作者：Marcelo Martins

介绍

循环曲目是用于电子游戏音乐制作中的音波内容。它可以用于许多不同情境下，其使用可以追溯到电子游戏行业起源时期。即便在今天，它也为人所熟知，非游戏玩家都知道电子游戏的音乐是“重复性的音乐小片段”。但是，游戏的技术、美学和用户预期都发生了变化，这迫使开发者必须重新思考这项技术的使用，使之更适合现代游戏制作环境。

本文有3个目标。第1是讲述循环曲目的历史以及随后如此流行和有效的缘由。第2是阐述游戏中音乐执行的相关挑战和循环带来的影响。第3是介绍执行游戏音乐的新方法，避免明显增加预算或开发时间。

如果你已经对循环的历史很熟悉，希望能够对其运用了解更多，可以直接跳到这篇文章的最后一部分——“执行音乐的有效方法”。否则，你可以从以下段落开始阅读。

何为循环曲目？

在电子游戏背景下，它指的是开端和结尾无缝连接的音乐。通过这种方法，作曲人员努力不让听众识别出音乐的起点和终点。这种曲目可以无限重复循环，听起来好像比实际情况要长得多。

使用循环曲目主要有两个原因，包括美学和技术层面，二者是紧密相连的。要更好地理解这些原因，我们需要回溯历史，看看在行业早期阶段游戏是如何制作完成的。

以往电子游戏中的音乐循环

在行业历史上，开发者在游戏与媒介的兼容上总是会遇到问题。存储音乐、音效、图像和其他数据的可用空间是有限的。数据优化做得越好，游戏的运行就越快，需要存储的数据量就越少。在某些情况下，优化是游戏制作的必要需求。在上世纪80年代中期，当主机市场开始流行时，磁盘空间与今天的标准相比相去甚远。当时，为保证游戏可以运行，需要将游戏做得很小。

文件大小的技术限制与电子游戏中最重要的美学功能——互动行为发生冲突。在游戏中，很难确切知道玩家会在某个阶段中花费多少时间，因为进入下个阶段的时间完全取决于玩家。从理论上来说，玩家可以在某个阶段待上数小时的时间，毫无进展。

技术和美学这两个原因给游戏音乐作曲者带来了巨大的挑战。他们需要创造在磁盘上占据空间很小的音乐，同时还要保证音乐的长度灵活多变。取决于玩家与游戏互动的结果，相同的音乐应当既可以播放1分钟，也可以播放数个小时。

这也正是循环曲目被广泛采用的原因所在。文件所占空间足够小，可以存放在有限的磁盘空间内，同时不断“扩展”以符合多数互动场景。

但是，循环曲目有很大的不足之处，会影响到它们的制作和对听众产生的效果。

音乐循环的劣势

作曲者面对的挑战之一是制作玩家愿意长期听的循环曲目。无论该曲目多么美妙，一遍遍的重复也会让它变得乏味。做个简单的实验便可以验证这点：尝试听4遍你最喜欢的音乐。到了第4遍，你可能就会对音乐产生厌烦感。之前悦耳的旋律现在变得很烦人，歌曲各个阶段能够产生的惊喜也已经消失。最后，循环音乐会产生非期望结果：它让玩家感到反感，而不是吸引玩家。

循环的长度也应当细心考量。即便相同的音乐可以重复数个小时，也不意味着它应当重复这么长时间。歌曲的时长很短，长度往往只有1或2分钟。如果创造的是短歌曲，很难在其中设置足够的元素来保持长时间的趣味性。音乐对时长的依赖很重，作曲者的工作就是制作在长时间播放后依然能够为玩家所接受的音乐。创造对比是实现上述目标的方法之一。如果音乐的某个部分较为紧张，那么另一个部分就较为缓和，通过对比来维持听众长时间的兴趣。循环的内容越短，创造这种对比就越困难，听众就越有可能对音乐产生厌倦感。

对比不是唯一受循环限制影响的技术。作曲者还尝试使用其他多种作曲技术。比如，如果作曲者希望提升听众对旋律的熟悉感，但是不使用之前的那种重复方法，他们或许会采用以不同音调来播放相同的旋律。这种技术能够产生出熟悉感，但同时也增加了新意，因为它不是完全相同的重复。

提升歌曲的音调能够让听众感觉到音乐的紧张感不断增强。但是，在某些点上，歌曲会达到其循环点，回到原本的音调上。当发生这种情况时，歌曲的紧张感就会减少，从而创造出与玩家期望完全相反的感觉。

