Pikmin 2 - Wistful Wild (Patreon)

Pikmin 2 is one of my favorite games ever. Pikmin 1 was already great, but adding in terrifying semi-randomly generated dungeons, quirky treasures, and several funny little guys (Volatile Dweevil) really gave the game its own identity.

Something else Pikmin 2 did quite successfully was the incorporation of Dynamic Music - The soundtrack seamlessly adds in layers of new instruments based on whether the Pikmin were fighting, working, or simply standing next to a weird plant. In today's arrangement, each loop highlights one if these layers: it progresses through a normal loop, a working loop, a fighting loop, and then ends with a sundown loop.

There's a lot to talk about with this one, so let's dive in:

@0:00 - The instrumentation in Pikmin 2 is fairly unique, so mimicking the sound of the original plucked string instrument required a lot of layering. What you hear in the beginning is a combination of Harpsichord, Sitar, Dulcimer, Cimbalom, and Acoustic Guitar. The instrument that appears almost immediately after that is actually a string bass played very high in its register (with some slight echo and detuning). I thought it gave off a very unrecognizable sound that was fitting for a "sci-fi autumn" zone. 

@0:10 - The original flute in this song has a very exaggerated, overblown quality to it so in addition to an Alto + Bass Flute I also layered it with an old Bottle Blowing sampler instrument. 

@0:57 - Did you know that a Celeste sounds really cool when you detune it a bit? 

The lead instrument here is also a string bass, but with quite a bit of processing on it. You've got some compression, a trash filter, a bit of EQ and echo on there to give it that exaggerated sound. The result is an instrument that cuts through everything else and is very dry yet oppressive. 

The background melody is a Koto + a plucky synth with fast vibrato. Synths are always a great tool to get some melody lines to moved to the front of a mix. 

@1:35 - The "Working" loop begins here. I try to have each section "bleed" into the next one a bit. The Hi-Hat rhythm can be heard briefly before the change, and a reverse Piano sample propels us into the more intense section. Doing this can really help a tone transition feel less jarring, as it kinda prepares our ears for what's to come. It's not so different from a suspended cymbal roll.

The defining instruments of this section are the Piano and Bass. The short notes of the Piano lay out a marching rhythm, and the Bass counters this by playing in a pseudo-polyrhythmic style. (Don't fact check this lmao). The Drums are an addition of this arrangement that I used to help fortify the Piano's metronomic rhythm. Also, a glide-y synth joins all the plucked instruments to keep that line audible.

@1:44 - Since a lot of intense elements have been added, an Accordion helps play the melody so it can be heard over the rhythm section.

@2:31 - The Marimba can more clearly be heard here acting as a "metronome." 

@3:09 - Onward to the "Fight" loop. This loop is not too unlike the Working version, but the addition of new percussion gives it a more militaristic vibe. There are 3 Snares, a Timpani, and Tubular Bells. The lead-in to this section is the same 2-bar snare rhythm, but reversed! 

@3:37 - Ok this is probably where I took the most creative liberty: I ditched the snares and added in a distorted drum loop I designed. I thought it would really amp up the intensity and give the music an "actively in battle" quality. The drum loop has a lot of effects placed on it, but it mostly breaks down to distortion, weird reverb, compression, and filtering. It ended up reminding me a bit of the drums in Strawberry Fields Forever. 

@4:43 - This is the "Sunset" loop. A much-needed respite after the noisiness from before. I'm going to take a moment to talk about the difficulties of mixing a piece with multiple "moods" like this.

More often than not, using blanket processing on a piece with varying intensities can be problematic - For example, mixing a piece that starts out with orchestra and then descends into an orchestral+metal breakdown can create issues when listening to each section separately.

If you mix the orchestra with a bias towards the metal instruments the solo orchestra section at the beginning will potentially sound light and empty, and if you mix biased to the orchestra the metal section will sound bloated later on.

The solution to this is very, very simple but frustrating. You essentially have to mix two separate songs (or in the case of today's arrangement, three) and process them separately. This can create a lot of clutter in your DAW if you duplicate tracks, so more realistically you'd be tackling this with intensive automation. Automation can be super finicky and annoying depending on the DAW, but it's ultimately worth it to keep your track sounding consistent across several tone/genre changes. If your EQ plugin offers Dynamic EQ nodes, this can also work as a patch job to temporarily cancel out clashing frequencies.

ANYWAY, that about wraps up this breakdown! I hope you liked this one. I'm very excited for Pikmin 4's release, but I'm also so nervous. I hope it's good! In fact, On Pikmin 4's release date (July 21st) I'll have another Pikmin 2 arrangement ready to go.

But for now, have a good Sunday and if you have any questions about this piece let me know in the comments!