- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 composer Jason Graves says to capture the tone of multiplayer maps, “you have to play a lot of multiplayer”
- Graves says the mode’s vibe is “completely different” from the campaign, and he tried to capture “forward momentum and pure adrenaline”
- He adds that he has to be flexible when composing tracks, “especially considering updates and expansions in the future”
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 composer Jason Graves has shared his process for designing the game’s multiplayer music, which he described as wholly different from the campaign.
When asked in an interview with TechRadar Gaming how he captured the multiplayer mode’s specific tone, Graves said, “Number one, you play a lot of multiplayer!” and explained that it has a very different atmosphere from the steady-paced campaign.
“It’s a completely different vibe from the campaign, and the music needs to make you feel like anything could happen at any point in time,” Graves said. “A lot of what I was trying to capture was forward momentum and pure adrenaline.”
The composer joked that “I always thought of myself as the musical equivalent of Master Sergeant Apone in Aliens, pumping up all the troops beforehand, keeping them in line and focused in combat and rewarding them when they come back home. ‘Every meal’s a banquet! Every paycheck’s a fortune! Every formation a parade!'”
As for how each multiplayer map differentiates within the score, Graves said there’s plenty of ground to cover considering the number of maps the mode offers “especially considering updates and expansions in the future.”
“Instead of being too granular and assigning music to a specific map, we planned things out in terms of emotional intensity and timing,” he explained. “Things are a lot more flexible that way.”
There isn’t one strict way to compose these maps either, as Graves explained, “it’s more about the overall combination of sounds,” which he uses to showcase the fast-paced vibe by using a combination of real-world and electronic sound effects.
“There’s definitely a lot of aggressive percussion, distorted electronics, and organic textures that help give the music its identity,” Graves added. “I love combining real-world sounds with electronic processing, especially when you end up with something that’s difficult to identify.
“It creates a sense of energy and unpredictability that fits perfectly with multiplayer.”