循环曲目中的内容“成长”是另一种技术折中方法。这包括随着时间推移使用更多的乐器，使音乐听起来更加“壮观”。但是，当音乐通过循环点时，它就变得“空泛”。之所以会产生这种感觉，是因为歌曲起始阶段使用的乐器数量较少。

这些只是使用音乐循环的部分劣势。在行业初期，这些不足之处似乎并没有产生很大的影响。毕竟，游戏现在能够有这种音乐化背景，多亏了当时的循环。这是个伟大的技术和美学成就。

现在，情境有所不同。游戏变得更加高端，几乎每个游戏制作的技术层面都有了显著提升。玩家想要更高质量的内容，开发者需要快速适应才能生存下去。

这些挑战及其与循环曲目的关系将在下文做进一步的分析。

游戏音乐面临的新挑战

无论现代游戏多么高端，音乐的目标依然保持不变：改善玩家的沉浸度。但是，使用循环音乐已经难以实现这个目标。这种技术仍然可以使用，但是需要将其升级才能满足市场的需求。

改良这种技术的原因有很多，这取决于游戏题材、目标用户和每款游戏想要实现的目标。因为每种情况各不相同，本文将只阐述几乎在所有情况中出现的一种挑战。

难以容忍的重复

资深玩家已经对游戏音乐已经养成了一定的期望，而且能够快速识别循环点。他们不会接受通过循环来创造出的音乐扩展“幻觉”。这种技术在8位和16位机时代能够愉悦玩家，但现在带来的却是厌恶。

现在，甚至连游戏经验较少的玩家也能识别出音乐的重复。或许并非所有人都能够准确指出音乐循环点，但是他们知道音乐是不断重复播放。最后，结果与资深玩家是相同的，音乐产生的是与预期相反的效果。

除此之外，大量廉价的数字音乐录制设备已经改变了我们消费音乐的方法。玩家（游戏邦注：包括音乐消费者）可以获取到大量的音乐内容。许多人养成了每天听数个小时音乐的习惯，这使得他们对音乐质量的需求更高。当他们玩带有重复性音乐内容的游戏时，他们往往会忽视游戏中的音乐，比如将其关闭或调低音量。

许多现代游戏还提供了用存储在设备上的音乐替换游戏音乐的选项。所以，如果音乐可以替换的话，玩家就没有理由要持续听重复性的音乐。

应当注意的是，这些结论都是基于对玩家行为的观察和与游戏行业从业人员的非正式交谈而得出的。本文的目标不是要验证这些事实的科学性，而是要讨论这个市场面临的挑战并为制作游戏的职业人士提供指导意见和灵感。

正如之前提到的那样，本文并非劝说开发者放弃使用音乐循环。在几乎所有的现代游戏中，这项技术依然至关重要，而且也成就了许多绝妙的产品，这些产品以类似以往的方法来使用循环技术。这些分析的目标是让游戏制作者明白为电子游戏创造音乐所面临的挑战以及在某些情境下使用循环可能产生的影响。最后，是否使用循环以及使用的方法等艺术决定必须与产品、目标用户、预算和预想目标保持一致。

行业的响应

AAA游戏（游戏邦注：高制作价值的游戏）制作人意识到行业背景已发生改变，所以革新了游戏音乐的制作方法。在某些游戏中，制作者采用的解决方案是制作更多音乐，从而使内容显得更为多样化。从理论上来说，更多的音乐有助于减少持续性重复带来的影响。

但是，制作更多音乐并非适用于行业内所有人的解决方案。许多独立和小型工作室需要控制游戏制作成本才能生存下去。通常情况下，对这些公司来说，他们的可用成本根本无法满足现代玩家的音乐需求。这些公司采用了以往的低成本解决方案，制作持续播放的短循环音乐。这种方法很经济，但是并非总是有效。

执行音乐的有效方法

要制作使听觉疲劳达到最小化的音乐循环，应当首先评估项目的需求。尝试弄清楚玩家在游戏的每个阶段或关卡中的平均逗留时间。我们在此将这段时间被称为“游戏玩法时间”。因为游戏的非线性本质，得知确切的游戏玩法时间是不可能的，但是根据游戏计划和分析测试结果可以得出估算值。

为避免过度音乐循环，音乐的长度应当长于或等于游戏玩法时间。在这种理想情境下，玩家就只会听到一遍音乐。但是，在低预算项目中很难实现这个目标。如果音乐长度为游戏玩法时间的一般，那么它会重复播放两次，这是可以忍受的，多数玩家不会感到厌烦。但是，如果音乐重复3到5遍，那么重复次数就过多了，就会让玩家感到厌烦。最糟糕的情况是，音乐在游戏玩法时间内重复的次数超过5次。

