- Joined: 05 Jan 2022
- Posts: 144
|
Proposing standardised role descriptions
 Posted: Mon Feb 20, 2023 1:39 pm
|
Something that has been bothering me a little about the VGMs section is how there doesn't seem to be much consistency in the credits field.
When there aren't any in-game credits to derive a person's role from (which is sadly all too often the case), it seems that anything goes when it comes to settling on a word to describe said role... if one is even included in the first place!
I know that I've found myself alternating between "Music" and "Composer" to describe the same role and have been wondering if this will lead to confusion down the line, which is specifically what has led me to think about this as an issue.
I've contributed to sites like VGMdb where such things tend to be taken a lot more seriously, so if I may draw upon my personal experience a bit I would like to propose a sort-of guideline for how to fill out these fields in the future:
---
- Real names to be used where known (already standard)
- [For further discussion] When companies are credited in-game and the staff responsible are only sometimes known (i.e. Byte Size Sound), maybe the company should be credited with the individual staff responsible in paranthesis?
- Default to existing roles where available, be it from in-game credits or a person's own description of their role
- Credit musicians who both compose and arrange their own music under the encompassing role of Music
- Cases where the person who composed the music and implemented it into the game are seperate should be credited seperately as Composer and Arranger respectively
- If the composer did not compose their songs for the game they appear in (e.g. Mappy appearing in Shanghai II), maybe credit them as the Original Composer?
- [For further discussion] Should composers who composed music for the original version of a game that was then ported to a Sega 8-bit system be credited as a Composer or Original Composer? (I'm leaning towards the former)
- Composers of individual songs (e.g. classical music, Anime openings) are credited with the song's name in italics (already standard)
- For games which contain a mix of both original tunes from the musician working on the game and arranged tunes for other sources... maybe Composer & Arranger?
- [For further discussion] Are people behind sound effects and sound drivers to be credited? There are cases to be made for both (some packs include sound effects, linking sound driver creators help group together soundtracks with the same sound)
---
Any feedback or additional use cases to be addressed? I'm interested to hear them.
|
