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127-471: Icewind Dale received positive reviews, being praised for its musical score and gameplay . It was a commercial success, with sales above 400,000 units worldwide by early 2001. An expansion, Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter , was released in 2001, and a sequel, Icewind Dale II , followed in 2002. A remake by Overhaul Games , entitled Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition , was published for several platforms in 2014. Icewind Dale ' s gameplay operates on

254-561: A chiptune rendition of Yellow Magic Orchestra 's " Rydeen " (1979); several later computer games also covered the song, such as Trooper Truck (1983) by Rabbit Software as well as Daley Thompson's Decathlon (1984) and Stryker's Run (1986) composed by Martin Galway . Home console systems also had a comparable upgrade in sound ability beginning with the ColecoVision in 1982 capable of four channels. However, more notable

381-505: A magic mirror , which she asks "Magic mirror on the wall / Who is the fairest of them all?", to which the mirror always replies "You, my queen, are fairest of all." But when Snow White reaches the age of seven, she becomes as beautiful as the day, and when the queen asks her mirror, it responds: "Queen, you are full fair, 'tis true, but Snow White is fairer than you." There is no uniformity among believers, in how seriously they prefer to take such tales and superstitions. The Hermetic Order of

508-411: A paper-doll style inventory system, the storyline is divided into chapters, and there is a journal system archiving quests and notable entries on specific story-related information from non-player characters . Players begin the game by creating an adventuring party of up to six characters, either by creating new characters or importing those from a previous game. Each new character created requires

635-586: A "mild surprise" and noted that the game was "doing well". It was the country's 16th-best-selling computer game for the month of June. After retaining position 4 in its second week, it dropped to sixth place in its third week. Computer Games Magazine reported that Icewind Dale was among the titles that "dominated the retail charts in the U.S. for the month of July". It was the United States' sixth-highest computer game seller of July and 16th-highest of August, moving 21,923 units and earning $ 1.05 million during

762-488: A "new high watermark for what music in games could sound like." The soundtrack for Streets of Rage 2 (1992) in particular is considered "revolutionary" and "ahead of its time" for its blend of house music with " dirty " electro basslines and " trancey electronic textures" that "would feel as comfortable in a nightclub as a video game." Another important FM synth composer was the late Ryu Umemoto , who composed music for many visual novels and shoot 'em ups during

889-527: A CD drive supported 32 channels of PCM at the same resolution as the original PlayStation. In 1996, the Nintendo 64 , still using a solid-state cartridge, actually supported an integrated and scalable sound system that was potentially capable of 100 channels of PCM, and an improved sample rate of 48 kHz. Games for the N64, because of the cost of the solid-state memory, typically had samples of lesser quality than

1016-495: A DAC engine of one or more streams. Only a minority of developers ever used Amiga-style tracker formats in commercial PC games, ( Unreal ) typically preferring to use the MT-32 or AdLib/SB-compatible devices. As general purpose PCs using x86 became more ubiquitous than the other PC platforms, developers drew their focus towards that platform. The last major development before streaming music came in 1992: Roland Corporation released

1143-461: A MIDI controller to run the sequence. However, different products used different sounds attached to their MIDI controllers. Some tied into the Yamaha FM chip to simulate instruments, some daughterboards of samples had very different sound qualities; meaning that no single sequence performance would be accurate to every other General MIDI device. All of these considerations in the products reflected

1270-490: A MIDI controller) to give it the features of a fully integrated card. Unlike the standards of Amiga or Atari , a PC using x86 even then could be using a broad mix of hardware. Developers increasingly used MIDI sequences: instead of writing soundtrack data for each type of soundcard, they generally wrote a fully featured data set for the Roland application that would be compatible with lesser featured equipment so long as it had

1397-493: A My MLB sound track feature that allows the user to play music tracks of their choice saved on the hard drive of their PS3, rather than the preprogrammed tracks incorporated into the game by the developer. An update to Wipeout HD , released on the PlayStation Network, was made to also incorporate this feature. In the video game Audiosurf , custom soundtracks are the main aspect of the game. Users have to pick

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1524-519: A PC, inserting custom music into the stations is done by placing music files into a designated folder. For the Xbox version, a CD must be installed into the console's hard drive. For the iPhone version of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars , players create an iTunes playlist which is then played by the game. Scrying Scrying , also referred to as "seeing" or "peeping," is a practice rooted in divination and fortune-telling . It involves gazing into

1651-502: A Yamaha chip, the YM2612 ), but largely held the same approach to sound design. Ten channels in total for tone generation with one for PCM samples were available in stereo instead of the NES's five channels in mono, one for PCM. As before, it was often used for percussion samples. The Genesis did not support 16-bit sampled sounds. Despite the additional tone channels, writing music still posed

1778-513: A bowl of water or a magic mirror to see the future while he was in trance. Divination is briefly mentioned in chapter 44 of the Book of Genesis . A silver chalice or cup is deliberately planted in Benjamin's sack when he leaves Egypt, later to be used as evidence of theft. It is revealed the cup belongs to Joseph, the vizier of Egypt, whose steward said it was used for drinking and divination during

1905-577: A challenge to traditional composers and it forced much more imaginative use of the FM synthesizer to create an enjoyable listening experience. The composer Yuzo Koshiro utilized the Genesis hardware effectively to produce " progressive , catchy, techno -style compositions far more advanced than what players were used to" for games such as The Revenge of Shinobi (1989) and the Streets of Rage series, setting

2032-447: A cross between sequencing samples, and streaming music is used. Games such as Republic: The Revolution (music composed by James Hannigan ) and Command & Conquer: Generals (music composed by Bill Brown) have utilised sophisticated systems governing the flow of incidental music by stringing together short phrases based on the action on screen and the player's most recent choices (see dynamic music ). Other games dynamically mixed

2159-493: A cursed barbarian spirit named Kresselack ( Tony Jay ) who tells them that the threat lies elsewhere. Reporting this back to the druid, Arundel instructs the group to retrieve an ancient scrying item called the Heartstone Gem, so that he may discover the source of the evil more quickly. After finding the gem was stolen from its original resting place within a temple, the party travel to the caverns of Dragon's Eye, finding

