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[tortoiseandcrow]

there are certain situations where the threat level ramps up too quickly for my taste, such as when vultures drop down from above

Seems like you could solve this with little "Threat jump clips", right? Snippets of music that sort of get a track started like cold water being dumped on your head while you're sleeping? You could even code it so that when there's potential for a threat jump to happen, it gets quiet for a moment, almost like a sixth sense. Skilled players could use pauses in the music to anticipate danger 

Ooh! I like this a lot!

The first thing that came to mind was Paul Ruskay's incredible song in Homeworld for the Turanic Raiders. That opening kick, those syncopated drums...





Maybe you could plot it out so that the threat jump clips kick in based on the rate of increase of the "threat level" variable, as opposed to its absolute value. If the threat is increasing below a certain rate, just keep fading in new tracks, but if the threat increases really quickly then you get a threat-jump clip.

You could even make it so that it gives a hunting screech or some other terrifying organic sound when its AI locks onto you. That'd be some real cinematic stuff right there.

[JobLeonard]

Thanks for reminding me that Homeworld really was a perfect game on all aesthetic fronts.

[jamesprimate]

HEY FRIENDS! Busy week coming up for the slugcat crew. We're going to be showing the game at 3 difference events. I have like 2 seconds to devote to this post, but gotta make some sort of announcement


PAX West, Seattle Sept 2-5: As usual! You can find me and the freshest build of Rain World at the Adult Swim Games room, and other playable versions will be at the Sanshee Games corner and the SONY indie games booth. Maybe I'll be 3 places at once, who knows. http://west.paxsite.com/

XOXO Fest, Portland Sept 8-11: Lydia and I will be showing Rain World at the XOXO Arcade on a huge projector screen, should be pretty sweet. I'm kind of stoked to see XOXO Fest, I've heard really good things. https://xoxofest.com/

Busan Indie Connect, Busan South Korea Sept 9-11: Joar is going to be showing Rain World at Busan Indie connect and I'm *maximum jealous*, it looks super super cool. http://eng.bicfest.org/


But anyway, if you are at any of these def come say hi! I'll tell you 1000 secrets that I can't post here  

[saluk]

Excite! I can't wait to check out Rain World for the first time at PAX!

[Dinomaniak]

I know this is a bit off-topic, but since I'm a huge fan of PAX I'd like to ask : is there any place we can view PAX live online ?

That being said, I sincerely cannot wait to see your videos and I hope you'll present other parts of the gameplay. I've never seen the slugcat survive one rain in a video and would love to see that.

[Profesh]

ah that video is from a while back! i just realized most of our vids were set to private so ive been turning them public. this was an early version of the system just showing the functionality, and the "threat ramp up" was juiced a bit for the purposes of demonstration. its been polished quite a bit since then ofc.

yeah spot on! the "pulse" idea was the inception of this system. initially the concept was that it would *just* be the pulse, as if you were hearing the slugcats heart beating louder and the adrenaline rushing, but that got boring quickly. also at that same time we were having an issue with the world feeling a bit too quiet generally (despite having 120+ music tracks, its just so large!) so we used this to solve both problems in an appropriately rain world way

each region has tiered system of 8 to 12 layers of "threat music" that can stack up depending on how dire the situation is for little sluggie. to avoid becoming repetitive, each tier of audio pulls from a pool of possible tracks, with many many possible combinations. the pool for the early layers (first to come in) is generally pretty simple and subtle: a pulse beat or white noise elements but as the layers stack up it becomes more recognizably "music", with the final layers being a melody or lead line.

at this point it works pretty well! there are certain situations where the threat level ramps up too quickly for my taste, such as when vultures drop down from above, and there are some track layer combinations that work better than others ofc, so i might give it a bit more polish soon.

Related: I pre-purchased the Rain World alpha in January, alongside which was generously included a collection of your tentative candidates for the proposed in-game soundtrack: however, as a borderline-obsessive appreciator and sometime curator of 'seminal' videogame scores both for posterity and home-listening—think Streets of Rage, Command & Conquer, Syndicate Wars, Sub Terrania, Abe's Oddysee, et c.—was slightly disappointed to find that the latter is only provided in (it must be said, increasingly obsolescent) lo-fi mp3 format.

