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On a side note, saw a nice write-up celebrating the recent 25th anniversary of Selected Ambient Works Volume II: https://www.residentadvisor.net/reviews/23648

On a side note, saw a nice write-up celebrating the recent 25th anniversary of Selected Ambient Works Volume II: https://www.residentadvisor.net/reviews/23648 https://www.residentadvisor.net/reviews/23648 I feel like that album has a lot of potential for generative experiments. Admittedly, the album has an over-arching tone of eeriness throughout, which isn't something I want to listen to while I work most days. Maybe it would be inspiring to game developers working in the horror genre :)

lostgame 8y ago
Actually, speaking of games with Aphex Twin's music, I'm not sure how many folks here recall the Dreamcast classic 'Rez' - a synesthesic, psychedelic rail-shooter which actually featured a track of his, under his legal name 'Richard D. James'. If you guys haven't played it, seriously give it a shot. I believe there is a re-released version on XBOX and PC, though I can't speak to the quality of the ports, as I still play my Dreamcast almost daily. ;)
- DanBC 8y ago
  Rez is brilliant and I remember my dreamcast fondly. This page seems to say that his music wasn't used in the released version. https://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/10/k-project-rez-prototype/ https://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/10/k-project-rez-prototype/
  - lostgame 8y ago
    Okay, that seems to directly contradict my actual memory of the game! I'm absolutely going to have to confirm that. I distinctly remember reading 'Richard D. James', and recognizing the name, as I was a massive fan of 'Drukqz'. Strange how memory affects us. EDIT: And whom lucky enough to own one does not remember the Dreamcast fondly? ;) Crazy Taxi, Quake III, Skies of Arcadia, Ecco, THPS2 - I'd argue the ratio of quality software to shit software was literally almost 1:1, compared to, for instance, the PS2, where you might get 1 great game for every 10.
    - toast0 8y ago
      I recall there's a Dreamcast disc image floating around somewhere with a different music selection. Depending on where you got your copy of Rez, who knows what you've got. :) I just pulled my dreamcast out to play some of the games with my son. It's still a great system. There are some low quality games, but it definitely feels like you have to seek them out; as opposed to the shovel ware feeling I get on the PS1/PS2. Looking at the released game list though, I feel like some of these titles were probably good at the time, but won't hold up; but many of them are still as good as they were. VGA output is pretty nice too.
- fetus8 8y ago
  All the ports have been fantastic. The PS4 version supports PSVR, and the experience of Rez in VR is quite magical tbh. Tetsuya Mizuguchi, the producer of Rez, also worked on Tetris Effect which has an amazing soundtrack. Tetris Effect feels like a weird cousin of Rez btw!
  - lostgame 8y ago
    >> The PS4 version supports PSVR Oh, fuck off. That's amazing. Colour me almost wanting to grab one. Wish it had a Vive port. I'm not a fan of Tetris. I like games that have a very distinct 'beginning and end of the level' feeling.
    - fluffysandwich 8y ago
      Check out Rez Infinite on Steam. Seems to support Oculus and Vive. (https://store.steampowered.com/app/636450/Rez_Infinite/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/636450/Rez_Infinite/)
      - corysama 8y ago
        Rex Infinite is the only game that I strongly prefer to play on a Vive over a Rift. The Rift is more comfortable, but the Vive has a higher peak brightness. If you crank the settings in the game, the difference between headsets is significant.
- fb03 8y ago
  I played Rez on PS2 and it was amazing. Looking forward to buying Rez Infinite on PC.
- harry8 8y ago
