the challenge

Hours of non-repeating music, in a small game.

A short-session game played again and again needs hours of music that follows what happens on screen and never gets tiresome. With recorded tracks, that means hundreds of megabytes of audio and loops you recognize within ten minutes.

the problemVariety without weight

Different music every game, changing with how you play, and small enough for a web game and an Android app with no big downloads.

the approachA composer with rules

Instead of playing songs back, an engine composes them as they play, with the rules a composer would use for each genre, and synthesizes every sound live with WebAudio.

the workshopA studio to design it

Tuning the engine meant hearing it, playing with it and measuring it. That is how AP-STUDIO BEATWAVE came to be: the same engine with controls, screens and mixing tools, where what you hear in the game comes from.

who and with whatHuman direction, a single file

Design, composition and direction: Daniel J. Campos Lozada (NoamDan). JavaScript and WebAudio in a single page: every sound is synthesized in its own code, and automated tests render tracks and measure them.

how it composes

From three notes to a whole song.

The engine works like a methodical composer: first a small idea you can remember, then the phrase, and finally the form. Every track grows from a seed, which is written down in its info sheet.

MotifA cell of 3 to 6 notes with its own rhythm. It has a character: catchy, singable or rhythmic.
An 8-bar phraseThe motif comes back as an echo, a sequence or a fragment, climbs to a high point and resolves. The Openness knob decides how much it changes: to the left it repeats almost unchanged; to the right it leaps and uses passing notes.
A song with a formThe phrase is spread over parts: intro, A, B, break and outro. Each genre has its own forms (Pop, EDM, Lo-fi, Hip-hop, Cinematic and others), and the engine picks among the ones that fit.

EDM form · 160 bars · the song in the screenshots

Intro16 bars
A16 bars
B32 bars
Break32 bars
A16 bars
B32 bars
Outro16 bars

The “your hook” panel: a 5-note motif and its appearances across 8 bars, each colored by its role — **The hook.** The motif (pink) and how it returns across the 8 bars: each color is a role (echo, sequence, fragment, high point, ending). Tap any screenshot to see it full size.

The hook’s rules

Strong beats and long notes always land on chord tones.
Passing notes that resolve by step.
No leaps wider than a sixth, within a limited range.
7 melody shapes (call and response, AABA, ABAC, 1- and 2-bar riffs, long notes, short phrase) and 7 endings.
In the B part, the hook moves up a third.

The “song” panel: 7 parts on a timeline and a description of each — **The song.** What the engine built from that hook: an intro without melody, the A part with the hook as is, the B part higher and with more energy, the break at half speed.

Harmony that never clashes

harmonyBy genre and by mode

A 4-chord progression, curated for each genre or freshly built and functional (tonic, pre-dominant, dominant), always in the song’s key. Color (7ths, 9ths, add9, sus2, sus4, 6ths) is picked only from what sounds right in the scale: tested on 600 tracks, not a single clash.

voicingVoice leading

Chords are voiced for the smallest movement from one to the next, including the jump from the last back to the first. Across 1400 progressions, none moves more than before and 732 move less.

b partIts own chords in B

The B part uses another progression in the same key, starting on a different chord with a bit more color; it can also switch scale while keeping the tonic. Tested on 240 tracks: the B hook always lands on chord tones.

second voiceCountermelody

A soft second voice, an octave below, that answers the hook in its gaps with chord tones stepping down. It plays in the B part and in the last A.

The chords panel: progression with full chord names, a piano showing the notes, a chord keyboard, strumming, the nine gestures and per-part development — **Chords.** A colored progression, a keyboard that plays chords from the scale, strumming, gestures and per-part development (B-part chords and countermelody).

genres, meters and seasons

17 genres, each with its own rules.

A genre is more than a tempo: it brings its drums, its swing, its sounds, its song forms and its own way of humanizing. These are the 17, with their typical tempos.

Lofi channel70–90 bpm
Lofi house lounge112–124 bpm
Raw lofi house122–130 bpm
Chill synthwave85–115 bpm
Melodic techno + trance126–135 bpm · game
Melodic / afro house120–128 bpm · game
Liquid DnB168–174 bpm · game
Melodic jungle160–170 bpm · game
Neurofunk170–178 bpm · game
Boss theme120–160 bpm · game
Chiptune110–150 bpm
Pocket 4-bit100–140 bpm
Ambient50–70 bpm
Cinematic60–90 bpm
Boom-bap hip-hop85–95 bpm
Trap / drill130–145 bpm
UK garage130–135 bpm

The ones marked “game” are the genres grouped by the Mixing view’s “Game journey” shortcut. Tempo can be changed by hand; the Studio tells you when it falls outside the genre’s typical range.

