#python blue

Happy End of the Year Celebrations to all of you!

We’re happy to announce the release of 2 new projects on this beautiful day:

First, we start in music. After all, Christmas is certainly a good day to discover new tracks and new artists. The following synth-SciFi soundtrack composed by Python Blue might not be totally in the spirit of Santa Claus, snow and fir trees, but his remix album will reach the heart of most Black Cube fans! Kel Leda was a demo created this year during a game jam. The Original Soundtrack was short, so this new arranged album is a welcome addition to the project. Enjoy and share!

Kel Leda Remix album by Python Blue (that you can compare with the OST for the fun)

  Then, we’d like to take this opportunity to introduce the 3rd and last episode of our scifi comics: “ANTERRAN Day 0″ part 3 is now available for purchase! You can even consider taking all 3 episodes at once, now that this first series is finished. We will consider seriously working on the sequel if the project meets enough success, but now the future of planet Talifa is in your hands. Working on thee books with artist John Carvajal sure was a great and new experience. We definitely need you to show your interest in order to allow us to continue working on a new chapter in the ANTERRAN series.

ANTERRAN Day 0, Episode 3 by John Carvajal (all three episodes on Amazon)

Hi everyone, we’d like to share with you a summary of our latest news! Sorry it’s still a bit long, but we don’t post very often lately ;)

RealMYHA

We're glad to inform you that the Kickstarter of RealMyha ended in success, and that Denis and Simon have now gained around 6 000 €, in order to develop the game. This is a very important moment for The Icehouse as it was our first real collaboration and attempt to fund a game. They both saw it as an opportunity to promote the project and discover how many people would be interested in it (if any at all), and that has worked out with a great result. Yesterday the usual questionnaire has been sent to all the backers, so please make sure you received yours by email if you supported the project!

Latest news:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/simonsays-watchplay/realmyha/posts/2067850

Blue Moon

We have a major update regarding this exciting project from Juanjo/Luminy Studios:

"Hi, after making a prototype and taking some time to consider things, I decided that it was time for a new stage in the project to begin: As you probably know from other updates, I was already making some important changes, but now I am moving to the next stage and I'm completely redesigning the levels (graphically speaking) to take advantage of the new features of Unity 2017.1!!! So that will specifically impact on the graphics quality, which will be increased, and I can't wait to show you by how much. This means that what you have seen so far of the game will now change: see the WIP screenshots attached, showing the new aspect of Ytria's surface. Blue Moon is a collaboration with Simon Mesnard (story) and Python Blue (music), but I am working on it on my own, so it takes time. I will do my best to keep you updated!"

Current homepage of the game:

http://www.theblackcube.fr/bluemoon

  Phenomena

Our Friend Python Blue has recently released a new, personal album, Phenomena, that you can listen in streaming here:

https://python-blue.bandcamp.com/album/phenomena

MVEM books

Simon has taken the decision to work more actively on his own, very personal, series Mon Village est Magique during next year. As a result, he has decided to go through his past books and finally release them to public. Even though they're written in French, it's an important first stage, and an English translation of book 1 will arrive soon. With the cooperative comics and the desire of Simon to create a game in this series, it's definitely something to look out for during the next few months!

http://www.monvillageestmagique.fr

Unity Neon Challenge

Juanjo is going to participate in the Neon Challenge using the Unity engine. The purpose, to make it short, is to create a scene that shows a possible future for humanity. Juanjo has decided to work on an extrapolation of our present, putting into situation robots, nature and several other aspects of our societies and world. Have a look and support him on his dedicated page, right here:

https://connect.unity.com/p/entry-for-neon-challenge-wip

Interview with Python Blue Release of ASA: Alternate Soundtrack New WIP screenshots of Blue Moon! ...

Our Friend Python Blue is a music composer who created an alternate soundtrack to the scifi/Myst-like game ASA: A Space Adventure. You can listen to the soundtrack in free streaming on his bandcamp: https://python-blue.bandcamp.com/album/asaas-a-space-adventure-alternate-soundtrack

Chris, aka Python Blue, is currently working on the soundtrack of Blue Moon, a game currently in development by Juanjo Barcelo. We have asked several questions to Chris for the occasion:

1/ Hi Python Blue. Some time ago you became a Friend of The Icehouse collective. How did it happen and why did you accept to join us?

Hello. Let me start off by saying that I consider myself a musician with a strong interest in soundtrack work in particular. Fortunately, to answer your question, I never decided to join the Icehouse collective solely for possible monetary gain. I also consider myself a casual gamer who has a soft spot for adventure games, and when I discovered ASA: A Space Adventure, it really hit me close to home, in a good way, and I really want to be able to contribute to similar games in the future. My liking ASA: A Space Adventure so much led me to even make a rescore of the game, and my staying in touch with Simon ever since resulted in my finding out that the entire Icehouse collective makes similar games, so I figured why not join if it’s about developing the kind of games I love the most?