  Ps4 vr port[1]. I say do it. I say it's the only thing with having in vr. I say a bunch of stuff much of it more nonsensical than this. You'll know if you need ps4 vr now or if you don't. There is no trance vibrator or game girl advance review. [1]https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/rez-infinite-ps4/ https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/rez-infinite-ps4/ [Edit] Eh, lots of love lower in the thread. Have this instead... http://www.ultimathule.info/playlists.html http://www.ultimathule.info/playlists.html
neonhomer 8y ago
One thing I like to do is combine the tracks from each disc, so I listen to order like track 1, 13, 2, 14, etc. Most of the beginning tracks are less creepy. Also there is a "missing" 19 track you can preview on his site: https://aphextwin.warp.net/release/68148-aphex-twin-selected-ambient-works-volume-ii https://aphextwin.warp.net/release/68148-aphex-twin-selected....
- stallmanite 8y ago
  I do the same, small world. I find that DrukQS benefits from re-ordering the tracks even more than SAW II.
yonaguska 8y ago
> Admittedly, the album has an over-arching tone of eeriness throughout, which isn't something I want to listen to while I work most days. I think it may have to do with me being ADHD, but I actually like ambient music with a little bit of a stressful edge to it. It gives me a little bit of urgency and controlled stress seems to be my best motivator.
codeulike 8y ago
As mentioned in that article, the eeriness comes from him creating the album through lucid dreaming, allegedly. Here's the original interview about that, its pretty fascinating: Interview with David Toop, March 1994, The Face Broaching this subject of dreams, he becomes animated and talks a long streak. "This album is really specific," he says, "because 70 percent of it is done from lucid dreaming... To have lucid dreams is to be conscious of being in a dream state, even to be capable of directing the action while still in a dream. I've been able to do it since I was little," Richard explains. "I taught myself how to do it and it's my most precious thing. Through the years, I've done everything that you can do, including talking and shagging with anyone you feel that takes your fancy. The only thing I haven't done is tried to kill myself. That's a bit shady. You probably wouldn't wake up, and you wouldn't know if it had worked, anyway. Or maybe you would. "I often throw myself off skyscrapers or cliffs and zoom off right at the last minute That's quite good fun. It's well realistic. Eating food is quite smart. Like tasting food. Smells as well. I make foods up and sometimes they don't taste of anything—like they taste of some weird mish-mash of other things." ... "About a year and a half ago," he says, "I badly wanted to dream tracks. Like imagine I'm in the studio and write a track in my sleep, wake up and then write it in the real world with real instruments. I couldn't do it at first. The main problem was just remembering it. Melodies were easy to remember. I'd go to sleep in my studio. I'd go to sleep for ten minutes and write three tracks - only small segments, not l00 percent finished tracks. I'd wake up and I'd only been asleep for ten minutes. That's quite mental. "I vary the way I do it, dreaming either I'm in my studio, entirely the way it is, or all kinds of variations. The hardest thing is getting the sounds the same. It's never the same. It doesn't really come close to it. When you have a nightmare or a weird dream, you wake up and tell someone about it and it sounds really shit. It's the same for sounds, roughly. When I imagine sounds, they are in dream form. As you get better at doing it, you can get closer and closer to the actual sounds. But that's only 70 percent of it."
- aasasd 8y ago
  I vaguely knew that Richard should be a, ahem, trickster in interviews, but now I have a piece of evidence: hitting REM sleep in ten minutes? Yeah right.

