How did you get started writing music for Games and can you tell us your first game you worked on?

My first steps into music were via the demo scene on the ZX Spectrum, I had started out life programming from a very young age but it eventually became clear that music was the path I should follow. I used SoundTracker extensively, and at one point even build my own MIDI lead to connect my keyboard to my Spectrum…I'm sure I must have my earliest compositions stored on tape somewhere! I'm pretty much mostly self taught, I had a few lessons on the church organ and studied music up to A-Level but that was it.

The first game was called 'Birdie in Trouble' from Kilk! Games, and I actually did some SFX for that! It came about from the developer asking on the Touch Arcade forums if there was anyone who could help out with providing sound effects. I believe the first game I provided an actual music track for was 'Fastball 2', from the same developer. From there I gradually picked up a bit more work, before approaching Orange Pixel with the offer that I would write the soundtrack for their next game (which was called INC) on a ZX Spectrum, so they were some very authentic chiptunes! The rest is history as they say…you can never really pinpoint the exact moment where going full time music / sound effects became a reality but it just seemed to happen that way. I've been very fortunate but you have to take every opportunity sent your way!

What is your process for writing a soundtrack to a game?

This really does vary from game to game, but I'll try and go into more detail about the general process I like to follow. I usually start by meeting with the developer and chatting (with the nature of the work this sometimes is only possible via Skype / email) about their plans for the game, the sort of mood they want to convey and the part they would like the audio to play. A great game soundtrack can vary from playful chiptunes or energetic guitars, to the more atmospheric ambient style. I find obviously it's important to listen the developers ideas on what they would like for the game, but not to be afraid to suggest your own…after all they will have brought you on board for your expertise! In fact most of the time I'd say the eventually audio is usually a combination of developer input and composer ideas. One other key thing I like to find out, what music has the developer been listening to (if any!) during development to date…that is usually a good indicator of mood for the future! Also at this point I'll go through any concept art and if there is a playable version of the game, spend some time playing it!

What instrument is your prized possession?

Ooo there could be a few here, it's probably a tie between my Juno 106 synth and the Fender Mk1 Rhodes electric piano!

Is there a game genre you would like to work on that you haven't already?

I've been thinking about this, and I'm not sure if there is, I can honestly say I enjoy working in all genre types and I am fortunate enough to often have the chance to! Musically…I'd quite like to do some sort of futuristic synth soundtrack based around the styles of Vangelis and Jarre mixed with a little Daft Punk, so if anyone wants to come up with a game for that… ;)

Have you ever taken part in a Game Jam, can you tell us a little about your experience?

I sure have, I've taken part in a few and can honestly say I love them. In fact one game I'm working on now (Tango Fiesta) was born from the Rezzed game jam! I find the time pressure really pushes you to make quick decisions and actually I find the whole situation less pressurising, being able to produce anything at all in such a short space of time is an achievement in itself.

Where do you get inspiration from?

Well I suppose this would come from other artists…Lately I've been pretty bad at keeping up with music, but I do try and listen to as much new stuff as possible. I'm a huge fan of Telefon Tel Aviv, in fact if it wasn't for their music I doubt I would be writing still today. I'd just about given up writing music altogether a few years back, and then I heard a song of theirs called 'Sound in a Dark Room' and it absolutely blew me away! I try and play games as often as I can and obviously pay a lot of attention to the audio in each one, it's always interesting to hear what other composers are doing and how they have interpreted a certain game genre with their music. I do also as you might expect pay extra attention to the music when watching films, always interesting to listen to the techniques employed by musicians to add to the atmosphere / mood.

What music excites you?

Ha, lots! Seriously, I wouldn't know where to start really, I love hearing new music, there is so much to discover out there... so maybe new music is what excites me?

When you are writing and creating music do you have a fav snack or drink on hand to keep you going?

