# LEITMOTIF, SOUND DESIGN, HORIZONTAL RE-SEQUENCING, AND VERTICAL RE-ORCHESTRATION

## An Introduction to Narrative in Music

## UNIÃO BRASILEIRA DE FACULDADES – UNIBF (Brazilian Union of Colleges)

DIGITAL GAMES DEVELOPMENT

### GUILHERME YURI BERMÊO COSTA

BRASÍLIA, 2023

Capstone project (Trabalho de Conclusão de Curso) submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the certificate of the Lato Sensu Specialization Course in Digital Games Development at União Brasileira de Faculdades (UNIBF).

Advisor: Prof. Carlos Hoegen

## ABSTRACT

The main theme of this study is to discuss the importance and evolution of narrative elements in music and how these elements have influenced digital games. Through varied research ranging from the study of the leitmotif in music as a narrative device — from Scheherazade (1888) to contemporary popular-music works — through the application of sound design techniques in the history of cinema and in the film Dune (2021), it culminates in the emergence of tools that have enabled real-time re-sequencing and re-orchestration in digital games through player inputs and the states of the game and its avatars. Lastly, it offers an exploration of contemporary digital games that have used this whole set of techniques for better narrative construction and/or player immersion, such as The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017) and Journey (2012).

Keywords: Leitmotif; Vertical Re-orchestration; Horizontal Re-sequencing; Narrative; Soundtrack; Scheherazade.

## TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. [INTRODUCTION](#1-introduction)
2. [DEVELOPMENT](#2-development)
    1. [NARRATIVE IN MUSIC](#21-narrative-in-music)
    2. [FILM SOUNDTRACKS](#22-film-soundtracks)
    3. [ADAPTIVE MUSIC IN DIGITAL GAMES](#23-adaptive-music-in-digital-games)
3. [LITERATURE REVIEW](#3-literature-review)
4. [METHODOLOGY](#4-methodology)
5. [ANALYSIS OF RESULTS](#5-analysis-of-results)
6. [FINAL CONSIDERATIONS](#6-final-considerations)
7. [REFERENCES](#7-references)

## LIST OF FIGURES

- [Figure 1: The themes of the Sultan and Scheherazade, respectively.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig1.jpg)
- [Figure 2: Scheherazade's theme, second movement, bars 1 to 4.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig2.jpg)
- [Figure 3: Scheherazade's theme, fourth movement, bars 8 to 9.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig3.jpg)
- [Figure 4: Scheherazade's theme, fourth movement, bars 659 to 665.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig4.jpg)
- [Figure 5: The six cover artworks of Everywhere at the End of Time.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig5.jpg)
- [Figure 6: Comparison between the Star Wars theme and Siegfried's theme.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig6.jpg)
- [Figure 7: The FMOD interface, in which six musical segments can be seen that may play in a sequence defined via a parameter, dynamically and in real time. In the highlighted segment, transition 10 is playing between sections 4 and 0.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig7.jpg)
- [Figure 8: The original "Field (Day)" theme, and part of the fragmentations used as the game's soundtrack.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig8.jpg)
- [Figure 9: A diagram explaining the vertical layering in the music of Journey's second scene.](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig9.jpg)

## 1. INTRODUCTION

Music is a fundamental part of contemporary entertainment media, as it can help create an atmosphere, evoke emotions, and reinforce the narrative of a story. In film, for instance, the soundtrack can help build tension, suspense, or emotion, while in video games it can help immerse the player in the gameplay experience. In addition, the soundtrack can also be used to identify the brand of a series or film, creating an immediate association for the viewer. The soundtrack can likewise be used to help sell the product, as is the case with film songs that are released as singles and become popular. With the growth of streaming and the ease of access to music, the soundtrack has become increasingly important to the entertainment industry, helping to forge an emotional connection with viewers and listeners, and in doing so it borrows techniques already explored that date back to classical music. As humans, we are constantly experiencing sound. Sound is all around us, and our brain is very good at listening unconsciously and deciding whether or not we should pay attention (MOORE, MARISH, and DUSABLON, 2019); it is by taking advantage of this trait that sound designers and composers of adaptive scores manipulate the player's emotions.

Among the cinematic milestones important to this research, 1939 stands out as the year that marked the intersection of Design and Cinema. The release of what would become a major success, Gone with the Wind, directed by Victor Fleming, marks the moment when a production designer[^1] was credited for the first time, in recognition of the immense contribution William Cameron Menzies made to the film. The production designer can be described as "the person responsible for interpreting the screenplay and the director's vision for the film (...) visual metaphors, colour palette, locations. They also coordinate the costume designers, make-up artists, and hairstylists (...)" (LOBRUTTO, 2002) — that is, a conceptual designer of the film's visual imagery, responsible for the entire process: pre-production, production, and post-production[^2].

The professional equivalent to the production designer for sound — the sound designer — was only credited on a major film production forty years later, in Apocalypse Now (1979), when director Francis Ford Coppola, recognizing Walter Murch's immense contribution to the film, described the sound designer as "the sound editor responsible for every aspect of a film's audio, from dialogue and sound-effects recording to any re-recording of the final track" (BARDINI, 2018). Neil Hillman and Sandra Pauletto delve deeper into the term coined by Murch and state that "the sound designer has the skill needed to bridge the gap that exists between the emotions the director wishes to evoke and the listening modes used by the audience to perceive those emotions through the ear" (PAULETTO and HILLMAN, 2014).

