How To Fail At Music And Sound
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- čas přidán 15. 09. 2023
- Music is hard, and sounds are whatever, let's take as many shortcuts as possible! It's easy to fail at this topic!
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Twitter(x): / theartindi
itch.io: artindi.itch.io/
Music:
Doh De Oh by Kevin MacLeod
Link: incompetech.filmmusic.io/song...
License: filmmusic.io/standard-license - Zábava
I think I've done the opposite countless times. Started making sound effects and music until i feel overwhelmed and then give up on the game. For me, it seems music is a great way to fail at video games.
One of the hardest parts for sure, so honestly the chip tune jumble isn't a bad way to start, as long as you can get something done it's better than nothing. :)
@@Artindi
I will argue that well done composition chiptune is FAR superior to “average” composition that gets to utilize actual instruments and musicians. Those things are excellent to have, but they can’t hope to carry a tune without a tune to carry
I’d consider an ideal “minimum” complexity to be 3 or 4 notes capable of playing at once, like the Choir “Soprano Alto Tenor Bass”. Just enough notes to allow for a full chord when you want a certain part of the song to hold more emotional weight
The key is balance tbh
Music is a great way to fail at life, bud-lemme tell ya.
This is probably insanely common, but I keep finding myself having what one might describe as "tree-crown" ideas, floods of them, all these neat little things to stick at the far end of my game idea... and then I go "So about that tree trunk we need to build first", and all the inspiration just gurgles away as I contemplate how many steps away from being able to use any of it I am.
Still, take it in steps, set attainable goals at regular intervals, build from the foundation up, prototype, and... it should be doable.
I also recommend adding a single unbalanced sound effect that will blow your eardrums out. Players love this.
Props for the Video and design
Yes, and the one sound that plays over and over again is delicious. :)
Or the NPC who has the same voice line over and over, while selling stuff next to him
The Hotline Miami explosion sound...
fnaf 4 reference
Music is the one part of game dev I'll always, always outsource. I like doing programming, pixel art, sound design, writing, all of that stuff, but I have neither the desire nor the patience to learn how to compose. Mad respect to the musicians out there, especially those who make tracks available for free.
This is fair to be honest. There is so much that goes into game development it's still blows my mind anytime someone makes a whole game by themselves.
Great shortcut for making video game music: Make only a short sequence of notes and use it in every song. If anybody complains, you can just use "That's called motif!" as an excuse.
It worked for Super Mario World and for Super Mario Land 2 - 6 Golden Coins. It's the star song, that funky star song... wait, not in that track :)
As a professional game developer, I totally loved these videos. Please make more.
Oh for sure I will. :)
I’m not a professional game developer (just an (below) average one), but I agree.
Rainworld:
"Ok dude, I'm making a game and I want someone to make music for it, i'll pay you ofc"
"...hum dude i'm a bit busy programming some stuff, so since you're a bit familiar with my game now...can you do some level design for me ?"
Yeah let's give to the music guy the responsibility of the level design...what could go wrong ?
Well rainworld happened, and there is room to make an entire video on the artistic and emotionnal feeling conveyed by the game, wich certainly take its root from the fact it was a musician who had a huge impact on the level design... in fact there was already multiple video on this topic.
Now I want to play it even more. 0.o
Honestly music and sound intimidate me the most. There are *so* many different videos of art, how to 3d model, how to draw, pixel art, and in regards to the technical side of things there are tons of things for that.
But in regards to music, there seems to be lackluster content especially when it's in reference for a game. And it seems even less for sound design, and using it in conjunction with coding. Like there are some minecraft mods, like Sound Physics Remastered, or like Presence Footstep. I've always wondered how the hell it works or how they did it, how I can use the same techniques for my own games and so on.
At most I've seen lots of videos on concepts of sound design, but never really the how I guess.
And it's a shame since I love when games have great audio and music, but I just have absolutely no clue how to do it myself, especially since I'm not musically inclined so I'm starting with no knowledge :P
I learned to make music the classic way. By going to piano lessons. And so I've never needed to try and learn the basics through online videos or tutorials. From the sounds of it I guess there is a bit of a gap out there. But yeah, a very hard thing to learn. Takes a lot of time to get to a passable level, I can totally see why it would be one of the harder aspect of game development and why so many people turn to others who already have the skill.
@@Artindi I envy that you got to learn piano/go through the classical route. Many of my friends were band/choir throughout highschool, and while I would ask them about music theory, and everything, they'd (obviously) have no idea where to start since it seems like a lot of info to try to condense.
To me, it just feels like there's less resources on the actual creation of music, especially for people like me who doesn't have a musical background, and the use case is for games.
For everything else, programming & art(3d modeling, 2D, ect.) there's mountains of resources and even for the purpose of a video game.
For music there are resources, but for specific instruments it seems. Like guitar, piano and so on.
