Musical Storytelling

 


What a fever dream of an episode THIS was

I've been trying to think about how to write a post about this, because I absolutely love game and film music, and I try to put that love into Sonic RPG.

To me, film and game music are more than just trying to match a mood for a scene or area, they are about specifically adding texture beyond what is captured through dialogue and visuals. Really great game and film music, in my view, is extremely critical to taking good stories and making them great.

The music Billy Adams wrote for episode 3 is a great example. The Dark Swamp shares melodic details with the Iron Lock theme, which was an intentional choice by Billy to connect the two areas musically, just as they are connected thematically in the story; both being "haunted".

Similarly, the music I wrote in episode 3, where Antoine sees his parents, was meant to achieve multiple aims-- on the one hand, it is trying to be both touching and haunting (via use of choir and piano)-- on the other hand, it is trying to establish this simple melody as "Antoine's Theme". You hopefully noticed that this same melody was used twice after that scene to represent Antoine's character development. Once just after the parental ghosts disappear and he decides to rescue Sonic and Sally, and then again when he ultimately finds Sonic and Sally.

Starting in episode 2, and then demonstrated again in episode 3 in two different places, I try to establish a theme from Season 1 that plays during the episode Sonic Boom as a "Sally Theme":

My favorite technique when writing a character theme is trying to explore different emotional contexts with the same melody. For instance, the show's signature Sonic Theme (sadly only used in Season 1), written by Michael Tavera, operates in multiple contexts besides just being "heroic". You have a wide array of motifs wherein Sonic's Theme is the melodic base to represent an emotional context of anxious, sad, concerned, hopeful, etc, etc. In the game, I tried to make similar variations of it.

One of the first things I do when trying to get a sense of a new episode of the RPG is hop on my piano and start playing around with musical ideas-- either new character themes or motifs of existing themes-- which help me explore different emotional experiences that these characters might go through. Many times I will find a musical idea that I feel could fit a big emotional moment really well and this will become the inspiration for a new story beat where the character is put into the emotional context that fits the musical idea I discovered. I believe that the "snow day in knothole" idea, which eventually was realized in episode 4, was something I first explored musically before exploring in any other way.
Episode 4 had some very intentional theme writing. It was the first major episode to not feature any "main cast" members, so I was very intent on trying to give Rotor and Logan a musical context and personality that would compliment their shared story. Hopefully it was clear the places where Rotor's theme was established:
...and Logan's theme was established:
For episode 5, I wanted it to feel like Tails was becoming a Sonic-level hero, and as such, Tails required not just a really great theme, but several motifs that mimicked Sonic's motifs.
In the show, there are these moments where Sonic and Robotnik are going back and forth-- Sonic catches Robotnik off-guard-- Robotnik responds-- Sonic looks scared-- Sonic ultimately bests Robotnik-- Robotnik angry. And these thrilling scenes are often met with what sounds like a dualing between the Sonic and Robotnik themes. Check out a variation by  GreenCauldron of that here:
I wanted to capture this same feeling near the end of the episode, when Tails is racing Robotnik to the Light of Mobius:
In episode 5, there are even motifs of the Light of Mobius theme:
One last thing I want to point out is how episode 5 utilizes a kind of musical rhyming concept, wherein the story sets up with the Tails storybook theme, then goes into a motif of section B of Tails' Theme, and we repeat this same pattern at the close of the episode, which is then followed by Tails' full triumphant theme (rarely used in the episode) in the credits. This musical technique hopefully helps compliment the book-ending strategy that is being taken by the writing and help the player feel like they have both closure and accomplishment.

Anywho, I hope this helps you enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look at how my musical process helps shape Sonic RPG!

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