jnWake ⚖️ Posted August 16 Posted August 16 For MAGWest 2025, DoD held Wii U Wiik, where the goal was to cover a theme from a game original to the Wii U. Among those was indie darling Shovel Knight and its amazing soundtrack so I took the chance to cover something from it. Since the deadline was tight I decided to pick the theme "The Starlit Wilds", a beautiful tune that plays on scenes where Shovel Knight dreams about rescuing his love interest Shield Knight. There's melancholy and hopefulness on those scenes so I kinda tried to capture both things on my take. As a silly story, the chord progression from the intro was born by accident as I was toying around with different chords for the main melody. I was playing a AMaj7 on my left hand but my ring finger slipped from C# to C and that accidentally created a beautiful major to minor progression that inspired the tone of the cover! This track features the great Emunator! I've been wanting us to collab again on one of my tracks after "Ambience of the Forest" and I'm glad we got to do it again, even if it was rushed. I mentioned earlier that the Wii U Wiik deadline was tight but real life made it even tighter for me, as I began the track a little less than 2 days before deadline. I sent Emu a WIP on wednesday night and during thursday he sent me stems for some instruments (piano, bass, pads) and SFX ideas, plus cool snare and kick samples. Unlike our work on "Ambience", I handled the mix this time, but I'll be sure to try and get him to mix for me again in the future! Quick breakdown: 0:00-0:36: The aforementioned chord progression (and some other chords) acts as backing of the only melody from the source. There's campfire SFX and other sounds as ornaments. The idea is that Shovel Knight is starting to fall asleep. 0:36-1:17: B section from the original (starts around 0:24) plays here on piano. Shield Knight is falling! 1:18-1:54: We move to a hopeful section, the chord progression changes to a brighter one and we get an upbeat rhytm (bless those 80s snares). Shovel Knight feels he can rescue Shield Knight now! The same elements from the source are covered again, with faster tempo. 1:54-end: It was all a dream though... First, piano plays the arpeggios that play at 0:34 on the source and then we get a repeat of the intro, campfire effects return as Shovel Knight wakes up and the adventure continues. Hope you enjoy! Games & Sources
prophetik music ⚖️ Posted August 22 Posted August 22 opens with some filtered pads and fire sfx. the keys that come in have a beautiful tone - just the right amount of twinkle. the sweepy pads behind it alongside the buzzy bass and chippy arps are just so good - this opening is spectacularly engaging and reminiscent of starlight and the heavens. there's a great autopanned synth that comes in at 0:37 which is imo a touch loud, but i love the tone and what it's doing. a beat comes in at 1:18 and we get a huge genre shift. what a surprise! the accelerando into this is a neat idea too, as a method to help feel like it's being kickstarted. there's some fun rhythmic elements, a filter squelch transition, and we're back to the fire sfx as the Knight wakes up. a bit of a recap and then it's done. i love the suspended chord right before the end, and then adding in the color tones to help make it feel not quite settled at the end (that b2 is delicious). short and sweet, this is another winner from two superb musicians. the story is clear and the inspiration that was taken from it results in a really unique work. excellent job. YES
paradiddlesjosh ⚖️ Posted August 25 Posted August 25 Damn, y'all were really cookin' with this one! Short and sweet arrangement, clean production, tells a clear story. (Anyone else have a hankering for s'mores after hearing this one? No, just me? More for me, then!) Get outta here! YES
Liontamer ⚖️ Posted August 28 Posted August 28 Interesting to get beat-driven more than halfway through; ah, it's just a crescendo of sorts, I got ya. Yeah, this is nice. Lovely theme variation by virt, and y'all did well in fleshing it out further as well as liberally sprinkling in some chiptune-esque spices to stay true to the style of the source. :-) YES
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