Matchstick Studios
8 person team
Jan 2025 - May 2025
Burning Daylight
First-Person Horror Farming Sim
Composer / Sound Designer
Overview
This game was interesting to work on because it utilized a gradually shifting
gameplay tone. The daytime segment begins normally, with the sun rising
and a refreshing instrumental volume swell, but the atmosphere changes
until the music completely drops out with a haunting note and night arrives.
Night is when the player faces the monster and must fight or hide.
This game's soundtrack was not extensive, but it did allow me to dabble
in genres I normally don't get to. I decided on "tricking" the player into thinking
the game would be peaceful with calm music, then gradually adding dissonance to the soundtrack
in order to build apprehension.
Main Menu Theme
This is a very sparse track (it has only two instruments). A lonesome guitar twangs on the left while a baleful harmonica cries on the right. I also added wind effects to increase the feeling of isolation. This track is just ambiguous enough to not inform the player of the game's true nature.
Daytime Theme
This track plays when the player begins the game at sunrise. A refreshing, jubilant
explosion of instruments greets the player, then a short pause comes. The drums kick in
and double-tracked acoustic guitars begin playing a simple theme. Organ and harmonica begin
trickling into the arrangement as it goes on.
Halfway through, the song halts again. The drums kick in a second time, but now
the acoustic guitars are playing in a minor key. Dissonance emerges at the endpoint, and
the music fades away as the organ holds a spooky chord, heralding nightfall.
Victory Theme
This track plays if the player wins by surviving the night. Electric guitar, organ, bass, drums, and harmonica all take their own place in the mix. It makes the player feel cheerful, relieved, and a bit whimsical.
Defeat Theme
This track plays if the player loses by dying to the monster at night. It's a slowed down and heavily affected version of the main menu theme. The slowdown, delay, and reverb all combine to make the song even more somber than it originally was.
Defeat Theme (unused)
This was the original defeat theme. It consists of the daytime music reversed, heavily distorted through tape emulations, and affected with tape delays and other warping effects. I think this is a more effective defeat theme than the one the team decided on in the end.