Inside My World - OST Composing Jam 7 Submission

Listen in the attached YouTube video! Or via this embedded SoundCloud player!

Note: I noticed in the YouTube video above, there are some minor clipping artifacts, but I think they may have been added on accident when creating the visualizer. The files below and SoundCloud files are more carefully mastered and do not have these artifacts.

Usage Permissions:

The music here is free use as long as credit is given in the work. Optional, but if you make use of it, I would love to know, as I’d be interested to see where it’s getting used! Feel free to just leave a comment on the submission. I would be happy to provide stems and more loopable versions of the tracks if you reach out to me.

Contact info:

You can reach me by messaging me on Itch.io via my profile, or at dontotmusic@gmail.com

Chosen theme/Theme Fit:

I decided to try to use the provided theme of the Jam, as I thought it looked fun, and I think the fun of Itch.io Jams is to build your own interpretation of a shared theme :)

The theme phrase was "Inside My World" and the image was the following:

When viewing the “theme” of the Jam, I thought I would view the picture like concept art for an imaginary game. In addition to composing music, I also like to do game development, so I thought to myself, “What kind of game would fit with this picture and phrase, and what kind of gameplay would evoke the same kind feelings that this picture and phrase evoke?”

I took note of the underwater environment, with bubbles and fish, and thought about water elements. I saw the childish nature of the fish drawings and the age of the young girl in the kimono, which made me feel the game would be for all ages. I noticed the sense of wonder and fun that the girl was having, and saw the larger bubble figure standing to the left of the girl, and in addition to the phrase, thought it might be a game that involved a girl exploring an unknown world, a bubble spirit who was guiding her, and the surroundings would be very dreamlike and have magical realism and mystery.

With those thoughts in mind, and such stylized art in the picture, I imagined something like a 2d adventure/platformer/exploration game, where you play as the girl and explore this world, and the world unfolds and new wonders are revealed as you get guided on an adventure by the bubble spirit.

In these kinds of games, there usually isn’t much dialogue, and there are a lot of ambient sound effects, so I felt as though the music has to do a lot of heavy lifting to characterize the feelings of the character. As such, I tried to weave in some of those feelings of wonder and mystery into the harmony and melody of the score.

Description of entry:

Track 1: Overworld theme

I’m a big fan of games where soundtracks evolve as progression is made throughout the story. For that reason, I like to take the stems of each instrument and build loops out of each of them, and introduce them as the player makes progress in the level. If I were making this game, I would probably open with just the piano arpeggiation that plays in the first bar of this recording, and as the player discovers more, or perhaps gains more mobility, through doors opening or access to new mobility equipment/skills, then the glockenspiel track might come in, to symbolize the main character’s newfound delight and confidence in this strange world.

I also have a Cello track that comes in last, and I was thinking that the Cello would be symbolic for the presence of your bubble companion, who is a helpful guide, because the deep, warm presence of the Cello is like that of a companion.

I thought the 12:8 time signature and use of maj7 and dominant 7 chords and voicings with lots of space and interesting chord extensions could evoke a sense of exploration, wonder, and also slight confusion that I would expect of a character in a strange, but fun, new world.

Track 2: Overworld theme - Underwater Waltz

I’ve always been a fan of underwater renditions of music in games. I love the immersion of the muffling of the high frequencies, as it immerses the player in an obvious cue that reminds them of actually being underwater. I also love games like some of the 3d Mario games, where some of the instrumentation and composition elements actually change when you are underwater. As such, I took time to record an underwater rendition of the overworld theme, replacing the glockenspiel with a xylophone with a lot of reverb

However, in this version of the track, no Lowpass filter has been applied yet. I apply that effect in the next track.

Track 3: In and Out of Water

This isn’t really an additional composition, but I did a mockup of what some gameplay might sound like, in which we can imagine the player submerging into the water, or coming out of the water, with splashing sound effects, and then crossfading between the above water and underwater version of the tracks. I would imagine that this would be done dynamically in the game’s audio system.

I also apply a heavy high pass filter and play underwater ambience sound effects when the player is underwater.

Track 4: Menu Theme

When making this track, I thought it might be best suited for a “end of level recap” screen that happens, where it tells you the collectibles you’ve gotten. Or perhaps it could be used in a level select screen. Either way, this was created by taking the chords from the main theme and putting them through a bunch of arpeggiators with a few different instruments and doing some tweaking. It’s also at a slower tempo, providing the player with a relaxed score while they might be making decisions on which level to play, or equipment to take, etc.

Track 5: Adversity Theme

This might be a track that plays when something bad happens, or you have to deal with an adversary in the game. Because I imagined the game to be fairly lighthearted and geared towards all ages, I decided to make it dissonant but not scary, using a minor 2nd sound. It uses a goofy sounding warbly synthesizer, and plays in an uptempo polka sounding style, to characterize the enemy as chaotic.

It also makes use of the leitmotif established in the main theme, but takes advantage of a minor 2nd type sound, and plays the motif “out of key” to make it sound dissonant, to evoke the feeling of the current in game event causing discord in the world.

Screenshot Proof

Here is a screenshot of my DAW as evidence of soundtrack composition