以下表格显示循环重复次数和对多数玩家产生结果间的关系。

如果游戏中的音乐产生情境D中的结果，那么最佳的解决方案是制作更多的音乐内容，努力向情境A靠近。

但是，如果你因为预算或时间方面的限制无法制作更多的音乐内容，那么还有些其他的解决方案。即便是AAA游戏，也可以使用这些技术作为最小化项目成本的策略。

解决方案1：倒序播放歌曲

描述：将歌曲分为不同部分。在流行音乐中，这些部分往往被称为A、B、桥段和副歌。通过些许调整，可以改变这些部分的播放顺序，产生略有不同的新歌曲。音乐分成的部分越多，组合的变化可能性就越大。

优势：在不断的游戏玩法时间中，音乐的开端不会完全相同。这可以消除玩家在开始听到音乐那一刻产生的重复感。当游戏在不同阶段使用相同的音乐时，这种方法特别有用。

劣势：当歌曲完成循环时，玩家就会意识到游戏将重复播放相同的歌曲。某些经验丰富的玩家甚至能够在循环完成前察觉到音乐各部分的播放顺序。

执行建议：作曲者需要导出不同版本的歌曲，将各部分放在不同的位置上。作曲者还可以分别导出歌曲各个部分，然后在游戏引擎中即时拼装。

解决方案2：去除旋律

描述：旋律是音乐中最容易被人记住的元素。如果你现在回想任何一首音乐，你可能想起的都是它的主旋律。旋律是很强大的音波元素，如果使用恰当的话，能够让玩家更容易记住你的游戏。但是旋律也有不足之处。如果它们重复的次数过多，就会让玩家感到厌烦。

优势：当去除旋律时，就可以增加循环的重复次数，同时不会对玩家的沉浸感产生影响。

劣势：如果旋律被去除，音乐就会失去其影响力，也就不容易被玩家记住。

执行建议：让作曲者导出两个版本的歌曲，一个带有旋律，一个没有旋律。然后交替播放这两个歌曲，努力找出旋律版本和无旋律版本这两者重复的平衡点。你还可以去除播放旋律的音轨，假如你的游戏引擎带有该功能的话。

《塞尔达传输：天空之剑》的首个地下城Skyview Temple使用的就是这种技术。当Link位于主房间时，播放的是带有旋律的音乐。当他进入较小房间时，播放的是没有主旋律的音乐。

解决方案3：关闭音乐

描述：如果使用歌曲重复，你可以在重复次数逼近之前所述情境D时将音乐关闭。

优势：没有音乐就不会让玩家产生听觉疲劳。

劣势：在游戏长时间保持安静后，音乐的忽然再次引入显得很不恰当。

执行建议：将循环播放3次（游戏邦注：即接近情境C）。在第3次重复后，让音乐逐渐淡出。在一段时间内保持游戏在无声状态下运行，然后再次加入音乐。你也可以保持游戏的无声状态，直至下个关卡或场景。

《光晕》使用了这种解决方案。当玩家在单个关卡中花费的时间过长时，游戏配乐就会消失。

解决方案4：随机播放列表

描述：这种解决方案是指以随机的顺序来播放不同歌曲，类似于激活随机播放选项的音乐播放器。

优势：玩家在游戏玩法时间内可以享受到多样化的音乐内容。此外，可以根据项目的主题制作合适的音乐。这样做的结果比简单地用多音乐播放列表来替代游戏音乐更好。

劣势：在某些情况下，音乐内容会开始重复。

执行建议：以随机顺序播放歌曲，但是不要连续两次播放同一首歌曲。

解决方案5：可扩展的尾声

描述：这是个可以添加到音乐文件末尾的短循环。这个循环重复数次之后，可以再播放完整的歌曲。

优势：效果类似于解决方案3，但是更加微妙。当你在音乐末尾制作循环时，你可以缓和玩家的听觉疲劳，使其为下次音乐循环做好准备。

劣势：如果使用过度的话，和其他音乐循环一样，可扩展尾声也会让人厌烦。

执行建议：让作曲者制作短循环（游戏邦注：30秒即可），使用与预设连接音乐相同的BPM和敲击元素。这个文件也应当足够灵活，可以连接至歌曲的起始部分。

结论

要使游戏的音乐更为有趣，尝试组合使用这些解决方案。你可以用带有可扩展尾声的歌曲（解决方案5）来制作随机列表（解决方案4）。你还可以设置带有可扩展尾声的歌曲（解决方案5）播放一段时间后去除旋律重复播放（解决方案2）、完全静默（解决方案3）或者调整音乐各部分播放次序（解决方案1）。从根本上来说，任何解决方案的组合都是可行的，它们都有着类似的结果：扩展游戏的现有音乐，在制作成本没有显著提升的前提下维持其质量。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Rethinking the audio loop in games

