Writing Interactive Music for Video Games: A Composer’s Guide

Chapter 15. Advanced Dynamic Music Manipulation Techniques

The ability to dynamically change the harmonic or rhythmic context of the music based on player choices can radically change the way the music tells the story of a game. This chapter focuses on real-time music manipulation techniques, including dynamic melodic and harmonic changes, stylistic changes, ensemble-based changes, and building a small sequencer within the game itself.

Weighing More Expensive Options

Although horizontal resequencing and vertical remixing offer a variety of ways for composers to create interactive music for video games, these forms have limited flexibility in terms of dynamic variability and adaptability from moment to moment during gameplay. Horizontal resequencing ...