Just as film productions involve a variety of professional roles in creating a final product, the same is true for the digital games industry. Within the field of sound study — especially when it comes to AAA[^3] projects — there can be many kinds of professionals, such as composers, musicians, voice actors, audio programmers, audio engineers, directors, and sound designers. The focus of this work will be on the creation and manipulation of sounds (for audiovisual productions, including films, digital games, and television) and on musical motifs, and on how such techniques can be used to create a more engaging and immersive narrative in music, whether static or dynamic as in digital games.

## 2. DEVELOPMENT

### 2.1 NARRATIVE IN MUSIC

When it comes to narrative in music, we commonly associate the subject with musicals and opera, since the relationship between theatre and music has likely existed for as long as theatre itself. Greek comedies and tragedies dating from the fifth to the third century BC are known to have incorporated choreographed movement and music, while in the Middle Ages[^4] entertainment was provided by itinerant performers and consisted of a mixture of music and physical comedy, whereas religious dramas and biblical plays relied on song and melodic poetry (DORLING KINDERSLEY LIMITED DK, 2015). After being forced into exile in 1849, the composer Richard Wagner began writing a series of essays on a plan to reform opera, drawing on the concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk[^5]. The work that came closest to this goal was Der Ring des Nibelungen[^6], based on a blend of Norse and Germanic mythology (GLOBO LIVROS, 2019). It is in this tetralogy of operas that Wagner developed the technique of the leitmotif[^7], although he never actually used that term. Later, the use of the leitmotif also became part of other forms of expression, such as film and television soap operas (CADERNO DE MÚSICA EBC, 2016). Following the popularization of the leitmotif, composers began to use the technique as narrative in their works; one of the notable examples in classical music is the symphonic poem[^8] Scheherazade by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov[^9], composed in the winter of 1888, twelve years after the premiere of the Der Ring des Nibelungen tetralogy at the opera house Wagner built in Bayreuth (GLOBO LIVROS, 2019).

During the winter of 1887, while working on Alexander Borodin's opera Prince Igor[^10], Rimsky-Korsakov decided to compose an orchestral piece based on the collection of tales One Thousand and One Nights[^11]. Initially conceived as a symphony[^12], its four movements were to bear different titles: Prelude, Ballad, Adagio, and Finale; however, Rimsky-Korsakov was later persuaded by his fellow composer Anatoly Lyadov[^13] to specify in the titles the parts of the book that had inspired him. The four movements were titled "The Sea and Sinbad's Ship", "The Story of the Kalandar Prince", "The Young Prince and the Young Princess", and "Festival at Baghdad — The Ship Breaks against the Rocks. Finale", respectively — even though, some years later, he preferred to remove these references in order to leave the listener greater freedom (FOLHA ONLINE). It is true that those titles still appear today in virtually every edition, but Scheherazade cannot be understood as a literal description of the texts. Rimsky-Korsakov freely adapted the narratives. Above all, he sought to maintain a fanciful atmosphere in which exoticism is a device of seduction, a way of offering a sonic journey through an idealized world — a fantasy stretching from bestiality to eroticism in distant landscapes (METROPOLITANA, 2020). Rimsky-Korsakov wrote a brief introduction that he intended for use with the score, as well as the program for the premiere.

Sultan Shahriar, convinced of the falseness and disloyalty of women, swore to execute each of his wives after the wedding night; but Scheherazade saved her own life by intriguing him with the tales she narrated over 1,001 nights. Drawn on by curiosity, the Sultan postponed his wife's execution day after day until he abandoned his bloody plan entirely (VASCONCELOS, 2012).

The grave, sombre leitmotif that opens the first movement is meant to represent the domineering Sultan (Figure 1, below); this theme emphasizes four descending notes on a whole-tone scale[^14], generally performed by the orchestra's brass section. After the introduction of the Sultan's leitmotif, we hear beautiful chords on the woodwinds (representing delicacy), and then we hear the leitmotif representing Scheherazade, his wife, portrayed by a solo violin[^15] (Figure 1, below) accompanied by a harp (ALMEIDA, 2015).

Figure 1: The themes of the Sultan and Scheherazade, respectively.
![Source 1: ROFFEL (2020)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig1.jpg)

Throughout the symphony, the more stories Scheherazade tells the Sultan, the more confidence she gains and the more complex her solos become, while the Sultan's theme grows "weaker" and more submissive to the protagonist with each movement. The second appearance of her leitmotif during the second movement is musically more complex and leads to an astonishing burst of double stops[^16] in the fourth bar (Figure 2, below), which is technically challenging (DICTEROW, 2008).
Figure 2: Scheherazade's theme, second movement, bars 1 to 4.
![Source 2: DICTEROW (2008)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig2.jpg)

The third movement of the piece, "The Young Prince and the Young Princess", recounts a great love story; to this end it employs long melodies intertwining in unison with lighter percussion — an aesthetic that, years later, can be recognized in romantic films such as the main theme of Gone with the Wind (1939) (VASCONCELOS, 2012). During this movement, Scheherazade's leitmotif appears only in bars 142 to 157, through a very subtle entrance accompanied by woodwinds.