2286-516: A dynamic approach to video game music, using at least eleven different gameplay tracks, in addition to level-starting and game over themes, which change according to the player's actions. This was further improved upon by Namco's 1982 arcade game Dig Dug , where the music stopped when the player stopped moving. Dig Dug was composed by Yuriko Keino, who also composed the music for other Namco games such as Xevious (1982) and Phozon (1983). Sega 's 1982 arcade game Super Locomotive featured

2413-526: A few 1st level spells selected for their spellbook and then one memorised for use at the start of the game. Once a party is created, characters earn experience points in the game through completing quests and defeating enemies, and level up upon earning enough. Leveling up will automatically increase a character's hit points , grants spellcasters access to more spell slots including higher levels of magic, sometimes allows additional weapon proficiencies, and allows thieves to improve their thieving abilities. In

2540-482: A focused state that reduces mental clutter, enabling the emergence of visual images. These initial images, however trivial, are amplified during the trance. Some scryers report that they hear their voice affirming what they see, creating a mental feedback loop. Throughout history, various traditions and cultures have practiced scrying as a means of revealing the past, present, or future. The practice involves diverse media, from reflective surfaces to shimmering mirages, and

2667-534: A game's title screen, menus, and gameplay. Game soundtracks can also change depending on a player's actions or situation, such as indicating missed actions in rhythm games , informing the player they are in a dangerous situation, or rewarding them for specific achievements. Video game music can be one of two kinds: original or licensed . The popularity of video game music has created education and job opportunities, generated awards, and led video game soundtracks to be commercially sold and performed in concerts. At

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2794-462: A gameplay feature, with the game generating levels based entirely on the music on whatever CD the player inserted. Microsoft's Xbox allowed music to be copied from a CD onto its internal hard drive, to be used as a "Custom Soundtrack", if enabled by the game developer. The feature carried over into the Xbox 360 where it became supported by the system software and could be enabled at any point. The Wii

2921-443: A loop, though it was dynamic and interacted with the player, increasing pace as the enemies descended on the player. The first video game to feature continuous, melodic background music was Rally-X , released by Namco in 1980, featuring a simple tune that repeats continuously during gameplay . The decision to include any music into a video game meant that at some point it would have to be transcribed into computer code. Some music

3048-540: A lot of depth". IGN scored it 8.8/10 and GameZone gave it 9.5/10. According to GameSpy 's Allen Rausch, " Icewind Dale was a fun dungeon romp that can hold its head up high, even if it can't match its big brothers". The game's music score by Jeremy Soule received widespread critical acclaim. Chris Chan of the New Straits Times said the game was one of the best he ever played, and went on to positively compare it with Diablo II . The strongest criticism

3175-540: A mandatory century of imprisonment at the hands of the adventurers that is now close to end, and that he will soon walk the Prime Material once more to seek his revenge. (see Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear ) Icewind Dale is based on the BioWare Infinity Engine , featuring pre-rendered backgrounds and sprite-based characters displayed with an isometric camera perspective. This engine

3302-428: A medium, hoping to receive significant messages or visions that could offer personal guidance, prophecy , revelation , or inspiration. The practice lacks a definitive distinction from other forms of clairvoyance or divination but generally relies on visions within the chosen medium. Unlike augury , which interprets observable events, or divination, which follows standardized rituals, scrying's impressions arise within

3429-400: A mental feedback loop. Practitioners apply the process until they achieve a satisfactory state of perception in which rich visual images and dramatic stories seem to be projected within the medium itself, or in the mind's eye of the scryer. They report that the technique allows them to see relevant events or images within the chosen medium. Nostradamus practiced scrying; he would stare into

3556-404: A mirror in a darkened room (often on Halloween ) could catch a glimpse of their future husband's face in the mirror — or a skull personifying Death if their fate was to die before they married. Another form of the tale, involving the same actions of gazing into a mirror in a darkened room, is used as a supernatural dare in the tale of " Bloody Mary ". Here, the motive is usually to test

3683-488: A music file to be analyzed. The game will generate a race track based on tempo, pitch and complexity of the sound. The user will then race on this track, synchronized with the music. Games in the Grand Theft Auto series have supported custom soundtracks, using them as a separate in-game radio station. The feature was primarily exclusive to PC versions, and was adopted to a limited degree on console platforms. On

3810-412: A nomination for the " PC Role-Playing " award, which was ultimately given to Diablo II . In the United States, Icewind Dale debuted at #4 on PC Data 's weekly computer game sales rankings for June 25–July 1, 2000, following the title's release on the 30th. Domestic sales for the period totaled 39,285 copies, which drew revenues of $ 1.71 million. Mark Asher of CNET Gamecenter called this performance

3937-406: A number of the missing villagers being held there by lizard men . They eventually find the gem being used by a powerful Marilith named Yxunomei ( Tara Strong ). After killing Yxunomei and retrieving the gem, the party return to find Kuldahar under attack by Orogs , and Arundel mortally wounded by a shapeshifter disguised as the archdruid, who taunts them before vanishing. The true Arundel advises

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4064-463: A pseudo fourth sound channel. Its comparatively low cost made it a popular alternative to other home computers, as well as its ability to use a TV for an affordable display monitor. Approach to game music development in this time period usually involved using simple tone generation and/or frequency modulation synthesis to simulate instruments for melodies, and use of a "noise channel" for simulating percussive noises. Early use of PCM samples in this era

4191-492: A similar basis to that of Baldur's Gate in that it incorporates a modified version of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition ruleset in which the rules' intricacies are automatically computed; the game keeps track of statistics and controls dice rolling. It has a similar user interface with minor cosmetic changes, and focuses mainly on combat, often against large groups of enemies, with dialogue driving

