Kinetics and the 12 Tone Approach (The Game Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Video game music composer Winifred Phillips is pictured at work in her music production studio. Phillips' music for Jurassic World Primal Ops won a Global Music Award and a NYX Award, and was nominated for a Society of Composers & Lyricists Award and a Game Audio Network Guild Award.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Hey everybody! I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and I’m happy to welcome you to the fifth installment in this series of articles based on my Game Developers Conference 2023 lecture, “Chaos Theory: The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops.” I’ve included the content of my GDC lecture in these articles, accompanied by all of the included videos, sound files, and many of the illustrations from my GDC 2023 conference presentation.

During the previous four articles in this series, we learned about Jurassic World Primal Ops the latest video game in the popular Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise. We discussed how the strategy for this game’s musical style was driven by the concept of Chaos Theory.  This chaos-inspired musical composition philosophy attempts to increase tension through the use of some of the most unpredictable composition techniques, employing these unconventional strategies in the effort to create subversive and disturbing effects.

An illustration supporting a discussion of the use of chaotic, unconventional music composition techniques in order to subvert listener expectations. This illustration is included in the article by award-winning video game music composer Winifred Phillips.

By devising a musical style that avoided a conventional structure, the music of Jurassic World Primal Ops was able to support and sustain emotional unbalance during lengthy action sequences. You’ll find these unconventional techniques discussed in detail in these four articles:

Part One: Tonic Pivot (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Two: Quartal Chords and Chromatics (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Three: Whole Tone and Octatonic Scales (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Four: Polytonality (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

We just concluded our discussion of the role that polytonality played in the musical score of Jurassic World Primal Ops.  Polytonality is an uncommon musical device that helps us to break away from harmonic conventionalism.  But harmony is just a piece of the puzzle, and it certainly isn’t the only way we can introduce chaos into our game scores. 

This bullet list is used to support organization in a discussion of unconventional music composition techniques to enhance tension during chaotic gameplay. The article is based on the Game Developers Conference lecture given by BAFTA-nominated game composer Winifred Phillips.

At this point, let’s shift from our discussion of harmonies, and talk now about kinetics.

 Energy in music is typically driven by tempo and meter, which give us a sense of momentum. There are lots of ways we can experiment with unusual meter structures. For instance, in that polytonal piece of music we discussed in the previous article, there are also abrupt, temporary changes in meter that make things feel agitated and unstable.

Illustration included in a discussion of how unpredictable meter changes can enhance suspense and tension. This article is written by Winifred Phillips (video game music composer).

The time signature moves from triple meter, to a single measure of common time, then back to triple meter, then to a single measure with 5 beats of irregular time, then back to triple meter again. Let’s listen to that:

While meter changes can keep our music feeling on edge, they’re not our only tool. Kinetics addresses not only general momentum, but also the energy of sudden movement. In an interview for Total Film Magazine, composer John Williams addressed the awesome importance of musical kinetics in his scores for the first and second films from the famous Jurassic franchise, describing how he had to “match the rhythmic gyrations of the dinosaurs.”

Photo includes renowned film composer John Williams, along with a quote he gave during an interview with Total Film Magazine. This image is included in the article about game music composition by award-winning composer Winifred Phillips.

As a composer for a Jurassic World game, I knew it wouldn’t be possible for me to exactly match the rhythmic gyrations of the dinosaurs. However, I could best simulate that effect by employing a technique that I’ll be calling ‘kinetic fragmentation.” Let’s discuss that idea.

 In traditional composition, bursts of movement can be achieved with classical ornamentation, such as trills, runs, repetitions, glissandi, hits, flourishes, crescendos, gestures, and other techniques that inject abrupt vigorous impact into our music.

A list of techniques associated with classical ornamentation in music composition, as discussed in the article by game music composer Winifred Phillips.

But those are also familiar sounds, and this talk is about pushing our music towards the unfamiliar.

Classic ornaments are well organized, performed with expert discipline and in accordance with traditional harmonics. Chaotic ornamentation, on the other hand, is unruly, performed with abandon, and often-incorporates atonal or polytonal qualities.

I treated all of these techniques as ‘kinetic fragments’ that could be injected into my compositions and cause disruptive impact. These kinetic fragments were great at making the music seem as if it had been structured specifically so that it would conform to the movements in the game. They enhanced both excitement and menace during gameplay – they were the musical equivalent of fireworks, or bolts of lightning.

