The music problem

[MantaRevan]

Civ 6's music is repetitive. You only get background music from civs you meet, and you only get background music from civs. No culture-group or era soundtrack like from previous games.

That isn't to say the music isn't very good (it is), but by the time you hit the atomic era you'll want to put your head in a blender if you have to hear Kongo's theme remixed one more time. If the music can get annoying over the span of a single game only a few months from launch, imagine how sick you'll be of Scarborough Fair four years from now.

It's gotten to the point where soundtrack is a major factor behind what civs I want in my game. Frederick Barbarossa was in my past three games, and I'm going to have to mute the music or restart if I roll him in the next one.

This is especially odd because each civ has fun B-sides that mix things up a little, but they only seem to get played in the ancient and classical eras, when you've met fewer civs and the soundtrack runs out. By the later eras you almost never hear them .

This doesn't seem to be high on Firaxis's list of priorities, but it impacts the game's playability in a huge way. What are some ways they (or modders) could fix the problem in expansions?

One option is to change the way the game selects what music its going to play next so that the B sides come up more often. Currently the algorithm is set so that it plays your civilizations theme again every time you advance every other era, regardless of if you had just finished listening to it. Removing this trigger might make the soundtrack less jarring.

Another option is to add more general music in an expansion. It doesn't have to be as expansive and varied as what Civ 5 had, even a little would go a long way towards breaking up the monotony of Hard Times Come Again No More over and over again. As more civs get added to the game, this problem will naturally get better, but not that much better over the course of a single game.

A last option is to go the Paradox route and release more music as DLC, allowing people annoyed by the lack of variety to remedy the problem, while avoiding forcing people who play with Spotify on in the background to pay for it as part of an expansion pack.

Any other solutions? Do you guys think Firaxis will address this? Am I just crazy and the only person bothered by this? What are your thoughts?

 

[nzcamel]

I think the music is far more varied than in IV and V. Though, to be fair, if you do strike a similar roster of civs in a row, the music will end up a bit samey. And I think you're right that the b-track has often not been developed into the later ages, which is too bad. I remember the bittersweet moment in IV though, when you'd get your religion, but then know that pretty much the only music you'd be listening to for the next couple of eras was that religions set

Edit: Which may be another reason to give us a 'any civ but x' option for random choices when setting up a game.
i.e. I love the didgeridoo, but I could do without hearing Waltzing Matilda for a few months!

 

[Jimdigriz]

I don't see why Firaxis couldn't add the music from the last couple of games as well just to keep it more varied. Agree with the OP.

 

[Uberfrog]

While Civ 6, despite the excellent quality of the music, has quite a small number of songs, I'm not sure this is an easy problem to fix, short of allowing you to play your own music as in Civ 4.

Civ is a game you play for hours on end, for hundreds or thousands of hours total. Even the longest playlist will get repetitive in that time. I remember hearing Adams' The People Are The Heroes, Dvořák's Slavonic Dances and the Ancient Era theme over and over again. All are great tracks, but Civ games are long! Of course it's going to get repetitive.

The same is easily true of Civ 5, and Crusader Kings 2 (despite its DLC). I find the music of CK2 far more forgettable in any case.

Don't get me wrong, more music would be welcome. Just I'm sure we'd still see these complaints even if dozens of new tracks were added

 

[miked1991]

I'm no modder but how hard would it be to simply extract all of the music files from previous civ games and add them to the cycle in civ 6?

 

[Victoria]

I never play with sound, the family is always interrupting. I do not miss it, its not like its needed so can you not just use your own playlist?

 

[PYITE]

This game has sound?
One of my favorite parts of this game is that there is no need to listen to game audio. You can listen to whatever you want.

 

[upi00r]

I'm no modder but how hard would it be to simply extract all of the music files from previous civ games and add them to the cycle in civ 6?

Probably pretty hard unless you can do it with SDK. There is no data within xml files that would let you to add new tracks.

 

[The Kingmaker]

I don't see why Firaxis couldn't add the music from the last couple of games as well just to keep it more varied. Agree with the OP.

This. ^^^

Just as the soundtrack of Heroes of Might and Magic VI included redone versions of old favorites from Heroes II and III, there is no reason Civ can't give us updated versions of some of our favorite Civ tunes. Seriously, the soundtracks consist either of original pieces that are part of their IP (Hammurabi's Code, The Shining Path, etc.) or traditional music that's within the public domain (Greensleeves, Ode to Joy, etc.).

 

[MantaRevan]

I never play with sound, the family is always interrupting. I do not miss it, its not like its needed so can you not just use your own playlist?

Everyone has a different way of enjoying the game, and I really like how well Civ's music complements the game and makes it feel more immersive. So yes, I could make my own playlist but that's not really the way I enjoy civ. After playing for long enough, it might be necessary, but imo it's better to improve a game feature than to ignore it.

 

[Disgustipated]

Occasionally if I play while I'm drinking, then I'll put on my itunes in the background. Usually on shuffle, but occasionally I like to play civ games to Rammstein, that band seems to fit with civ games for some reason. But usually the default music for me. I agree with the OP, the music is lacking. It's not bad, but I still feel Civ5's music was superior in most cases (not all). But of course civ 4's music was best, but it may not be fair to compare classical classics to something come up from a game composer.

 

[God of Kings]

... or traditional music that's within the public domain (Greensleeves, Ode to Joy, etc.).

Greensleeves is already in Civ VI (as Victoria's ambient music)

 

[The Kingmaker]

Yes, I know.

I was making a point about the type of music that is public domain as opposed to original compositions for Civ.

I'm glad Greensleeves made it in.

But there's more where that came from. So much more.

 

[Two Stepper2098]

There is actually a lot of other music in the game: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh4Eme5gACZGDVGh-unzj0p70NiADSdY0. Each civ has 4-9 secondary songs, and many of those have variations of themselves with different instruments as well. The main problem, as OP said, is that they stop playing after the Ancient and Medieval Eras so you end up listening to the Industrial/Atomic versions of every civ on repeat.