Music the plutonia way

Just curious, since many people are very enthusiastic about the significance of music, is anyone off put by using original doom and doom 2 music in a megawad or short episode even if the music is shuffled? Are we at a point where reusing dooms music in pwads is pretty much unacceptable in a higher profile doom 2 mapset?

I hate stock midi.

Default midi -> Jimmy's Jukebox

When I was making a Plutonia style mapset I ended up using 75% iwad midis, nothing else seemed fitting enough. Doom music is the best Doom music, other midis are too arcadey\melancholic\complex\etc. So I think at least for very iwad-like mapsets using stock music is completely fine and justified.

Nah, the stock music is teh great. I actually like it when authors shuffle it around in their own funny ways.

Plutonia MIDI Pack was a lot of fun and the contributions were very awesome, but it wasn't really meant to outclass Bobby Prince. :P

I use to go to MIDImelody and put rock/metal songs into levels, sometimes even MIDIs from other wads.

I don't mind at all when maps/mapsets reshuffle the stock music, assuming the tracks chosen make some sort of sense--it's not the novelty (or lack thereof) of a soundtrack that's important to me, but rather how well the soundtrack is chosen.

By the same token, it's actually sort of a shame that a lot of the community's non-stock music doesn't get reused much, I think. Certain composers (e.g. Klem) and some excerpts from other games (Duke3D, RoTT, Descent, etc.) see a healthy amount of use, but the number of cool tracks that only ever show up in one map is 'significant', to say the least.

I'm doing this with the PWAD I'm working on at the moment. Initially it was for placeholder music but I kind of like it now. Unless I get a tempting offer from a musician to make a brand new soundtrack I might leave it as it is.

no, not really. if it's just the original soundtrack from the game right-through, i have music-packs that replace them with remixes anyway. if the tracks are replaced somehow, and it's stock music, it's cool. i don't have anything against Bobby Prince's work at all, though it is a bit tame, volume-wise, when you put in an original Doom MIDI alongside a track some other musician made. that's probably the only issue i have with them.

Ribbiks said:

I hate stock midi.

Really? Why? Even tracks like D_E1M2, D_STALKS, and D_THE_DA, which pretty much work with any standard doom map? I like to see songs used in unexpected contexts, like how D_E1M8 a scary boss map song was used on the first map of the flesh consumed. Tracks like D_E1M3, D_E2M7, D_BETWEE and D_DEAD get pretty much zero usage, and as such I don't associate those tracks with anything other than their respective IWAD maps. They are not necessarily bad tracks, and I would like to see some good maps give these tracks justice.

also, what do you think about the alien vendetta way? Mostly stock Doom and Doom 2 music with a few external source tracks slipped in? Personally I prefer the Plutonia way or entirely original tracks from start to finish, not a mix of both.

i don't see a problem with mixed songs in a WAD. in fact, i find it rather bizarre that you can take, say, a Heretic MIDI, and shove it into a Doom mod, and it won't sound out of place, generally. but if you take a Doom MIDI, and slap it into Heretic, it would feel pretty confusing and unfitting. why is that? how come Doom can have tracks from so many games, and make them fit pretty much all the time?

40oz said:

Really? Why?

a combination of overexposure and extreme distaste for anything composed in a 12-bar-blues-esque way, those key changes sound like a bad joke to me at this point.

D1 has some great atmospheric tracks, I'm just sick of hearing them.

I've heard the music too much to want to hear it in other's works. I can hear it all the time playing actual Doom 1/2 no problem, but it annoys me when its still there in our levels

40oz said:

like how D_E1M8 a scary boss map song...

Stop right there. D_E1M8 is not scary. That song is sad and depressing. D_EM28 is scary.

The way TNT mixed doom2 midi's with their own i thought was pretty cool. At map03, i distinctly remember being like "awww, only 2 new midis" then i was surprised to hear many more.

Wagi said:

Stop right there. D_E1M8 is not scary. That song is sad and depressing. D_EM28 is scary.

i had a feeling wrong, my bad.

I think Plutonia is perfect with it's stock music. TNT had some great custom tracks that really fitted there but Plutonia is good enough with the regular tracks, at least i didn't find anything wrong with it on my playthrough of Plutonia. Certanly better than some shitty custom midis. Maybe some good custom midis would have been even better, who knows.

Oddly, I don't mind if a PWAD uses IWAD midis... from Doom the First. Doom 2's stock tracks make me want to replace them with something else -- Jimmytracks come to the rescue, usually. :P

I think I'm just sick of Doom 2's soundtrack, but not Doom 1's. I'm a weird.

Both Doom and Doom had some very nice midis, and I dont mind them being used in todays maps at all. On the contrary, I cant stand it when the iwad-midis I dont like are being used. Ugh. Kill.

I'm one of those who liked Plutonia with its stock Doom and Doom 2 music, but if there were the possibilities of using music from other games, I always believed either Heretic or Duke Nukem 3D would make good alternatives. Both games have music fitting to the gameplay and mood of Plutonia just like its music set.

As long as its not the default midi for that specific mapslot, then it doesn't bother me.

I prefer to hear "new" music used instead of the stock midis- especially when we've all heard the same music over and OVER AND OVER

Wagi said:

D_EM28 is scary.

I'd like to hear D_EM28 once in a lifetime, just to get real scared. :D

PSTrooper said:

As long as its not the default midi for that specific mapslot, then it doesn't bother me.

Tell. Me. About. It.
D_AMPIE is sure the worst crime committed against community and the only reason I could accept its existence was because it was made for a certain joke map. Then it doesn't get overwritten in neither Final Doom wads, and not even in HR. Nonsense.

darkreaver said:

Both Doom and Doom had some very nice midis, and I dont mind them being used in todays maps at all. On the contrary, I cant stand it when the iwad-midis I dont like are being used. Ugh. Kill.

This is how I feel too. Lots of good songs in Doom 1, and a few in Doom 2 that aren't too overplayed. But there are also a bunch I'm completely sick of.

With OPL playback, I actually like "music the Plutonia way", i.e. using Doom 1 music with the Doom 2 GENMIDI definitions. It changes them just a bit and keeps them interesting.

the only song i'm really sick of hearing in Doom wads is the one from Heretic's E1M9. ugh.

It's not the midis I mind as much as reusing of them, and any other overused sources (rott... bleh).

Appropriate use of iwad midis is a-okay by me. Bonus points if it's a midi that I'm particularly fond of (Map18 being appropriately used is just awesome). I find myself mapping with a track in mind as I map, oddly enough. Usually I wind up choosing something different, but plugging in an iwad track as a placeholder really helps with direction. So basically I'm cool with their usage, no matter how severe it may be.

Doomhuntress said:

the only song i'm really sick of hearing in Doom wads is the one from Heretic's E1M9. ugh.

The other thing. It's great for a short showdown-map, but if it's used in a level that takes longer to finish than the average bear (i.e. CC3 MAP14), one just loses all will to live.

Cell said:

The other thing. It's great for a short showdown-map, but if it's used in a level that takes longer to finish than the average bear (i.e. CC3 MAP14), one just loses all will to live.

that's the example that came to mind immediately for me. though, i'm not really sure if there are any long maps using that song other than that level, aside from Alien Vendetta's map32.