A Game By Its Cover 2018

Silver Rule jam comments

2018-09-14T11:12:22Z

Well...Ace couldn't obtain the Silver Rule. I quit after a game over at the spike trap after the first locked door, so I'll just review the things so far. Before I start: having three separate downloads for the three platforms instead of one with all three of them would be nice. The graphics are pretty solid for a NES/C64-style game. The three different spells, essentially a sword attack, a projectile and a mine, are also a nice idea. The story is a bit confusing, especially the first piece of text being "Two weeks later". I read on the game page that it is a sequel/ has a prequel, but that should maybe be mentioned in-game as well. I also noticed that advancing the text at the last sentence of a section would also cast a spell which is probably caused by using the same key but seemed unintentional nevertheless. Entering the mind was pretty weird...which isn't bad per se, it's even an interesting idea. But the way the game changed when I first hit the C key was pretty unexpected. A short explanation before that and maybe even a transition animation would be nice. The fight mechanics were okay for that retro aesthetic. The enemies - especially being the first encounters in the game - took a surprising amount of hits which felt a bit drawn-out, however. I'm not really a fan of the soundtrack. They are original compositions and that is always a plus in my book, but they became repetitive pretty soon. I've listened to all songs on your soundcloud playlist at your website and "The Chamber of Silver" might be the best example to show what I mean: having just a two-chord progression/riff repeat every eight seconds is a pretty small fundament for a composition that the player hears for at least a few minutes. That specific progression (i-ii° if I'm not mistaken which would probably correspond to A minor and B diminished in your case) is especially critical as a diminished chord is something that yearns to be resolved, not repeated. Think of it as the equivalent of some author writing "But..." every other sentence, including the three dots and nothing behind that to specify what would follow. It just leaves you hanging. I can sort of see that you wanted to use that to create the atmosphere of a dark dungeon where you can never be sure what is behind the next corner. And using it for effect every once in a while isn't bad. But that effect wears off pretty soon and becomes predictable...which is the complete opposite of its goal. Extending the pattern to four chords (like in the title theme) or more could be beneficial. For example, you could repeat the two chords two times and then use a few different chords. An eight-chord progression could for example look like this: A min(or) - B dim(inished) - A min - B dim - C maj(or) - D min - A min - E min The C major chord resolves the B diminshed chord and gives the progression a sense of relief and short triumph before going one step further and landing on D min, another minor chord that again increases tension but signals that this progress will not last. The return to the previous A minor confirms this and the E minor (ideally below the A minor notes) drives that point home while also introducing a more resigned alternative to the B diminished that usually followed the A minor. But that's just a suggestion, there are many different alternatives, so just try a few out and I'm sure you'll find one that suits you. Having more variation in other places could also really improve those compositions. You introduce more instruments as the songs go on, that's a start. If it's well done, it can even be enough for a whole song. But different parts of the songs that use different riffs, different harmonies or different keys (or some combination of those) can also lead to some interesting results and bears a lot of untapped potential. Another tip for introducing new instruments or sections in a song: don't just restrict them to "Bar 1 to 4 uses just this instrument, Bar 5 to 8 uses an additional instrument, Bar 9 to 12 uses another additional one". Some pattern/loop-based DAWs like Ableton Live or FL Studio encourage those types of compositions, but it tends to get a bit too formulaic. Most successful composers - whether they do classical music, soundtracks, jazz, rock or pretty much any genre - tend to smoothen those transitions a bit. For example, a newly introduced instrument doesn't have to start in the first bar of a repeated pattern. Instead, it can start at the end of the last bar of the previous iteration of that pattern. This might be a bit hard to convey with only words, so I'll use an example of a soundtrack that you probably know pretty well: The basic pattern starts at 0:00 and gets repeated a few times after that. At 0:06, the high strings and flute join in with a lower note before the pattern is fully repeated, then they play a higher note at the beginning of the next iteration. Similarly, at 0:20 the bell-type sound is introduced before the pattern is complete. That way, the transition to the next, different pattern is more fluid. On a related note: this doesn't just work for introducing instruments, but also for removing them again. Having an instrument hold a note that fades out while the pattern of the other instruments repeats is an easy way to smoothly return to a previous section while staying interesting. This also works for drums (or percussion): having a little fill before the drums kick in - even just two or three notes - can work pretty well to introduce them. Likewise, a long cymbal hit on the first beat after the drums otherwise stopped playing is a nice trick to remove them again without being too abrupt. Also: some reverb is almost always a good idea to give the song production a bit more depth. NES-era soundchips (and older ones) usually didn't have a reverb unit so that's not always appropriate. But since the samples in the soundtrack are more comparable to the SNES era and beyond, that's not an issue here and we're free to add some reverb or delay to it. I think that's enough about the soundtrack (or the game in general). I saw that you entered two game jams at roughly the same time for Silver Rule and its prologue. That can be very stressful and having to cut a few corners to meet the deadlines is something that pretty much all developers do at one point or another. So I don't want to come across as too harsh. There are justa few things that I've seen from a lot of upcoming composers and that can relatively easy be changed to improve their works. I mean, I've been at the same point a few years ago, when I started composing with computer software. I can imagine how proud you felt when you finished it and how demoralizing these lines might be. But trust me: learning all these things is easier than it sounds and soon you'll be doing them without even noticing it. In that spirit, I'd like to end with the slogan of your studio: Never give in!