Figure 3: Scheherazade's theme, fourth movement, bars 8 to 9.
![Source 3: DICTEROW (2008)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig3.jpg)

The fourth movement features a Sultan about to lose his patience, but he is quickly drawn back into Scheherazade's tales once more, which carry a very weary leitmotif at a slow tempo, full of dissonances in triple stops[^17] and rests that simulate a faltering voice (Figure 3, above) (VASCONCELOS, 2012). This movement includes a "scene" in which Sinbad's ship crashes against the rocks; since the piece is shaped by each orchestral group's interpretation, there is a famous video of the Galicia Symphony Orchestra in which the conductor Leif Segerstam begins to shout at some of his fellow orchestra members[^18], simulating what would be the desperation of sailors trying (in vain) to steer clear of the rocks, greatly enhancing the story's narrative (SINFÓNICA DE GALICIA, 2015). In the end, the conflicting relationship between the two is resolved when the Sultan's leitmotif is presented as a minor subdominant in relation to Scheherazade's leitmotif with its major tonic cadence, closing the conflict in a lyrical, fantastical, and peaceful manner, represented by a light, melodic leitmotif with a very high final harmonic (Figure 4, below) (GRIFFITHS, 1989).

Figure 4: Scheherazade's theme, fourth movement, bars 659 to 665.
![Source 4: DICTEROW (2008)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig4.jpg)

Throughout the history of contemporary music, many groups and artists have come to use techniques that guide an album along a single idea or linear narrative. Known as concept albums, a concept album is one in which all the songs contribute to the same final effect or to a single story (ARAÚJO, 2015). Among the most famous concept albums, the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) is considered one of the first, in which each band member was supposed to adopt a fictional character and the title track introduced the band as the "Lonely Hearts Club Band"; however, most of the songs bear no relation to the proposed narrative beyond their sound. In 1969 came the release of what would be regarded as the first rock opera album in history, Tommy by the British band The Who; with a total of 24 tracks, the album begins with an overture[^19] and tells the story of the blind, deaf, and mute boy Tommy Walker, who comes to suffer this condition after seeing his father killed by his mother's lover. In 1975, the record was adapted for the cinema by director Ken Russell. Shortly afterward, The Who released their second rock opera album, Quadrophenia, in 1973, covering, from a first-person perspective, roughly two days in the life of a certain Jimmy, a protagonist with a quadruple personality, each facet associated with a member of the band. In 1979, the British band Pink Floyd released the double album The Wall; with a total of 26 tracks, the record tells the story of Pink, whose father is killed during the Second World War and who is forced to live with an overprotective, oppressive mother. In the story, "the wall" is a metaphor the band devised for the character building barriers until he reaches total isolation. The record uses a narrative full of interludes between tracks that compose a vision of the story, while evoking leitmotifs to represent characters and ideas (FREIRE, 2020). The album stands as the band's second work built around a narrative; in 1977 they had already released Animals, their first work in the independent studio the band set up. Animals is inspired by the novel Animal Farm by the writer George Orwell; on the album, society is divided into three types of animals, each presented in a different song and re-evoked through sound in other tracks. The album is a direct critique of capitalism, owing to Roger Waters's concern about inequality, prejudice, and social and political attitudes aligned with the British punk movement then on the rise (LAST FM, 2016).

On the national scene, the first work considered a rock opera in Brazil is the album O Filho de José e Maria (The Son of Joseph and Mary) by Odair José, released in 1977. In the mid-1970s, Odair was even excommunicated from the Catholic Church for speaking out in favour of sex outside marriage; this fact, among others, led him to remain reclusive. He spent his time away listening to records and reading books, and it was while reading The Prophet by the Lebanese writer Khalil Gibran that he had the idea of recording an entire album about the story of a contemporary prophet, telling what Jesus's life might have been like had he been born in modern times (MEDEIROS, 2015). Musically, the songs move comfortably among the brega, rock, and funk styles the band had mastered; Odair shifts between the story's characters through vocal techniques such as the use of drive[^20] to portray the priest in the track "O Casamento" (The Wedding) (ASCARI, 2020). The release of O Filho de José e Maria was a commercial disaster: critics did not understand the concept of a rock opera, still unheard of in Brazil. The heavy themes were poorly received by the conservative Christian public, who repudiated the story of a messiah-boy born of a relationship outside marriage. The Church classified it as a blasphemous record and helped drive away Odair's loyal audience (MEDEIROS, 2015).

Over the years, the concept of building a work around a single theme was used more and more in the subgenres of progressive rock and progressive metal. In an extreme case, the American band Coheed and Cambria has eight studio albums in which each album tells a chapter of a continuous science-fiction story set in a universe conceived by the band called The Amory Wars, beginning in 2002 with the release of the band's first album, titled The Second Stage Turbine Blade, along with 32 comic-book issues drawn by the band's own vocalist, Claudio Sanchez (REED, 2015). Beyond the direct narration of the story told by the songs, there is also the appearance of several leitmotifs, the best known being the "Keywork leitmotif", most prominent in the songs "Second Stage Turbine Blade", "The Ring in Return", and "Keeping the Blade" (MUELBOY, 2014). As of this writing, January 2023, the complete story of The Amory Wars contains 109 songs totalling 8 hours and 45 minutes; playlists with all the songs in chronological order can be found on the major streaming platforms.

