iMUSE (''Interactive Music Streaming Engine'') is an

interactive music In video games, adaptive music (also called dynamic or interactive music) is background music whose volume, rhythm or tune changes in response to specific events in the game. History Adaptive music was first used in the video game ''Frogger'' by ...

system used in a number of

LucasArts Lucasfilm Games (known as LucasArts between 1990 and 2021) is an American video game licensor that is part of Lucasfilm. It was founded in May 1982 by George Lucas as a video game development group alongside his film company; as part of a large ...

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

s. The idea behind iMUSE is to synchronize music with the visual action in a video game so that the audio continuously matches the on-screen events and transitions from one musical theme to another are done seamlessly. iMUSE was developed in the early 1990s by composers

Michael Land Michael Z. Land (born 1961) is an American video game composer and musician best known for his scores for various games produced by LucasArts. Biography Early life and career Michael Land was born in the North Shore area north of Boston, Massa ...

and

Peter McConnell Peter Nelson McConnell (born April 19, 1960), also known as Peter Mc, is an American video game composer and musician, best known for his work at LucasArts and for composing the soundtracks for every '' Sly Cooper'' game since the second instal ...

while working at

. The iMUSE system was

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling disclo ...

ed by LucasArts in 1994, after being added to the fifth version of the SCUMM game engine in 1991.

Development

iMUSE was developed out of

's frustration for the audio system used by LucasArts while composing ''

The Secret of Monkey Island ''The Secret of Monkey Island'' is a 1990 Adventure game#Point-and-click adventure games, point-and-click graphic adventure game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games. It takes place in a fictional version of the Caribbean during the Golde ...

''. His goal was to create a system which would enable the composer to set the mood via music according to the events of the game. The project was much more daring than he had imagined. He brought in an old friend,

, to collaborate on creating the system, which they later patented together. iMUSE was also found to be useful to account for differences in processing speed between personal computers at the time, as there was no direct means of synchronizing sound with gameplay rendering. To account for this, the iMUSE system acts as a

pit orchestra A pit orchestra is a type of orchestra that accompanies performers in musicals, operas, ballets, and other shows involving music. The terms was also used for orchestras accompanying silent movies when more than a piano was used. In performances ...

, according to McConnell, playing back shorter or longer sections of music while waiting for key events to occur within the game's drawing engine. The first game to use the iMUSE system was '' Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge'', and it has been used in all

LucasArts adventure games From the late 1980s to the early 2000s, LucasArts was well known for their point-and-click graphic adventure games, nearly all of which received high scoring reviews at the time of their release. Their style tended towards the humorous, often ...

since. It has also been used for some non-adventure LucasArts titles such as the DOS versions of '' Star Wars: TIE Fighter'' and ''

Dark Forces Dark Force or Dark Forces may refer to: ''Star Wars'' *The dark side of the Force *'' Star Wars: Dark Forces'', a 1995 video game and novelization *'' Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II'', the sequel to the 1995 video game and novelization *''Da ...

''.

Usage

One often cited example of the iMUSE system is at the very beginning of ''Monkey Island 2'' where Guybrush finds himself in Woodtick, the small town on Scabb Island. Whenever Guybrush walks into a building, a variation of the Woodtick theme plays, each with a different instrument. When Guybrush then walks out again the music has a closing flourish that leads back into the basic Woodtick theme.

References

{{LucasArts adventure games Computer music software Middleware for video games Video game music technology

Development

Usage

See also

References