How to Write Music for Video Games

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Check it out our new course right here - here: thinkspace.ac.uk/courses/how-to-write-video-game-music/ How To Write Video Game Music is our brand new course and we are super excited about it! If you ever wanted to get started in video game music or you are looking for a new musical challenge this course will give you the essential skills every video games composer needs. The course includes our new interactive video technology, MinusONE scoring projects and a vibrant and supportive Discord Community where you can share your work and get feedback from your peers.

[@ohmygod3390]

this is so amazing.....I will sign up...quick questions...do you guys teach how to use Wwise as well in this course?

[@frankwales]

"You're writing the music for a scene that hasn't been directed yet" is a great way to encapsulate the challenge and the potential in game music

[@chro.]

that’s from c418 who made the minecraft soundtrack

[@kalvynjr5966]

The amount of work this man puts into describing specific musical concepts for free is mind boggling! Thank you so much for making these amazing videos!

[@Evangelionism]

I appreciate Guy Michelmore and what he does for the music community so much, and intros like this remind me of why I originally subscribed all those years ago. ❤️

[@DarqIce]

Ditto.

[@zypher9690]

This was super creative! I loved every minute of this. 😊

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Thank you

[@skippyzk]

I've been doing this for 20 years, not professionally, but I'll still watch this because you're so informative

[@TonyIrayhany]

Funny story 😂: I looked for some tips on composing a videogame for a client. This video was the one which seemed to be great to watch. And then, I saw your face and I was like: "hmmm, this person is very familiar to me but I don't remember who exactly". And when I finally reached the end of video, I was like :" wow, great explainer, he is very familiar to me. There was this great and aged-person I considered as Gandalf for music composer and his name was Guy Michelmore. However, this one have a beard. Guy didn't had a beard at that time" When I was going to look for another video, I just looked at the OP name and it ta-da it is Guy Michelmore 😂 I missed your Easy-Go-Ness, I feel I belong with you humably speaking. Thank you for the video Guy! Great work

[@thomasdevries8558]

Wonderful! So glad to hear you mention Jason Graves! I went to high school with him and had the pleasure to play music with him! He's really done well for himself and we're all so proud to know him!

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

AHA! Jason is lovely and a phenomenal composer. He does some work with our postgrqad students

[@thomasdevries8558]

@@ThinkSpaceEducation A secondary side note... it was fun to find out that years after we both graduated, that we met again professionally before socially. Not long after graduating from university, I started working as an artist for a games company and as I was tasked with making cinematics and needing time on an editing deck locally, imagine my surprise to meet Jason out of the blue. Before games, he was in video production - at least that's my memory from 25 years ago! Since that time, I guess we've both kept with it... the odd fact about this that I want to share is that Jason is a drummer... that was his musical start, and almost everyone else that I've met in game sound and music are also Drummers! Out of 5 people in the audio department, 4 were drummers. Maybe its because there's something about drummers on the east coast... maybe its industry-wide... I think it would be fun to poll anyone that you meet that also has made a career of video game composition and sound design if they were Drummers first. Thanks for all the inspiration and for using Cubase! Cheers!

[@craigkerr]

This feels like it should be paid content, you wouldn't get quality like this from any college lecturer. I feel inspired to try and compose myself now. Absolutely phenomenal demonstration with a great balance of interactivity as well as tons of useful information. Love it!

[@AMB666]

This is absolutely amazing! Very very creative and informative! But I think one of the challenges is to put down a great pieces which doesn't suck or get very boring on lots of repetitions!!

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Yup that is the skill of great games composers

[@MEllOWDPRODUCTIONS]

7:46 A great example is the music in Mirrors Edge. In that game the composer named Solar Fields really added lots of horizon movement so that the soundtrack feels alive. Which makes one song easily around 10 minutes long. How? Well Solar Fields divided the pieces in certain blocks like Guy talks about in this video: The first one is just an ambiance, the root of the song like Guy made at 2:45. From there he starts adding and subtracting things so that the song gets lets static. The second part is the more "alert" style of the music. In Mirrors Edge this can me you get chased by people or something happens in the narrative that shifts the music. The third part can go two different ways, so for the music creation there is an branching path: You managed to escape but are now in a building where you have to solve a puzzle by doing parkour or, the chase intensifies to an another level and the music gets more aggressive and got that "hurry up" feeling. From there things gets interesting, because again an level can be branched in more different ways. Note that the alternate music always got the same roots as the ambiance, for the track still ahs to feel familiar. But now so familiar that i gets boring. So Solar Fields added lots of modular synthesis to solve that problem(also something you hear in the Doom 2016 OST by Mick Gordon)...!!! If you want to hear an example to follow along of what i am talking about, here is a link to one of my most favorite pieces of Solar Fields~ Hopefully it can you help all out if you want to create your own video game music...!!! Keep on creating D Mirrors Edge - Flytrap OST: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gZ_Cl4KJoZWAfbc

[@randomizednamme]

Chopping the end of the bounced audio and moving it to the front blew my mind, so simple!