An illustration expanding on the definition of 'Kinetic Fragmentation' in game music composition, as discussed in the article by game music composer Winifred Phillips.

So let’s check out an example of kinetic fragmentation in a combat track I composed for Jurassic World Primal Ops. You’ll hear lots of big orchestral hits in tight clusters, anxious brass repetitions, hectic woodwind runs in multiple opposing scales, forceful trills and flourishes, all coming together to add chaos to the kinetics of the game:

In that lead piano we just heard, there’s another useful technique that injects more atonality into the music. Let’s briefly discuss it.

This bullet list supports the organization of a discussion of unconventional music composition techniques. The article is written by Winifred Phillips (video game composer).

As you might have noticed, the lead piano line was heavily inspired by the 12-tone approach, so let’s check that out. 

An illustration supporting a discussion of the 12-tone technique in music composition. The article is written by Winifred Phillips (video game music composer).

We start with all the tones of the chromatic scale:

But then we avoid any sense of key signature or harmonic center by sounding all of those 12 notes in an apparently scattered arrangement:

Using a 12 Tone approach makes our lead lines unpredictable; so let’s check out another example! Here’s some exploration music. Notice the 12-tone influence in the marimba part:

In the sixth and final article of this series, we’ll be stepping back from our granular analysis of top techniques from music theory to consider the significance of musical context, and the vital importance of creating contrast within our scores. In the meantime, you can read more about game music composition in my book, A Composer’s Guide to Game Music.  Thanks for reading!

Image of the book cover for the book A COMPOSER'S GUIDE TO GAME MUSIC, written by game music composer Winifred Phillips and published by The MIT Press.


This photo depicts video game music composer Winifred Phillips working in her music production studio.

Winifred Phillips is a BAFTA-nominated video game composer.  The music she composed for her latest video game project Jurassic World Primal Ops won both the Global Music Award and the NYX Award, and was nominated for a Society of Composers & Lyricists Award for Outstanding Score for Interactive Media, and a Game Audio Network Guild Award in the category of Music of the Year.  Other recent releases include the hit PlayStation 5 launch title Sackboy: A Big Adventure (soundtrack album now available).  Popular music from Phillips’ award-winning Assassin’s Creed Liberation score was featured in the performance repertoire of the Assassin’s Creed Symphony World Tour, which made its Paris debut with an 80-piece orchestra and choir. As an accomplished video game composer, Phillips is best known for composing music for games in many of the most famous and popular franchises in gaming: the list includes Assassin’s Creed, God of War, Total War, The Sims, and Sackboy / LittleBigPlanet.  Phillips’ has received numerous awards, including an Interactive Achievement Award / D.I.C.E. Award from the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, six Game Audio Network Guild Awards (including Music of the Year), and four Hollywood Music in Media Awards. She is the author of the award-winning bestseller A COMPOSER’S GUIDE TO GAME MUSIC, published by the MIT Press. As one of the foremost authorities on music for interactive entertainment, Winifred Phillips has given lectures at the Library of Congress in Washington DC, the Society of Composers and Lyricists, the Game Developers Conference, the Audio Engineering Society, and many more. Phillips’ enthusiastic fans showered her with questions during a Reddit Ask-Me-Anything session that went viral, hit the Reddit front page, received 14.9 thousand upvotes, and became one of the most popular gaming AMAs ever hosted on Reddit. An interview with her has been published as a part of the Routledge text, Women’s Music for the Screen: Diverse Narratives in Sound, which collects the viewpoints of the most esteemed female composers in film, television, and games.  Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Threads.

Polytonality (The Game Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

This photo supports the article by video game composer Winifred Phillips about the use of polytonality in game music composition. Photo depicts Winifred Phillips at work in her music production studio.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Hello there! I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips.  Welcome to the fourth article in my series based on my GDC 2023 lecture, “Chaos Theory: The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops.” Before we continue with the article series, I’d like to share some related news – the Academy of Interactive & Visual Arts just awarded my music for Jurassic World Primal Ops with a 2023 Gold in the W3 Awards!  This is the 18th year that the AIVA has recognized “heroes of digital creativity,” and I’m thrilled that my music for this project was recognized by the AIVA!

Image including information about the Academy of Interactive & Visual Arts W3 GOLD AWARD, won by the music of Jurassic World Primal Ops -- as included in the article by video game composer Winifred Phillips.