2/ You are a music composer with a very personal style. I would say that your music is very reminiscent of the 80s and 70s, with synthetizer and several effects in the genre. Is that right? Is there a reason for that? (your age, your tastes, a specific interest in an artist or group of this era?)

Well, while I do consider myself a composer nowadays, I used to also be a musician who tried to appeal to the charts of synthwave, which is all about having hints of 80s music in it, so I guess you could say the hints of my past are still there. To further develop on my answer, my second biggest interest in music would be classic rock and electronic music, especially that from the mid to late 80s, to the point that I’ve spent much of my time trying to research how many of the classic synthesizer sounds in particular were made.

3/ Can you tell us more about yourself, your life, your past work, the people you worked with? Is music composition a hobby for you, or a job, or both? How do you see your future cooperations with other creators?

In all honesty, while I have released several albums worth of music, both soundtracks and otherwise, I view music making as something in between a career and a hobby. I certainly love the arranging of instruments and sounds in particular, but I realize that even if I make enough to survive on music alone, it would likely be at the cost of my personal privacy due to becoming a celebrity. That’s one reason why I’ve felt it best to migrate to soundtrack work: from what I’ve seen, the chance of becoming a celebrity and a household name is still there, but even it it was as likely to happen, most of the people developing a game, movie, etc. are working as a team, as opposed to entirely on their own, and the recognition seems to work along those lines as well. That being said, I think soundtracks are my musical calling, and while the idea that I would end up needing to be surrounded by strangers who obsess over me at all times is still there in this niche, I myself am surprised how low the chance is despite how successful many other composers have become. I’d still prefer to take smaller projects when I can (several of my other projects, for instance, are just musical commissions for friends of mine), but it’s not to say I’m not open to the possibility of, for instance, the Icehouse becoming an AAA group of game developers.

4/ Recently you have finished your work on an important album of yours: ASA Alternate Soundtrack. It was born after you played the game of Simon Mesnard, ASA: A Space Adventure. How did it come to life? Were you more inspired by the Original Soundtrack of ASA composed by Karreo, or were you more touched by the world and visuals of the game?

For my rescore of ASAAS, I’d say my inspiration was a combination of listening to the original soundtrack and making my own interpretations based on the visuals. I did enjoy the original soundtrack, don’t get me wrong: I do find it very memorable for a soundtrack in this day and age. I guess with the rescore I just wanted to see how I could pull it off, preferably with a more synthesizer-heavy sound since ASA is a science fiction game in which most of the time is spent away from what the player’s character is familiar with. I did throw in some tributes to the original music though, particularly with my synth piano melody in the opening and closing pieces.

5/ It would seem that there will be other cooperations with The Icehouse and the Black Cube series: there is the game of Simon, ATOS, currently in development (note: the ASAAS soundtrack was used in the prototype during the BlackCube Jam 2016). But more important, there is an ambitious project in Full3D with Juanjo Barcelo, Blue Moon: The Lucium Project. Do you feel lat ease with the idea of working on a game made in realtime 3D (Unity engine)? Does it change anything to your workflow, and the perception that you have of a world, of a game?

Truth be told, I can’t imagine Blue Moon will be much more difficult for my workflow as someone contributing music to a game. On the contrary, I do have a fascination with 3D engines: I briefly experimented with both Unity and Unreal (though I never did get the time to make much decent out of either) and even contributed in small ways beyond music to some custom stories for Amnesia The Dark Descent (which is a 3D game with lots of C++ based scripting). The only major difference I can picture with Blue Moon over my rescore of ASA is that ASAAS was made on my own schedule due to it being a personal project in the end, whereas with Blue Moon, I’m obviously actively working with other people under what will likely be deadlines.

Here some new exclusive pictures of Blue Moon, kindly offered by the developer, Juanjo :) Learn more about Blue Moon: http://www.theblackcube.fr/bluemoon

6/ What are your plans for the future? Do you work on other projects with other people? Wishes? A last word?

Well, again, many of my other current projects are for friends. One of said friends is a fairly successful YouTuber by the name of Lightsen, and I’ve been doing music for her animations for a few years now. I’m honestly generally content with things staying that way right now while I try to balance music with my offline commitments, such as volunteering and looking for an additional dayjob. However, once things settle down for me, I am willing to consider trying to give more to the game development community, especially Icehouse. Final words I would give would be to any prospective musicians: while it’s generally wise to go outside of your comfort zone, especially in this industry, don’t get ahead of yourself, either. Try to venture out slowly and learn about everything you can about the business aspects especially before deciding whether you want to pursue it professionally, and if you do still feel music is for you, always remember that you decided that because you love making music for yourself: any casual listeners or label managers it pleases is merely a bonus.