lostgame 8y ago

Actually, speaking of games with Aphex Twin's music, I'm not sure how many folks here recall the Dreamcast classic 'Rez' - a synesthesic, psychedelic rail-shooter which actually featured a track of his, under his legal name 'Richard D. James'. If you guys haven't played it, seriously give it a shot. I believe there is a re-released version on XBOX and PC, though I can't speak to the quality of the ports, as I still play my Dreamcast almost daily. ;)

DanBC 8y ago
Rez is brilliant and I remember my dreamcast fondly. This page seems to say that his music wasn't used in the released version. https://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/10/k-project-rez-prototype/ https://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/10/k-project-rez-prototype/
- lostgame 8y ago
  Okay, that seems to directly contradict my actual memory of the game! I'm absolutely going to have to confirm that. I distinctly remember reading 'Richard D. James', and recognizing the name, as I was a massive fan of 'Drukqz'. Strange how memory affects us. EDIT: And whom lucky enough to own one does not remember the Dreamcast fondly? ;) Crazy Taxi, Quake III, Skies of Arcadia, Ecco, THPS2 - I'd argue the ratio of quality software to shit software was literally almost 1:1, compared to, for instance, the PS2, where you might get 1 great game for every 10.
  - toast0 8y ago
    I recall there's a Dreamcast disc image floating around somewhere with a different music selection. Depending on where you got your copy of Rez, who knows what you've got. :) I just pulled my dreamcast out to play some of the games with my son. It's still a great system. There are some low quality games, but it definitely feels like you have to seek them out; as opposed to the shovel ware feeling I get on the PS1/PS2. Looking at the released game list though, I feel like some of these titles were probably good at the time, but won't hold up; but many of them are still as good as they were. VGA output is pretty nice too.
fetus8 8y ago
All the ports have been fantastic. The PS4 version supports PSVR, and the experience of Rez in VR is quite magical tbh. Tetsuya Mizuguchi, the producer of Rez, also worked on Tetris Effect which has an amazing soundtrack. Tetris Effect feels like a weird cousin of Rez btw!
- lostgame 8y ago
  >> The PS4 version supports PSVR Oh, fuck off. That's amazing. Colour me almost wanting to grab one. Wish it had a Vive port. I'm not a fan of Tetris. I like games that have a very distinct 'beginning and end of the level' feeling.
  - fluffysandwich 8y ago
    Check out Rez Infinite on Steam. Seems to support Oculus and Vive. (https://store.steampowered.com/app/636450/Rez_Infinite/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/636450/Rez_Infinite/)
    - corysama 8y ago
      Rex Infinite is the only game that I strongly prefer to play on a Vive over a Rift. The Rift is more comfortable, but the Vive has a higher peak brightness. If you crank the settings in the game, the difference between headsets is significant.
fb03 8y ago
I played Rez on PS2 and it was amazing. Looking forward to buying Rez Infinite on PC.
harry8 8y ago
Ps4 vr port[1]. I say do it. I say it's the only thing with having in vr. I say a bunch of stuff much of it more nonsensical than this. You'll know if you need ps4 vr now or if you don't. There is no trance vibrator or game girl advance review. [1]https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/rez-infinite-ps4/ https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/rez-infinite-ps4/ [Edit] Eh, lots of love lower in the thread. Have this instead... http://www.ultimathule.info/playlists.html http://www.ultimathule.info/playlists.html

neonhomer 8y ago

One thing I like to do is combine the tracks from each disc, so I listen to order like track 1, 13, 2, 14, etc. Most of the beginning tracks are less creepy. Also there is a "missing" 19 track you can preview on his site: https://aphextwin.warp.net/release/68148-aphex-twin-selected-ambient-works-volume-ii https://aphextwin.warp.net/release/68148-aphex-twin-selected....

stallmanite 8y ago
I do the same, small world. I find that DrukQS benefits from re-ordering the tracks even more than SAW II.

yonaguska 8y ago

> Admittedly, the album has an over-arching tone of eeriness throughout, which isn't something I want to listen to while I work most days. I think it may have to do with me being ADHD, but I actually like ambient music with a little bit of a stressful edge to it. It gives me a little bit of urgency and controlled stress seems to be my best motivator.

codeulike 8y ago

As mentioned in that article, the eeriness comes from him creating the album through lucid dreaming, allegedly. Here's the original interview about that, its pretty fascinating: Interview with David Toop, March 1994, The Face Broaching this subject of dreams, he becomes animated and talks a long streak. "This album is really specific," he says, "because 70 percent of it is done from lucid dreaming... To have lucid dreams is to be conscious of being in a dream state, even to be capable of directing the action while still in a dream. I've been able to do it since I was little," Richard explains. "I taught myself how to do it and it's my most precious thing. Through the years, I've done everything that you can do, including talking and shagging with anyone you feel that takes your fancy. The only thing I haven't done is tried to kill myself. That's a bit shady. You probably wouldn't wake up, and you wouldn't know if it had worked, anyway. Or maybe you would. "I often throw myself off skyscrapers or cliffs and zoom off right at the last minute That's quite good fun. It's well realistic. Eating food is quite smart. Like tasting food. Smells as well. I make foods up and sometimes they don't taste of anything—like they taste of some weird mish-mash of other things." ... "About a year and a half ago," he says, "I badly wanted to dream tracks. Like imagine I'm in the studio and write a track in my sleep, wake up and then write it in the real world with real instruments. I couldn't do it at first. The main problem was just remembering it. Melodies were easy to remember. I'd go to sleep in my studio. I'd go to sleep for ten minutes and write three tracks - only small segments, not l00 percent finished tracks. I'd wake up and I'd only been asleep for ten minutes. That's quite mental. "I vary the way I do it, dreaming either I'm in my studio, entirely the way it is, or all kinds of variations. The hardest thing is getting the sounds the same. It's never the same. It doesn't really come close to it. When you have a nightmare or a weird dream, you wake up and tell someone about it and it sounds really shit. It's the same for sounds, roughly. When I imagine sounds, they are in dream form. As you get better at doing it, you can get closer and closer to the actual sounds. But that's only 70 percent of it."

aasasd 8y ago
I vaguely knew that Richard should be a, ahem, trickster in interviews, but now I have a piece of evidence: hitting REM sleep in ten minutes? Yeah right.