6 time signatures4/4 · 3/4 · 6/8 · 12/8 · 5/4 · 7/8

Drums are rewritten for each one: the waltz in 1-2-3, 6/8 in two beats, 5/4 as 3+2, 7/8 as 2+2+3. Bass, chords and melody adapt to the new meter. You pick it when generating or live.

9 seasonsFrom Day of the Dead to winter

Halloween, Day of the Dead, Christmas, New Year, Meteor Shower, Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. Each one adds its own progressions to any genre, plus sound layers: trumpets and bells for Day of the Dead, sleigh bells and choir for Christmas, a countdown and fireworks for New Year. In automatic mode, the season comes from the date.

9 gesturesWhat happens at each change

Swell, Rise, Sweep, Hits and Reverse before the B part; Sink and Tape Stop before the break; Cascade and Bell Toll as the A part comes in and at the end. Each one lands exactly on the change of part; the engine chooses by genre and never repeats the last one it used.

Halloween, for example, always plays in harmonic minor or Phrygian and adds a detuned music box, tremolo strings, a heartbeat every 8 bars and whispers.

it sounds human

Neither perfect nor sloppy: human.

A machine that plays perfectly in time sounds like a machine. The Studio nudges every hit and every note a little, the way each genre would, and leaves the accents alone.

knobHuman

100% is each genre’s own amount, 0% is dead on the grid, and it goes up to 167%. It never goes beyond ±20% velocity or ±25 ms, and full-strength hits and the song’s first step are never touched. It moves drums, melody, bass and chords, and it is in every view.

dynamicsGroup pumping

The kick pushes the rest of the mix down, like sidechain in electronic music, with its own amount for each group of instruments and a release time that follows the tempo.

drumsFills

Before an A or B part comes in, the snare plays a fill on the last beat of the bar, the way a drummer would. It can be switched off in the engine options.

notesLegato

Melody, chords and long synth each have a Legato knob: from a clipped note to one that holds and joins the next with no gap. Every sound comes with its own default.

dj-style mixing

A radio station that never ends.

In the Mixing view, the engine creates one track after another and blends them on two decks, like a DJ: one fades down as the other comes up, the bass swaps halfway through the blend, the tempo glides from one track to the next, and only compatible keys meet (the same key, a fifth or a fourth).

The Mixing view mid-blend: waveforms for decks A and B, cover art, each track’s parts and the mixer with its knobs and crossfader — **The Mixing view** blending two tracks with the “Game journey” shortcut. The cover art comes from the game’s own cover engine.

set arcWaves that peak with a boss

Waves (default): warm-up, rise, a boss-theme peak and a breather, over 4 to 6 tracks; each wave starts a little higher. Long climb: about 14 tracks rising to the boss and 3 to close. Steady: even energy.

the next trackRelated tracks

With “Relative”, the next track shares a compatible key, a neighboring mood, a tempo from the same family (no jumps above 12%), half of the sounds and a hook with the same motif rhythm and different notes. Measured over 12 tracks: about 5 of 8 sounds carry over and there are no tempo jumps. “Cousin” and “Free” loosen it up.

simulationVirtual player

The Mixing view can imagine someone playing: if they advance, the wave climbs; if they get stuck, the wave holds and the energy drops a little. It is the same idea as in the game, where the music follows how you are playing.

release-ready export

From idea to distributor-ready files.

Export builds a .zip with what a distributor asks for to release on Spotify and other platforms. The song is rendered offline, about 15 times faster than listening to it.

aurora-lights/
  aurora-lights.wav    24-bit WAV · 44.1 kHz
  aurora-lights.mp3    MP3 320 kbps
  stems/               one WAV per active channel
  portada-3000.jpg     3000 × 3000 cover art
  ficha.txt · .json    the song’s metadata
  cancion.json         the project, to edit it

Loudness: −14 LUFS integrated, measured with the streaming standard (ITU BS.1770), and a −1 dBTP true peak measured between samples, the way Spotify and YouTube measure it. Tested: −14.0 LUFS in both WAV and MP3.
Pre-export check: Before exporting, without changing anything, it checks peaks, true peak, clipping, mono compatibility, DC offset and extreme lows or highs in the raw mix.
Reference track: With a reference track loaded, the Studio compares loudness, true peak, stereo width and balance by range, and suggests which channel to adjust. The file is analyzed on the device, never uploaded.
Balance diagnosis: It measures the mix in third-octave bands against its own slope, names the symptom (muddy, boxy, harsh, boomy, thin), solos each channel to find the culprit and offers one button per fix. Fixes are applied by hand, one at a time: it is a guide, not the absolute truth.
Info sheet: Title, artist, collection, composer, genre, tempo, key, progression, form, length and seed. It fills itself in.