[@McCartyRec]

watched 3 minutes of this, and I got my answer already! thanks! This video is a gem

[@nolram]

This is great ! Though being a game composer specifically often also requires a bit of knowledge of the tools used to implement the music into the game - usually FMOD or Wwise - and actually playing the game to understand it and the kinds of interactions one may have in it is also beneficial.

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Absolutely - as i say at the end its like learning of the rules of chess not becoming a grand master. This is the grammer and synbtax - now go write a novel

[@adriansuarez5407]

Less than a minute in and this man has already earned all of my respect. So well done.

[@kayceparkinson9018]

Really had no idea that video game music did some of this. I pick out cross fades and loops when I play one but the vertical layering is really something else entirely that I didn’t even realize. Very neat content this week.

[@piyasirimusicproduction]

This is bloody awesome! I actually had no idea that it was done this way! ❤

[@notbanditatall]

watched the full thing, wonderfully explained and showcased, loved all the effort put in, very very informational!

[@jamesdanko9874]

I am loving your content Guy!! I just found your channel yesterday, and I’ve must have watched like 10-15 of your vids! They’re both educational, inspiring, and just fun, I love your energy and personality

[@max6419]

You are one of my absolute favorite music educators on KZbin. You are so knowledgeable and have such a great way of conveying the matter. Absolutely love your videos!

[@MitehMusic]

Guy, could listen to you talk all day. Please continue to make content

[@DreMusicPro]

As always: a great video, Guy! I'd like to add: you don't necessarily have to compose to a scene that hasn't been directed. I like to ask for the installer file, or gameplay footage, and score to that because I think finding the "pace" in those scenes is important. If they don't/can't provide the installer, and I'm having trouble coming up with something, then I'll grab a snippet of a scene from another game that I think captures what I want to write, and then compose to that scene. For anyone interested in composition for video games Winifred Phillip's "A Composer's Guide to Game Music" is a solid learning tool!

[@yorique2267]

I can’t put into words how much I appreciate this video

[@yorique2267]

@Guy_Michelmore get a job

[@JoshwaLaw]

Maaaan, I've gone 28 years of my life not understanding how exactly they transition music like this in games, and this finally explained it so very well 👏😁 absolutely fantastic job explaning it and showing it all off! Also incredible intro section haha

[@roogrey]

Fascinating! Thanks, Guy; superb as ever.

[@HarshRyan]

Sir you're a musical genius like hans zimmer. A true gem ❤ for young producers who want to learn about filmscore music.

[@particlese]

I'd preemptively donned my sunglasses of doubt having, as a gamer, seen years of marketing bonanzas wherein composers are given about 8 seconds to spill the beans that their game has a custom Dynamic Music System™ (like many others), or simply has music which (gasp!) makes you feel stuff and things. I should have expected better from you, but here I was with the glasses. This was great! Sincerely entertaining _and_ educational as usual. I figured it must be more complicated than I realized, and having this concrete peek at the process gives me even more appreciation for this version of the art. And of course your intro was great fun, even for me with my acute zombie game allergy. :)

[@MG4-f8r]

awesome soundtrack love it 💞🔥🎵🎶🎶 thanks for the teaching

[@This__Is__True__Beats]

Every Guy Michelmore vid he puts out, puts a smile on my face....reminds me to ease up when making beats

[@ChannelWaldo]

Smart, someone hooked you up with the idea of consistent high quality content.. it’ll work well for you

[@g.p616]

This video is the most informative, succinct, revealing and practical introduction to game music composition the world has ever seen! A master communicator, thanks👍.

[@LesusGames]

You sir, are the greatest music tutorial KZbinr ever.

[@DaveStutts]

This video is so good. I love you, Guy.

[@shadowdemonaer]

The start was long but surprisingly, it kept me interested the whole time. Very well done.

[@t33h33studio]

This was exhilarating! And eye opening!

[@nigelbrown3658]

A topic I’ve been waiting for. Thank you

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

enjoy

[@TiniLShadesofTL]

So blessed to have found this video. Yes, this video is very useful. I will be starting a music for video game course soon and your video has certainly given me many pointers as a head start. Thank you.

[@tgr9857]

We all know we’ve been waiting for this

[@markaitkenguitar]

Like watching Dr. Frankenstein give a lecture on his creation. It’s alive! Brilliant.

[@vortex_all9055]

this guy is the best human being to ever walk this planet

[@BusyCasual]

I haven't finished the video yet but as an aspiring composer who is working with her roommate on their first project, that intro was fantastic.