Then there's sound design which seems even more of a black box to me.
Sorry for the rant, music & sound are just such a vital thing I *want* to learn but it feels like so much to learn and there's also the hurdle of finding the resources of where to learn it.
Anyways, great video lol
@@kaviscorea8302 I'm going to do some research, on it, 'cause you got me wondering now. If I find anything I'll be sure to let you know. :)
@@Artindi Awesome! I would absolutely love to hear what you find. I'd appreciate you letting me know anything you find 🙏
In my experience a lot of tutorials regarding music seem to use chip tunes or refer to other free resources, then comes the how to make use of them and ect.
@@kaviscorea8302 So here's what I got so far:
A nice little video explaining quite a bit from a beginners perspective with plenty of tips and tricks: czcams.com/video/2jLeuviQ7Ho/video.html
Here is a tutorial series showing how to use lmms, the program featured in the last link, I use lmms and I watched this series to learn the basics: czcams.com/play/PLqazFFzUAPc4K1To5JTtR3cskcdRifM1M.html
Here is a nice little video explaining music theory in a pretty simple way, there were several out there that I didn't think explained it that well, and this guy does a pretty good job in my opinion: czcams.com/video/AmC_qmSODEk/video.html
Here are two videos talking about how to make a melody: czcams.com/video/MM6fyvz2BKU/video.html
czcams.com/video/OEIk3bJtTNw/video.html
Here is a video showing some cinematic cord progression that I thought was interesting, (it might be on the more advanced level, but still might be helpful.): czcams.com/video/tbENQXY5T5I/video.html
Of course each of the videos above probably have more to offer on their respective channels as well.
My own tips:
Just like how one might invest into a decent computer in order to code a game, it might be worth investing into a piano keyboard to learn and write music. I believe it will be harder without a keyboard, (but of course not impossible.)
Listen to the type of music you want to create, I like to make cinematic and EDM music because that is what I enjoy listening to. But I also try to figure out what makes a song as good as it might be.
It takes a LOT of time to get good at writing music let alone just playing an instrument. And it will take a LOT of practice. like an insane amount. You might only be able to produce garbage that makes your ears bleed for a few months. But just like working out, imperceptibly over time, the quality of the music you make will improve.
Although I make fun of it in my video, using chip tune jumbles are not a bad way to get by while you learn to make something better. And I recommend 1bitdragon: 1bitdragon.com/ which you can also get on Steam. It's a great way to make music without knowing anything about music. (though it does cost a bit, but overall not bad if learning writing music is proving to take longer than expected)
Hopefully this is helpful! :D
For a hackathon at work, and I took a tutorial for Unity, followed it, but skipped the last section on sound/music opting to implement sound using FMOD. It was great... until I had to present. Since it was a time-constrained hackathon, I had not considered implementing a volume control, and no one could hear me talk about the project while it was running since the volume was too loud. 😅
I made all this art in one day. 0.0
my brain hurts.
You can also add characters speaking in different volumes, love having to lower the sound because of one character and not be able to hear another one.
There are lots of great ways to fail using audio mixing! Even if you accidentally give your game volume controls, you could label them confusingly, with for instance environmental sounds being baked into a "Sound Effects" category even though they're always so quiet you can barely hear them even at max volume... or adding a "master volume" control but nothing specifically for the many voice overs that are normally buried under the music and loud shooting noises. So many possibilities! =D
I still wonder how garbage like that makes it through QA
@@Nerobyrne Same way narrative & gameplay bugs get through. The folks at the top don't truly value narrative, art, sound, or even game design/gameplay. I can't honestly say they value visual arts either, beyond having it look cool enough to pass Store-browsing muster. If it's not valued, it gets tacked on late in production, and isn't given enough time for proper testing & improvement.
Ironically, I am actually learning some stuff about what to do and what not to do, not by following the instructions given, but by doing the opposite.
How dare you! nah JK, that's what they're for! Helps give perspective I think. :)
My music experience boils down to:
I went to band class for 2 years and had some theory lessons to go with it
I looked at some sheet music for songs I liked and took notes
And now I can compose mediocre music!
It don't take much! One of the best piano players I've ever known learned how to play by only ever watching CZcams videos.
@@Artindi
I stand by music not being just art, but a universal human language: genuinely _anyone_ can pick up some form of musical ability through experience, just as a child doesn’t need specific classes to learn their mother tongue, they simply learn it by living in it every day
@@spindash64 also, the simplest forms of music will just develop naturally when humans find out you can make different sounds by smacking different things together.
LOVE THIS SERIE
me too. :)
1:57 And back to collecting colourful fauna 😂
I know it was probably a mistake, but there are a lot of possibilities to imagine here:
A) Are the flowers actually animals that look like flowers?
