Due to the background of the game, the music of God of War mainly adopts orchestral film music techniques, which is very similar to the feeling of European fantasy blockbusters such as The Lord of the Rings. As far as our own feeling of music in the game is concerned, it is no less refreshing and shocking than that of The Lord of the Rings. After analyzing various elements of music, we think that the music of "God of War" has the following unique features:

1. A large number of vocal chorus

It is not uncommon in the soundtrack of the movie, but in the soundtrack of the game, except for some fixed scenes (such as churches), it is generally a game. In "God of War", we can hear the extensive use of vocal chorus everywhere, including the roar of increasing momentum and the singing of beautiful melody. With these magnificent vocal chorus, the depth and sense of history of music suddenly strengthened, giving people a sense of atmosphere.

2. Application of percussion

Percussion is also a common method of film soundtrack, and it is no exception in God of War. In order to express the momentum of music, in addition to the commonly used orchestral percussion music such as snare drum and timpani, there are many unconventional percussion music (such as metal collision and scratching) used to create an atmosphere in "God of War". The shock brought by these percussion music can't be expressed by ordinary orchestral music, and it has a unique effect on the performance of the BOSS war in the "God of War".

3. Beautiful melody

It's not enough to have rhythm and momentum. After all, the problem of melody can't be ignored in the game soundtrack. In "God of War", there is a "desert of death" scene, where three singing witches are to be eliminated. Players have to rely on their voices to identify their positions. Their songs are beautiful and moving, and their melodies are extremely sad. If you indulge in them, you will be easily confused by them. From this detail, we can see the important position of music and melody in God of War. Of course, there are many other scenes with beautiful and soft melodies.

4. Combination of calmness and climax

If the music of the whole game is full of grandeur, you won't have too many memories of it after playing, but you will feel tired of hearing. In "God of War", the collocation of music in each scene is very elegant, and there will never be more than 2 minutes of noise or more than 2 minutes of calmness. It is always a combination of climax and tranquility, and intense and serene.

II. Audibility of background music

The music style of online games mainly depends on the background of the game. As far as online games developed in China are concerned, our studio mostly does games with martial arts background, so the music tends to be folk music style. Although there are great differences between folk music and orchestral music, as far as the above-mentioned "combination of calm and climax" is concerned, they are actually interlinked.

Because of the single-player game, each scene stays for a very short time, so the same piece of music will not be repeated too many times, so there is relatively more room for music to be played, which can be particularly intense and soothing. At present, a common problem in online games is that the music style is too strong. When R&D companies review music, they only start from the perspective of hearing, ignoring the background role of music in the game, which is very likely to cause players' hearing fatigue.

This situation will be improved in the future development of online game soundtrack. Background music doesn't have to be evaluated by the obvious theme, and it is a main trend of online game soundtrack in the future to match the artistic conception of the picture and make the music more resistant to listening.

III. Musical Emotion and Cycling Mode

Speaking of "Musical Emotion", when we listen to the soundtrack of "God of War" carefully, we will find that there are a lot of short music clips that create an atmosphere without theme melody. The main purpose of these clips is to show the occurrence of an event without appearing in the background, so they are widely used in other stand-alone games except God of War.

Let's talk about the "musical mood" of online games. At present, it is rarely used, and it only appears in some rare events such as upgrades and battle victories. This short music is rarely involved in the music list of a game. When it comes to the reason why "music mood" is seldom used, we must point out the uniqueness of online game music-cyclic playing. This monotonous cycle may be played dozens or even hundreds of times in some scenes, but it is widely used in online games at home and abroad at present, and it is mainly divided into two forms:

◆ Seamless connection from beginning to end

means that the music of the game has no obvious beginning and end, instead, the beginning and end are connected very smoothly, and after the music is played once, it automatically jumps to the beginning for the second cycle, and The background music under this cycle is usually very short (1 ~ 1.5 minutes), and there is never a gap in hearing. No matter how music is done, it is very easy to cause players' hearing fatigue. After all, no matter how good a piece of music is, listening to it for a few hours will also make people bored. This seamless connection is usually widely used in fighting music and casual game music.

◆ natural beginning and end

Music has a complete beginning and end, and when it is played circularly, it is also connected with the end.

From the perspective of the listening endurance and durability of online game music, the "natural beginning and end" circulation mode is more scientific. Besides, according to our production experience, we think that adding a suitable time blank (such as 3S) will help to strengthen the listening endurance of background music and give players an auditory buffer.

IV. Combination of program control and music playback

Actually, in World of Warcraft and Paradise II, we can find a lot of music similar to some short clips in God of War. Maybe after you come to a new scene, the music will only appear once when you enter this scene, and then it will stop, and it will not be played again, but only the sound effect will be preserved. Unless you quit the game, the music will not repeat when you enter this scene again. At least in the domestic online games that we have made, this way of background music and circulation has not appeared too much, because in a big map, it may be necessary to make a lot of short pieces of this kind of music, and there are some problems in the production cost and the coordination of programs and music, which have never attracted much attention from R&D companies. However, this way will be an important aspect of the development of online game soundtrack in the future. After all, simple circulation can never satisfy the appetite of players from the auditory sense. Only by combining music skillfully with scenes and pictures can we achieve better overall effect.