4318-662: A single note long, and play it back through the computer's sound chip from memory. This differed from Rally-X in that its hardware DAC was used to play back simple waveform samples, and a sampled sound allowed for a complexity and authenticity of a real instrument that an FM simulation could not offer. For its role in being one of the first and affordable, the Amiga would remain a staple tool of early sequenced music composing, especially in Europe . The Amiga offered these features before most other competing home computer platforms though

4445-658: A song "Goal Scoring Superstar Hero". These songs used long vocal samples. A similar approach to sound and music developments had become common in the arcades by this time and had been used in many arcade system boards since the mid-1980s. This was further popularized in the early 1990s by games like Street Fighter II (1991) on the CPS-1 , which used voice samples extensively along with sampled sound effects and percussion. Neo Geo 's MVS system also carried powerful sound development which often included surround sound . The evolution also carried into home console video games, such as

4572-612: A song (often not American) that is upbeat and has lots of rhythm. The inclusion on the FIFA soundtrack has given many artists exposure that helped launch their music careers. Sequencing samples continue to be used in modern gaming where fully recorded audio is not viable. Until the mid-2000s, many larger games on home consoles used sequenced audio to save space. Additionally, most games on the Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS used sequenced music due to storage limitations. Sometimes

4699-565: A sound card) would actually handle all the decompressing. Fifth generation home console systems also developed specialised streaming formats and containers for compressed audio playback. Games would take full advantage of this ability, sometimes with highly praised results ( Castlevania: Symphony of the Night ). Games ported from arcade machines, which continued to use FM synthesis, often saw superior pre-recorded music streams on their home console counterparts ( Street Fighter Alpha 2 ). Even though

4826-475: A video game was to use digital means, where a specific computer chip would change electrical impulses from computer code into analog sound waves on the fly for output on a speaker. Sound effects for the games were also generated in this fashion. An early example of such an approach to video game music was the opening chiptune in Tomohiro Nishikado 's Gun Fight (1975). While this allowed for

4953-497: Is also able to play custom soundtracks if it is enabled by the game ( Excite Truck , Endless Ocean ). The PlayStation Portable can, in games like Need for Speed Carbon: Own the City and FIFA 08 , play music from a Memory Stick . The PlayStation 3 has the ability to utilize custom soundtracks in games using music saved on the hard drive, however few game developers used this function. MLB 08: The Show , released in 2008, has

5080-669: Is common for X-games sports-based video games to come with some popular artists recent releases ( SSX , Tony Hawk , Initial D ), as well as any game with heavy cultural demographic theme that has tie-in to music ( Need For Speed: Underground , Gran Turismo , and Grand Theft Auto ). Sometimes a hybrid of the two are used, such as in Dance Dance Revolution . Many sports game titles like Madden NFL , NBA 2K , and FIFA use popular and underground songs in their soundtrack to give their menus atmosphere. The phrase "FIFA song" has become popular in recent years, it describes

5207-411: Is no clear limit to the coining and application of such terms and media. Scrying has been practiced in many cultures in the belief that it can reveal the past, present, or future. Some practitioners assert that visions that come when one stares into the media are from the subconscious or imagination , while others say that they come from gods , spirits, devils , or the psychic mind, depending on

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5334-500: Is no special limitation on the preferences or prejudices of the scryer; some may stare into pitch dark, clear sky, clouds, shadows, or light patterns against walls, ceilings, or pond beds. Some prefer glowing coals or shimmering mirages . Some simply close their eyes, notionally staring at the insides of their own eyelids, and speak of "eyelid scrying". Scrying media generally either suggest images directly (such as figures in fire, fluid eddies, or clouds), or else they distort or reflect

5461-419: Is often accompanied by rituals inducing altered states of consciousness . Despite its popularity in occult circles and its portrayal in media, scrying lacks empirical support and is met with skepticism from the scientific community. There is no definitive distinction between scrying and other aids to clairvoyance , augury , or divination , but roughly speaking, scrying depends on impressions of visions in

5588-538: Is regarded as amounting in essence to extrasensory perception . Scrying is neither a single, clearly defined, nor formal discipline and there is no uniformity in the procedures, which repeatedly and independently have been reinvented or elaborated in many ages and regions. Furthermore, practitioners and writers coin terminology so arbitrarily, and often artificially, that no one system of nomenclature can be taken as authoritative and definitive. Commonly terms in use are Latinisations or Hellenisations of descriptions of

5715-452: Is the soundtrack that accompanies video games . Early video game music was once limited to sounds of early sound chips , such as programmable sound generators (PSG) or FM synthesis chips. These limitations have led to the style of music known as chiptune , which became the sound of the first video games. With technological advances, video game music has grown to include a wider range of sounds. Players can hear music in video games over

5842-477: The Commodore 64 and NES, which resulted in the chiptune genre. The release of a freely-distributed Amiga program named Soundtracker by Karsten Obarski in 1987 started the era of MOD -format which made it easy for anyone to produce music based on digitized samples. Module files were made with programs called " trackers " after Obarski's Soundtracker. This MOD/tracker tradition continued with PC computers in

5969-522: The Fifth Generation . In 1994, the CD-ROM equipped PlayStation supported 24 channels of 16-bit samples of up to 44.1 kHz sample rate, samples equal to CD audio in quality. It also sported a few hardware DSP effects like reverb . Many Square titles continued to use sequenced music, such as Final Fantasy VII , Legend of Mana , and Final Fantasy Tactics . The Sega Saturn also with

6096-680: The Macintosh which had been introduced a year earlier had similar capabilities. The Amiga's main rival, the Atari ST , sourced the Yamaha YM2149 Programmable Sound Generator (PSG). Compared to the in-house designed Amiga sound engine, the PSG could only handle 1 channel of sampled sound, and needed the computer's CPU to process the data for it. This made it impractical for game development use until 1989 with

6223-516: The Motorola 68000 CPU and accompanying various Yamaha YM programmable sound generator sound chips allowed for several more tones or "channels" of sound, sometimes eight or more. The earliest known example of this was Sega 's 1980 arcade game Carnival , which used an AY-3-8910 chip to create an electronic rendition of the classical 1889 composition " Over The Waves " by Juventino Rosas . Konami 's 1981 arcade game Frogger introduced