While I do of course recognise that given the sheer number of subsequent iterations and, by extension, revisions to the game's sound-design it arguably wouldn't have made sense to accord these 'preliminary' works the same, lavish treatment as befits a full commercial release; can you at least confirm that the final, definitive soundtrack will be made available in glorious Bandcamp-worthy FLAC—and, if so, perhaps mastered a tad more sympathetically than this abomination? (Obviously I'm not expecting full chamber-music dynamics, but perhaps something in the vein of Disasterpeace's exquisitely rendered official score to Hyper Light Drifter, because believe it or not, from what I've heard thus far your music really does warrant the extra attention.)

Thanks in advance, and keep up your truly world-class endeavour in all departments!

Cheers,

- Ryan

[Profesh]

there are certain situations where the threat level ramps up too quickly for my taste, such as when vultures drop down from above

Seems like you could solve this with little "Threat jump clips", right? Snippets of music that sort of get a track started like cold water being dumped on your head while you're sleeping? You could even code it so that when there's potential for a threat jump to happen, it gets quiet for a moment, almost like a sixth sense. Skilled players could use pauses in the music to anticipate danger 

Ooh! I like this a lot!

The first thing that came to mind was Paul Ruskay's incredible song in Homeworld for the Turanic Raiders. That opening kick, those syncopated drums...





Maybe you could plot it out so that the threat jump clips kick in based on the rate of increase of the "threat level" variable, as opposed to its absolute value. If the threat is increasing below a certain rate, just keep fading in new tracks, but if the threat increases really quickly then you get a threat-jump clip.

You could even make it so that it gives a hunting screech or some other terrifying organic sound when its AI locks onto you. That'd be some real cinematic stuff right there.

Oh God, this is my crack cocaine. Here, have some Syndicate Wars:

[jamesprimate]

ah that video is from a while back! i just realized most of our vids were set to private so ive been turning them public. this was an early version of the system just showing the functionality, and the "threat ramp up" was juiced a bit for the purposes of demonstration. its been polished quite a bit since then ofc.

yeah spot on! the "pulse" idea was the inception of this system. initially the concept was that it would *just* be the pulse, as if you were hearing the slugcats heart beating louder and the adrenaline rushing, but that got boring quickly. also at that same time we were having an issue with the world feeling a bit too quiet generally (despite having 120+ music tracks, its just so large!) so we used this to solve both problems in an appropriately rain world way

each region has tiered system of 8 to 12 layers of "threat music" that can stack up depending on how dire the situation is for little sluggie. to avoid becoming repetitive, each tier of audio pulls from a pool of possible tracks, with many many possible combinations. the pool for the early layers (first to come in) is generally pretty simple and subtle: a pulse beat or white noise elements but as the layers stack up it becomes more recognizably "music", with the final layers being a melody or lead line.

at this point it works pretty well! there are certain situations where the threat level ramps up too quickly for my taste, such as when vultures drop down from above, and there are some track layer combinations that work better than others ofc, so i might give it a bit more polish soon.

Related: I pre-purchased the Rain World alpha in January, alongside which was generously included a collection of your tentative candidates for the proposed in-game soundtrack: however, as a borderline-obsessive appreciator and sometime curator of 'seminal' videogame scores both for posterity and home-listening—think Streets of Rage, Command & Conquer, Syndicate Wars, Sub Terrania, Abe's Oddysee, et c.—was slightly disappointed to find that the latter is only provided in (it must be said, increasingly obsolescent) lo-fi mp3 format.

While I do of course recognise that given the sheer number of subsequent iterations and, by extension, revisions to the game's sound-design it arguably wouldn't have made sense to accord these 'preliminary' works the same, lavish treatment as befits a full commercial release; can you at least confirm that the final, definitive soundtrack will be made available in glorious Bandcamp-worthy FLAC—and, if so, perhaps mastered a tad more sympathetically than this abomination? (Obviously I'm not expecting full chamber-music dynamics, but perhaps something in the vein of Disasterpeace's exquisitely rendered official score to Hyper Light Drifter, because believe it or not, from what I've heard thus far your music really does warrant the extra attention.)