I'm pretty routine about snacking and drinking, if only to make sure I don't overdo the coffee / food! Usually a couple of coffees during the morning and maybe a biscuit or a little bit of chocolate. Other that I drink a lot of water during the day. I actually find keeping sort of near normal working hours (so usually starting at 9am and finishing around 6-7pm) suits me best. Once in awhile I'll stay up late but my studio is away from my house, so I have quite a good work / life separation.

Who would you like to collaborate with, be it for TV, games or film?

Right now I'd say Trent Reznor or Joshua Eustis.

What's in the pipeline for you, if you can discuss it here of course?

Having finished on some large long term projects over the summer, I'm now currently preparing the Halfway soundtrack for release. Tango Fiesta is currently in early access so is an on going project, with some big audio updates to come still! There are a couple of other things that I'm hoping all go ahead but I can't say much more yet…some TV related too!

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Level Up If I reach my target of 30 followers per month or collect a Super Bonus Pass then I level up. Once I reach level 12 I have completed the Stage and I will think about increasing the following count to an average of 3 per day. To be honest I haven't thought that far ahead, however the increase seems like the natural progression as well as potentially limiting the use of powerups and bonus items.

What, no end of level boss? Hmm, No it's not that kind of game, well not in the typical video game sense. Instead of coming face to face with an end level boss, once I've completed a level successfully I meet an After Level Merchant. Don't worry I'm don't know what I'm talking about either. But wait, let me explain about the merchant, essentially it means every time I level up I will either;

purchase a game made by an indie from the App Store (because I'm on iOS);  

help fund an indie game via Kickstarter / indiegogo;

make a donation to an indie via their site;

vote to greenlight a game on Steam and perhaps even purchase a game on Steam (pushing the boundaries of my mobile collection :D) and

lastly, not forgetting the HumbleBundle

I will make the purchase/donation/support randomly but heavily influenced by the indie community on Twitter. Feel free to offer me advice or pitch a game you think I should take a look at.

So what happens if someone stops following me? I'm hoping it won't be too much of a regular occurrence but in the event of losing a follower it only affects the total count and not the monthly target. If I start the month with 67 followers I must gain 30 new followers to avoid losing a life but if I lose a follower then unless it's one of the new 30 it won't affect how many I've gained. Make sense? It does in my head.

What about false Twitter accounts? I won't be painstakingly checking whether the people following me are legitimate people, although, more often than not the majority will be indie game devs, studios, gamers, designers, artists, musicians, marketeers and other people of similar ilk. It's also fair if I follow myself from one of my alt accounts. I have about 8 accounts but only actively use 4 including @theindie5iews. I am also allowed to Retweet myself (from @twitfortheday only) as I build up my follower count but it's against the rules to favourite my own Tweets.

So I'll kick-off with the all important question first! Your followers on Twitter should know you're partial to the odd treat and a huge fan of Nandos. Do you have a particular food or drink that you like to enjoy while coding?

I mostly just drink water while coding. My problem is I tend to get too absorbed in coding to remember to eat or drink, which is bad, so I don’t tend to snack while doing it.

What was the thinking behind putting the source code up on Steam for Blast Em!?

I actually never intended the game to go on Steam at all, I was just going to put it through my website and leave it there. It was a small project I worked on while waiting for some middleware to be ready for the WiiU version of So Hungry. As it was a small project and I get so many people asking for my advice on game making my first aim for the game was to release the source code to it. A publisher approached me and asked if they could look into putting the game on Steam for me.

What game making achievement are you most proud of?

The first version of the crowd system for Football Manager. Up until I joined Sega Sports Interactive their 3D engine always showed empty stadiums and they needed crowds for the next release which was something like a month away. So in my first couple of weeks I had a very basic crowd system up and running which made it into Football manager 2010. The technique I came up with was the basis of everything I do in creative shader production from then on.

You seem to work on multiple projects at the same time. Are you constantly having ideas for games?

