the_mit_press

Hey Ccstriker77! Thanks for the question, and the kind words about my work on the God of War music team! Much appreciated. Regarding making game music -- it couldn't be -more- different than making regular music! Game music is very distinct. The demands on the composer are very different than they would be for a film or television composer, or even for a symphonic composer. Game music has to be interactive. It has to react to the actions of the player. That's actually really inspiring to me. I feel like I'm having a sort of musical conversation with players. They perform actions, and the music responds. Hopefully the music inspires players on their in-game journey. In terms of the technical aspects, game music has to be constructed in bits and pieces, that can be jig-sawed together by the game engine according to what's going on in the game. I go into a lot of detail about this in my book -- it's a fascinating way to think about music creation, and it's really inspired me to stretch and grow as a composer.

Hey, Pegthaniel! Cool question! I always love receiving a build of the game while I'm working so that I can play it and get inspired by what the development team is doing. That's not always possible, though. Sometimes the game is just too early in development for me to receive a playable version. In that case, I read all sorts of design documents, look at tons of concept art, have lots of great meetings with the developers to talk about what inspires them and what their vision is for the music of their game. I'll also do a bunch of research before I begin work. The research sometimes focuses on musical style, genre, instrumentation, etc. Sometimes the research also includes topics related to the game narrative and history. I want to understand the world of the game, so that I can create music that's appropriate for it.

Hey, Manofthedown! I was working as a composer for a National Public Radio series called Radio Tales, when the idea of becoming a game composer got stuck in my head. Always been a gamer, always a huge fan of games! Once the idea of writing music for games lodged in my head, I couldn't shake it. So I started doing research into game publishers and developers, reaching out to see if I could find a project and a team that would want to work with me. I happened to contact Sony Interactive Entertainment America at just the right time -- they were putting together a music composition team for God of War. I actually told the whole story at a Society of Composers and Lyricists event in NYC -- there's a video here: https://youtu.be/XPz8nQQgtBk?t=258

Jesper here: https://www.jesperjuul.net/temp/juul.png

Jesper: I am torn on this: On one hand, criticism of microtransactions tends to be identical to common criticisms of video games in general: "they exploit the psychology of players, they are just about money, they have not redeeming value" etc. etc. etc... That make me suspect that complaints about microtransactions are just complaints about a new business model that we didn't have when we were growing up. And really: remember that the traditional game-in-a-box-for-one-price model has its own problems such as paying $60 up front for a game that turns out to be terrible, or when single player games are padded with 20 hours of dull content to justify the purchase price.

On the other hand, yes, there are microtransaction-games, especially geared towards children, that are pretty manipulative.

But in the end, I think it's just a particular business model that's not obviously better or worse than other models. I have happily paid €100 for items in Clash Royale because I felt it was worth it, and more worth it than some of the dull games I have on my shelf. So I feel the microtransactions may be better than their reputation.