Rockdrums 2 RocknRoll v2 discussion

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Just wanted to announce I'm planning an update, not a huge one, but one I think is needed. Basically here is what is on my mind:

Prehistoric Era to Industrial Era: Not changing(unless someone has any suggestions of coarse)

Atomic Era: Revamping this era. I have alot of new tracks which fit the era better.

Information Era onwards needs a revamp, but I need a bit of suggestions/help for this. I know what I'd like to do with the Information Age, some idea of what to do with the Nanotech and Transhuman eras, but after that its tough. How does one far future era sound more futuristic than the previous?

Is at that point in the game the right approach for music? Should instead of sounding more advanced at that point be about capturing the essence of what that era represents?

Ideas and suggestions are welcome.

 

[raxo2222]

For Information get that Rick Roll music - I think it was Never Give Up by Rick Asley or something like that.
You can add some most popular songs from YouTube, because its dankest timeline

 

[Praetyre]

While it's your mod, not mine (I have recently gotten much, much closer to getting my old hard drive back, and thus my music project resumed), I personally strongly oppose the use of English vocal tracks (for English, read "any language the player can understand in spoken form") in video game background music (both in Civ and in general, although with the caveat Civ doesn't really have actual spoken dialogue; my reasons have more to do with other factors in Civ and other complex strategy games); it's too distracting on a number of levels. I'm fine with things like Latin chanting since that's much subtler and more background-y and helps build atmosphere, but IMHO there are substantial differences between music as background and music as primary product, and it shows artistically.

Although I might make an exception for We Didn't Start the Fire, inasmuch as that's song is practically a summary of the Cold War era; I wouldn't mind it playing automatically at the start or end of it, if that could be rigged up. And I can see a role for things like 30s/40s style radio music to build atmosphere, for similar reasons to the vanilla Medieval tracks.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

I generally also try to stay away from music with lyrics, of coarse, ancient music, or medieval chants or even opera later are an exception. So I agree.

I think the problem remains the futuristic eras, and what approach to go with them to make them different.

Two different main approaches:

1. I do have a general idea of what I think sounds more advanced in music, and could have more and more of that each futuristic era, resulting in each futuristic era sounding more and more ethereal or even alien as time goes on.

2. Choose tracks that try to represent an era, like a space-themed soundtrack for the Galactic Era.

of coarse a third possibility is a hybrid of the two.

 

[margolloxx]

as always with art it is a highly subjective thing trying to define what modern or let alone futuristic themes in such a game could be, since, unlike in the past, nowadays you have so much to choose from and there are plenty of examples of scifi settings with classic music that worked very well together.

i also dont believe that synthetic music is in any way advanced in comparison to orchestrals, even if the tool may be.

the reason i wouldnt like vocals like "We Didn't Start the Fire" or anything really is that this might be very contrary to what is actually happening. just think about it playing while i throw my nukes around...

 

[Raven Destroyer]

you could use Instrumental versions of well known songs, to avoid the vocal issue while having music distinctive to the era,

as for the future Era's, slowly changing it to something ethereal sounding would work, Endless Space really nailed down their music, might be a good source of inspiration

 

[Harrier]

you could use Instrumental versions of well known songs, to avoid the vocal issue while having music distinctive to the era,

In the 60/70/80s an Italian Alto Sax player - Fausto Papetti, covered lots of then popular tracks (Jazz and pop). Just a thought. Google him.

 

[darkedone02]

Cyberpunk music tend to fit mostly futuristic musics, and there tons of it from games like Shadowrun Returns, Dragonfall, and Hong Kong. There is also some interesting songs I heard thought a Cyberpunk Genre setting in Spotify that I could link here. You could try to borrow some songs that fit well for this.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3upJSeV6lAHhMTuraNg5J4?si=qul-Pl3nQQWvE-q4tOYQvw

 

[Raven Destroyer]

Fausto seems to work for me as a pleasant background tune whilst doing other things, thanks for sharing it Harrier

 

[darkedone02]

If your looking for space music, EVE Online OST is pretty good so far when it comes down to slow pace space age music. It may snooze some people to sleep, that's when I turn on rebel galaxy space southern rock that kinda fits the genre of criminals in space or someone out on their lone road.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Yeah I agree on the ethereal music and the cyberpunk genre type music. I think the earlier future eras would fit more the cyberpunk(Nanotech, Transhuman) while the later ones(Galactic etc) would fit with the ethereal?

 

[darkedone02]

That sounds like a good idea, it's how by music you determined how humanity has gone via music as we progress in the future.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

I'll have to get something together. What era would you say the cut-off point would be to transition to ethereal type music?

 

[Praetyre]

I would suggest Nanotech be neo-gothic cyberpunk (like Bladerunner), Transhuman be much more alien but still Earthbound (like the Tiberian series), Galactic be optimistic and somewhat of a throwback to classical music (like Star Trek and other science fiction of that era), Cosmic be Lovecraftian and emphasizing the vast blackness of space (like Alien or Afterworld), and Transcendent be ethereal.

 

[Sword_Of_Geddon]

Those are some good ideas. I'll see what I have in my collection. Any examples of Cosmic tracks in the way your talking about by chance?

 

[gamer1978]

You guys should really update the music of the main mod. Make this mod mod part of the main mod Caveman to cosmos I mean. If possible. The mod definitely needs new music across all the eras.

 

[Raven Destroyer]

the problem with that Gamer1978 is that it'd add a lot of size to the download, and not everyone plays with ingame music on, so it'd be quite a waste of their bandwidth and time

Besides, Rockdrums 2 RocknRoll is already the endorsed Music mod

 

[gamer1978]

Well I'm fine with RocknRoll being as a mod mod then. I'm curious, how is this version II of it coming along? I am trying the original one out and I'm digging the new music so far. Adds a lot of atmosphere for people like me that do actually listen to the game music.