Marcelo Martins

Introduction

A looped composition is an intriguing sonic artifact used in the production of music for videogames. It can adapt itself to many different situations, and it has been in use as long as the videogame industry has existed. It is so popular that even today, music for videogames is still remembered by non-gamers as “tiny, repetitive pieces of music.” Nevertheless, the technology and aesthetic of games, along with consumer expectations, have changed, forcing developers to rethink the use of this technique in order to make it relevant in the modern game production environment.

This article has three objectives. The first is to talk about the history of looped compositions and find out why they were so popular and effective back then. The second objective is to identify challenges related to musical implementation in games and the impact caused by loops. The third and final goal is to suggest new ways of implementing music into games, without significantly increasing the budget or time of development.

If you are already familiar with the history of loops, and wish to know more about their application, jump to the last part of this article, “Efficient approaches to musical implementation.” Otherwise, start by reading the next paragraph.

What is a looped composition?

In the context of videogames, it is music in which the beginning and end are seamlessly connected. By doing this, the composer is trying to prevent the listener from identifying where the music starts and ends. This composition can be repeated endlessly, and it sounds like it is much lengthier than it actually is.

There are two main reasons to use looped compositions. The first is aesthetical and the second is technical, and they are closely related to each other. To better understand these reasons, we need to go back in history and remember how games were produced during the industry’s infancy.

The musical loop in yesterday’s videogames

Historically, developers always struggled to fit games into a medium. The available space to store music, sound effects, graphics and other data is finite. The better the optimization of this data, the faster the performance of the game and the lesser the amount of data it requires to be stored. In some cases, optimization is an essential requirement. In the mid-1980s, when the console market started to gain popularity, disk space was incredibly small compared to today’s standards. At that time, games had to be very small in order to be viable.

The technical limitation of the file size enters into conflict with the most important aesthetic feature of video games: interactivity. In a game, it is very difficult to know exactly how long a player spends in a given section, since it’s the player who decides when to advance. Theoretically, one can simply stay put for many hours in a stage without progressing.

These two reasons, technical and aesthetical, created a huge challenge for game music composers. They needed to create music that occupied a minimum of space on disk, and, at the same time, had flexible length. The same music file could be reproduced for one minute or for several hours, depending on the result of the player’s interaction with the game.

That’s why the solution of the looped composition was so well received. The files were small enough to fit in the limited space available for storage, and at the same time, could be “extended” to fit most interaction scenarios.

However, looped compositions have significant drawbacks that affect both their production and the effect they have on the listener.

The disadvantages of looping

One of the challenges the composer faces is making the loop pleasing to the ear for longer periods. It doesn’t matter how beautiful the composition is. After being repeated over and over, it becomes boring. Here’s a simple exercise that proves this: try listening to your favorite music four times. By the fourth repetition, you may not be able to listen to the music at all anymore. The melodies that were once pleasant and pleasing become annoying, and the surprise generated by each new section of the song is gone. In the end, looped music creates an undesired effect: it repels listeners, instead of attracting them.

The length of the loops should also be carefully considered. Even though the same music can be repeated for many hours, it doesn’t mean it should be. The songs are still quite short, usually one or two minutes in length. It is very hard to create short songs that have enough elements within them to be interesting for so long. Music is highly dependent on its duration, and the job of the composer is to make music pleasant over time. One of the ways to do this is to create contrast. If a certain part of the music is tense, the other part can be soft, creating contrast and maintaining the interest of the listener for longer periods of time. The smaller the loop, the more difficult it is to create this contrast and the more likely the listener will grow bored of the music.

Contrast is not the only characteristic affected by the limitations of looping. Several compositional techniques also need to be adapted. For instance, if the composer wishes to enhance the familiarity of a melody without repeating it exactly as before, they may want to play the melody in a different key. This technique creates a feeling of familiarity, but at the same time adds novelty, since it’s not an identical repetition.

