[Jbird]

How do you make the music for your games. Is it with a keyboard? Is there a program on the computer that i could use?

[Ninkazu]

http://www.modplug.com

[XMark]

Independent games usually use either MIDI files, or tracked formats such as XM or IT because of the small file sizes involved.

Tracked formats:

Modplug is an amazing program, but have caution when using it. It's generally the easiest to use tracker, but it has extra features such as VST effects which are not universally supported by the formats it saves under. In other words, if you're not careful the song could end up sounding completely different in the game than it does in Modplug. If you're rendering your music to MP3, Modplug is a great choice, though.

Fasttracker II ( http://www.gwinternet.com/music/ft2/ ) is a bit harder to use, but it is geared specifically toward the XM file format without Modplug's extra bells and whistles. There have been a few unofficial attempts to make later versions of Fasttracker (Starbreeze studios dropped the project when they started working on Enclave) but I haven't tried them yet, so I can't give an informed opinion.

Impulse Tracker is even harder to use (at least for me), and I've never really taken the IT route, but a lot of people swear by it, so there must be something really good about Impulse Tracker that I missed out on :)

MIDI

If you want to compose MIDI, there's really no way but to go out and buy a MIDI keyboard and a MIDI sequencing program. Just about any electric keyboard you buy nowadays has a MIDI port on it, though you will need a MIDI interface to connect it to your computer.

The keyboard that I use is the M-Audio Oxygen 8, which plugs into my computer's USB port and uses a software driver instead of a MIDI interface. The Oxygen 8 is a great choice for starting composers, though it only has 25 keys which could be an annoying limit after a while.

I'm not too familiar with MIDI sequencers, but what I've been using in my short MIDI experience is the free version of Pro Tools which you can download at http://www.digidesign.com/
I've found Pro Tools to be pretty much the best all-around audio package out there, though the free version is kind of unstable, and it was really designed to work with its own proprietary hardware. I'm saving up to get the MBox system myself.

There is also a free open source MIDI sequencer you can download at http://www.jazzware.com/ though I don't like it as much because you have to open a seperate window to see and edit the piano roll of a MIDI track.

I've heard that Cubase is a good MIDI sequencer, though I haven't tried it myself. It's something to look into.
_________________
Mark Hall
Abstract Productions
I PLAYS THE MUSIC THAT MAKES THE PEOPLES FALL DOWN!

[js71]

Impulse tracker harder than modplug?
Well I suppose it's just a matter of opinion, but I find Impulse by FAR the easiest tracker out there. I switched to modplug because Impulse wouldn't run under win2k, and it has some extra features which can be very usefull, although I still say Impulse tracker is the easier and fastest way to track if you're in a hurry... Or even if you're not. But It all really depends on what you're used to. You can't really say a certain program is flat out BETTER than any other (well, you can... but it's really annoying =P).

[Ninkazu]

Ben's probably going to make movie tutorials for modplug once he gets camtasia studio. Although.... I'll need to super-compress them into wmv files.

Why does this matter? Ben can make some pretty good music, and can help you visually.

[js71]

...Yeah, I never mentioned ben.
I was just saying that in my opinion impulse tracker was easier.