6350-577: The NEC PC-8801 and PC-9801 in the early 1980s, and by the mid-1980s, the PC-8801 and FM-7 had built-in FM sound. The sound FM synth boards produced are described as "warm and pleasant sound". Musicians such as Yuzo Koshiro and Takeshi Abo utilized to produce music that is still highly regarded within the chiptune community. The widespread adoption of FM synthesis by consoles would later be one of

6477-617: The PC speaker , and some proprietary standards such as the IBM PCjr 3-voice chip. While sampled sound could be achieved on the PC speaker using pulse width modulation, doing so required a significant proportion of the available processor power, rendering its use in games rare. With the increase of x86 PCs in the market, there was a vacuum in sound performance in home computing that expansion cards attempted to fill. The first two recognizable standards were

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6604-573: The Roland MT-32 , followed by the AdLib sound card. Roland's solution was driven by MIDI sequencing using advanced LA synthesizers. This made it the first choice for game developers to produce upon, but its higher cost as an end-user solution made it prohibitive. The AdLib used a low-cost FM synthesis chip from Yamaha, and many boards could operate compatibly using the MIDI standard. The AdLib card

6731-559: The TurboGrafx-CD RPG franchises Tengai Makyō , composed by Ryuichi Sakamoto from 1989, and the Ys series , composed by Yuzo Koshiro and Mieko Ishikawa and arranged by Ryo Yonemitsu in 1989. The Ys soundtracks, particularly Ys I & II (1989), are still regarded as some of the most influential video game music ever composed. However, there were several disadvantages of regular CD-audio. Optical drive technology

6858-592: The 1990s. As the cost of magnetic memory declined in the form of diskettes , the evolution of video game music on the Amiga, and some years later game music development in general, shifted to sampling in some form. It took some years before Amiga game designers learned to wholly use digitized sound effects in music (an early exception case was the title music of text adventure game The Pawn , 1986). By this time, computer and game music had already begun to form its own identity, and thus many music makers intentionally tried to produce music that sounded like that heard on

6985-528: The 1990s. Examples of Amiga games using digitized instrument samples include David Whittaker 's soundtrack for Shadow of the Beast , Chris Hülsbeck 's soundtrack for Turrican 2 and Matt Furniss's tunes for Laser Squad . Richard Joseph also composed some theme songs featuring vocals and lyrics for games by Sensible Software most famous being Cannon Fodder (1993) with a song "War Has Never Been So Much Fun" and Sensible World of Soccer (1994) with

7112-482: The Atari 2600 and several late Famicom titles. These chips add to the existing sound capabilities. From around 1980, some arcade games began taking steps toward digitized, or sampled , sounds. Namco's 1980 arcade game Rally-X was the first known game to use a digital-to-analog converter (DAC) to produce sampled tones instead of a tone generator. That same year, the first known video game to feature speech synthesis

7239-483: The CD while retrieving game data exclusively from the hard disk, thereby allowing the game CD to be swapped for any music CD. The first PC game to introduce in-game support for custom soundtracks was Lionhead Studio's Black & White . The 2001 game included an in-game interface for Winamp that enabled the players to play audio tracks from their own playlists. In addition, this would sometimes trigger various reactions from

7366-460: The CD, allowed for much lower latency and seek time when finding and starting to play music, and also allowed for much smoother looping due to being able to buffer the data. A minor drawback was that use of compressed audio meant it had to be decompressed which put load on the CPU of a system. As computing power increased, this load became minimal, and in some cases, dedicated chips in a computer (such as

7493-568: The CD-ROM itself. The popularity of the Super NES and its software remained limited to regions where NTSC television was the broadcast standard. Partly because of the difference in frame rates of PAL broadcast equipment, many titles released were never redesigned to play appropriately and ran much slower than had been intended, or were never released. This showed a divergence in popular video game music between PAL and NTSC countries that still shows to this day. This divergence would be lessened as

7620-628: The Golden Dawn (1888-c.1902 in its original form) taught their own version of scrying that could be done individually or as a group. It emphasized three levels: Scrying is not supported by science as a method of predicting the future or obtaining information unavailable to empirical investigation. Some critics consider it to be a pseudoscience . Skeptics consider scrying to be the result of delusion or wishful thinking . Psychologist Leonard Zusne suggested that scrying images are hallucinations or hypnagogic experiences. A 2010 paper in

7747-515: The Luremaster , in early July 2001. During the creation of Heart of Winter and Trials of the Luremaster , Black Isle developed ideas for a full sequel, Icewind Dale II . It entered production in late July 2001, just as the Black Isle's Torn project was scrapped, according to designer Dave Maldonado. Discussing the rationale behind Icewind Dale II , designer J. E. Sawyer said that it

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7874-685: The Run , International Karate ), Koji Kondo ( Super Mario Bros. , The Legend of Zelda ), Miki Higashino ( Gradius , Yie-Ar Kung Fu , Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ), Hiroshi Kawaguchi ( Space Harrier , Hang-On , Out Run ), Hirokazu Tanaka ( Metroid , Kid Icarus , EarthBound ), Martin Galway ( Daley Thompson's Decathlon , Stryker's Run , Times of Lore ), David Wise ( Donkey Kong Country ), Yuzo Koshiro ( Dragon Slayer , Ys , Shinobi , ActRaiser , Streets of Rage ), Mieko Ishikawa ( Dragon Slayer , Ys ), and Ryu Umemoto ( visual novels , shoot 'em ups ). By

8001-423: The adolescent gazers' mettle against a malevolent witch or ghost , in a ritual designed to allow the scryers' easy escape if the visions summoned prove too frightening. Folklore superstitions such as those just mentioned, are not to be distinguished clearly from traditional tales, within which the reality of such media are taken for granted. In the fairytale of Snow White for example, the jealous queen consults

