Music Mechanics .

We as a species have invented things like video games and coffee. We’ve achieved such things as landing on the moon and coding half decent enemy AI.

Success is the triumph of reason and ability over adversity. One other great invention of ours has nothing to do with reason per se and everything to do with emotion and the ability to hack it.

Music is without a doubt one of the most powerful forces available. A picture may be worth a thousand words, and in our games these pictures have even more vibrancy. Music though, music can reach down into the core of you and change how you feel about everything.

Think of the duties left to the sound track in anything you enjoy. Need a short hand notation for a tense moment? They have those. Need to reinforce that people are in love? Life long enemies? About to get down and well… you know. It’s more than emotional short hand though, it goes beyond that.

Music can reprogram you.

Music as Scenery

Want an MMO where the music and the sounds play a huge part? Look no further than Funcom’s The Secret World.

Once upon a time while playing The Secret World, my computer was shall we say inequal to the task of properly handling the game. This is what you get for playing on minimum settings sometimes. The reason I even bring this up was for those lovely little personal moments while everything loaded. Like an orchestra tuning their instruments, I got to hear the successive layers of sound load. The atmospherics for the location. The soundtrack for the player. The little sound effects of powers and potential targets. Each one laid on lovingly for me and designed to give me the truest sense possible of actually being there. Of being in dark and foggy Kingsmouth. These things get under your skin and make the whole experience simply … more.

If you’re not into The Secret World, the best smaller representation of this all, to me at least, is Left 4 Dead. Again a game where the motifs and soundtrack aren’t just giving you a sense of the place you are playing, but actively prompting you and schooling you. You’ll hear danger before you see it, you’ll know when something is about to happen, your ears as much as your eyes are what keep you alive in the zombie apocalypse.

Musical Credit

Want an MMO with just wonderful music? There’s plenty of options, RIFT stands out in memory, but I think I will have to go with Guild Wars 2. Again, they know the value of the right bit of music in the right place. Look at the ongoing Living Story Season 2 if you want an example.

“When you hear live music while you’re playing, you feel it on a much more visceral level,” – Maclaine Diemer

Live music? For Season 2 they’ve made the trek to Berlin to record with a live orchestra. They’re not wrong either, that or every music fan talking about the experience when their band played live is talking rubbish. That’s not even taking account of things like Video Games Live. Guild Wars 2 already had me hooked on the audioscape in the game, adding in this little touch is simply going to spoil me.

Musical Override

So music can hack your emotions and make the mood just right. A good score can bring you up. A good score can get your heart pumping. They do tend to be personal preference though. For me? Orcs Must Die 2 has a fantastic score with my absolute favourite track being Gore Mage.

It’s the musical equivalent of snowboarding a house down the side of an avalanche while armed to the teeth. Sure it only clocks in around two minutes but at the end of those two minutes? You have conquered armies, you have saved worlds. You’ve stared into the face of death and air guitared him into submission.

Yes musical taste, just like taste in games, varies from person to person. For the duration that avalanche though, you and the War Mage are one. Gore Mage represents two full minutes of the character distilled into audio and fired into your brain. Eventually, as with all good things, it ends… but you can walk away with a grin knowing that not only must orcs die, you went full 80s action movie on them.

I’d love to hear from some of you about your favourite music pieces and MMO scores. Just to make that all easier I simply have to point out the ever amazing Syp at Bio Break has made a collection of links for audio amazement. Head to this page if you’re curious.

Emotion Hack

In the end we’ll all have our own preferred music. Some people may not even pay the slightest bit of attention to the game music natively. They might ignore the audio cues as they enter new zones or face new enemies. There’s people I know who keep their games muted all the time in favour of their own music.

That’s fine and entirely up to them. Music speaks to each of us differently. I’d love to hear what songs do it for you, what songs make you feel like the hero or set the scene for you.

I’d love to hear if there is that one piece of music that always gets you.

Personally I have a few. Some of them are classical, some are contemporary. Though in terms of video games? There is the one theme that will always get me. Anywhere in the world, no matter what I am doing. This is full on emotion hack. Sadly it isn’t an MMO piece, though I imagine such a game would be amazing. For me, the one bit of video game music that will always make me shiver is the theme from Halo 2.

One day I will be old, I will be dealing with the realities of whatever my life is. Then that theme will play and no matter who I become or where I am, I’ll be ready to fight the Covenant. Music does that.