Raising the key of a song gives the impression that the music is growing in intensity. But, at some point the song will reach its looping point and return to its original key. When this happens, the song sounds less intense, thus creating the exact opposite feeling desired when the composer gradually raised the key.

Another technique compromised by looped compositions is the “growth” of the arrangements. This consists of using more instruments over time, making the music sound more “grandiose”. However, when the music passes through the looping point, it becomes “empty” and “thin”. This happens because there are fewer instruments playing at the beginning of the song, before the arrangements started to “grow”.

These are just a few examples of the disadvantages of using musical loops. At the beginning of this industry, these weaknesses didn’t seem to have a huge impact. After all, games could now have a musical background, thanks to the loop. This was a great technical and aesthetical achievement.

The situation is different now. Games are getting more sophisticated and almost every technical aspect of game production has improved significantly. Gamers are demanding higher-quality content and developers need to adapt quickly in order to survive.

These challenges and their relationship with looped compositions are going to be further analyzed in the next paragraphs.

New challenges for game music

No matter how sophisticated modern games are, the goal of music still remains the same: promote immersion for the player. Nevertheless, it is hard to achieve this objective using short-length looped musical artifacts that repeat themselves ad infinitum. This wonderful technique is still going to be used, but it needs to be upgraded in order to fulfill the demands of the market.

There are several reasons that justify the revision of this technique, and they vary depending on the game genre, target audience, and the objective each game is aiming to achieve. Since every situation requires a different analysis, this article will focus on one challenge that permeates almost all situations.

The intolerance to repetition

Experienced gamers have developed their musical perception and are perfectly capable of quickly identifying the looping point. They don’t accept the “illusion” of musical extension through loops. The use of this technique, once pleasant in the 8 and 16-bit generation, now causes repulsion instead of immersion.

Even players with less experience are now capable of identifying the musical repetition. Perhaps not all of them will be able to pinpoint the exact location of the looping point, but they know the music is repeating. In the end, the result is similar, and the music becomes undesirable.

Besides that, the wide range of affordable digital music playback devices have changed the way we consume music. Players (and music consumers) have a huge arsenal of music content available in their pockets. Many are accustomed to listening to hours of diverse music throughout the day and this has made them even more demanding. When they play games with repetitive musical content, their tendency is to simply ignore the music by turning it off or lowering the volume.

Many modern games also provide the option to replace the game’s music with the music stored on the device. So there is no good reason for a player to continue listening to repetitive music if it can easily be replaced.

It is important to note that these statements are made based on observations of players behavior, as well as informal conversations with other people working in this industry. The aim of this article is not to be a scientific basis for proof of facts, but a document that discusses the challenges of this market and serves as guidance and inspiration for professionals that produce games.

As previously mentioned, this article is not attempting to discourage the use of the loop. This technique is still crucial in almost every game, and there are many examples of wonderful products (some that are even references for musical production in the industry), which continue to use loops in a way similar to previous generations. The purpose of this analysis is to alert game producers to the challenges of creating music for video games and the impact that the use of the loop may have in some situations. In the end, the artistic decision whether to use the loops or not, as well as the implementation approach, must be aligned with the product, the target audience, the budget and the intended goal.

The response of the industry

Producers of games referred to as “AAA” (games with high production values) are aware of this context change and have updated their approach to the musical production of their games. The solution, in some cases, is to produce more music, thus making the content more diverse. Theoretically, more music would help reduce the undesirable effects of continuous repetition.

However, producing more music is not a viable solution for everyone in the industry. There are a lot of independent and small businesses that need to produce low-budget games in order to survive. Often, the available budget is not adequate to satisfy the musical demands of the modern gamer. Companies are stuck with the low-cost solutions of the past, creating short loops that are played continuously during most of the gameplay experience. This approach is economical, but not always effective.

Efficient approaches to musical implementation

In order to create musical loops that minimize the probability of listening fatigue, it is first necessary to assess the needs of the project. Try to find out how much time, on average, players spend during each session, stage or segment of your game. In this article, this will be referred as Gameplay Time. Given the non-linear nature of the games, it is impossible to know exactly how long players spend in Gameplay Time, but it is crucial to have an estimate based on the game planning and, more importantly, the analysis of test results using various players’ profiles.

To avoid excessive musical repetition, the length of the music should be greater or equal to the Gameplay Time. In this ideal scenario, the player would only listen to original music. However, it is hard to achieve this goal in low-budget projects. If the music length is equal to 50% of the Gameplay Time, it will be repeated twice, which is tolerable and does not bother most gamers. But if the music starts to repeat 3-5 times, it can become too repetitive, repelling the player. The worst case scenario is when the music is repeated more than five times during the Gameplay Time.