8128-501: The audio stream. Manipulating the stream any further would require a far more significant level of CPU power available in the 5th generation. Some games, such as the Wipeout series, continued to use full Mixed Mode CD audio for their soundtracks. This overall freedom offered to music composers gave video game music the equal footing with other popular music it had lacked. A musician could now, with no need to learn about programming or

8255-416: The chip itself. Konami 's 1983 arcade game Gyruss used five synthesis sound chips along with a DAC, which were used to create an electronic version of J. S. Bach 's Toccata and Fugue in D minor . Beyond arcade games, significant improvements to personal computer game music were made possible with the introduction of digital FM synth boards , which Yamaha released for Japanese computers such as

8382-409: The city, the group eventually come across the source of the evil – a priest named Brother Poquelin ( John Kassir ). Poquelin reveals himself to be a demon who was exiled from his home realm by his superiors, and that both he and Yxunomei maintained a vendetta against each other that was getting out of control. Predicting she would follow him to the material plane , the demon sought a base of operation in

8509-424: The composition of a sequenced soundtrack. Being able to play one's own music during a game in the past usually meant turning down the game audio and using an alternative music player. Some early exceptions were possible on PC/Windows gaming in which it was possible to independently adjust game audio while playing music with a separate program running in the background. Some PC games, such as Quake , play music from

8636-495: The course of his accusation. This is mentioned to reinforce his disguise as an Egyptian nobleman. Nothing in the book of Genesis indicates that Joseph actually used the cup for divination. The Shahnameh , a 10th-century epic work narrating historical and mythological past of Persia , gives a description of what was called the Cup of Jamshid ( Jaam-e Jam ), which was used by the ancient (mythological) Persian kings for observing all of

8763-519: The culture and practice. There is neither any systematic body of empirical support for any such views in general however, nor for their respective rival merits; individual preferences in such matters are arbitrary. The media most commonly used in scrying are reflective, refractive, translucent, or luminescent surfaces or objects such as crystals , stones , or glass in various shapes such as crystal balls, mirrors , reflective black surfaces such as obsidian, water surfaces, fire , or smoke , but there

8890-415: The expedition, but did not count on the adventurers' survival being a problem until they recovered the Heartstone Gem, forcing him to eliminate Arundel. Despite the party having found someone else to use it, Poquelin had managed to build up his forces, which he soon sent to Easthaven. After a brief battle with Poquelin, the party finds itself transported back to Easthaven, which is now in ruins. After freeing

9017-742: The fifth generation of home consoles launched globally, and as Commodore began to take a back seat to general-purpose PCs and Macs for developing and gaming. Though the Mega CD/Sega CD, and to a greater extent the PC Engine in Japan, would give gamers a preview of the direction video game music would take in streaming music, the use of both sampled and sequenced music continues in game consoles even today. The huge data storage benefit of optical media would be coupled with progressively more powerful audio generation hardware and higher quality samples in

9144-450: The first General MIDI card, the sample-based SCC-1 , an add-in card version of the SC-55 desktop MIDI module. The comparative quality of the samples spurred similar offerings from Soundblaster, but costs for both products were still high. Both companies offered 'daughterboards' with sample-based synthesizers that could be later added to a less expensive soundcard (which only had a DAC and

9271-670: The game #3 on his list of "The 10 Greatest Dungeons and Dragons Videogames" in 2015. Kevin Rice reviewed the PC version of the game for Next Generation , rating it four stars out of five, and stated that "a huge, engrossing game with the most action in the Forgotten Realms series, Icewind Dale earns its place on the hard drive of any self-respecting RPG fan". During the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences ' 4th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards , Icewind Dale received

9398-518: The game architecture itself, independently produce the music to their satisfaction. This flexibility would be exercised as popular mainstream musicians would be using their talents for video games specifically. An early example is Way of the Warrior on the 3DO , with music by White Zombie . A more well-known example is Trent Reznor 's score for Quake . An alternate approach, as with the TMNT arcade,

9525-409: The game systems were capable of "CD quality" sound, these compressed audio tracks were not true "CD quality." Many of them had lower sampling rates, but not so significant that most consumers would notice. Using a compressed stream allowed game designers to play back streamed music and still be able to access other data on the disc without interruption of the music, at the cost of CPU power used to render

9652-624: The generation could boast similar abilities yet did not have the same circulation levels as the Super NES. The Neo-Geo home system was capable of the same powerful sample processing as its arcade counterpart but was several times the cost of a Super NES. The Sega CD (the Mega CD outside North America) hardware upgrade to the Mega Drive (Genesis in the US) offered multiple PCM channels, but they were often passed over instead to use its capabilities with

9779-428: The high cost of memory storage which rapidly declined with the optical CD format. Taking entirely pre-recorded music had many advantages over sequencing for sound quality. Music could be produced freely with any kind and number of instruments, allowing developers to simply record one track to be played back during the game. Quality was only limited by the effort put into mastering the track itself. Memory space costs that

9906-530: The inclusion of music in early arcade video games , it was usually monophonic , looped or used sparingly between stages or at the start of a new game, such as the Namco titles Pac-Man (1980) composed by Toshio Kai or Pole Position (1982) composed by Nobuyuki Ohnogi. The first game to use a continuous background soundtrack was Tomohiro Nishikado 's Space Invaders , released by Taito in 1978. It had four descending chromatic bass notes repeating in

10033-562: The introduction of FM (Frequency Modulation) synthesis, providing more organic sounds than previous PSGs. The first such game, Marble Madness used the Yamaha YM2151 FM synthesis chip. As home consoles moved into the fourth generation , or 16-bit era, the hybrid approach (sampled and tone) to music composing continued to be used. The Sega Genesis offered advanced graphics over the NES and improved sound synthesis features (also using

10160-501: The late 1980s, video game music was being sold as cassette tape soundtracks in Japan, inspiring American companies such as Sierra , Cinemaware and Interplay to give more serious attention to video game music by 1988. The Golden Joystick Awards introduced a category for Best Soundtrack of the Year in 1986, won by Sanxion . Some games for cartridge systems have been sold with extra audio hardware on board, including Pitfall II for

