sneak peak and also a look back at some older (very very old in some cases!) tunes……
So, “battle music”! When I say that I’m thinking of something pretty specific, the music that comes on and interrupts when you’re running around in an RPG and then boom battle! or perhaps, oh no, BOSS battle! Final boss music I think belongs in an entirely different category really (a category including the Rite of Spring in this case), but an example of that is also relevant for what follows…
I write a lot of random game music — but left to my own devices I tend to default to tuneful character themes, or pretty town themes, maybe the occasional piece of Uneasy Atmosphere. The thing is I love writing, or at least having written, exciting pacy rhythmically snappy pieces, like BATTLE MUSIC…. but it’s a lot more daunting to start something like that, so I don’t anything like as often. Of these, only a few are “actually” battle music, but a lot are I feel very much in the same zone, so without further ado….
Honourable mentions
More things that aren’t really battle music but have some kind of overlap — and that fill in the gap and show I did write some upbeat music between 2003 and 2011 !
Some more! featuring a strange sort of accordion and a pretty nice oboe solo I wouldn’t mind playing.
The remake of Final Fantasy VII has come out recently! Only part 1 of who knows how many thought… I can’t actually play it and don’t own it, but perhaps in honour of that, here’s some tunes. FFVII and the music were massively important in getting me composing a lot as a teenager.
Two quick pieces from yesterday then–using some RealFont and other old samples once again, though I spent just a little longer working on the sound, within those constraints, this time.
I’ve been listening to a bit of this kind of music. It’s generally very restful, quite repetitive, sometimes kinda jazzy in harmony, and also has the lo fi sound which I really rather like. (I’m wondering actually if I can mix it up with for e.g. my beloved olde soundfonts and in-between era game music sounds… something to try at some point…)
For now though I tried to make a couple tracks in approximately this genre this week:
This was done quite quickly and not necessarily with too much detail as to the mechanics of lo fi, but it was fun also to be throwing around 7th chords from the very beginning of this book. The tune is the kids’/folk song ‘The Fox’! The fox went out on a chilly night… etc.
For this next one I tried to more closely follow some specific tropes of the genre (though I’m still just barely getting into this!) — had fun sampling my own piano playing from a bit ago.