So happy to be discussing my Jurassic World Primal Ops music in this ongoing article series!  In these articles, I’ve included the substance of my GDC lecture, augmented with the videos, audio files, and some of the illustrations from the visual presentation that accompanied my lecture.

During the first three articles, we considered the world-famous Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise, and the release of the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game in concert with the theatrical run of the latest movie, Jurassic World Dominion.  I shared what it was like composing new music for a game in this famous and immensely popular franchise. By creating a musical score that emphasized unpredictability and chaos, I was able to enhance the tension and anxiety of playing an action-driven game featuring bloodthirsty dinosaurs on the loose in the modern world.

Illustration accompanying a discussion of the action included in the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops, as included in the article by video game composer Winifred Phillips.

You’ll find all these ideas discussed in detail in these three articles:

Part One: Tonic Pivot (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Two: Quartal Chords and Chromatics (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Three: Whole Tone and Octatonic Scales (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

We’d just finished discussing the fantastic utility of both the Octatonic and Whole Tone scales, which are particularly useful when we’re pushing our music away from a classic harmonic structure and towards atonality. But now let’s take a moment to step away from atonality altogether, and consider its close cousin – polytonality.

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Whole Tone and Octatonic Scales (The Game Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Photo of video game composer Winifred Phillips. This image is included in the article discussing the music of one of Phillips' latest projects, the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Hey everyone! I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and this is the third article in my series based on my Game Developers Conference 2023 lecture, “Chaos Theory: The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops.” In my GDC presentation, I examined the challenges of composing unpredictable and chaotic music for a high-intensity action game. This series of articles shares the substance of that GDC 2023 presentation, along with the illustrations, videos, and audio examples I included in my presentation at the conference last March.

In the first two articles of this series, we discussed the worldwide success of the popular Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise. We reviewed the gameplay structure of Jurassic World Primal Ops: the top-down action game released in concert with the blockbuster theatrical run of the Jurassic World Dominion movie. I shared my experience as the composer of this Jurassic World game, and what it was like composing music for such an awesome franchise.

Image supporting the article about the music of the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops, composed by award-winning game composer Winifred Phillips.

During our discussion in the previous two articles, we took a look at some of the best music composition techniques that can introduce tension and uncertainty into our musical structure, enhancing the experience of combat in an action-heavy game.  These ideas are discussed in detail in these previous two articles:

Part One: Tonic Pivot (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Part Two: Quartal Chords and Chromatics (The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

In the preceding two articles, we considered how subverting traditional cadences with surprising tonic pivots can introduce unpredictability into our musical structure, and how both quartal chords and chromatics can create ambiguity in regards to key signature and tonic center.  But there are other ways for us to obscure that tonic and make our music feel more tumultuous.

This bullet list provides additional organization to a discussion of music composition techniques, as included in the article by video game music composer Winifred Phillips.

As we all know, anyone who casually listens to music is well aware of the Ionian and the Aeolian modes:

The traditional major:

The traditional minor:

This image includes a representation of the Ionian and Aeolian modes in music (otherwise known as the traditional major and minor modes). Included in the article by Winifred Phillips (video game music composer).

These modes are everywhere, with all those famous and well-worn intervals, chords, and progressions, so we’ve come to expect them. That’s why avoiding these modes is a great way to subvert expectations and create disconcerting music.

In the score for Jurassic World Primal Ops, when I wasn’t pushing atonality into my compositions, I was leaning heavily into the Octatonic and Whole Tone scales. So let’s take a look at how that worked, starting with the Octatonic.

This image depicts the Octatonic scale and the associated diminished triad, as discussed in the article by video game music composer Winifred Phillips.

 The Octatonic, or diminished scale, is an eight-tone scale that alternates whole and half tones:

It has the advantage of working really well with diminished triads:

Diminished triads are nicely unsteady and menacing in the right context. The Octatonic became one of my go-to tools for the Jurassic World Primal Ops score. Here’s one of the most straightforward examples from a combat track: notice how the bass line runs through the entire Octatonic scale in order:

Now here’s a more complex example of the Octatonic scale in an action track. While I never ran through the scale in order, you’ll notice that the bass line is overtly Octatonic in nature, with diminished chords in the brass section – and I’ve arranged the strings in a conventional minor-mode, so this makes the whole thing feel more unstable and perilous: 

While I used the Octatonic pretty frequently in this project, I also alternated it with the Whole Tone scale. This scale consists entirely of whole steps:

This means it naturally feels disconnected to a key signature – because it’s just hard to determine where the tonic is.