[@Gomorrha21]

Great explanation, Guy. Shows some insight how video game composers have to think - scoring a game you probably not even know too much about, yet the composer knows the players will probably listen to this music a lot (so it has to be neither too boring nor too much in the foreground, being too annoying - which is a nother hurdle to take care of), And even thinking back to the very old days makes me kinda shiver even more, where all you got was a couple of oscillators with basic wave forms, and perhaps a noise channel (plus limited space), where bleeps and bloops had to make the same hoops (verticality could probably only done if you kinda juggle the instruments using those few channels. I like to think about those fast-paced arpeggios back on the C64 and 8-bit console days; like the Mega Man soundtracks on the NES), because you had limited resources. Which required the composer to be really creative then, also with the horizontal thing of making loops connecting to itself or other loops nicely.

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Well a friend of mine is scoring a new game for gameboy using all the old chips. Nostalgia city!

[@ember-moonglow]

Oh, wow, I wonder why KZbin shared this with me. Its tooootally not like I have been enlisted by my partner to write the music for their video game or anything /s. Thanks for tue useful resource, this will certainly assist me in my production!

[@MiroslavDrahos]

Wow, a channel of Guy playing videogames would get my instant sub.

[@skippyzk]

13:40 Horrifying! Such a contrast from your nice warm relaxing voice hahaha

[@DarnKatarn]

I love your channel. Most of the content isn't necessarily new to me, but you're one of the few who've captured my attention, and I'll watch to support you! Thank you for everything you do for the community! -Cheers

[@EpicbubbleNITE]

how have i never discovered you??? you are a hidden gem of a channel. this video reminds me of tom scott's videos lool

[@MarcShake]

okay. Top Production Level. Not just musicwise but storywise, too.

[@gmorb666]

3:00 i literally jumped when this started playing 😂

[@seva-m]

Great video! The part about using loops and handling transitions was incredibly useful. 🎵 I've been wondering, where's the best place to submit or advertise your music if you want game developers to use it? 🤔 I'm posting my tunes royalty-free on my website, but it's not the way, is it...

[@GregSiekman]

Thank you for this! So interesting!

[@tommyvercetti2836]

Maaaaaaan you read my mind!!! That's what I need right now! Love it!

[@NikkiLayne]

Absolutely charming.

[@earlsfield]

I am working on music, sound design and integration of the sound in games for more than 20 years. Whings changed somewhat, but pretty much everything you say is true. First, composer must understand itnteractive element of the game. Second, people have to understand and grasp non linearity as well as generative audio - and I am not talking about droning ambience, but re-using existing file for multiple different purposes. Third, people should ge middleware out there for free and try to create music and sfx and them program it (there are bunch of free projects, you can find Fmod and Unity projects). Practice a lot. Layer a lot. Have fun.

[@RezaSadeghimusic]

I love you man. You are amazing as always ❤️

[@Doctorstrass]

Hi Guy ! Thank you so much for your detailed videos, they have been a really useful source of knowledge ! much love from Belgium

[@stevesoucy5932]

Awesome video as always, Guy! Love your humor throughout.

[@Andyjustwatching]

Im very happy I have found your videos! :)

[@EsenEspinosa]

You deserved a like just for that introduction. WELL DONE.

[@JDusala]

Really good explanation Guy

[@paopis]

This is one of the best episodes ever! Thanks a lot for this one! ❤

[@danielrichmond5662]

This was extremely helpful! I'm a senior in game design (art side), working on my thesis. Have a big background in music, but I never really knew how games went about music comp. This is really gonna save my butt, because music from our previous years theses have been so abhorrently uncared about!

[@ChopieTheCat]

Amazing video. Quality was very high as well as informative and entertaining all in one! The beginning intro was top notch though and very creative. Saving your video and channel for when I start composing.

[@ivansoto9723]

4:50 I had to deal with this exact same thing when learning to record Hardsynths for the first time.

[@Shanluki]

Best video about music production i've ever seen. Very well explained.

[@woegarden]

great video, i was recently approached with some work for an indie game and this has been invaluable in trying to figure out the structure of everything

[@agucci]

Such a fascinating explanation of the challenges and how to overcome them!

[@squishrabbit]

Would love to see a breakdown of how Wwise / fmod work 👍

[@Luis_Orlando01]

ty for all that u teach me i really like ur videos keep it up!!!!

[@Justandybrown]

Loved the little intro!

[@salliemorrill2671]

Guy, really appreciate your time and effort w/this vid! On LinkedIn, video games companys are looking for audio engineers at large numbers. It's mindblowing to me, bc I grew up using razor blade editing, & now computers are so ubiquitous that we have a multitude of areas in audio engineering to investigate for employment. Your vid helped me to see how it is done. Thank you.