Yeah, far too many. I’m currently working on 4 games and there are at least another 4 ideas that I want to put into action. What I really love doing is making very small game ideas in the least amount of time possible. I’m not sure I have an ‘epic’ game in me. I’ve worked for studios like Lionhead, on games that took more than 4 years to make and after the first 8 months you tend to get bored of them. So I’m not looking to make some profound mark on the games industry that everyone will look at and venerate, I just want to make games.

When you have an idea for a game do you always make a prototype?

Yes, I always prototype everything I do and the prototype usually evolves into the final product if it’s fun enough. My prototypes always use simple coder art which is just enough to get the concepts in there as a proof it can work. If it does, I’ll work on more refined looking art so I can show it to a proper artist to get a feel of what I’m after. It’s all about rapid production - not wasting time.

What criteria or checklist do you apply to one of your prototypes to then decide to develop in further?

That’s a tough one. It’s usually if I think it’s fun and I can expand on it. So, for example on the latest game I’m doing which is a platformer called ‘A touch of magic’ I built the visual look first, which is something I never really do and then built the game bit by bit to fit into the theme. I was not only having fun playing it at each stage but having a lot of fun creating it and even more fun coming up with diabolical level ideas. I then showed a single level of it at London Indies and the people there seemed to like it. So, to sum that up - probably a mixture of fun and gut feeling, which isn’t ambiguous at all is it? ;)

If my facts are correct you are involved in the IGCCF which seems to have come about from putting on something for those unable to make GDC in SF Is that a fair description and will you continue to be involved, and if so, do you have any plans to develop and build on the existing program?

The IGC (Indie games collective) was an idea I had in the back of my mind for over a year before we actually did the first event at the UKIE offices in London. I attend a lot of conferences and a lot of the talks at them basically boiled down to “we did this, aren’t we great?” which is fine the first couple of times you hear it but eventually you begin to realise that the only really benefit of going to these conferences is networking - I can’t actually remember the last time I was able to take away some tangible piece of information I was able to apply to my game making. This is just my experience though - other’s mileage may vary.

So I wanted to put together something tangible that developers could come to and take away to use in their business. So the criteria for speaking at the first conference was pretty harsh but we pulled it off and the event was over-subscribed. We had poor UKIE panicking that the room was over capacity and we were probably breaking some health and safety regulations. I also teamed up with the amazing Andy Payne for the first event and through that Natalie Griffiths came on board.

The second event was more open, I wanted to give people who ordinarily you never hear from a chance to speak to a crowd and we timed it so that if you were missing out on GDC there was a more local alternative to come to.

Basically, I’m very passionate about finding ways to help other developers to make their games and one way to do that beyond everything else I do is to try and get more developers to spread their knowledge to help each other. I really think that by doing that we all make a more productive and healthy game development scene.

As for what’s next? Well, most of the time each of these events start off we a germ of an idea I have and then I usually tweet about it so I’m sure another idea will pop up soon.

What game, old or new has grabbed you, given you a shake and made you think, "Wow! This is frakkin' awesome!”?

Monument Valley is just an amazing example of elegance in design, coding, presentation, audio and production. I am amazed by that game. That’s now my benchmark of the level of quality we all should aim for.

Is there anyone in the industry who you would like to work with?

I’m terrible to work with. I’m always working, every spare minute I have goes into game development as I love making games so much. I actually get depressed if I’m not being creative. I’m pretty sure I would drive anybody working with me nuts. so while I would love to work with a few people: Georg Backer, Imre Jele, Louise James, Shahid Ahmad, Dan Marshall, Jake Birkett and David Mitchell - I’m pretty sure each of them would end up strangling me.

What piece of advice would you give yourself if you could go back to when you first started making games for a living?

“You see that lego you’re playing with? Start turning that into a computer game because somebody one day does and now they never have to worry about money again”

Follow Byron to keep abreast on his game developments, industry opinions and occasional trips to Nandos - https://twitter.com/xiotex