B) Did the gameplay mechanics suddenly change after the boss fight to become a monster collector?
C) Did we just get bored of the game and started playing pokemon?
D) Do we just expect the player to be dumb enough to not know the difference between flowers and animals?
E) Is the player in a dream sequence initiated by a hidden boss mechanic, and has to fight their way out over the course of several hours just to realize that they never actually finished beating the boss?
The possibilities are endless
Should I add a sound for the dash ability? I fear it might give it too much weight. After all, it's supposed to effortlessly launch forward.
The sound should be the character saying "Oh, that was effortless." Each time he dashes. :)
@@ArtindiI am injured and am not supposed to be laughing right now but that was amazing
@@Tiperia sorry 'bout dat...
Anyway, three men walked into a bar...
You should think that it would be funny to insert 'Fart with Reverb' then forget to remove it from the final build. Then release a day 1 patch and gaslight people by telling them that it was never in there.
@@Artindi How do you think she GOT injured? Bars hurt!
The one dislike is from the guy who succeeded
Ha ha, I guess he didn't watch all the way through. :)
This even outside a game context is very useful.
As a musician, I always start with the music when starting a new game project. The music conveys the feeling and rythm of the game, then the rest follows after it
Bit like an aural version of concept art, makes sense 👍
Make sure to have some sound effects that are absolutely necessary to hear for the game to be playable, and some sound effects/music that's super annoying. Then make sure that the necessary sounds and the annoying sounds *aren't* on different sliders.
the amount of ear piercing screeches i've heard in game jam games as a jump sound is *insane*! biggest tip: at least make the audio not make you immediately turn the game off
I remember a game jam game having the bonk sound effect if you get hit, it got changed though
I could SO easily fail at music
yeah, my video probably wasn't the most necessary tutorial, was it? lol :)
These videos are great! Please continue!
Oh.... I will. :)
I just stumbled across your videos, and I'm really impressed with how much you get across so clearly in such a short period of time! Good work, thanks for making these 👌🏼.
In regards to this topic- I feel like paying someone might be the best option for a lot of people, I already know a bit about making music (spent years trying to get good at guitar), and tbh my experience with it doesn’t give me much confidence 😂. Still, I'm sure I'll at least make an attempt at learning a DAW if I get the chance, I love music…It just doesn't love me back.
Thanks for the great comment! And yeah, I think music is one of the typically harder aspects of game development, it is good there are those other options out there. :)
I feel like one option that might appeal to some musicians would be, "I can pay you this much up front, and when the game is done and up on Steam (for instance), we'll sell the soundtrack for X dollars/euro/etc. (maybe let the musician set the price as they see fit) and all proceeds from soundtrack sales go to you, the musician." Your game gets some music, and the musician gets paid for their trouble (and an up-front sum so they're not working for free even if the game project tragically falls apart).
According to what I was told at college (if we can trust that), at least some musicians may also have familiarity with sound effects, so you might also end up getting some solid SFX as part of the deal. But maybe make sure you've got a pretty solid core and are making steady progress before extending any offers; nobody likes being jerked around, unintentionally though it may be.
I love music, I also love video game music, if I ever make a game, music is not an aspect I'll forget, that's for sure, it's so important for me...
Just remembering about a random song of a game makes me want to play it again! The donkey kong country water track for example, so memorable and emotional ❤
I love this series
I love this comment
I wonder what a game that has a justified use of redlined music and sound would be like. There's that Hotline Miami explosion, sure, but the static-y, crunchy texture of a clipping sound carries some type of quality to it that might deserve its own thing.
music and sfx are underrated
yup, so often neglected, especially in small indie projects and game jams.
I blame the decline in arts education in schools. We used to get exposed to everything from visual arts techniques, to dance/theater/performing arts, to music appreciation (incl performance & composition, depending on your school), and of course creative writing in various forms. By the time I was in HS & college ('90s), we were even starting to get media studies of film, TV, and nascent internet culture. Folks think they cut arts for STEM, but really they stopped teaching both...
I love making funny noises into the mic
The more I watch, the more I realize I've completely set myself up for failure. But I don't care, I'll fail at everything and never try again because it's easier
Don’t forget to use only one sound effect for every instance of a thing, so that your walking is as monotonous and grating to the ears as possible
these videos can be more useful than some actual tutorials.
I would like to see a video about how to fail out graphics.
yeah, that would probably be do-able. There are plenty of clichés in that side of game development. :)
@Artindi Oh, you reply to my comment!
@@dracosteven4524 I try to reply to as many comments as I can! :D (I'm still a pretty small channel so it's not too hard.)
Add botw style cel shading and lots and lots of grass. Your game is a grafikal masterpiece now 👌
amazing, very true
remember to only have one grunting sound effect for jumping in your platformer so the player gets sick of hearing it constantly
Me and my sisters think about making a game, I'm in charge of music because I play rhythm games. I don't think I'm doing terribly, but this definitely isn't the work of art.
