Anyone else play music/ambiance during play? I thought it might seems weird at first, but actually it's pretty immersive and you can do some neat stuff (sounds effects to cue certain enemies/special attacks/traps, instead of saying "you hear XYZ" you can play an audiocilp of XYZ, trailer music also amps up the major battles)
Curious to know what kinds of music (if any) you guys play.
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I do play music. While at first I made elaborated playlists, ripping tons of CDs, I switched to more minimalistic playlists. Now what I normally use is an ambient track, a dark ambient track, and a combat track. The ambient tracks are long, 1h and up, the combat track is a mix of fast-paced music that goes with the setting. I might add one or the other ambient mix for special occasions (fair, dungeon, nightclub, abandoned space station, etc.). By keeping the whole music minimalistic, I find that it gains in cohesion, and it allows me to concentrate on the game.
Artists I used so far (all genres and setting mixed):
Aphex Twin
Arcana
Archon Satani
Arecibo
Atrium Carceri
Corvus Corax
Dead Can Dance
Deutsch Nepal
Fear Factory
Ildfrost
Imminent Starvation
In Slaughter's Natives
Kodo
Lustmord
Machinehead
Monte Cazzaza
Nordvargr
Photek
Raison d'Être
Sabled Suns
Scorn
Skinny Puppy
Sonar
Slayer
The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath a Cloud
Velvet Acid Christ
Vivus Temporis
Yamato Ensemble
Music can be a great tool, but you have to be very careful with it. When used right it can make the atmosphere 10 times better, but when used wrong it can make it 20 times worse. My general rule of thumb is to avoid using anything which has vocals or is too recognisable, since those tend to be immersion breaking. I also rather prefer to focus on using sound effects and ambient sounds than actual music, these are much safer and just as good or even better for atmosphere crafting.
I agree. If I was DMing some kind of Delta Green session set during the Vietnam War, I'd use a Vietnam War music mix played simultaneously with some dark drone heavy ambient track without rythmics for the parts in the US Army base. Then, I'd switch the rock music off and replace it with sounds from the jungle for all the parts in the jungle. Then, when they arrive at the pre-human temple ruins, I'd just use a sinister dark ambient track. For the combat parts, I'd use one track from FEAR 2: Perseus Mandate OST.
Anybody have stuff for cyberpunk laying around? I've got combat covered with Carpenter Brut, but I'd love something to play for ambience on the streets and for inside buildings.
Not for peacefull ambience, but for cyberpunk combat I highly recommend Unreal series soundtracks, especially Unreal Tournament 2004
I use tabletopaudio.com for the most part, which seems to work pretty well.
how about some spacey twang?
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Git yerselves some proper filk while yer at it.youtu.be
Mostly play stuff by adrian von ziegler
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For sound effects and background noise I mostly use these
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You can find great ambiance tracks on soundcloud from the Legend of Grimrock games. The guy who makes theme is Peeba on soundcloud.
They're very good background themes that can be used in lots of different settings. I think the prison and the bog theme are very good.
Link for the lazy: soundcloud.com
Here are some ambient tracks for cyberpunk settings:
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The Guild of Ambient Youtube-channel has a lot of decent and long ambient tracks: youtube.com
Die Antwoord did some (three?) albums that are just the instrumental tracks of their songs, which I quite like for cyberpunk-ish background street music:
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Darkest Dungeon has some good ambiance and combat music.
Some songs from Die Antwoords are remixes from old Aphex Twin tracks. Here's the original material. Might be useful in a cyberpunk setting, though it doesn't mix well with synthwave or darkwave: youtube.com
Can't really go wrong with Aphex Twin. You could also try out some Chemical Brothers, Orbital and The Orb as sort of cyberpunk-y ambient.
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Did some at one point. Mostly just a test, i ended up picking out some battle themes to play during combat.
I ended up having to pick something at random once when i had to improvise in order to fix a mapping mistake i had made. It worked out brilliantly.
In horror games, I do like to play a bit of music, especially when the party supposedly are in a safe spot.
I also like to herald the coming of their nemesis/an enemy vastly more powerful than them via a certain sound I can play alone or over another soundscape, like the silent hill sirens
Orbital is really cool. Here's my favorite track from him: youtube.com
Otherwise Photek is pretty good, too:
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Bost are featured on the Pi OST, and Wipeout 2097 OST with a couple of other good artists (Future Sound of London, The Prodigy...). Though like I already said above, I'd avoid making too complex playlists using tons of short tracks - it'll most likely distracts the players.
Great taste - In Sides was one of the first albums I ever bought, and I break it out to use as a soundtrack for just about every sci-fi game I've ever run.
Here is a playlist with most stuff I used during the 1990s to GM Cyberpunk 2020: youtube.com
The list is pretty long a varied - you should be able to find some stuff to suit you.
Does anyone has some ideas for soundtracks in a post-apocalyptic setting, apart of the ubiquitous Fallout OST?
In exchange, here's some music that fits Delta Green pretty well (thanks to the user who introduced me to TKDE):
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And some more:
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This is great!
A more melancholic subtile kind of unnerving:
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Very nice! Now I need some bourbon.
No recommendations, just wanted to give thanks. I'm going to love using this dark Jazz in my Halloween game
I use this for my Call of Cthulhu campaigns. Whoever dies early has to blow the rest of the guys, that's why I usually DM and kill the prettiest one.
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In my GMing days (various systems) I used movie's OSTs or computer games OSTs and their sound FX. You can easily rip a PC games FX and incorporate them. How elaborate you want it is up to you, I used a DJ sound mixing deck software to pull off some neat ambience and scenarios/situations
That was good to hear
I love music thread on tg I always find good music;
When I ran an ancient greece game I put some music in the background when appropriate (introduction of the game, discussion with a strange poet, exploration ect, I used this video for "calm" moment youtube.com
For combat I remember putting a more dynamic soundtrack
If I ever get to run my dream game in a campaign, a pulp adventure focusing on Luchaores fighting against vampire, mummy and black lagoon monster, I'll probably use a tons of Surf rock, especially Messer Chups youtube.com
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Also pic related would be recurrent npc's, an alien band who pretend to be a music band to pay for the reparation of their crashed spaceship
I haven't actually done this, but I've considered using stuff from the various Star Wars soundtracks, plus Holst's "The Planets," in Star Wars campaigns.
