It’s been all quiet in terms of my C3/DS world, Artemiidae, ever since the first video update. The lack of updates hasn’t been due to anything negative, though! In fact, I’ve been researching how to change something important in the world. After digging around for ages, I came to the conclusion that it might be helpful for me to share my findings before loading up Artemiidae again. What mysterious project has been occupying my time? Creatures music! Everyone is familiar with the ambient sounds, whether they’re the simple WAV files in C1, or the MNG files in C2 and C3/DS.
The music in all of the Creatures games has always been memorable, at least for me. There was something so mysterious and magical about those short snippets of ambient sound in Creatures 1, and then Creatures 2 introduced a beautifully dynamic form of music. Creatures 3 and Docking Station also expanded on the music that we heard, and I’ve found that many of the tracks set the stage for playing a world. The trouble is that the MNG file format includes multiple tracks, and one must use a program like MNGPlayer to figure out what’s actually included in each file. However, these older programs don’t always work on newer operating systems, so one might never be able to find the names of the tracks. Unimportant? There’s actually a very good reason for knowing the name of the tracks in MNG files! More on that shortly.
For those who don’t have access to a program that can read MNG files, I’ve compiled a list of all of the tracks included with the music of Creatures 2, Creatures 3, and Creatures Docking Station. Remember this resource: It will come in handy for an upcoming C3/DS tutorial, which is explained a little further down! Can you change the music in a metaroom? Read on…
Creatures 2
Music.mng
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BioSpheres
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Birth
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Cellar
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Death
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GeneSplicer
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GrendelLair
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Incubator
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Machinery
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NearDeath
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PowerRoom
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Swamp
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Temple
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Underwater
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UpperLevel
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UpperTemple
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Vents
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Volcano
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Waterfall
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Creatures 3
Bridge.mng
Desert.mng
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Forest
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Main
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Quarry
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Tunnel1
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Tunnel2
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Volcano
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VolcanoControl
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Engineering.mng
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Engineering1
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Engineering2
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Events.mng
Grendel.mng
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Cryogenics
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Ground
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Pond
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Sewer
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Swamp
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Upper
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Main.mng
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AquariumBeach
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AquariumCaves
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AquariumDoor
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AquariumUnderwater
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Corridor
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VivariumCorridor
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VivariumGarden
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VivariumHatchery
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VivariumLearning
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VivariumNursery
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VivariumOrchard
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VivariumPond
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VivariumTreehouse
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Music.mng
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Aquarium
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AquaticPiano
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Bridge
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Desert
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DesertFilter
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EngineRoom
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GrendelLair
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Vivarium
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Creatures Docking Station
DS_Music.mng
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Bleep
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MetallicChords
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StringChords
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StringsFull
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StringSolo
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Tremelo
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TremeloBleep
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In C3/DS, there are a number of third-party metarooms that don’t come with music. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though! It actually opens up the door for each player to use the tracks from the MNG files in different ways. Why? Because music can be assigned to a metaroom with a couple of relatively simple CAOS codes. Grendel Man explained a couple of methods both here and here. I take no credit for knowing how to do this: This list is simply meant to be a resource for those who can’t see the track names inside the MNG files. Up next will be a tutorial showing just how to use musical CAOS in C3/DS metarooms!
Oh nice! Maybe now I can change DS’s whale noises to some of C3’s music. I’ve never liked the music in DS.
Also, I have to disagree about Creatures music. The only memorable tracks for me are C1’s weird blips and bloops and the music from the PS1 games.
I completely agree about the DS music! The only music I can mildly stand from it is in the Norn Meso. Everything else feels odd to me, like it doesn’t quite belong with Creatures. Changing existing music is a little more involved with the CAOS tutorial I’ll be posting, but it’s more a matter of time than difficulty!
C1’s music is still my favorite and most memorable, although I never played the PS1 games. Maybe I also spent far too much time playing the C2 music download from Docking Station Galaxy! If I had to go into it more, though, I would agree with you that in terms of pure memories, Creatures 1 takes the cake. Creatures 2 music is very pretty, but I don’t get as much of that nostalgia when I hear it. I also really like the randomness of the C1 music, and how they added so much atmosphere with just a few seconds of sound.
Thanks for bringing up this interesting file!
I knew C2 music was dynamic and based on environmental changes but thought it was a behaviour hardcoded in the game.
I didn’t know all that mixing information was so easily accessible.
I couldn’t resist throwing together a quick parser/extractor app to investigate the matter (based on GreenReaper’s excellent work and documentation on the file format.)
Maybe you will find it useful too, to avoid manually extracting the various track names in the future or accessing the raw .wav files.
Thanks for pointing me in this direction!
That’s more stuff to learn for me.
A sample parsing script can be found here.
And a binary version for easy usage (just drag & drop a .mng file on the executable, it will extract all information in current path.)
That’s awesome, LoneShee: Thanks so much for sharing those scripts! I love how there’s always something new to learn in Creatures, including things like this. I’ll certainly keep those links in mind should I need any other MNG file help in the future! Well done, as always!
Jessica, I was thinking about extending the DS_Music.mng file to include excerpts from Orbital’s Halcyon On and On. Or better yet, create an event piece that sounds similar with the samples included initially. How do I achieve this?