Just me trying to give an orchestral touch and love to some game music, mostly obscure and forgotten by history.

Orchestrated Chiptune/Game Music

I've always been very fond of this track from the game Settlers II, originally composed by Haiko Ruttmann. But I never felt the original MIDI nor the CD audio original lived up to its full potential.

This is my first attempt at getting there, although it's still not how I wanted. I envisioned it with more brass and more flowing string sections but it's pretty hard to get the dynamics right. For now, I'll upload this version since it's a mostly complete take on it, and I figured others might enjoy it.

I've had a very specific narrative in mind when I imagine an orchestration of this track. Due to the title and nature of the game, I always took it to be a dirge for the land itself (the blooming fields), and this is how I set it up. The focus on the settlers themselves is secondary. Here's how it goes:

The idea for this music, in my head at least, is to split the track into two parts: one shows the pristine wild nature during a warm day of spring, when the fields are blooming with flowers. An ominous sound of trumpets is foreboding the distant arrival of settlers, here to conquer this natural land and destroy it. After a moment of quiet, a sudden change in winds announces the arrival of the settlers in these lands.

The second part is about humans destroying nature in their settling of it, and the frenetic industry and war that results from it. (The strings symbolizing greed and death, with brass and anvils symbolizing industry and war.)

But all of this is just in a small patch of land. Meanwhile, not far from there, other blooming fields await their turn to be conquered and pillaged by the settlers, and we lament their fate under their arrival.

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Anyway, I will probably revisit it later, now that I have a subscription to EastWest's ComposerCloud. But I really am out of my depth in how to use it properly.

This is just me fooling around during the weekend, not a serious attempt at anything.

Orchestration of "The Fields are Blooming" / "Die Felder Bluehen" from "Settlers II"

Chiptunes Orchestrated: "Draconus" by Adam Gilmore

Chiptunes Orchestrated: "Global War" by Peter Elfinger

Not super happy with this one, it was my first attempt at this ever. I'll revisit this track later because it deserves more.

Orchestrated Game Music - Super Metroid - "Upper Norfair / Hot Lava Area" by Kenji Yamamoto

Still needs some work. I'll probably try again in the future.

Orchestrated Game Music - Super Metroid - "Lower Brinstar" by Kenji Yamamoto

Warheads SE is a Windows action space shooter game where you have to fire your projectiles following the gravitational field of planets. Think Worms in space!

Orchestrated Game Music - "Warheads SE, Game Music #3" by Simeon Peebler

A simple remake of Bobby Prince's "Rumba", composed for Apogee's Software "Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold". Here rendered as a sort of jazz band.

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold - Rumba (Story) -- Jazz remake

A simple remake of Bobby Prince's "Dark Halls", composed for Apogee's Software "Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold".

Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold - Dark Hall -- Remake

Eh, just playing around with this one. Apparently it's a track everybody hates, but I always liked it the most.

I suck at this, so it sounds weird and a lot of shit still needs tweaking.

Orchestration of "Dawn Of City" from Sim City 2000, by Sue Kasper

Here's the current WIP for my attempt at orchestrating Lukasz Sychowicz's "Piona".

Here's the original, for comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krGRhxfO5Eg

I'm not happy with the string ensemble marcato parts. Need to work on it a bit more, but just wanted to put it up here for the record.

I like the intro, outro also needs work.

Lukasz Sychowicz - "Piona" (Atari POKEY Orchestration)

WIP for Jakub Husak's "His Dark Majesty" song #4, for the Atari computers.

Haven't touched this one in a while. I'm mostly unhappy with the instrumentation, the timbres are not right yet. Those fast pulsing notes work better in the chiptune, I'm trying to capture that with an orchestra thing.

But here it is anyway, for the record. I'll significantly change this at some point.

Orchestrated Chiptune/Game Music

lucasvb