The Export screen: the pre-export check with every item passing, the destination, the audio files and the song’s info sheet — **Export** with the pre-export check already run and the self-filling info sheet.

ask in words

Describe it and the engine builds it.

In “Ask for a track in words” you type what you want, and the Studio picks up genre, key, mode, tempo, time signature, instruments and a few reference artists.

The “Ask for a track in words” box with a typed request, example chips and what the Studio understood — **“Melodic house in A minor at 124 bpm with electric piano”** (typed in Spanish). Below, what it understood: genre, tempo, key and sound.

What you write wins over what a reference suggests.
If it understands nothing, it asks instead of making things up.
A reference is an approximation of the recipe, not a copy.
It works offline: it recognizes keywords inside the page itself and sends your text nowhere.

Requests it understands

lofi in A minor at 85 bpm with piano
sad cinematic in 3/4
dark trap at 140 bpm
calm ambient at 60 bpm

The Studio’s interface is in Spanish, but the box also understands these English keywords.

in the game

The same engine you hear when you play.

The Studio starts from the game’s music engine, with the same music-theory tables, and gives it controls. That is why what gets tried here can make its way back into the game.

gameplayMusic that follows your level

In Asteroid Pong the music starts in techno and moves through drum & bass and jungle all the way to breakcore, from 124 to 194 BPM, following your level and how you are playing.

bossesA theme for every boss

Every boss has its own theme, between 166 and 176 BPM. In the Studio, “Boss theme” is one more genre, and in the Mixing view every wave of the set peaks with a boss.

jukeboxThree sound styles

The game’s jukebox plays the boss themes in modern, pocket 4-bit and chiptune: the same three sound modes you choose in the Studio.

compare“Game original”

A switch plays the melody, bass and sounds exactly as they are in the game today, to compare them with what is new.

back to the gameFrom the Studio to the game

The first thing to move from the Studio into the game is three new bass tones (sub, body and reese), which the game’s engine can pick alongside the original. The game’s melodies, genres and effects stay as they are.

Play the demo The music on the game page → The jukebox and radios, in the wiki →

how it is built

A single file, in the browser.

Every sound is synthesized live with WebAudio, the browser’s audio API. The whole Studio, MP3 encoder included, is a single web page.

One view per device

Desktop: rack, song list and mixer, to produce with a mouse. iPad: scenes and an XY pad, to play live with your fingers. Phone: a groovebox, for quick sketches. The mixer, with low cut, width and pan on every channel, is in all three.

A clock that never stumbles

Notes are scheduled at least 300 ms ahead, and further on slow devices: the Studio measures how long it takes to redraw the screen and adapts. Effects land on the exact time of their step. In a test with the processor slowed down six times: zero late notes (before, up to 161 ms late).

XY pad and automation

Seven effect scenes: filter, mood + energy, delay, stutter, gate, sidechain and reverb echo. REC records the pad and the knobs as automation.

Voted-on sounds

Every sound went through a separate Sound Lab, where it was voted to stay, go, or remain only as a manual pick.

The Studio on a phone: a display with mood, key, genre and tempo, pads for the 8 channels and the melody editor — **Groovebox**, the phone view.

what we learned

What the project taught us.

melodyRules before randomness

The first melodies were random walks: technically in key, but with nothing to remember. What made them catchy were simple craft rules: a motif that returns, chord tones on strong beats and passing notes that resolve.

qualityMeasure, don’t guess

Every promise became a test: no chord clashes across 600 tracks, −14.0 LUFS measured with the streaming standard, true peak below −1 dBTP. Nearly 50 automated tests render audio and measure it before every change.

timingThe clock is non-negotiable

A late note is audible even when the screen looks perfect. Separating UI drawing from the clock and letting the look-ahead adapt to the device brought late notes to zero, even with the processor slowed down six times.

soundThe ear decides

Every sound went through a voting lab: it stays, it goes, or it remains a manual pick. Numbers help find problems, but what gets released is decided by a person listening.

credits and transparency

An engine suggests. A person decides.

Asteroid Pong’s music and AP-STUDIO BEATWAVE are composed and directed by Daniel J. Campos Lozada, who releases music as NoamDan, in Buenos Aires. The engine suggests hooks, forms and sounds; what stays, what changes and what gets released is decided by a person.

That is why every info sheet the Studio exports says so (in Spanish):

«música creada con un motor procedural y dirección humana»
“music created with a procedural engine and human direction”

The MP3 encoder is lamejs (LGPL-3.0 license).

ap-studiobeatwave