You think Pepup works for a cave theme? I just don’t feel it. But you’ve done a lot more play testing than me. We’ll leave the caves alone for now. But I am all for improvement when and where it can be found. What did you think about the rest of the new changes?
Frogatto Soundtrack
Jetrel
#82
What do I think about the rest of the changes?
After going through the playlist, I've gotten rid of filler and made some changes.All of these will be rewritten with new samples at some point.
Tea for two
Frog tech
Milgrams themes (character and boss battle)These themes will be mastered, if I can manage
Point break
frogatto new cut final
frog forest
And possibly: Frogatto Title copy.The rest we’re keeping as is, are as follows
GunCetera, FrogUnderwater, DrumbeatFrogatto, Frogatto8bitfinal, Dumdeedum, Frogatto stage 1,2
There are quite a few other pieces that need work but those pieces are not as integral to the game so I won’t focus on them quite so much.
This sounds like a pretty good plan.
General - I am thinking Wellput.ogg should become the first theme the gamer hears. It's more upbeat, it's less annoying in its timbres and it is a great way to start the game without wearing out its welcome... whereas the current FrogattoTitle mix just doesn't cut it. It was an interesting little tune to develop but it's not working. So please replace FrogattoTitle.ogg with Wellput.ogg. Thank you
Yeahh… that’s going to be problematic, because FrogattoTitle serves a lot of different purposes:
- It’s our titlescreen theme
- It’s our victory theme
- It’s frogatto’s “character” theme
I can totally see WellPut working better than FrogattoTitle as the character theme. For a titlescreen theme, I’m kinda undecided - it could work; hell - it might be a great idea to actually do a rotation on the titlescreen, where we play a bunch of different songs (like starcraft 2 does). :o That idea just occurred to me and actually it … may well be the best plan. Not sure if it’s technically feasible, since the piece-o-shit SDL_Mixer library has terrible/nonexistent tools to detect the current song’s progress.
What it sucks as is a “victory theme”; not a short victory theme, but something a lot like the main chrono-trigger theme. Something bombastic, triumphant, and just over the top. The lack of which being exactly what makes WellPut better at being a laid-back character theme - I think “FrogattoTitle” was possibly trying to be too many things. However, it works better than anything else right now as a triumphant theme, and I’d like to keep it as that for the time being until we have a new one. We don’t necessarily need to remake “FrogattoTitle” in particular, but we absolutely do need some form of “triumph theme”.
I also would like to find a way to implement both wellput.ogg and whynotsad.ogg themes (is it uploaded?) to run side by side throughout the game b/c they both use similar musical structures and they would build well off each other in terms of contrast as stages progress while keeping the tension building and keeping a similar schematic. I would like for these themes to play at fairly regular intervals side by side, area to area, throughout the game as 'calming, friendly themes' to keep the game feeling light and crisp.
This is a good idea, I’d like to figure how to do that.
DDR
#83
I listened to all the music the other day. Most of it was ‘pretty good’, but some of it was really good. I mean, seriously… nice work. 8) Especially with those alien* tracks.
RyanReilly
#85
Orchestral frogatto theme. Not sure where this would go. I actually used this piece as an excuse to get a better group of orchestral instruments together. Not sure if I’ve nailed it yet. Still work to be done/
Jetrel
#86
You talked about wanting to have more “mysterious and foreboding” pieces in the darker parts of the game, and I said a big problem with doing that is we had almost no such pieces. One or two good ones, but less than, say 10% of our music.
So this could go in those levels, no problem. Honestly, a few more pieces like this would be awesome. ;D
Jetrel
#88
Also, a few more pieces in the loose direction of TerrestrialFortitude or SkyDrummin would be wicked, and would have tons of use. I can see one going in the kitty factory before this next release, for example.
RyanReilly
#89
Hmm. Let me see if I can drum something up in the next few days. $$
Also, I modified the orchestral piece a bit too give it a more mysterious tone for exploration in a dungeon. I think the mood would work well.
feedback on this actual piece would be appreciated. I need to know how the instruments are sounding to fresh ears. I am definitely trying to simulate live instrumentation in this piece
Jetrel
#90
The flutes (actually several instruments which seem to overlap, one seems to be a choir bit) get at little harsh around the 2:00 mark; not a problem of the music itself, it’s just a whole bunch of instruments hitting the same note really loud.
Your string samples sound way, way better than they used to be, but there’s still this problem - which I will note is present in many “professionally produced games” coming out of AAA studios, where the strings don’t sound real. I think the state of the art on string synthesis might not be there, yet. Chiefly, the big thing that’s missing is the initial “bite” as the musician begins pulling the bow - that, and the fact that a whole orchestra of real musicians would all be slightly out of synch. They’d be close, but not quite matching each other in terms of when they starting making noise.
Honestly, I think we just shouldn’t give a shit about this problem, because AAA games sure don’t. It’d bug me if I were making music, but I’m not sure it’s something most gamers are gonna really care about.
I do think a few studios have figured out ways around this - if I was going to guess, my first approach at solving it would be layering a bunch of solo instruments (which would normally be considered “part of” a string section on top of the “section” backup, and have them play the same thing, but play it slightly out of synch/etc). I wonder what other digital musicians have to say about this.
Maybe I’m just talking out of my ass.
DDR
#91
I’d have to agree with Jetrel on the harshness after 2:00. Other than that, I quite liked the piece. Nice work. 
RyanReilly
#92
Piano rendition of the ‘well put’ theme
Not sure where this would work. But here it is
Jetrel
#93
This piece would actually be quite helpful, because we really could stand to have some “reprise” pieces that veer away from the usual “wall of sound” pieces used during regular gameplay. Their primary use would be during dialogue and cutscenes, because the “regular gameplay” pieces are too intense for that.
This fits the bill.
RyanReilly
#94
http://soundcloud.com/frogattosound/myster-rioso
WIP. Not sure. It kinda seems like an adventure theme but it gets a little serious midway through. lol
Fun piece to write anyway.
Jetrel
#96
I take it this is a newer version of the one you just linked in the previous post.
I like it. 
Shall we replace FrogForest.ogg with it?
RyanReilly
#97
yes. I would replace it. The other piece is much more ambitious but I don’t think it’s working. I hope I can recover my files from g5 at some point b/c the piece could really work for something… but yea lets replace it for now. This piece works better and sounds better.
Jetrel
#98
Okay. It’s one of only two songs in the game that I’m bothered by; the other is the ancient “Dungeon.ogg” (which IMO ought to wholly be removed, but it’d help to have a good replacement for it, emotionally (we’re really short on dark, moody songs, and I’m using the heck out of the rest of our roster of those in the dungeon). Dungeon.ogg is barely used, now - it’s just on the first entry level to the dungeon to provide an ominous “drop” as you enter.
I do really like the non-string “quiet” segments in FrogForest.ogg, and I’ll be sad to see them go, but yeah, in the meantime, this is a solid replacement.
Sounds like a plan.