The second GD.net Composition Contest is now open! Basic Details: The contest starts today (Monday Sept 7th) and will end on Wednesday Oct 7th at 10PM Mountain time. Each contestant will score music (style of their choice) to the demo level of Bloody Massacre. Feel free to be as creative as you'd like! The Game: This year I focused on getting a game for composers to support since this is a game development site! :P Grzegorz from http://www.esenthel.com/ was kind enough to lend us his tech demo level for this contest. You can watch a video and view screens of this level at http://www.esenthel.com/projects/bloody_massacre/en/. You can download the game demo here: http://www.esenthel.com/download/Demo/Bloody%20Massacre%20Audio%20Contest.rar Once you download the rar then follow these basic instructions: 1. Placing Custom Music: -Create custom folders in "Bloody Massacre\Music\" -In custom folders place "idle" and/or "combat" (wav or ogg extension) -The tracks must be named "idle" or "combat" for them to playback in game! -There are 2 test folders there so you can see how does it look 2. switching in game music: -Use [ ] keys for previous/next track Note: You do not have to use multiple tracks but Grzegorz and I did what we could to make it somewhat dynamic with the time limitations we had in place. 3. For a list of in-game controls hold ESC. If you get this error: This application has failed to start because d3dx9_40.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem. then download: -the latest DirectX installed http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2DA43D38-DB71-4C1B-BC6A-9B6652CD92A3&displaylang=en -as well as physx system software installed http://www.nvidia.com/object/physx_system_software.html -and also here are links to video card drivers if they're out of date: ATI - http://ati.amd.com/support/driver.html NVIDIA - http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us This should fix that error. If you get other errors, contact me and I'll work with the creator/programmer to ensure you can get this up and running. The Prizes: This year we'll have first, second and third place winners. First place will get $100, second place gets $75 and third place gets $50. Each winner will be able to select a book, CD or other type of resource that deals with audio, music, sound, production or game development of their choice. The goal behind the contest is to give new(er) composers the chance to have their material heard by industry pros, gain some exposure and get another chance to support a game. I'll be putting together a suggestion prize list as the contest moves forward but it is more than okay to pick something not on the prize suggestion list just as long as it deals with one of the subjects listed above. (In other words you can't pick Baywatch: The Complete Series on DVD as a prize!) Let's make it related to audio or music or game design. Judges: Aaron Marks: On Your Mark Music Productions Music had always been a part of Aaron Marks’ life, but it wasn’t until 1995, when his overgrown hobby became On Your Mark Music Productions, that he began selling it to the world. He began with the local radio and television scene, composing jingles and scoring Public Service Announcements with eventual sights on Hollywood. Instead, he fell headfirst into the games industry, where his sound design and voice over talents also exploded, leading him to music, sound design and voice over credits on over 100 game titles for the Xbox and Xbox 360, PlayStation 2 and 3, Wii, Dreamcast, CD/DVD-ROM, touch screen arcade games, Class II video slot machines, Class III mechanical and video slot machines, coin op/arcade, online and terminal based video casino games and numerous multimedia projects. Aaron is the author of the books 'The Complete Guide to Game Audio' and 'Game Audio Development' and has written for Game Developer Magazine, Gamasutra.com, Music4Games.net and for the Society of Composers and Lyricists. He is currently teaching at the Art Institute of California, San Diego, has authored an accredited college course on Game Audio for the Art Institute Online, is a member of the AES Technical Committee for Games, was on the launch committee for the Game Audio Network Guild (GANG) and is the owner of On Your Mark Music Productions, where he continues his pursuit of the ultimate soundscape, creating music and sound for a multitude of projects. Will Loconto: Will Loconto Music and Sound : Games, Television, and Film With more than 20 years in the recording and videogame industries, Will Loconto brings a comprehensive body of knowledge, experience, and creativity to his work. He was lead vocalist/songwriter for T42 (Columbia Records) and spent several years with Information Society (Reprise Records). In the game industry, Will has served as Audio Director at two companies (ION Storm and Third Law Interactive). He has been a featured lecturer at Southern Methodist University’s Guildhall, the premiere program for game development. Will is a member of NARAS, ASCAP, the International Game Developers Association, and the Game Audio Network Guild. Chris Rickwood: Music for Interactive Media Chris Rickwood is an award winning composer known for creating dramatic musical