In 2016, the Brazilian album A Sinfonia de Tudo que Há (The Symphony of All That Is) by the band Fresno was released, conceived by Lucas Silveira with string orchestration by Lucas Lima. The album narrates the story of a character with absolute pitch who wakes up one day hearing "all that there is", perceiving a disharmony in the universe[^21]. The album stands out as a musical work whose plot is based on Joseph Campbell's concept of the hero's journey[^22], and it features a sound and lyrics influenced by Lucas Silveira's recent immersion in space-related subjects, using that metaphor to speak about the insignificance of humankind before the grandeur of the universe (SOBRINHO, 2016). The album is admittedly composed with the intention of sounding like an opera, musical, or play with a beginning, middle, and end; to that end, the band made room for the strings to feature more prominently, and although only five tracks contain an orchestra, their presence is so strong that it ends up permeating the entire album (VON BORELL, 2016). In an interview, Lucas Silveira comments on the album's creative process, in which the idea really was to sound like a musical:

> I started writing songs in 2013. There are even songs on this record that predate that. Then a friend of mine talked about writing a musical; I wanted to write a musical, I wrote a lot of songs like crazy, and from then on I felt like making songs that tell a story. This doesn't have to be made explicit, but I wanted to tell a story, and the record does tell a story, in order. (FOSTER, 2016).

In 2018, the band Titãs released the double album Doze Flores Amarelas (Twelve Yellow Flowers), the band's first rock opera in a career spanning three decades. The album tells a story in which three women named Maria decide to rely on technology — a matchmaking app called Facilitador — to make the most of a party. The ploy goes wrong, and they end up being sexually assaulted by five men. They turn again to the same app to try to fix the situation, and it suggests the magic of the twelve yellow flowers, which gives the album its name. In addition to the album, a DVD of the same name was released, with staged performances featuring three actresses and vocalists (Corina Sabbas, Cyntia Mendes, and Yas Werneck), as well as narration by Rita Lee (RAFAEL, 2018).

Among the different ways of building a narrative through sonic aesthetics, the little-known work of The Caretaker — the alter ego[^23] of Leyland Kirby — stands out in the hexalogy[^24] Everywhere at the End of Time. The concept of the hexalogy is based on what a person with Alzheimer's[^25] or dementia might feel during the stages of the disease. The artist makes heavy use of ballroom-music excerpts from the 1930s and 1940s, an era that, in the artist's words, was somewhat lost, being in the interval between two world wars and characterized by great uncertainty. In a very subtle and seemingly random way, we are confronted with hints that something bad is coming — for example, sudden cuts in the music or even a heavy use of melodic repetition. Gently, without our realizing the progression, we enter the more advanced stages of the disease, and those same calm melodies turn into increasingly ethereal and distant sounds through the heavy use of reverb effects. While the first three works are about 40 minutes long each, the last three tracks are much longer, always exceeding 1 hour and 25 minutes. This symbolism may be associated with the initial speed at which the memory of a person with the disease disintegrates and the subsequent sense of infinitude associated with these illnesses. It is from the fourth work onward that the boundary between music and noise grows ever more tenuous; yet, amid so much sound, it is still possible to discern the odd reminiscence of what were happy memories from the music we heard during the first three works. Even so, these vague memories are merely a small crumb of what is a perfect symphony of horror, one that continually reiterates the feeling of helplessness, confusion, and inner conflict. Finally, in the sixth and last work, one can discern some acceptance of fate as the music moves toward long synthesizer noises laden with effects. The melodies that accompanied us, especially in the first three works, are lost and can no longer be heard at all, heightening a very deep sense of emptiness and abandonment. The final track, "Place in the World Fades Away", is a crescendo of energy, an acceptance of the inevitability of time and the end of a life, and a total surrender to the emptiness that remains. One minute before the album ends, the music simply stops, in an attempt to convey the definitive and drawn-out end of a life that, in its final moments, seemed to have found its peace (CALDEIRA, 2020).

Figure 5: The six cover artworks of Everywhere at the End of Time.
![Source 5: CALDEIRA (2020)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig5.jpg)

The cover art (Figure 5, above) of each of the six works, all painted by the artist Ivan Seal, reflects the mental state of the disease's progression. On the first cover, one could say it is the depiction of a book, or simply of papers, rolled up and easily identifiable. On the second cover, one can make out that it is a vase of flowers — abstract, yet it is indeed a vase of flowers. On the third cover, one identifies what would be a tree, a plant, or an alga, painted aggressively and abstractly. The fourth cover recalls the last self-portrait painted by William Utermohlen, an artist who was himself a victim of Alzheimer's. The fifth cover is a wholly abstract statue, in which nothing can be identified. And on the sixth and final cover — perhaps the most frightening, because you recognize the object but it makes no sense at all — it would be a piece of wood with tape stuck to it (JOSEPH, 2020).

### 2.2 FILM SOUNDTRACKS

For us contemporary viewers, we are used to seeing musical accompaniment serve as a way to enhance the experience shown on screen, but it was not always so. Until the 1950s, the soundtrack was merely a piano accompaniment intended to fill the silence or the scenes in which the actors were not speaking. In the 1950s, orchestras began to be invited to create music for films. Ennio Morricone was one of the first to elevate the leitmotif technique in his work on the Dollars Trilogy[^26] between 1964 and 1966. Morricone decided to use the technique popularized by Richard Wagner to create the perfect accompaniment for the main characters without saturating the film with music, through musical insertions with a theme for each of the main characters (KEANE, 2021). A decade later, John Williams composed the score for Star Wars, a blockbuster[^27] that would prove so successful that it ended up spawning two sequels right afterward and, consequently, six more films over the years up to 2019. The aesthetic influence of Richard Wagner on John Williams's work is clear: the main theme of the score is directly influenced by the leitmotif of the hero Siegfried, from the third opera of Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen (Figure 6, below).

