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It's great, but it'd be cool if all the separate tunes kind of ran together into one long programmatic piece.

Attacca subito!

Flippy: I'm not sure if this is where you turn the midi thing back on or not, but it probably is. If you're using Internet Explorer, go to tools-internet options. Click on the security tab and then the "custom level" button. It might be in that list of stuff. If you're using Netscape, I think it's under tools- edit preferences, but I'm not sure if it has the same tabs and stuff. Hope this works!

And Geoffkhan's midi sounded fine on my computer also. There is the Star Wars melody (the main trumpet theme) in a steel drum track, but if your soundcard changed the track to some weird instrument you probably wouldn't hear it since it's kind of quiet and really staccato.

Everyone's submission is really great so far!

A computer hacker or a hackey-sacker?

 http://cygnes.homestead.com/files/indianajazz.mid

It's Indiana Jazz! Raiders of the lost groove!

I was gonna do an mp3 thing but I couldn't figure out how to record with my crappy soundcard and screwed up computer, so hope the instruments sound good on your computer!

Sorry, DMITRI, I'll try to get it right.

What I meant was that a song by definition is "a melody for voice", meaning a piano concerto doesn't fall into that category. But now that I look it up in a dictionary, it says it can also be a lyric piece for any instrument, which I would interpret to mean a short melodic composition, but that's just an assumption. Although I doubt such a monumental work as a concerto or Requiem would fall into the song category.

and Remixor:
I used the term "classical" loosely because that seems to be the common misnomer for "The Common Practice Period".

To comment on Stravinsky, I would say that while I think The Rite of Spring is definately his most well-known piece of music, and rightly so, that The Firebird is a LOT more lyrical and descriptive. Plus it suits itself better to ballet than the former.

And since we're talking about modern music, I would have to say that Ravel is my favorite 20th cent. composer. La Valse is probably the coolest thing I've listened to! He's also written some gorgeous piano works.

[Geoffkhan Quote:]

I saw BB King live. It was pretty damn cool.

Geoffkhan Quote:
"BTW: I think Stravinsky rocks. I think the Rite of Spring has many common elements with heavy metal. I think it was that whole "powerchord string section" thing. "

Yeah, but does heavy metal remind you of a Russian pagan ritual sacrafice?

[Dimitri:]

This thread was started today and it's already on its second page!

Here are some responses to assorted quotes:
Dimitri:
"-More instruments and musicians, I like music that's HUGE! one of the reasons I love that particular concerto... the piano sounds HUGE! Also the reason my runner up song is Requiem by Mozart"

Uh, you could like orchestral music for that reason, but I'd wager that most classical music falls into the solo/chamber music category. Plus a piano concerto isn't a song, and neither is a Requiem.

"-Complexity, classical music has a lot of musicians, and a lot of flexibility. There's only so much you can do with 5 voices and synthesised music ala boy band, but you get a good orchestra (which has more than 5 people) and you can do anything (within the limits of the instruments and voices)"

Hmm, boyband crap is...well crap, but that doesn't mean the musicians themselves are limited by their own technical abilities. And I guess the only reason that music is simple is because it works best with the crowd they're trying to please. Mozart, while being a musical genius, is one of the more simpler composers in the respect that he conforms to moderately strict rules of theory.  I think the reason his music is appreciated is that it is very clear and precise. It's almost hard NOT to understand his music. Plus he composed some of the most beautiful melodies ever. Although classical music does have its share of complex composers such as Bach ,who is probably the only really complex and difficult composer until late Romantic and modern eras, and all those modern weirdos.

"Even rock groups that can actually play instruments, the music just isn't complex enough."

Maybe they're striving for clarity above all else?

"-emotion, now I'll grant, I've heard good modern music (not including rap)that provokes good emotion. But when you hear "Night on Bare mountain" and "Oh Fortuna" you just think "Evil". When you hear "Requiem" or the choral in Beethoven's ninth symphony you think "powerful". When you hear the moonlight sonata you think, 'Sad'"

My opinion is that music is expression, so all but the most monotonous garbage has emotion, but I see your point. But if you look at the entire scope of classical music, it's almost a "new" thing to put so much emotion into music such as the examples you mentioned. I mean, listen to any other Beethoven sonata and you'll hear more of a subdued emotion, which you could argue is what the music actually is, but it's also a development of the sonata form and almost a compositional exercise for Beethoven. The level of emotion in it is probably equivalent to much of the music you might hear on the radio. The Romantic period is when emotion became the sole reason for writing music (which, incidentally, Beethoven started), and that's when you begin to hear the angst and painstaking beauty in classical music.