This image includes the whole tone scale notation, supporting a discussion of the use of this scale to create tension and uncertainty for the musical score of Jurassic World Primal Ops (composed by video game composer Winifred Phillips).

First, let’s check out a combat example:

As you can see, if we’re looking for an unbalanced scale with no tonal center, the Whole Tone scale is just what we need. Also, it features augmented triads:

Augmented triads are also harmonically ambiguous. All this is great for creating uneasy-sounding music.

This image connects the concept of the whole tone scale with the associated augmented triads, supporting a discussion in the article by Winifred Phillips (award-winning game music composer).

So let’s check out another example – this is music I composed for one of the tense ‘tracking’ sequences in which the player (as an expert dinosaur hunter) is attempting to locate these huge prehistoric beasts in the wild. Notice how apprehensive this Whole Tone structure feels:

Octatonic and Whole Tone scales are fantastic for when we’re pushing our music away from a classic harmonic structure and towards atonality.

In the next article of this series, we’ll be stepping away from atonality altogether and considering its close cousin, polytonalityIn the meantime, you can read more about game music composition in my book, A Composer’s Guide to Game Music.  Thanks for reading!

Image of the book cover for the book A COMPOSER'S GUIDE TO GAME MUSIC, written by game music composer Winifred Phillips and published by The MIT Press.

 


Photo of video game composer Winifred Phillips.

Winifred Phillips is a BAFTA-nominated video game composer.  The music she composed for her latest video game project Jurassic World Primal Ops won both the Global Music Award and the NYX Award, and was nominated for a Society of Composers & Lyricists Award for Outstanding Score for Interactive Media, and a Game Audio Network Guild Award in the category of Music of the Year.  Other recent releases include the hit PlayStation 5 launch title Sackboy: A Big Adventure (soundtrack album now available).  Popular music from Phillips’ award-winning Assassin’s Creed Liberation score was featured in the performance repertoire of the Assassin’s Creed Symphony World Tour, which made its Paris debut with an 80-piece orchestra and choir. As an accomplished video game composer, Phillips is best known for composing music for games in many of the most famous and popular franchises in gaming: the list includes Assassin’s Creed, God of War, Total War, The Sims, and Sackboy / LittleBigPlanet.  Phillips’ has received numerous awards, including an Interactive Achievement Award / D.I.C.E. Award from the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, six Game Audio Network Guild Awards (including Music of the Year), and four Hollywood Music in Media Awards. She is the author of the award-winning bestseller A COMPOSER’S GUIDE TO GAME MUSIC, published by the MIT Press. As one of the foremost authorities on music for interactive entertainment, Winifred Phillips has given lectures at the Library of Congress in Washington DC, the Society of Composers and Lyricists, the Game Developers Conference, the Audio Engineering Society, and many more. Phillips’ enthusiastic fans showered her with questions during a Reddit Ask-Me-Anything session that went viral, hit the Reddit front page, received 14.9 thousand upvotes, and became one of the most popular gaming AMAs ever hosted on Reddit. An interview with her has been published as a part of the Routledge text, Women’s Music for the Screen: Diverse Narratives in Sound, which collects the viewpoints of the most esteemed female composers in film, television, and games.  Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.

Quartal Chords and Chromatics (The Game Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Composer Winifred Phillips wrote the musical score for the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops. In this photo, Winifred Phillips is pictured working in her music production studio.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Glad you’re here! I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and this is the second article in my series based on my Game Developers Conference 2023 presentation, “Chaos Theory: The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops.” In the lecture I gave last March at GDC, I shared my creative process composing music for a project in the famous Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise. During this article series, I’ll be sharing the substance of that GDC 2023 presentation, supplemented by the audio and video examples I used, along with some of the best illustrations I included during my conference lecture.

In the first article of this series, we took a look at the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game, in which players capture and train awesome dinosaurs to fight alongside them against evil poachers and mercenaries.  Jurassic World Primal Ops was released in concert with the theatrical run of Jurassic World Dominion, the latest movie in the popular Jurassic franchise.  As a top-down action game featuring an assortment of history’s most famous and dangerous dinosaur predators, Jurassic World Primal Ops needed a musical score that would emphasize the power and danger of these enormous prehistoric lizards.