[@DDayter]

haha that intro was awesome! Very great video as always!

[@OfficiallyChris]

So for this upcoming year I’m gonna be doing game dev and I got offered to try to get music for this lil game this definitely helped a lot to understand and I’m glad you mentioned Jason graves I went to go search him and found he composed music for one of my favorite games untill dawn I can’t wait to get started with composing ❤

[@JasonSeymore]

This. Is. Gold. THANK YOU!!!

[@mrc404]

Forever grateful for your content, and you.

[@High-Tech-Geek]

Love it! Thanks for this great info, Guy!

[@FabienC-MusicAndSoundDesign]

Captivating presentation and great explanation!

[@RichardJacques]

Hi Guy hope you're well. Great video to introduce people into video game composition! Just a thought from my side, I've been using these type of techniques for over 20 yrs now, and although they are useful for some type of games they can also get very musically boring for the player. This depends hugely on the type of game and the way the player may or not play through said game. Your zombie game example is a great example of scoring interactively, i.e. what we can do with interactive music and middleware, but just to put a counter point of view out there: what if the player is going from stealth, to action, to stingers in a short space of time ? (ie 20 or 30s)? This sounds like a musical mess! What if the player plays more stealth but another player plays more action / combat driven? Therefore the music can sound too "AI driven" if we're not careful, and it's like there is a virtual mix person in the box frantically switching musical states. My point is: just because we can, does that mean we should? There are definitely places for these techniques but I also advise composers to look at a particular scene / segment of gameplay / mission from a high level point of view as to what the composer is trying to achieve from a creative and aesthetic point of view, and then work out how to create this in an interactive environment. It's always a fine balance between having the technical tools at our disposal versus the creative and musical tools about how we approach a game. And of course every game is different! :) RJ

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

Richard how nice to hear from you! ( Hey everyone - when at the end I say I'm just explaining the rules of chess but I'm no grand master - Richard is a Grand MASTER) You are 100% right and I have recently heard almost the same thing when speaking to Jason Graves and Will Roget. Ill email you and we should arrange a chat about this for our MA students.

[@biborkaos7069]

I wasn’t expecting to run into your comment here, just wanted to say your presentation this month was really helpful, got the game for my birthday. Also, these are all really great advices, will keep in mind for future projects. By the way, do you have any tips for composing cello and double bass parts?

[@kenb6870]

This is one of my dreams! I really appreciate you, Guy, for this segment, explaining how this works! Thank you!

[@Dexterdevloper]

thank you so much for explaining

[@luke7442]

What a creative intro! Made my day.

[@ozzyg82]

I’ve been playing The Last Of Us 2 recently - and was tuning into just this kind of thing, the way the music is cued at certain points, the way it fades, changes, is used to foreshadow - and have been intrigued by how well the score responds and interacts with my choices. So interesting!

[@darrenifyouask]

Rah this video editing is SERIOUS. 10/10!! Great explanation of gaming topic. I like how you was inside the 🎮 . I could visualise what you was speaking about

[@kenroy916]

Oh my god I love this guy!!

[@stefanul]

you are currently my favorite youtuber

[@nicolasgarcia1990]

21 minutes of pure gold

[@doctorcringe2270]

That intro deserves a sub. Regardless of anything else gg😂

[@marcyd700]

This is great, Guy. Really tells me what I need to consider as a composer for this medium.

[@floralemmens]

You are so creative my dude. These videos are hilarious to watch. But i'm actually learning sonething ye know. Love the intro. Kudos to you.

[@dizbeefpvdizbeliefdizzy3612]

This is mind blowing would love to make music for games. Thanks so much

[@tobiasw2032]

that intro was amazing!!!

[@rustamh7675]

This is a great teacher!!!

[@romanograsnick]

Thanks a lot for the lightning tour, Sir. That will help me a lot when doing music for my games. I will use it to illustrate the danger in a realm were you need to whisper and to be quiet. Keep up the good work :D

[@zizzlegrr]

entertaining intro and informative tutorial. thank you for this gem

[@Fender2300DC]

This video is brilliant!! You went above and beyond, thanks for explaining all of this in such detail :D Thank you

[@Mental_Power_Music]

wow. Love the energy. such a great explanation as always. I didn't think I was interested in game music, but this is very useful and interesting. and I remember when you split the tea, when reading the news.

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

it was coffee and I will remember that moment to my dying day

[@mxclvre]

Best information I've found on this so far!

[@Trayzonne]

Ableton Live has an export option for seamless loops without having to do all the things you did in the video, great content thank you for sharing!!

[@annastephenson-knight6048]

Merry Christmas Guy.

[@ThinkSpaceEducation]

And to you too

[@alanredversangel]

Great content and a Cubase user too, Subscribed!