Trapezoid:

"Sort of. I like classical music, but I prefer contemporary music and personally think it has has more unexplored potential than classical. Obviously what you hear on the radio is mostly homogenized crap, but with contemporary music, creative ingenuity is much more blatent. It may have less instruments than classical, but those few instruments can be ecclectic as the artist wants. It's hard to find any utterly bizarre classical music. Utterly bizarre can be good. Very good."

I think the term "Classical music" is very misleading, as it encompasses a wide range of music that has monumental differences. Most people think of music before the 20th century as classical, but there's a whole era of 20th-21st century classical music. The music can be weird and "utterly bizarre", and there's tons of it. This weirdness probably is the influence behind the "contemporary" music you might listen to. Plus, there are still contemporary classical composers and are continuing to explore music's potential, and are almost on par to what modern dance has become, since after classical form was broken, anything's acceptable.  I can only recommend some composers to listen to:
Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Holst, Prokofiev, Falla, Debussy, Ravel, Bartok, Grofe, Villa-Lobos, Copland, Orff, Britten, Poulenc.
Here are a few names of people I've heard of, but never listened to:
George Crumb, Philip Glass, William Bolcom, Shulamit Ran.
And even these Romantic composers have some weird stuff:
Brahms, Franck, Grieg, Mussorgsky, Liszt, Mahler, Dvorak, Saint-Saens, Chabrier


Sorry everyone, I didn't mean to sound preachy or anything, just clearing up some misconceptions.

Hmmm, I remember this game called the Last Dinosaur Egg, which was sort of similar (I never got that far into it because it was pretty badly done). I think the same thing happens with the transmitter getting lost every time and you have to go find it, but this idea sounds way better. That second scenario sounds really cool; I like paradox thingies worked into games.

Er, Ed's on NBC now (actually I'm not sure if it's syndicated or not), but since it's summer there aren't any new episodes and I guess they're not going to play reruns either. It'll be back next season.

It's cool, but the hands look kind of weird, like he's feeling the air as he walks foreward. Maybe if you close the hand a little or turn them in it would look better.

Second, I downloaded the old version of loom, the one that came before 256 colours. I forget how many colours that was. Anyway, I'm immersed in a spectactular world, even though it's PC speakers and a crappy soundtrack. Yes, crappy! You realize that's all just classical music, right? They didn't MAKE a soundtrack for that game! So it's crappy!

Yufster, go to my website right now.

A sponge. No, not the kind you clean with.

I'm using DPaint to do my graphics too, and for, uh, some of the same reasons as Yufster. I like cool old graphics and you can't get the same effects in PSP or PS.

In Macbeth, you have the Porter.

It's debatable whether Shakespeare actually even wrote the Porter into that play.

I kind of disagree with you also. I don't think you NEED humor in a story, I mean there are plenty of stories without any; I can think of several operas and ballets, although I do like it when it's included. It can add something to your enjoyment, but I don't think it's necessary.

And lesbians... Thats a pretty cool word.

K, back on the lesbian subject...the word lesbian is derived from a Greek island called Lesbos (or Lesvos in modern Greek), where the female poet Sappho is from. She wrote love poems sometimes between two females and that's where the name comes from. Also, inhabitants from Lesbos (all female I think) were supposedly the most beautiful women in the world. So yeah, it's a pretty cool word.

The tofu mask doesn't count because it was to fool the vegetarian cannibals so it's more of a cannibal mask than a voodoo mask.

Well, how about the Crocodile mask in GK1, which I believe Gabriel uses in the voodoo ceremony?

Has there ever been an adventure game walkthru as an inventory item?

Yeah, in the front view he looks kind of, uh, camp. It looks like his posture is a little different and, like Jimi said, his arms are weird.

Yeah, my game's sereous (ie no jokes), and it would be cool if everyone found the story as powerful as I do. So, uh, it's supposed to be a tear jerker. It's been in production for 2 yrs and still seems to be the only one in that particular genre.

What bugs me, or rather, what I'd like to see more in games is animation. I haven't actually played many of the newly released games so I'm just assuming that there isn't much in them. But I really like seeing animations; I know I feel kind of cheated when the game creator displays a message that says he/she was too lazy to do an animation and just use your imagination. It's not a huge deal or anything, but animations are cool! I'm trying to do a lot of animations in my game, but it's pretty easy with 16 color 320x200 EGA graphics.

OK, I tried all the different options and nothing works. Does anyone have any idea what's going on?
Thanks.

Hehe, S&M...

Anyway, I like text parsers the best, although I don't like AGS games with them because they're harder (developers might not put as much time into them as professionals did).