An illustration depicting some of the dinosaurs players encountered during the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops. This image is included in the article written by award-winning game music composer Winifred Phillips.

Turning to an examination of music theory as it relates to such an intense and chaotic musical score, we discussed how traditional cadences could be subverted into unpredictable progressions that we dubbed Tonic Pivot. You’ll find all these ideas discussed in detail in part one of this article series.

Continuing our discussion of harmonic devices, let’s move to the second chaotic technique on our list.

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Tonic Pivot (The Game Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops: GDC 2023)

Video game composer Winifred Phillips pictured in her music production studio. Phillips was nominated for a Society of Composers and Lyricists Award for the music she composed for Jurassic World Primal Ops (pictured).

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Hi! I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips.  In March, I gave a presentation at the Game Developers Conference 2023 – a top industry event with lectures and panels from lots of different experts in all the varied disciplines within the field of game development.  My lecture was entitled “Chaos Theory in Game Music.” It focused on my musical score for the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game, and it was rated by GDC attendees as one of the best sessions of GDC 2023!  So awesome to participate once again in one of the best game audio conferences of the year!  

Each year after I present at the Game Developers Conference, I include most of the content of my lecture in a series of articles.  So with this article, I’m kicking off a six-part series based on my highly-rated GDC 2023 presentation!  I’ll be including all of the discussion from my GDC lecture, along with lots of the illustrations and videos that were a part of my GDC talk.  So let’s get started!

During the course of this article series, I’ll be sharing my process composing the musical score for Jurassic World Primal Ops – it’s the video game from Universal Games and Behaviour Interactive. Jurassic World Primal Ops came out last summer, right alongside the theatrical run of Jurassic World Dominion (the latest film from the popular Jurassic World franchise).

Illustration supporting an article about the music of the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game. This article was written by video game composer Winifred Phillips.

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BBC Sound of Gaming Interview: Winifred Phillips Discusses Game Music Composition

Winifred Phillips, pictured in her recording studio at Generations Productions during an interview with the Sound of Gaming radio show on BBC Radio 3.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Delighted you’re here!  I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and earlier this month, I was honored to be interviewed for the BBC Radio 3 program Sound of Gaming, hosted by Louise Blain.  BBC Radio 3 specializes in classical music, which means that the Sound of Gaming program is especially unique among that network’s program line-up.  Focusing on exceptional musical compositions from the awesome world of video games, the Sound of Gaming show has been airing regularly since 2019, bringing classical music listeners into a whole new world of musical expression.

Photo of journalist Louise Blain, host of the radio show Sound of Gaming on BBC Radio 3, as included in the article by award-winning video game music composer Winifred Phillips.

The show’s host Louise Blain is a top video game journalist, and the co-author of the popular book Guinness World Records 2014 Gamer’s Edition.  In addition, she co-hosted the BBC Proms 2022 concert “Gaming Music at the Proms” from the famous Royal Albert Hall in London.  In each of her Sound of Gaming programs, she also includes an interview segment called “The Cutscene,” during which she interviews a game music composer whose work fits into the overall theme of the program.  Whether it’s a composer for moody stealth missions, or one who specializes in light-hearted mishaps, the conversation throws light on the musical style that’s explored in the rest of the program.  In the June 3 2023 episode, the theme was “The Extraordinary,” and focused on games that ignite the fires of the imagination.  During my interview for this program, I was delighted to discuss my music for three of my video game projects: Assassin’s Creed Liberation, Sackboy: A Big Adventure, and Jurassic World Primal Ops.

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The Music of Jurassic World Primal Ops – Techniques for Game Composers

Video game composer Winifred Phillips is photographed on the red carpet of the 2023 Society of Composers & Lyricists Awards. Phillips was nominated for Outstanding Original Score for Interactive Media for the music she composed for Jurassic World Primal Ops.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

So happy you’ve joined us!  I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and one of my latest projects is the musical score for the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops (listen to the score here).  Over the past few months, I’ve been tremendously honored that my score for this game has garnered several award nominations, including Outstanding Original Score for Interactive Media from the Society of Composers & Lyricists, and Music of the Year from the Game Audio Network Guild.  As a result, I’ve been asked numerous questions about how this score was created.  With this in mind, I thought it might be helpful to write a brief article that includes a few of the guiding principles that shaped my work on this project.