10287-612: The latter month alone. The game remained in PC Data's weekly top 10 until the week ending August 5. Three days later, Interplay's Brian Fargo noted that Icewind Dale was "selling beyond our forecasts and in number one position[s] in certain European territories". According to Chart-Track , Icewind Dale was the United Kingdom's best-selling computer game for its debut week, breaking Diablo II ' s three-week streak in

10414-598: The lifetime domestic sales of Icewind Dale had reached 270,000 copies ($ 9.5 million), while the Icewind Dale franchise together had sold 580,000 units domestically. In August 2006, Edge ranked the original Icewind Dale as the United States' 74th-best-selling computer game, and best-selling Icewind Dale title, released since January 2000. Due to the early sales performance of Icewind Dale , Interplay and Black Isle Studios put an expansion pack , Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter , into development within two weeks of

10541-459: The main story. The player is able to order a character(s) to engage in movement, dialogue, combat, or other actions such as pickpocketing within each game location. Combat has a real-time as opposed to a turn-based system, though with the option of pausing at any time so the player can give the party orders which are carried out when the game is resumed. Like other D&D -based games developed and/or published by Black Isle, Icewind Dale employs

10668-479: The major advances of the 16-bit era , by which time 16-bit arcade machines were using multiple FM synthesis chips. One of the earliest home computers to make use of digital signal processing in the form of sampling was the Amiga in 1985. The computer's sound chip featured four independent 8-bit digital-to-analog converters . Developers could use this platform to take samples of a music performance, sometimes just

10795-505: The media or activities. Examples of names coined for crystal gazing include 'crystallomancy', 'spheromancy', and ' catoptromancy '. As an example of the looseness of such terms, catoptromancy should refer more specifically to scrying by use of mirrors or other reflective objects rather than by crystal gazing. Other names that have been coined for the use of various scrying media include anthracomancy for glowing coals, turifumy for scrying into smoke, and hydromancy for scrying into water. There

10922-690: The medium itself. The terminology and methods of scrying are diverse and lack a standardized structure. Practitioners coin terms such as "crystallomancy," "spheromancy," or " catoptromancy ," naming practices based on the medium or technique employed. These practices have been reinvented throughout history, spanning cultures and regions. Scrying media encompass reflective, refractive, or luminescent surfaces like crystals, mirrors, water, fire, or smoke. Some practitioners even close their eyes, engaging in "eyelid scrying." Methods of scrying often induce self-induced trances , using media like crystal balls or even modern technology like smartphones . Practitioners enter

11049-441: The medium might reduce visual stimuli to thresholds below which any clear impressions could interfere with fancied visions or free association. Examples include darkened reflections of night sky, or plain shadow or darkness. One class of methods of scrying involves a self-induced trance , with or without the aid of a medium such as a crystal ball or, even via modern technology such as a smartphone among other things. Some say that

11176-479: The medium of choice. Ideally in this respect it differs from augury, which relies on interpretations of objectively observable objects or events (such as flight of birds); from divination, which depends on standardized processes or rituals; from oneiromancy , which depends on the interpretation of dreams; from the physiological effects of psychoactive drugs ; and from clairvoyance, which notionally does not depend on objective sensory stimuli. Clairvoyance in other words,

11303-745: The month. According to PC Gamer US , it also achieved "high sales" in Germany, where it debuted in 17th place on the computer game sales charts in July. After peaking at #5 the following month, it claimed places 16 and 29 in September and October before exiting Germany's top 30. By the end of 2000, Icewind Dale had sold 145,564 copies and earned $ 6.8 million in the United States, according to PC Data. Its sales by early 2001 totaled more than 350,000 units worldwide, including 45,000 units in Germany. Global sales had surpassed 400,000 units by April 2001. As of 2006,

11430-460: The observers' vision confusingly, in the manner to be seen in crystals or transparent balls. Such fancies have long been satirised by sceptics, for example in Hamlet III.ii: Do you see yonder cloud that's almost in shape of a camel? By the mass, and 'tis like a camel, indeed. Methinks it is like a weasel. It is backed like a weasel. Or like a whale? Very like a whale. Alternatively

11557-420: The original game's launch. Producer Darren Monahan said that the team "included a lot of fan feedback, particularly relating to the balances of each of the classes in the original game." Another focus lay on importing code and features created for Baldur's Gate II to the Icewind Dale series. Heart of Winter was officially released on February 21, 2001. The game was followed by a downloadable add-on, Trials of

11684-453: The other two, however, and music tended to be simpler in construct. The more dominant approach for games based on CDs, however, was shifting toward streaming audio. In the same timeframe of the late 1980s to mid-1990s, the IBM PC clones using the x86 architecture became more ubiquitous, yet had a very different path in sound design than other PCs and consoles. Early PC gaming was limited to

11811-540: The party to take the Heartstone to Larrel ( Michael Bell ) at the fortress of the Severed Hand, the only one capable of using it now, before dying from his wounds. Arriving at the fortress, the party discover that Larrel is insane, and complete a task to help him regain his sanity. Using the gem, Larrel discovers the source of the evil to reside in the former dwarven city of Dorn's Deep. Fighting their way through

11938-431: The player to provide them with their name, gender, race, class, and alignment , and then determine their ability scores and weapon proficiencies. The class of a character affects what alignments are available to them, what weapons and combat styles they can use, and how proficient they can be in them. Characters designated as thieves require the player to allocate points to the various thieving skills, and spellcasters need

12065-458: The player's Creature, like dancing or laughing. Some PlayStation games supported this by swapping the game CD with a music CD, although when the game needed data, players had to swap the CDs again. One of the earliest games, Ridge Racer , was loaded entirely into RAM, letting the player insert a music CD to provide a soundtrack throughout the entirety of the gameplay. In Vib Ribbon , this became

12192-469: The portal and seals it off at the cost of his life. The party then fights Poquelin in his true form as the devil Belhifet, and manage to defeat him, banishing him to the Nine Hells and escaping the tower as it collapses. In time, Easthaven eventually recovers, and the town is reconstructed. In a twist ending , it is revealed that the game's narrator ( David Ogden Stiers ), was really Belhifet, who spent