Thanks in advance, and keep up your truly world-class endeavour in all departments!

Cheers,

- Ryan

Most certainly! The soundtrack at this point is absurdly long, like 3.5hr+, a good deal of which is music that is setup in layers for dynamic audio, or other game context dependent format. So after everything is settled with development  i really want to take some time and get everything cleaned up, organized or arranged into proper listenable tracks (so it sounds like a song rather than 12 layers of loops that interact etc), and see how it can be grouped into a few albums worth of music.

We've had a few companies come to us with concepts for doing nice vinyl editions and I'd really like to pursue that as well, though 3.5 hours of vinyl is a LOT of vinyl, so might break it down into a few different self contained volumes or something. But yes I'm going to go all out with the music, its going to be fun!

[Christian]

Are the tracks still "junk audio" transformed to music?
https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=25183.msg1121330#msg1121330

Literally me recording us talking at the PAX booth and showing him the soundwave loading:
https://clyp.it/obyjx1dg

The same sample pitched down for effect and to create better material to grab from:
https://clyp.it/udnp13qu

Selecting audio points in that sample to capture from, i do this weird semi-randomized arpeggiated thing:
https://clyp.it/ddlxzmds

And from there the track takes shape. Adding percussion and other instruments (many of them also taken from that same audio clip, manipulated to suit my ends through sample and hold techniques or whatever):
https://clyp.it/v2v2et5r

This one was good too
https://clyp.it/jjn25egr

[Saijin_Naib]

Most certainly! The soundtrack at this point is absurdly long, like 3.5hr+, a good deal of which is music that is setup in layers for dynamic audio, or other game context dependent format. So after everything is settled with development  i really want to take some time and get everything cleaned up, organized or arranged into proper listenable tracks (so it sounds like a song rather than 12 layers of loops that interact etc), and see how it can be grouped into a few albums worth of music.

We've had a few companies come to us with concepts for doing nice vinyl editions and I'd really like to pursue that as well, though 3.5 hours of vinyl is a LOT of vinyl, so might break it down into a few different self contained volumes or something. But yes I'm going to go all out with the music, its going to be fun!

I really, really, really hope you do make an arranged OST for us! Have as many tracks/movements/albums as you need! The more, the happier I am!

[tortoiseandcrow]

The first thing that came to mind was Paul Ruskay's incredible song in Homeworld for the Turanic Raiders. That opening kick, those syncopated drums...

Oh God, this is my crack cocaine. Here, have some Syndicate Wars:

Oh I like that rather a lot!





I see you your Syndicate Wars and raise you Planescape: Torment. As far as I'm concerned Mark Morgan's old Black Isle work is basically infallible. The percussion is so distinctive, and those flute samples...

I really can't wait until all the 90's kids start aestheticizing the hell out of those old midi-based RPG soundtracks in the same way that folks like James and Disasterpeace have done with chiptunes.

EDIT: Link fixed!

[JobLeonard]

The first thing that came to mind was Paul Ruskay's incredible song in Homeworld for the Turanic Raiders. That opening kick, those syncopated drums...

Oh God, this is my crack cocaine. Here, have some Syndicate Wars:

Oh I like that rather a lot!





I see you your Syndicate Wars and raise you Planescape: Torment. As far as I'm concerned Mark Morgan's old Black Isle work is basically infallible. The percussion is so distinctive, and those flute samples...

I really can't wait until all the 90's kids start aestheticizing the hell out of those old midi-based RPG soundtracks in the same way that folks like James and Disasterpeace have done with chiptunes.

youtu.be links don't get embedded properly for some reason, you need the full youtube.com link:





(related: it's super-frustrating when writing an <url=http://...> link to youtube and the forum overwrites the link tag as an embedded youtube vid. Anyone have any ideas where I can file a proper complaint about this?)
Anyway, to the future of chiptunes. It's going to be amazing

[Schoq]

lots of people have complained about it through appropriate channels but we're praying to a god that doesn't listen

[gimymblert]

people have complain there were no youtube embedding to start with

[JobLeonard]

I just don't understand why they didn't go with something like a [yt] tag

[jamesprimate]

Are the tracks still "junk audio" transformed to music?

yes, mostly! most of the audio is in fact, including sound effects and all of that

[saluk]

I got to try this at PAX, it lived up to the 5 years of hype! I was super impressed by the AI, it's one thing to read a discussion on how the AI works and to wonder about how effective that will really be in-game, and another to be in that world and acting and reacting to the living agents that are all around you. Combined with the glorious sound work and distinctive visuals it was my favorite experience at pax. I meant to swing by and see some more of the behaviors but got lost in the rest of the con...