The table below shows the relationship between the number of repetitions of the loop and the sensorial results for most players.

If the music in your game results in scenario D, the best solution is to create more musical content and try to approach scenario A.

However, if you can’t produce more musical content, due to budgetary or scheduling constraints, there are some workarounds. It is important to notice that even AAA games are using these techniques as a strategy to minimize the costs of the project. All the solutions cited below are related to the concept of dynamic arrangements (horizontal and vertical).

Solution 1 – Inversion of the parts of the song

Description: Songs are divided into different parts which are presented one after another over time. In popular music, these parts are often called A, B, bridge and chorus. By making some adjustments, it is possible to change the order of the parts, making a slightly different, new version of the song. The more parts the music has, the greater the possibility of combinations.

Advantages: The music doesn’t start exactly the same way during different Gameplay Times. This mitigates the feeling of repetition at the moment the player starts to listen to the music. It is especially useful when the same music is used in different sections.

Disadvantages: Once the song completes its loop cycle, the player realizes that the same song is being reproduced. Depending on the listener’s experience, they may even perceive the order replacement before the completion of the cycle.

Suggestion for implementation: The composer needs to export different versions of the song, with parts in different places. It is also possible to export each part separately and then assemble them in real time within the game engine.

Solution 2 – Mute the melody

Description: The melody is the most memorable element in music. If you think of any music right now, you will probably remember the main melody. Melodies are powerful sonic artifacts that, if used properly, can make your game even more memorable. But melodies have a drawback. If they are repeated too much, they can repel the listener.

Advantages: It is possible to increase the number of loop repetitions when the melody is muted, without harming the player’s immersion.

Disadvantages: If the melody is often excluded, the music can lose its impact and fail to be memorable.

Suggestion for implementation: Ask your composer to export two versions of the song, one with melody and one without. Then play them alternately, trying to carefully find the balance for the repetition of both melodic and non-melodic versions. You can also mute the tracks that play the melody, if your game engine has this feature.

This technique is used in the Skyview Temple, the first dungeon of Zelda: Skyward Sword. When Link is in the main room, a melodic version of the theme is played. When entering smaller rooms, the main melody is muted.

Solution 3 – Implementation of silence

Description: An aggressive version of solution 2. By repeating the song a number of times, you can simply turn it off when the number of repetitions approaches the aforementioned scenario D.

Advantages: As there is no music, the player won’t experience the undesirable effects of listening fatigue.

Disadvantages: If the game is silent for a long time, abrupt reintroduction of the music can be jarring.

Suggestion for implementation: Play the loop 3 times (approaching scenario C). After the third repetition, let the music subtly disappear. Leave the game in silence for a while and repeat the operation. You can also mute the music until the end of the next stage/segment.

This solution was used in Halo. When the player spent too much time in one stage, the music simply disappeared.

Solution 4 – Random playlist

Description: This solution proposes the use of different songs played in random order, similar to a music player with the shuffle option enabled.

Advantages: The player has a greater diversity of music content available during Gameplay Time. Furthermore, the music can be tailor-made to match the theme of the project. The result is better than simply replacing the game’s original music with the playlist.

Disadvantages: At some point, the musical content will start to repeat.

Suggestion for implementation: Play the songs in random order, but don’t repeat the same file twice in a row.

Solution 5 – Expandable end

Description: This is a short loop that can be added at the end of the music file. After a few repetitions of this loop, the full song can be reintroduced.

Advantage: The effect is similar to solution 3, but more subtle. When you create a loop at the end, you can mitigate the effects of listening fatigue and prepare the player for the next musical repetition.

Disadvantages: The expandable end can become annoying if overused, just like any other musical loop.

Suggestion for implementation: Ask your composer to create a short loop (30 seconds is more than enough), using the same BPM and percussive elements of the music it will be connected to. This file should be flexible enough to connect with the beginning of the song.

Conclusion

To make your music production even more interesting, try to combine these solutions. You can create a random list (solution 4) with songs with expandable ends (solution 5). You can also use songs with expandable ends (solution 5) that may repeat without melodies after a while (solution 2) and fall into silence (solution 3), returning with parts reversed (solution 1). Basically, any solution combination can be made and they all have a similar result: the expansion of the existing musical production of your game, maintaining the quality without significant increase to production costs. (Source: Gamasutra)