[epiar-devel] epiar.net Contact Form Submission

Sat Sep 3 15:30:51 PDT 2011

With regards to the music, I went through and did some random listening and like what I hear! I see a lot of it is already non-commercial, attribution-required, share-and-share-alike Creative Commons, isn't it?

One item: do you know the artist well enough to ask for Ogg Vorbis versions? I can convert the MP3s of course but at a quality loss. If s/he still has the originals in a lossless format, it'd be best just to get either V0 or V2 Ogg Vorbis files from him directly. We use Vorbis since the decoding software is free of patent claims, and we can include the Vorbis code in Epiar itself, so no one has to worry about having that codec installed.

Here are some of my suggestions, what do you think?
* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/388124 - Great battle music. Remember that we'll be playing laser sound effects on top of this. I think it has the right balance of danger and stress.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/389356 - Possibly main menu music, but the piano makes it a bit too somber. I think this would be great music for when the player dies - the screen fades to grey with the "You are dead" message and this music plays ... and continues to play, even back on the main menu screen, where, emotionally, the player still feels defeat. When they start a new game or leave Epiar, the music would obviously change/stop. I think, from an art direction point of view, that would be great.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/402636 - Also excellent battle music. I think it'd be nice to have 2-3 different battle themes that we could randomize, ala a console RPG.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/402224 - Ambient background music for normal play. We need a few of these. This should be for a somewhat uninhabited, creepy sector.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/420076 - Ambient background music for normal play. This could be played in any sector I think. We want very ambient, non-distracting music that barely suggests an emotion for the deadness of space.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/397181 - Another battle theme I think!

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/361736 - Battle theme. Absolutely.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/377421 - I like the attitude but the flute especially makes it hard to fit in somewhere. It's also maybe too driving to be an ambient background song but I wanted to highlight it anyway as one of the good pieces (for my own critique).

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/334962 - General ambient background music perhaps.

* http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/331368 - Another great battle theme.

What do other people on the list think?

A side note: as far as planet landing music, I think I'd rather just have the music volume go very low and introduce some misc. airport-type sounds, or, for an uninhabited planet, I'd rather introduce jungle sounds. Those sounds would then fade out after 15 or so seconds. I think that'll do. Players might be thinking while landed at a planet and we don't want distracting music there.

From looking other the entire collection, here are some mixed criticisms, both praising you, and talking of the relationship this music could have with Epiar:

You guys (it's you and a friend making the music?) seem to really understand emotion and situation, e.g. "death of me" absolutely sounds like what you'd expect to hear when the player dies, "traveling on the map" sounds exactly like taking that first step out of a city in an RPG, etc.. You also are able to produce more than just misc. flanger techno, which is a huge plus. Too many kids out there have keyboards and are making generic techno and that's not as useful as you'd think. The ability to have strings and drums is great!

With regards to Epiar, you'll notice most of what I picked out is the more classical bits - I think the John Williams' classical-for-space (e.g. Star Wars) concept is right on the money, and anything techno/trance falls short of that mood. Piano, too, in general, though I love the instrument, is too expressive for anything Epiar needs except perhaps somber music, but there's already enough of that.

This is great. What do you think? Should we just use the tracks above and obey your CC license or do you want to try to produce new ones?

Thanks again, this is fantastic stuff,
Christopher Thielen

On Sep 3, 2011, at 2:53 PM, Irbis wrote:

> can be done.
> My/our music and sound composer is him http://maverlyn.newgrounds.com/
> As for the graphics feel free to send me what you have in mind. but please state what you are lacking the most. what kind of graphics exactly. obviously i can do propably all of them but i would prefer to just patch the biggest holes before moving to the optional ones.
> 
> For example: You have a star sprites and you arent happy with them. then give me a call and ill try to fix you some juicy ones.
> 
> +when ill have a look at the gfx you'll send me and ill see i can make some of them but better i will do them anyway and leave you the choice which one you prefer. No charge.
> 
> Oh and no ignorance detected heh. As i said, i am a game dev myself and the main reason why i started to do most of the assets myself was because i had troubles explaining my crew what i exactly expect them to provide me with heh. Luckly for me this changed when a new gfx artist joined us last month with which i almost have a telepathic connection because he literaly reads my mind and i dont need to
> provide him with any detailed description or explanation :P
> 
> But hey, ive wwaited for a guy like him for over 2 years.
> 
> kudos!
> 2011/9/3 Christopher Thielen <chris at epiar.net>
> Apologies for the late reply. Been moving houses!
> 
> I'd love to hear the sound and music.
> 
> As far the artwork, how about I send you some screenshots of the current game and you could make art in the style that you see already? Or attempt to introduce a new style? You'll have to forgive my ignorance on what an artist needs, I'm a programmer. :-)
> 
> On Aug 17, 2011, at 12:40 AM, Irbis wrote:
> 
>> No problem :) i have a 3months old son so i offten have delays myself.
>> 
>> Actualy i am not a programer. I mean i use outside developing tool called Contruct that doesnt ask for any programing knowledge. For the same reason i havent touched Epiar source code - for me it looks all egiptian heh. but as i said i still can do a descent:
>> -UI
>> -starships
>> -effects
>> -projectiles
>> -planets
>> -stars
>> -nebulas
>> -etc
>> 
>> +my friend does the sound and music. would you like me to make a showreel pack of my work and show it to you?
>> 
>> 2011/8/15 Christopher Thielen <chris at epiar.net>
>> Sorry for the delay in getting back to you.
>> 
>> Absolutely. Are you familiar with git and C++? Have you had a chance to check out the Epiar source code?
>> 
>> On Aug 1, 2011, at 5:31 AM, Irbis wrote:
>> 
>> > Irbis (Irbis777 at gmail.com) at 89.72.55.187 writes:
>> >
>> > Hello there. Ive been stalking epiar for quite a while now. Meanwhile i am developing my own games. But for various reasons i have to stop my work. Mostly due to lack of requaired amount of time. Thats why i thought that maybe i can help you guys. I mean, if your are interested.
>> > My games being mostly made by one person (thats me) and so i have various skills. I have a frined which makes incredible music, i do all the graphics, sprites, animations, special effects, textures and UI.  you can see some of my work here http://spacesimcentral.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=63 and here http://www.scirra.com/forum/cc-grindspace-alpha-002_topic43350.html
>> > kudos!
>> >
>> > Submitted Monday August 1, 2011 at 5:31:29am PDT
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -- 
>> I_R_B_I_S
>> WebRep
>> 
>> Overall rating
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>>  
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> 
> -- 
> I_R_B_I_S

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