Figure 6: Comparison between the Star Wars theme and Siegfried's theme.
![Source 6: KREROWICZ (2014)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig6.jpg)

Elements related to sound design in film can be found in scores by the composer Hans Zimmer. In Inception (2010), Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien, the song is used as a cue for another reality. The song is not only present as diegetic[^28] music but is also present in the genetic structure of the entire soundtrack. In an interview with The New York Times (2011), Hans Zimmer comments: "all the music in the score is subdivisions and multiplications of the tempo of Edith Piaf's song." The clearest example is the Inception theme, where the theme of Piaf's song, played by the trombones, is revealed when the track is slowed down. "I was surprised at how long it took them to figure it out. [It] wasn't supposed to be a secret" (MICHAELS, 2010). In the film Interstellar (2014), the characters visit a planet where it is mentioned that each hour is roughly seven years in Earth time owing to the time dilation[^29] between the two planets in question. The composer uses clicks in the soundtrack every 1.25 seconds to represent one Earth day, giving the track an air of urgency and tension in the scene (KOMOI, 2020).

For the composition of the soundtrack to the film Dune (2021), Hans Zimmer wanted to distance himself as much as possible from Western scores (just as Star Wars drew on the source of 1930s and 1940s film scores, as well as classics by Holst and Stravinsky); the composer's idea was to conjure sounds never heard before (KING, 2021). In his creative process for this score, what stands out is the variety of wind instruments, inspired by the sound of the desert wind, and instruments made of metal, including materials used in cryogenic storage tanks and SpaceX engines. In the film, the complex, resonant tonal textures accompany visuals of wind-blown sand and spice. In an interview with The New York Times, the composer remarks that, in recording the drones[^30] for the soundtrack's pieces, a battalion of 30 bagpipe players was used in a church, where hearing protection had to be worn: the volume on site reached 130 decibels, the equivalent of an air-raid siren. The most mystical presence in the soundtrack is a choir of female voices that sing, whisper, and chant in an invented language. "The true driving force of this work is always the female characters", the composer stated. "It is really the women who shape everyone's destiny." One striking voice stands out like a war cry, with ancient, melismatic[^31] syllables in disjointed rhythms. Aesthetically, the singer and music therapist Loire Cotler says she drew inspiration from everything from Jewish nigun[^32] singing, South Indian vocal percussion, and Gaelic lament to Tuvan guttural throat singing[^33]. "When you start mixing these distant influences and techniques, interesting sounds begin to happen", she said. "It's a vocal technique called 'Hans Zimmer'." (KING, 2021).

### 2.3 ADAPTIVE MUSIC IN DIGITAL GAMES

Paul Booth (1989), in his work on human–computer interaction, proposes that human–computer interaction is a dialogue, in which an exchange of symbols and meanings between the parties is carried out to produce perceptible results. This exchange is seen as the pillar of digital games, where player and system actively react to the situations posed by the other party. However, the definition Booth proposes is closer to the user's relationship with the digital game, which differs from other types of software. Interacting with a digital game gives us the power of agency — the ability to perform meaningful actions and see the results of our decisions and choices. This agency is the essence of interaction in video games, which differs from other, non-interactive forms of entertainment such as books and films. It is therefore natural that the role of the soundtrack in games reflects this question of interaction, with music and sound effects created to be synchronized with the player's actions and the game's possible states.

Dynamic audio in digital games is the technique that allows music and sound effects to be adapted according to the player's actions and the situations that occur within the game. This creates a more immersive and engaging gameplay experience, since the music and sound effects adapt to the player's actions and help create a more intense and exciting atmosphere. Dynamic audio encompasses both interactive audio[^34] and adaptive audio[^35]. In addition, music can be used as a narrative element, contributing to the game's story and gameplay. The dynamic-audio technique is now an industry standard, thanks to the ease of communication between game engines[^36] and audio middleware[^37].

For Winifred Phillips (2021), adaptive music differs from linear music in fundamental ways. Linear music is a single contiguous unit, like a straight line moving in one direction, with a beginning, middle, and end. But adaptive music is more like a maze that can move in many directions with many divergent possibilities. The art of creating and implementing interactive music is not only about understanding and implementing interactive-music systems (such as those listed in the image) but also about analyzing the components of those systems and seeing all those divergent possibilities. The adaptive soundtrack has been in use since Monkey Island 2 (1991), when LucasArts used a piece of software called iMUSE to make smooth transitions between pieces of music for drama, jokes, and exploration. In the game, this is most evident in the Woodtick area, where entering different rooms causes the music to transition to different themes. In one scene, where you wake sleeping pirates, an accordion is added to the music that was already playing, in a natural way (BROWN, 2014).

In the book A Composer's Guide to Game Music, the topic of horizontal re-sequencing is introduced with the following paragraph:

> In music, we mentally picture the ephemeral concept of time as a horizontal phenomenon, moving inexorably from left to right (like the notes on a score). Likewise, most audio-editing software presents audio as a waveform moving horizontally from left to right. The fundamental idea behind horizontal re-sequencing is that, when carefully composed and according to certain rules, the sequence of a musical composition can be rearranged. This process takes place while the music continues to move forward along the horizontal axis of time, allowing a continuous and fluid transformation of the musical content. (PHILLIPS, 2014).