12319-454: The potential to produce much more realistic sounds, each sample required much more data in memory . This was at a time when all memory, solid-state ( ROM cartridge ), magnetic ( floppy disk ) or otherwise was still very costly per kilobyte . Sequenced soundchip-generated music, on the other hand, was generated with a few lines of comparatively simple code and took up far less precious memory. Arcade systems pushed game music forward in 1984 with

12446-427: The region to form a military force that could crush her. While doing so, he stumbled upon the ancient artifact Crenshinibon , which he claims had been "calling" to him. Poquelin immediately used its power to help him amass an army to conquer the lands of Icewind Dale , until Yxunomei's activities around Kuldahar led to the formation of Hrothgar's expedition. Seeking to stop it, the demon had his frost giant minions crush

12573-481: The region. It dropped to third place the following week, before falling to seventh. Discussing Icewind Dale ' s chart performance, a writer for PC Zone mentioned being "a little surprised at seeing Diablo II capitulate so easily, especially to Icewind Dale , despite the success of Baldur's Gate ". Icewind Dale was the United Kingdom's third-best-selling computer title in August, placing above Diablo II for

12700-425: The relaxation response , or possibly by hypnosis . Once this stage is achieved, the scryer may begin free association with the perceived images. The technique of deliberately looking for and declaring these initial images aloud, however trivial or irrelevant they may seem to the conscious mind, attempts to deepen the trance state. In this state some scryers hear their own disassociated voices affirming what they see, in

12827-562: The release of the Atari STE which used DMA techniques to play back PCM samples at up to 50 kHz. The ST, however, remained relevant as it was equipped with a MIDI controller and external ports. It became the choice of by many professional musicians as a MIDI programming device. IBM PC clones in 1985 would not see any significant development in multimedia abilities for a few more years, and sampling would not become popular in other video game systems for several years. Though sampling had

12954-765: The release of the Super Famicom in 1990, and its US/EU version Super NES in 1991. It sported a specialized custom Sony chip for both the sound generation and for special hardware DSP. It was capable of eight channels of sampled sounds at up to 16-bit resolution, had a wide selection of DSP effects, including a type of ADSR usually seen in high-end synthesizers of the time, and full stereo sound. This allowed experimentation with applied acoustics in video games, such as musical acoustics (early games like Super Castlevania IV , F-Zero , Final Fantasy IV , Gradius III , and later games like Chrono Trigger ), directional ( Star Fox ) and spatial acoustics ( Dolby Pro Logic

13081-410: The sensation is drug-like, some that various drugs can potentiate the experience; others categorically exclude any connection with drug usage, believing that it invalidates any images observed. Many practitioners say that the scrying medium initially serves to focus attention, removing unwanted thoughts from the mind in much the same way as repetition of a mantra , concentration on a mandala , inducing

13208-762: The sequel Icewind Dale II and its expansion, was released in 2003. All four games were released again in Black Isle Compilation – Part Two in 2004, in Ultimate Dungeons & Dragons in 2006, and in Atari 's Rollenspiele: Deluxe Edition in 2007. Icewind Dale was again re-released on October 6, 2010, complete with expansion packs on GOG.com . A remake of Icewind Dale was developed by Beamdog 's Overhaul Games and published by Atari for Windows, OS X, Linux , Android , and iOS in 2014. Video game music Video game music ( VGM )

13335-609: The seven layers of the universe. The cup was said to contain an elixir of immortality, but without cogent explanation for any relevance of the elixir to the scrying function. In the late 1820s, Joseph Smith founded the Latter Day Saint movement based in part on insights gained from the reflections of seer stones . Smith had at least three separate stones which he used initially in treasure-hunting expeditions. Subsequently, he took to placing his favorite stone inside his hat to read what he said were miraculous reflections from

13462-565: The shaman Jerrod who led the barbarians in the conflict. Gaining entry into the demon's crystal tower that enveloped the temple, the group discover that Poquelin's true intention was to reopen the portal contained within the Stone, allowing him to conquer the North with an army of devils at his command. Although he successfully achieves this, Everard, having shunned the tale of Jerrod's sacrifice until finally understanding what he did, throws himself into

13589-558: The snowboarder lands, the music resumes regular playback until its next "cue". The LucasArts company pioneered this interactive music technique with their iMUSE system, used in their early adventure games and the Star Wars flight simulators Star Wars: X-Wing and Star Wars: TIE Fighter . Action games such as these will change dynamically to match the amount of danger. Stealth-based games will sometimes rely on such music, either by handling streams differently, or dynamically changing

13716-458: The sound effect. The mid-to-late 1980s software releases for these platforms had music developed by more people with greater musical experience than before. Quality of composition improved noticeably, and evidence of the popularity of the music of this time period remains even today. Composers who made a name for themselves with their software include Koichi Sugiyama ( Dragon Quest ), Nobuo Uematsu ( Final Fantasy ), Rob Hubbard ( Monty On

13843-452: The sound on the game based on cues of the game environment. As processing power increased dramatically in the 6th generation of home consoles, it became possible to apply special effects in realtime to streamed audio. In SSX , a recent video game series, if a snowboarder takes to the air after jumping from a ramp, the music softens or muffles a bit, and the ambient noise of wind and air blowing becomes louder to emphasize being airborne. When

13970-493: The stone. Smith also said he possessed a pair of spectacles manufactured from seer stones, which he called the Urim and Thummim and which he said enabled him to translate the golden plates that are the stated source of the Book of Mormon . Rituals that involve many acts similar to scrying in ceremonial magic are retained in the form of folklore and superstition. A formerly widespread tradition held that young women gazing into

14097-407: The surviving villagers, the local cleric of Tempus, Everard, informs the party that Poquelin is going after Jerrod's Stone, a mystical object housed under the town's temple, which acts as a seal on a portal to the Nine Hells of Baator. Originally opened during a major historic battle between the combined might of the barbarian tribes and an army of a powerful mage, it was sealed shut by the sacrifice of