If you can't figure out how to make chiptunes, you can also just sing into the mic. It definitely sounds exactly as good as it does in your head.
No but for real if this was an actual limitation you had and you leaned into this for the game feel, a fully a cappella OST could be pretty neat. Only that this would be for a very specific type of game designed with this in mind, not a general solution for any kind of game.
Here before this blows up!
Oh boy, I hope so. :)
Or be like me, make a short melody you like, try adding different chords and instruments to it, then get depressed and abandon the project because it doesnt sound perfect and/or you dont know how to follow up that melody 😅
I'm kid that makes games, when I thinking about music... I thinking about using music from other games, films and etc.
I honestly think no original music in game is better because of my awful music creating skills. (For example: If I have only original music in my game it will be eardrum killing simulator)
Also if I will do make original music I will make it short because there could be a situation where music good at the start but at the end it will became horrible.
I want to see someone follow those totrials and make a game with it
1:38 no way bro went to dubstep xD
cool video
And if you can't create or buys sounds, just use PC speaker or chiptune ones.
I tried following your tutorial, and accidentally made the OST of Dead Cells
Unles it's a music based game the first thing I do in any game is turn the music off.
Looks like every game is failing at music.
Splatoon music just does literally the opposite of everything mentioned in this video
bold of you to assume I'd use a mic. That costs money and my phone can already record, so like what's the point
Just a question from a guy who would totally not make a commercially successful game. Let's assume I pay $100 to commission a sound or music (is that cheap?), if I add their SFX to my game do I still need to pay them royalties? My hypothetical game can earn anywhere between chump change to a million dollars. Am I obligated to pay a portion to them? Same goes for other artists I will have commissioned.
Depends on the agreement with the artist, sometimes you can just outright buy the piece and it's rights, or sometimes it can be royalties, but a happy inbetween is a sort of royalties after a threshold. For example, you could buy a piece for $50 insted of $100 and then royalties will be applied only on games sold after the first $5,000 revenue. This way the game developer can hopefully avoid to heavy a cost for something that might not succeed, and the artist is fairly compensated ether way. But every commission will be a case by case scenario for what is best between you and the artist. (In my humble opinion.) :)
Now if you were looking for a sarcastic answer, just use your IP ownership of your game to sue him into oblivion for even asking for pay. What a tool, thinking he deserves anything for doing something just anyone can now magically do. Plus, you can also take down his music uploads, because *you* own the game, not him.
500th like!
1:57
"collecting colourful fauna"
That's different from picking flowers... What, are we catching bunnies after fighting a boss?
Yes. Flower shaped bunnies. ;)
The best thing to do is to have no music or sound, so that way the player can imagine their own
waiting on the How to Fail at Level design🤣
That might be a good idea. :)
@@Artindi Been having alot of troubles with level design and im sure alot of people might be on the same boat as me
@@AzeliaIsill what kind of game are you making?
@@Artindi A metroidvania but we gunna spruice it up a bit we have a few secret genres we putting under the hood
@@AzeliaIsill lol, well, I'll see what comes out, and perhaps eventually I can just make an episode for metroidvanias as well. All with time though. :)
If you are making a RPGMaker MV, make sure that you don’t change the title theme. If players don’t hear this at the start of your game, then you have failed: czcams.com/video/Jj0e1eQqQfc/video.htmlsi=s3xhhRqJGG_S_5Li
One word: Undertale
Just Undertale
i am a musician and new gamedev,
and i find this extremely offensive
Yeah, I gotta be honest with this one.. NONE of that sounded like sarcasm at all to me.
If you're a real pro like me, you learn about synths and make all your sound effects with oscillator, envelopes, and lfos.
Yeah. Music is kinda hard.
hehe, :(
ZUN did not follow this tutorial.
The *boing noise gets annoying 02:19
Thanks. I'm trying to follow the how to fail at music send sound episode. ;)
i i am going to take all of these videos one day and incorporate them all into a single worst videogame in existence
hey could you please be careful with the flashing lights at 1:38 at least a photosensitivity warning
whoops, didn't even think of that. Thanks! I'll try and remember to put a little warning at the beginning of videos with something like that.
Don’t forget, we don’t live in the cartridge era that was the 80s anymore. You have no reason not to flex the voice lines your cast of exposure-paid actors everywhere the player goes. So make sure to have voiceovers during the game. …No, more than that. Make sure the characters keep talking over the action constantly. No, even more! Make the voice lines so frequent that the characters have to talk over both each other *and* themselves to get their single, poorly acted one-liner a piece out. If there is a single second of gameplay where your player is not having the “The voices never stop…” experience, you failed. Try again.
Im gonna follow all these guides to make the worst game ever. 2:08