In the horizontal re-sequencing technique, the composer must take into account the fragmentation of the soundtrack and how the stitching between the different segments and structures will be handled. With the evolution of software, it became possible not only to transition from one soundtrack segment to another but also to transition at specific points and with specific bridging fragments. Today the tool makes it possible to mark the timings and the possible entry cues from one micro-composition to another, allowing the transition between section A and section C to include a bridge B, without abruptly altering the tempo or the musicality, making the transition from one segment to another imperceptible to the player and giving the impression of a single, linear track.

Figure 7: The FMOD interface, in which six musical segments can be seen that may play in a sequence defined via a parameter, dynamically and in real time. In the highlighted segment, transition 10 is playing between sections 4 and 0.
![Source 7: (FARLEY, 2018)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig7.jpg)

In the game The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017), the world of Hyrule where the game takes place lies in ruins after a war; as a narrative means of representing this backdrop, the entire soundtrack is crafted with minimalist micro-compositions (representing the fragmentation of the world) — minimalist (representing the emptiness that remained after the devastation) — played on piano (moving away from all the epic fanfares of the previous games), where the focus lies more on the ambiences and the narratives told through sound design (BROWN, 2014). As an example, the "Field (Day)" theme (Figure 8, below) consists of six minimalist piano bars, fragmented into 12 micro-compositions that are played in random order, with random intervals (silence), and may even contain notes with reversed audio, the sound played backward (SCRUFFY, 2019).

Figure 8: The original "Field (Day)" theme, and part of the fragmentations used as the game's soundtrack.
![Source 8: (SCRUFFY, 2019)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig8.jpg)

In Breath of the Wild, the combat soundtrack alternates between three possible scales[^38], equidistant from one another, together with an extended, more elaborate and more intense version in three possible scales for tougher enemies. The theme brings together many different sounds in odd rhythms, forming a soup of texture, almost like a minimalist piece. There are some sounds that play only when you hit an enemy — not exactly at that instant: thanks to the middleware that manages the audio, these sounds play in sync on the music's next appropriate beat[^39], with layers of sound based on how hard you hit, with three different piano segments in the three possible scales of the combat theme (SCRUFFY, 2019).

In addition to horizontal re-sequencing, another very important technique inherent to sound technology in digital games is vertical re-orchestration, also known as vertical layering or stratification (MENEGUETTE, 2016). Vertical re-orchestration consists of building sound up through layers, adding or subtracting instruments and/or sound effects, which can be controlled by predefined states or parameters (grouped and/or individual), offering the advantage of masking cuts and allowing the construction of non-apparent transitions without the need to create new micro-compositions (MENEGUETTE, 2016). In Journey (2012), the layering of music is notable in the game's second scene. The player must activate mechanisms to build a great cloth bridge in order to reach the next destination. The soundtrack reacts to each completed part of the bridge. The music begins with a drone note played by double basses while long synthesizer chords provide the harmonic material. Fragments of the main theme are played by both woodwind and brass instruments. When the second mechanism is triggered, a pizzicato double-bass solo is added, giving a clearer sense of pulse to the previously diffuse music. With the activation of the third mechanism, a variation of the theme's melody is played for the first time by a bass flute, making the musical phrase discernible (ROVERAN, 2017).

Figure 9: A diagram explaining the vertical layering in the music of Journey's second scene.
![Source 9: (ROVERAN, 2017)](https://guilherme.bermeo.dev/unibf23/img/fig9.jpg)

Completing this section of the game takes about seven minutes — enough time for the composer to explore the sonic layers. The transition to another piece of music occurs when the player begins to cross the newly built bridge. A new piece, now livelier, with extensive use of percussion and a fuller sonority, signals the player's success and invites them to discover the next stage (ROVERAN, 2017).

According to Luiz Roveran (2017), the choice to gradually reveal the sonic layers establishes a contrast with the player's condition within the universe of Journey. It is not merely music that establishes a dialogue with the game's narrative and drama, but also a musical track that helps point the way. Each added instrument signals that the player is approaching the resolution of the puzzle.

## 3. LITERATURE REVIEW

The literature review carried out for this work aimed to critically analyze current publications on the topics of sound design, leitmotif, horizontal re-sequencing, and vertical re-orchestration as narrative elements in music, as well as the evolution of technology and its implications for the creation of more immersive narratives over time. This methodology is appropriate for the study of complex, multidisciplinary topics, allowing an understanding of the various perspectives and approaches found in the literature. The citations used were duly referenced in accordance with the technical standards of the field.

## 4. METHODOLOGY

According to GIL (2002, p. 41), exploratory research aims at a closer approach, a greater familiarity with the problem, making it explicit. With more flexible planning, it allows for the consideration of various aspects. The exploratory bibliographic methodology is a research approach that seeks to understand a specific topic through the review of existing bibliographic sources.

The bibliographic research was carried out by reviewing a variety of sources, such as books, scientific articles, dissertations, theses, and articles from specialized journals, as well as online sources such as YouTube videos and articles on specialized websites.

## 5. ANALYSIS OF RESULTS

The analysis of the data collected in this work made it possible to verify the relevance of narrative elements in music and how these elements influenced the development of digital games. From the research carried out, it was possible to highlight the importance of music as a narrative element in different contexts, from classical music to contemporary popular music.

