Video games soundtracks

Music is a part of a lifestyle, and games are increasingly taking video game soundtracks and fusing them with an image that the game can play on. Just think of a tune, and you can associate it to a place, time, and a mood. The tune fits to a lifestyle of a particular time, it can be today or yesterday, a decade ago or in the future. To do this video games have music that fits to their genre. The games match the style of the game with the feel of the music. What other way is better than to get that feel with the music of the time, when the game is supposed to take place. Music like "Bark at the Moon" with Ozzy Osbourne, and "Rockit" with Herbie Hancock which are featured in Grand Theft Auto:Vice City game, or "Loops of Fury" by the Chemical Brothers in WipeoutXL, which reflects the feeling of the game. You can even try this by playing a game with the audio turned off, and it totally changes the feeling of playing the game. Video games employ different ways of getting the music across, so that it functions within the game. The in game radio station is one way they do that, and you can use it to deceide what feeling the game experience will have by building your own playlist of tracks, and add some to our playlist in the video games playlist article. Movies have been using music in the movies for a long time, but they have added something extra, the music has been part of the movies, and followed the suspense, drama, and action of what an actor is doing in a movie.Games have a possibility of taking what movies have been doing for a long time and making the experience more interactive. In the game the music has to follow your actions, and instead of watching the action passively at a movie screen, you are at the center of the attention, and the game and the music are all a part of what you will do in the game. The suspense, drama, and action of the music will follow your movements, and change according to what you will do, or where you will go.

Music that follows the action of a player in a game is termed "Adaptive music".The music follows your action, and changes in tune with the action of the game. An example, could be while playing a game like Metal Gear Solid, you are trying to sneak around enemy patrols, you try to get pass one of the enemy guards without them seeing you, but you accidentally make a sound one of them hears, and he goes to inspect what it was, and sees you, the alarm goes on.

The music would change to signal the change of action. It is here where the music follows your action, and how you resolve the situation by running away or by attacking the guards. As the game becomes more immersive it gives you a chance of experiencing the game directly as some games are offering quality sound in the form of Dolby 5.1. With the right equipment, the sound and the music of the game can be heard all around you, like in the cinema.The change in the experience is that instead of watching passively you are interactively involved with the experience.

Just like movies can transport us to magical environments, where good meets evil, games can transport us there more directly by immersing you in the situation. Music in the movies has been doing this for a long time, and has applied what is called a leitmotiv to create a theme for every character or location in the movie. The word leitmotiv comes from German, and means a "leading theme".

One of the most known uses of leitmotivs in movies is in its use for the Star Wars movies, where every character, object, and location have their own leitmotiv.Characters like Luke, Leia, and Vader, and even an object like the Force has its own theme in the movie, which describes its personality in the movie.

The idea of using the leitmotiv to tell a story comes from Wagnerian Operas where they were used to present different locations and characters.They also introduced a new way to immerse people into the opera by hiding the orchestra below and in front of the stage, hidden out of view from the audience. This increased the level of immersion, and the music became more an invisible part of the opera.

Some of today's biggest games like Final Fantasy and Knights of The Old Republic employ a leitmotiv to give locations and characters a deeper personality.The difference from watching a movie and playing a video game is interactivity, music in the movies has mostly followed a linear progression. Games are interactive and allow the music to follow your action in the game, your actions in the game makes the music change according to your actions.

Interactive mediums like video games are taking music to a new level, and changing the way we listen to music, instead of the music flowing in a linear way, it looks more like a map, or a network. The music changes to where we are on the map or in the network, much like playing a game, the music depends on where you are, and what you are doing in the game.