14224-428: The time video games had emerged as a popular form of entertainment in the late 1970s, music was stored on physical media in analog waveforms such as cassette tapes and phonograph records . Such components were expensive and prone to breakage under heavy use, making them less than ideal for use in an arcade cabinet , though in rare cases such as Journey , they were used. A more affordable method of having music in

14351-496: The town of Easthaven, a party of adventurers are met in the tavern by the town's leader, Hrothgar (voiced by Jim Cummings ), who invites them to join him on an expedition to investigate the town of Kuldahar, after reports of strange happenings there. On the road to Kuldahar, the expedition is ambushed by frost giants, who cause an avalanche that blocks the path back to Easthaven. With only the adventurers surviving, they continue to Kuldahar and meet with Arundel (also voiced by Cummings),

14478-510: The village's archdruid , who explains that a mysterious evil force has been kidnapping villagers, causing abnormal weather patterns, provoking monsters, and reducing the magical warmth provided by the giant tree that towers over the village. Asking for their help to discover the source of the evil, the adventurers begin by searching the Vale of Shadows, an area containing Kuldahar's crypts, due to rumours of undead creature sightings. They encounter

14605-564: Was about "limiting risks and maximizing our chances for a popular title". Announced in February 2002, Icewind Dale II shipped on August 27, 2002. Icewind Dale and Heart of Winter were re-released in two budget packages in 2002, entitled Icewind Dale: The Collection and Icewind Dale: Complete . They were re-released again in 2002 alongside Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment in Black Isle Compilation . A collector's edition called Icewind Dale: The Ultimate Collection , which included

14732-403: Was also released: Sunsoft's shoot 'em up game Stratovox . Around the same time, the introduction of frequency modulation synthesis ( FM synthesis ), first commercially released by Yamaha for their digital synthesizers and FM sound chips , allowed the tones to be manipulated to have different sound characteristics, where before the tone generated by the chip was limited to the design of

14859-408: Was limited to short sound bites ( Monopoly ), or as an alternate for percussion sounds ( Super Mario Bros. 3 ). The music on home consoles often had to share the available channels with other sound effects. For example, if a laser beam was fired by a spaceship, and the laser used a 1400 Hz square wave, then the square wave channel that was in use by music would stop playing music and start playing

14986-410: Was original, some was public domain music such as folk songs. Sound capabilities were limited; the popular Atari 2600 home system, for example, was capable of generating only two tones at a time. As advances were made in silicon technology and costs fell, a definitively new generation of arcade machines and home consoles allowed for great changes in accompanying music. In arcades, machines based on

15113-492: Was previously a concern was somewhat addressed with optical media becoming the dominant media for software games. CD quality audio allowed for music and voice that had the potential to be truly indistinguishable from any other source or genre of music. In fourth generation home video games and PCs this was limited to playing a Mixed Mode CD audio track from a CD while the game was in play (such as Sonic CD ). The earliest examples of Mixed Mode CD audio in video games include

15240-599: Was still limited in spindle speed, so playing an audio track from the game CD meant that the system could not access data again until it stopped the track from playing. Looping , the most common form of game music, was also a problem as when the laser reached the end of a track, it had to move itself back to the beginning to start reading again causing an audible gap in playback. To address these drawbacks, some PC game developers designed their own container formats in house, for each application in some cases, to stream compressed audio. This would cut back on memory used for music on

15367-496: Was that the gameplay was too uniform and was mostly combat-focused, with little interaction or investigation. Bob Low of the Daily Record noted technical issues such as poor pathfinding and occasional crashes. PC Zone criticized its similarities to previous Infinity Engine games. IGN ranked Icewind Dale No. 6 on their list of "The Top 11 Dungeons & Dragons Games of All Time" in 2014. Ian Williams of Paste rated

15494-650: Was the Japanese release of the Famicom in 1983 which was later released in the US as the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985. It was capable of five channels, one being capable of simple PCM sampled sound. The home computer Commodore 64 released in 1982 was capable of early forms of filtering effects, different types of waveforms and eventually the undocumented ability to play 4-bit samples on

15621-536: Was to take pre-existing music not written exclusively for the game and use it in the game. The game Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter and subsequent Star Wars games took music composed by John Williams for the Star Wars films of the 1970s and 1980s and used it for the game soundtracks. Both using new music streams made specifically for the game, and using previously released/recorded music streams are common approaches for developing sound tracks to this day. It

15748-464: Was used in some games, like King Arthur's World and Jurassic Park ), as well as environmental and architectural acoustics ( A Link to the Past , Secret of Evermore ). Many games also made heavy use of the high-quality sample playback capabilities ( Super Star Wars , Tales of Phantasia ). The only real limitation to this powerful setup was the still-costly solid state memory . Other consoles of

15875-472: Was used to power Black Isle Studios' previous games Planescape: Torment , Baldur's Gate , and others. Icewind Dale was released in 2000 in North America on June 29, Australia on July 7, and Europe on July 21 for Windows by Interplay Entertainment . Developed by Contraband Entertainment and published by MacPlay , a port for Mac OS and Mac OS X was released on March 26, 2002. Icewind Dale

16002-530: Was usurped in 1989 by Creative 's Sound Blaster , which used the same Yamaha FM chip in the AdLib, for compatibility, but also added 8-bit 22.05 kHz (later 44.1 kHz) digital audio recording and playback of a single stereo channel. As an affordable end-user product, the Sound Blaster constituted the core sound technology of the early 1990s; a combination of a simple FM engine that supported MIDI, and

16129-565: Was well received by critics, scoring 86% from GameRankings and 87/100 from Metacritic . Computer Gaming World , GameSpot , The Electric Playground and CNET Gamecenter nominated it as the top computer role-playing game of 2000, although all four awards went to Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn . GameSpot 's Greg Kasavin gave the game 8.6/10, opining it is "well suited for fans of Black Isle Studios' previous games, fans of classic hack-and-slash AD&D computer games, and anyone looking for an action-packed role-playing game with

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