The role of music in constructing narratives in digital games was also made evident, highlighting its importance for player immersion and for building a richer, more engaging narrative experience. Furthermore, the study pointed to the evolution of sound design techniques in cinema and their influence on narrative construction in digital games, as well as the importance of the tools that allow real-time re-sequencing and re-orchestration.

In summary, the analysis of the data collected in this work makes it possible to affirm the importance of narrative elements in music and how these elements have influenced the development of digital games over time. Through the theoretical grounding presented, it was possible to support the assertions made and to highlight the relevance of music in building a richer, more engaging narrative experience in digital games.

## 6. FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

This work addressed the importance and evolution of narrative elements in music and how they affect the construction of narratives in digital games. Through extensive research — which included classical music, contemporary works, popular music, cinema, and digital games — the fundamental role of music as a narrative element was highlighted, as well as the evolution of the tools that enabled new techniques such as horizontal re-sequencing and real-time re-orchestration.

This work demonstrates the importance of music as a narrative element in digital games and its influence on the development of this industry, which today earns more than the film industry. With constant technological evolution and the use of new tools — such as Sony's DualSense controllers, which feature haptic feedback with two audio channels — there is still much to be explored in terms of narrative. In conclusion, the role of sound in constructing narratives in digital games is fundamental and must be continually considered, explored, and improved.

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[^1]: The term "production designer" basically defines what we usually call an art director — since, in the United States, "art director" means set designer. Here in Brazil, the first feature film in which a professional was credited in this role was Kiss of the Spider Woman, in 1985. (KREUTZ, 2017)

[^2]: A work is usually built in three stages. Pre-production is where the screenplay is written and the visual and sound projects and concepts are conceived and defined. Production is the stage in which filming takes place. Post-production is the stage in which the work is finalized, where the editing and the treatment of sound and visual image for the final synchronization occur. (LOBRUTTO, 2002)

[^3]: AAA, or Triple A, is used to classify those games made by large companies that spend a great deal of money on the marketing and creation of their game. Nowadays the term AAA is used even for games that have not yet been released, and it has become just another phrase used by studios to win players' attention; it is not considered a seal of quality based on any metric. (NOVAES, 2018)

[^4]: A period of history that extended from the 5th to the 15th century. (BEZERRA, 2021)

[^5]: In Portuguese, "obra de arte total" (total work of art), an aesthetic concept originating in 19th-century German Romanticism. Generally associated with the German composer Richard Wagner, the term refers to the combination of music, theatre, song, dance, and visual arts in a single work of art. Wagner believed that, in ancient Greek tragedy, these elements were united but, at some point, became separated. The composer criticized the state of the opera of his time, in which all the emphasis was placed on the music, to the detriment of the quality of the drama. (FERREIRA DA SILVA, 2018)

[^6]: "The Ring of the Nibelung", in English.

[^7]: Leitmotif (from the German Leitmotiv, "leading motif"): a recurring set of notes that denotes a character or their memories. Leitmotifs were used extensively, with unprecedented sophistication, in Wagner's Ring, in which the entire musical fabric — especially in the orchestra — was created from melodic fragments associated with different characters, ideas, or states of mind. (GLOBO LIVROS, 2019)

[^8]: The symphonic poem was created by Liszt; it is a work for orchestra in a single movement, also descriptive in nature, but generally longer and more freely constructed. To bring unity to the music, he used what he called thematic transformation; this pompous expression simply means that a basic theme recurs throughout the piece, but in continuous transformation — of character and of spirit — so as to correspond to each situation. (BENNET, 2020)

[^9]: One of the most influential composers of the nationalist Romantic school, he was responsible for reviving traditional Russian culture in an innovative way and for revolutionizing musical orchestration. (MARTINELLI, 2019)

[^10]: Based on "The Tale of Igor's Campaign", the story tells of the war against the Polovtsian invaders in 1185, when Prince Igor Svyatoslavich and his son Vladimir were taken captive. Borodin was unable to finish the work, which was completed by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Glazunov and premiered on 4 November 1890. It later became known mainly for the "Polovtsian Dances", performed separately in concerts. (CADERNO DE MÚSICA EBC, 2017)

[^11]: One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of stories and folk tales originating in the Middle East and South Asia, compiled in Arabic from the 9th century onward. In the modern Western world, the work became widely known through a French translation made in 1704 by the orientalist Antoine Galland, who translated the Arabic original of Dr. J. C. Mardrus, turning it into a classic of world literature. (LEITURIA, 2021)

[^12]: One of the most important musical genres. Unlike the concerto, it does not highlight any single instrument; rather, each instrument has various occasional appearances, and the string orchestra carries the main melody. The symphony emerged in the Classical period, becoming consolidated with Haydn, considered the father of the symphony. (CONCERTOS ASTRA-FINAMAX, 2020)

[^13]: He studied piano, violin, counterpoint, and composition with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, until he was expelled for absences in 1878. Readmitted two years later, he completed his studies and simultaneously began to teach. Lyadov had great talent as a composer, but owing to his insecurity he never realized his musical ambitions. His most popular works are the small piano pieces and the symphonic poems on traditional Russian themes. As a teacher, his work in training important names of the Russian musical scene of the time, such as Sergei Prokofiev and Nikolai Myaskovsky, stands out. (RÁDIO E TELEVISÃO DE PORTUGAL, 2014)

[^14]: Russian composers had the custom of using whole-tone scales to denote someone evil or magical. (JAMES, 2017)

[^15]: Within each group of instruments in the orchestra there is an implicitly accepted hierarchy, and each group provides a soloist (or principal) who will be the protagonist of the solos and the leader of the group. (GUAÍRA, 2020)

[^16]: A double stop is the technique of playing two notes simultaneously on a string instrument, such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass. (HUGILL, 2005)

[^17]: A triple stop is the technique of playing three notes simultaneously on a string instrument, such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass. (HUGILL, 2005)

[^18]: [Video available on YouTube](https://youtu.be/zY4w4_W30aQ); the scene in question is at the 44:59 mark.

