Music has been around for centuries. Across the globe, as an integral part of traditions, cultures, and humans as a whole, could we ever have thought it would impact us while playing online games? And impact us to such an extent that it can quickly alter a mood, significantly implement a new way of thinking, and most of all, create a hyper-realistic gaming environment. This is the new world we are living in and music is leading the way.

Online games themselves have undoubtedly become increasingly complex, technology has taken the graphics and soundtrack worlds to another level, and together they are making the online gaming experience highly sought-after.

Players from around the world are taking to the world of virtual reality with a vigor that can bring out a competitive nature we may not have known we had, or that our friends had with whom we are competing.

Why is music so powerful?

For the most part, we don’t realize the music soundtrack or simply write it off to mere backing track notes, but an online gaming soundtrack and music can be composed using a few humble beats and notes, to a full-blown orchestra that makes you feel like you have stepped into another world. How powerfully influential, and it doesn’t stop there.

When you have a music backing track collaborating with an already popular online game it does the very best of what the marketing and advertising industries try so hard to achieve, attract new players. And, it does effortlessly. Music in a game is the perfect pacemaker, it sets the tone for what is happening, and what is about to happen, and can encourage current players to strive to do their best. Just with a few well-played music notes.

If you have ever played an online game with your friends you will know all too well how adrenalin can kick in the moment the music is introduced. Finding some of the best 2 player games on the market will allow you to showcase your driving or military skills to your opponents. Your friends will be energized by your adrenalin, and suddenly everybody is giving their all to be victorious in the game. The music intensifies, the tempo increases, and with some of the best sound-producing headphones on the market, you can be fully immersed in the scene and get lost in the battle.

Music offers a cinematic experience that slows and quickens with the task, helps to set the tone of the scene, and ultimately creates a rollercoaster of dramatic effects. Video game music is designed and created in such a way that it provides an ambiance while you are in a hyper-focus state of concentration intending to complete the task, it offers a subtle somewhat ‘white noise’ in the background to maintain engagement but not so much that it distracts you away from the game itself.

The genre of online gaming music

There are a few elements to understand about listening to music while playing online games, other than that they rev us up and get our blood flowing, but they can also do the opposite. These simplistic tones are not only subconsciously powerful, but influential in how we play the game, and they must compose of;

•Curated pieces of music are designed to act as a base, to repeat indefinitely, without the use of introduction or fading out.

•Certain melody’s also play over in-game sounds and more often than not have zero lyrics.

•Polyphony limitations; A few years back only a handful of notes and sounds were allowed to limit complexity, but still required it to sound as if more instruments were being used. These days there is more creative freedom and composers have opportunities to give it their all so the player can feel like the music was created just for them to compete and play in that particular game.

The soundtracks are a large collaboration of feature instruments, but then also chilled music. There is a fine balance to getting it right. The atmosphere needs to be calming to set a tranquil mood when players are seeking, hiding, or hunting, and then the next minute be able to burst into a full-blown opera house-inspired orchestra that sounds like it has 100 participants as you dive out of the helicopter to the ground on hostile enemy territory. It is no wonder online gamers are glued to their screens.

The final beat

At the end of it all music is effectively used in the online gaming industry and beyond all to make sure players feel a certain way at the appropriate time. Music offers everything from immersive experiences, theming, and tone, and is ultimately necessary just like good gameplay and graphics to ensure the player has the best gaming experience.