scores for video games, film, and television. Rickwood’s work can be heard worldwide on a variety of mediums for clients such as Activision, THQ, Microsoft, Cartoon Network, Capcom, and Nintendo. He began his career by composing intense orchestral cues for several game titles including Evil Dead: Hail to the King, BloodRayne, and Maximo: Ghosts to Glory. Since then, Rickwood has composed over 20 scores for Cartoon Network New Media, contributed music and sound for several PC games including Law and Order: Criminal Intent, Civil War: Bull Run, and The Apprentice: Los Angeles, and experimented with other gaming mediums such as mobile phones and video poker machines. Stephen Harwood Jr: Composer Stephen is a talented composer who has worked on Brothers In Arms: Road To Hill 30 (Gearbox/Ubisoft), Brothers In Arms: D-Day (Gearbox, Shanghai Ubi/Ubisoft) ,Evo (Canned Bananas), Ruboku Deluxe (Canned Bananas) and many other titles. His film credits include Sidekick and The Ring. Sam Hulick: Composer Sam Hulick is an award-winning composer for video games and interactive media. He began his journey into the musical realm over twelve years ago, starting out with a simple Ensoniq VFX-SD workstation, writing mostly what would now be considered new age. Years later, he changed direction and became more involved with writing orchestral works. Sam has been active in the industry, working on independent productions as well as AAA titles such as BioWare's critically acclaimed Mass Effect. He continues to hone his skills, always striving to improve, bringing high quality, evocative soundtracks to today's cutting edge entertainment media. The Rules: The rules are pretty basic: 1) All music in the score must be written by you and only you. 2) Only one submission per person. Any one can take part in the contest! The contest is free to join. 3) All submissions must be received by 10 PM Mountain time on Oct. 7th 2009. 4) All submissions must in OGG or WAV format as these are the only two formats that will work with the game engine. 5) Please include your screen name as well as your real name when submitting your materials. This helps me keep everything straight and in order. Note: Winners will have to provide GD.net with their shipping address and real name to receive prizes. Please Note: The preferred method of delivery is posting file on an FTP site and then giving me the link. Once I get all of the submissions, I'll relay them to each of the judges and the judging process will begin. Last year it took about 3-4 weeks to get all of the results in from the judges. If you cannot upload to an FTP site, then contact me privately so we can attempt to make other arrangements. Last year everyone seemed to be able to do this without any problems. You only need to send me the song files themselves. Another method for sending the file is http:// www.yousendit.com which is free for files under 100MB. It costs money for files larger than that (up to 2GB) but also has a two week free trial. If you use this method, you must have my email address which I can give out privately. Fair warning: Do not contact me the night submissions are due in a late attempt to work something out. You have a full month to prepare, so I suggest you use your time wisely. The last thing I want to do is have several people spamming me last minute while they try to figure out how to get this file to me. Make arrangements now and save yourself the headache! :) How You'll Be Judged: Judging will be based on how creative and supportive the music is to the game. Instrumentation, orchestration, style, pace is all up to you! You have complete freedom, just make sure whatever you write supports and enhances the playing experience. That about does it for now. I'll be looking over this post and polishing it up more as time allows. If you have any questions, concerns or suggestions please feel free to contact me! Start writing!!! Thanks, Nathan [Edited by - nsmadsen on December 26, 2009 10:16:48 AM]

Good question! Let me check with the programmer on this.

do we have to create two tracks ? idle and combat ? or just one track with similar variation ?

I put a note in the post saying it is completely optional. You can create two completely different tracks, one track with variations for combat and idle or just one track alone for the entire game experience.

Thanks,

Nate

Very cool Nathan!

Good you and Grzegorz both finally made it. :)


Cheers,
Michal

Andrew Poole Todd- thanks I'll forward this on to the programmer for his advice.

dmartineau- I haven't heard back from the programmer regarding your question.

Thanks!

Nate

From the programmer:

Quote:No, the game will not run on Mac, only PC Windows.

As for the error "engine.pak", either a person didnt have enough room on the hard disk, or moved/copied some files from the archive I have provided for you. You need to extract it, dont copy or move anything, but just run it.

So for the strict Mac users I'd suggest writing music to the youtube video and screens provided. While not ideal this can give you a good idea of the game's vibe.

I hope that helps! If anyone else is having issues or problems, please feel free to contact me! I hope the writing is going well.

Thanks,

Nate