I’ll be giving a lecture during the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco about my creative process, and I’ll be including some fine detail about how I planned and constructed this music.  In this article, I’ll be focusing on a couple of broader concepts related to the role that music played in this project.  But first, let’s briefly discuss the game itself.

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The Big Index 2023: Articles for Game Music Composers

 

Video game composer Winifred Phillips was nominated for a 2023 Society of Composers & Lyricists Award for her music for the video game Jurassic World Primal Ops.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Welcome!  I’m game music composer Winifred Phillips, and just before the holidays I was ecstatic to learn that my music for the Jurassic World Primal Ops video game was nominated for a Society of Composers & Lyricists Award!  In all the excitement following the announcement of the SCL Awards nominees, many budding game composers reached out to me for advice regarding their own career trajectories.  I found myself referring many of them to articles I’ve written in this space over the years – articles covering the widely diverse topics that interest us as game composers.

Since 2014, this series of articles has explored the evolving state of our industry and the tools and techniques that can help us make great game music.  Over time, these articles have become a fairly deep repository of information. After referring so many budding composers to articles in this lengthy series, it has occurred to me that this sizable collection has become quite difficult to navigate – partially due to the many topics that have been explored over the years.

Discussions have included many of the creative challenges that make our profession unique.  Through an examination of the structure of interactive music systems, numerous dynamic composition techniques have been investigated.  Along the way, we’ve pondered how game music composition has been accomplished in the past, and where it might be going in the future.  A profusion of resources have been collated in these articles – including the best methods to find gigs, and awesome networking opportunities that can benefit a game composer’s career.  There have also been examinations of resources that can keep us inspired and creatively energized.

Together, these articles constitute a living document about game music composition.  However, they definitely need an index at this point.  With that in mind, I’m offering this ‘big index’ of articles I’ve shared over the years, organized by subject matter.  We can navigate around this index using the following menu:

Dynamic Music in Games | Game Music Business | Game Music And Cognition | Game Music Composition and Production | Game Music Events and Interviews | Game Music in Virtual Reality

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Utility for Modular Game Music (Composing for Lineage M: GDC 2022)

In her music studio at Generations Productions, Winifred Phillips is pictured here composing music for her video game projects. Phillips is a BAFTA-nominated video game composer of music for games in the franchises God of War, Assassin's Creed, Total War, Lineage, LittleBigPlanet, and The Sims.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

Delighted you’re here!  I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips.  Welcome to the fifth and concluding installment in this article series based on my Game Developers Conference 2022 presentation, “Composing for Lineage M: Modular Construction in Game Music.”  You’ll find the entire contents of my GDC lecture in these articles, accompanied by all of the included videos and some of the images from the Powerpoint presentation I used during my conference session.

During the previous four articles in this series, we learned about how NCSoft ported the original world-famous Lineage PC game from 1998 to mobile devices under the name Lineage M.  We discussed how the launch of brand-new DLC content for this mobile port raised an unusual conundrum.  How does a modern game composer create new music that will work effectively within a game engine originally devised in the 1990s?  In the previous articles of this series, we discussed the popular DLC release of Lineage M: The Elmor, and I described what it was like creating new music for such an awesome game with an amazingly long history and enduring fanbase.

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Segmentation for Modular Game Music (Composing for Lineage M: GDC 2022)

Pictured working in her music studio at Generations Productions, As a video game composer, Winifred Phillips' credits include games in the franchises The Sims, Total War, Assassin's Creed, LittleBigPlanet, and God of War. In this photo, Phillips is pictured at work in her music production studio.

By Winifred Phillips | Contact | Follow

So happy you’ve joined us!  I’m video game composer Winifred Phillips, and this is the fourth article in my series based on my Game Developers Conference 2022 presentation, “Composing for Lineage M: Modular Construction in Game Music.”  I’ve included the content of my GDC lecture in these articles, along with the videos and some of the images I used in my Powerpoint presentation during the conference.

In the first three articles of this series, we discussed the port of the popular Lineage PC game from 1998 to mobile devices under the name Lineage M, and the subsequent launch of brand-new content for this world-famous game in the DLC release Lineage M: The Elmor.

This is an official promotional game image supporting a discussion of game music composition within a modular system, as described by video game music composer Winifred Phillips.

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