[Christian]

Yeah, last version I played the game was 2015's E3 demo, and even then the AI was so impressive. I can only imagine how crazy things are now. The animations were also really fun. It's the kind of game where the traversal is enjoyable by itself

[kennoley]

Found out about this game recently, is there any way to play this alpha your talking about?

https://www.humblebundle.com/store/product/rainworld_earlyaccess_soundtrack/FpSDLkj8s

And when I say alpha, I mean it. No sound, only four regions

1. ) Question for Christian and/or devs, If I buy rain world from this link will I get rain world on steam when it releases or will I have to buy it again?

2.) What will be the final price of the game when it releases (The alpha from this link costs $25)

3.) I'm also curious if this link is legit or not

[crankykong]

I love the game, the atmosphere is so dense. I am mostly impressed that they use direct sunlight in a more sparingly way,then most other games would do. You have those islands of light shining down onto the environment, in a general overcasted lightsetting on most of the maps. That creates a very moody atmosphere.

And the water just looks so inviting.Its almost like you can feel the wetness of it,swapping physically correct up and down. And they play so well with this general fear,that everybody of us has, swimming in very deep water and not knowing what creature could be hideing under you.

I have only a few concerns:

1: the jump and run part of the game.

Yes its an adventure game (and that's the part i am mostly exited about),but its a sidescrolling 2D jump and run at the same time. It has to be per definition, because the view is 2D and your char can jump and run, so there you go.And it looks like there could be not enough diversity in term of movement options. It looks like most of the time you are climbing up metal bars,jumping from metal bar to metal bar, or crawling into holes and tunnels. I have nothing against this climbing mechanic in general, but if this is the only thing you are doing in the game,beside of swimming, than it could get boring quick. I wonder if there are any mechanics like in super meat boy or donkey kong, where you have to avoid traps or traveling with mine cars on rails or have some swinging rope mechanic,or solve some puzzles,...

2: The wormlike yellow observer,who watches you all the time.
Maybe i am really the only one,but does anybody else find this guy annoying?
He peaks out every second screen and is , at least for me, very distracting.
Its like hearing a vague sound on your bike,while riding it and at first you think its not big of a deal,but
after two weeks of hearing it all the time,you get really annoyed of it. He shows up way to often. To give the player the feeling,that he is watched,they don't have to let him show up on almost half of the screens. It would be more than enough,that he appears on every 10th,or even better 20th screen of a map. Every 2nd screen is total overkill and very anoying.Sometimes less is more.I for myself would be way happier if it would be a camera,which gets extended out of the ground for a short amount of time and than retracted again, instead of this worm with a very unrealistically/cartoony shaped bodyform and set of animations.What this game does really good are the animations of the animals living in this world and than there is this worm,which has such a cartoony,exaggerated set of animations, it just does not fit to the rest of the creatures.That would also fit way more in the lore, with the char beeing  in some industrial ruin setting.

3.The sounds.
I have nothing against techno and trance, its my favorite kind of music to listen. But the sounds are so random and unharmonic sometimes. I think a atmospheric ambient sound would fit way better. I hope they let us turn down the music setting in the audio options,so that you can play your own music in the background and still have the other ingame soundeffects.

4. The Releasedate.

At this point i have the feeling that they have the game finished basically month ago,but they do not want to release it at the moment,because they think its not known enough in the public and so they go from mess/show/exposition to mess/show/exposition just to get publicity for the next half of an year and then they will release it summer 2017,or even winter 2017,although it is already finished and they could release it tomorrow,but they wont. And that's very annoying because it could have the opposite effect,that all of the people who are watching the game right now will lose there interest in the game,if they have to wait another half or even one year, without any comunication.And then say , you hyped me up for several years without releasing, that was mean .. i don't want to deal with your game anymore.