[^19]: A piece that serves as an introduction to an opera or to another type of composition or musical spectacle. (ORQUESTRA SINFÔNICA BRASILEIRA, 2021)

[^20]: A style of singing used by many singers, especially in rock and metal. It usually emphasizes an aggressive intent, or strength, in the interpretation of the songs. This sound creates a very interesting effect in the way of singing, but it must be used with great care and attention, since it is very easy to ruin your voice in just a few minutes or songs by singing with a raspy tone without using the proper technique. (FANTOM, 2006)

[^21]: "I woke up hearing the sunset; / And each note guides a step I take in the air; / I lived so many days in disharmony; / With the symphony of all that is." (SILVEIRA, 2016)

[^22]: The Hero's Journey, or Monomyth, is a structure for telling stories that originated with Joseph Campbell in The Hero with a Thousand Faces. It was later adapted by Christopher Vogler in The Writer's Journey to arrive at the 12 stages known today as the Hero's Journey. The 12 stages of the Hero's Journey are: the ordinary world; the call to adventure; refusal of the call; meeting the mentor; crossing the first threshold; tests, allies, and enemies; approach to the inmost cave; the ordeal; the reward; the road back; the resurrection; and the return with the elixir. (VIEIRA, 2019)

[^23]: Someone who considers themselves a second version of themselves. (DICIO, 2021)

[^24]: A set of six works. (FAUSTINO, 2010)

[^25]: It is a degenerative brain disease that affects older people. Brain functions such as memory, language, calculation, and behaviour are impaired in a slowly progressive manner, leading the patient to dependence in carrying out their daily life activities. (HOSPITAL ISRAELITA ALBERT EINSTEIN, 2021)

[^26]: Known as the Man with No Name Trilogy, it is a famous series of spaghetti-western films directed by Sergio Leone and starring Clint Eastwood. A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965), and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) secured a status for the director and the actor, who, very effectively, revolutionized western cinema. (AMORA, 2017)

[^27]: The word "blockbuster" dates back to the early 1940s, when the world was at war and bombs were dropped from aircraft with the aim of destroying entire city blocks. In the film industry, the word was first used to refer to the 1975 film Jaws, which became a cultural phenomenon and broke records unimaginable for the time. (LIRA, 2019)

[^28]: All the sounds present in the fictional universe in which the action takes place. They are those that the characters and the audience can hear. (JÚNIOR, 2020)

[^29]: It is the difference in the measurement of time by two identical and perfectly synchronized clocks that arises when one of these clocks is moving at a speed comparable to the speed of light, or when it is subject to a gravitational field different from the one in which the other clock is located. (HELERBROCK)

[^30]: Drones are essentially sustained or continuous tones that establish a tonal centre to accompany melodic instruments or voices. A drone can simply be the main note of a particular key, or a root and its octave. (ARNOLD, 2013)

[^31]: Melisma is an ornament used to extend the syllables of a word over a given musical passage. (FONSECA, 2018)

[^32]: A song of the Kabbalistic/Hasidic tradition, usually without words. (O REBE, 2010)

[^33]: Throat singing — also called overtone or diphonic singing — is performed in two or more simultaneous sounds emitted from the throat of a single person who, by manipulating the spaces of the oral cavity, brings out the harmonics of their own voice. The technique is quite popular in Central Asia, where it originated among the Mongols and Tuvans. (ESTADÃO, 2016)

[^34]: Refers to those sound events that react to the player's direct interaction. In Super Mario Bros., for example, an interactive sound is the sound the character makes when jumping. (COLLINS, 2008)

[^35]: Refers to sound that reacts to game states, responding to various game parameters such as countdowns, player health, enemy health, etc. (COLLINS, 2008)

[^36]: A game engine is a set of software designed primarily for the development of video games. The best known are Unity 3D and Unreal Engine. (VALENCIA-GARCIA, 2016)

[^37]: Middleware is software that allows developers to integrate assets and implement various services within a larger software environment. Audio middleware allows sound designers to easily attach sound files to a game environment and easily determine the interaction of these files with existing assets, such as graphic sprites, models, environments, among others. The best known are FMOD and Wwise. (NEFF and PITT, 2011)

[^38]: A musical scale is a determined sequence of notes that, in its original organization, goes from the lowest sounds to the highest. Through these notes are structured the chords, the harmonic field (the relationship between notes and chords), and the melody present in a piece of music. (SOTER, 2021)

[^39]: Within a bar, the beat is made up of the strong pulses that drive the pulsation. If we consider common 4/4 time, the strong beat falls on the first quarter note and the weak beats fall on the second and third. (VALENTE, 2020)