# Adaptive Music Composition for Games

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel adaptive music system for video games that enhances immersion by dynamically integrating cognitive and emotional models with multi-modal composition techniques, improving game experience.

## Contribution

It presents a new Adaptive Music System (AMS) that combines cognitive and emotional models with multi-agent composition for more immersive game music.

## Key findings

- Gamers reported higher immersion with AMS.
- Music better correlated with game-world concepts.
- System successfully integrated into two distinct games.

## Abstract

The generation of music that adapts dynamically to content and actions has an important role in building more immersive, memorable and emotive game experiences. To date, the development of adaptive music systems for video games is limited by both the nature of algorithms used for real-time music generation and the limited modelling of player action, game world context and emotion in current games. We propose that these issues must be addressed in tandem for the quality and flexibility of adaptive game music to significantly improve. Cognitive models of knowledge organisation and emotional affect are integrated with multi-modal, multi-agent composition techniques to produce a novel Adaptive Music System (AMS). The system is integrated into two stylistically distinct games. Gamers reported an overall higher immersion and correlation of music with game-world concepts with the AMS than with the original game soundtracks in both games.