The Frostpunk series composer offers insights into the past, present, and future of 11 bit studios orchestral game scores.
By Jerry Jeriaska
The story of society survival game Frostpunk 2, developed by 11 bit studios, is set in the resource-hungry metropolis of New London in the early 20th century. In an alternate telling of history beset by an apocalyptic volcanic winter, survivors led by the player-as-Steward vie for power by championing strategies for resource acquisition and allocation.
Series composer Piotr Musiał's original soundtrack for Frostpunk 2, out now, is published by Milan Records. In this three-part interview, the musician outlines several key themes from the original Frostpunk score. The discussion explores his methods in discovering a unique sound for the sequel and sheds light on a multiplicity of opportunities on the horizon.
Part One: A Steampunk Vision of Victorian England
In 2018, Frostpunk series composer Piotr Musiał collaborated with the Atom String Quartet of Warsaw, Poland. The composer describes the earliest compositions recorded with the quartet as the most "archaic," incorporating historical stylistic patterns.
"We used solo instruments, string quartet, and a small strings ensemble—the kind of sound that gives you the vibes of the Victorian era," the musician says. "The Romantic harmony from that era is also present in those first main themes."
Musiał noted that these instruments—cello, viola, and violin—could conceivably be owned by the Londoners of Frostpunk before moving north with the onset of the Frost. The game's cinematic intro depicts colossal clouds of volcanic ash blotting out the sun and ushering in a catastrophic New Ice Age. Hence, the soundtrack required dramatic innovations to reflect the genre of dystopian science fiction.
Musiał situated a specific melodic line, played by cello, in the game's opening scene. This "theme that started it all" he designated the "motif of journey." This line plays as the survivors flee in hopes of outrunning the Frost. He would revisit the same melody in the downloadable content expansion, and again in the conclusion of Frostpunk 2, providing an overall sense of continuity.
Evoking the scarcity of available resources and the hazards of the natural environment, Musiał set the music score in a minor key. For in-game music, the placement of cues was oftentimes randomized, so that no two playthroughs sounded alike.
"It is more laid-back music, mostly for the beginning of the game," the composer observes. "These were mostly those ambient, less emotional, less dramatic tracks. We have the string quartet play more and more as the game progresses."
As the gameplay challenges intensify, the composer distinguishes these changes in the score by using motoric techniques and driving harmonic progressions. Added strings and brass instruments punctuate dramatic moments. Leading up to the day of recording "The City Must Survive," the composer determined the intensity should be "dialed up to 'eleven.'"
"The first Great Storm in Frostpunk was really devastating," the composer says of the narrative significance of the climactic final chapter. "It was the first time, so it was the worst time."
Temperatures plummet to record lows in the closing chapter of Frostpunk. For "The City Must Survive," Musiał incorporated a ticking clock to signify the arrival of the impending storm. Violin parts, descending in pitch, signal an irreversible destiny locking into place.
"This violin duet section has a lot of driving force towards the end of the track," the composer observes. “It’s really cool that people noticed this particular musical moment."
Something intended for Frostpunk and the expansion DLC, but never fully explored, was the concept of incorporating a larger ensemble. In scoring Frostpunk 2, that full collaboration with the Sofia Session Orchestra came to fruition, involving the participation of Jagged Alliance 3 composer George Strezov as conductor.
"My acclimation to the new style was also a process," Musiał says of early development on the sequel. "In this case, the game was developed [over the course of] a couple years. I had the privilege of trying things out and getting out of my comfort zone—getting used to new musical decisions for the game. It took time."
The opening cinematic of Frostpunk 2 is set to the music track "The Last Winter." For the composer, writing music for time-locked sequences like the two Frostpunk intros conferred certain advantages.
“[Writing for] cutscenes and cinematics can often be easier than working on gameplay," he says. "The video in linear form and the voiceovers, if we have them, give the composer plenty of clues of what the music should be like. Now it’s just about sending the right message with it.”
After 30 years of relentless whiteouts, the British Empire clings to survival. We view the Captain—the personification of the player's city-structuring role in Frostpunk—now wheelchair bound, observing smokestacks outside his window.
As he cedes power to a more democratized and conflict-ridden authority, contesting factions clamor for their rightful ascendency to power. Familiar motifs from the Frostpunk score give way to a new sound, heard by the ailing Captain as he loses his grip on power. This transition to "dissonant chords, eerie sound design and ominous low strings," the composer consciously intended to be unsettling.
Serving as a bridge between the two series installments, the composer incorporated an overt callback by quoting the Frostpunk main theme. He had previously recorded an arrangement with the Sofia Session Orchestra that he anticipated would figure into development on the sequel, and utilized that piece in the cinematic intro.
Reflecting on his foresight, he concludes, "Sometimes you are lucky to have a good idea and then realize it when the time comes."
Part Two: The Uprising of Oppositional Factions
The setting of Frostpunk 2 presents players with a larger population to manage, while internal strife complicates the Steward's oversight of delegating resources. For the music score, the larger orchestra would be required to elicit more complex emotions. The composer sought a trusted collaborator to partner with him in this creative challenge, and viewed Strezov as a reliable choice in venturing into uncharted territory.
"I knew I wanted George to lead the orchestra on Frostpunk 2," Musiał says of his long-time acquaintance. “I don’t ever have to guide him through the music, whether it’s big, bombastic trailer music or something intimate. He’s very musical, passionate and has a deep love and understanding of music. A genuinely good guy, too.”
For the main theme of Frostpunk 2, Musiał introduces some foreshadowing of the anger roiling beneath the surface of the city's political process. With the citizenry's broadened capacity for marshaling technological resources to withstand the storms comes a hunger for power and agency.
"The theme of Frostpunk 2 is a mixture of different emotions," Musiał explains. "We start with something like a unison orchestra, which spreads out into a chord. This was sort of a symbol of the unity going badly, and the growing dissidence of the people. I use this chord in other ways in the soundtrack, as well as a couple of short musical cues that reoccur in many of those tracks."
This short musical cue, representing a breakup of consensus, operates as something of a signature sound throughout the game, noticeable in moments while setting up outposts and creating settlements. Another instrumentation technique, introduced on strings following this intro, serves as a reminder of the punishing weather conditions.
"The sound of this specific moment in this track, the violins played sul ponticello," the composer says. "It is a specific string bowing technique that gives you this shimmering sound. It is a not-so-nice and not-so-classical sound. It gives a little motion to the sound that makes it unstable and frosty. It literally feels cold or glassy."
Musiał intended to situate the Frostpunk and Frostpunk 2 main themes in one historical and thematic timeline, though much has changed. To strike a balance between old and new elements, the composer experimented with a method of compositional encryption, reordering notes from the Frostpunk theme so they might resonate with returning players on an unconscious level.
"The first four notes are from the Frostpunk 1 theme, but in different order," he reveals. "It’s one of the ways to make a melody feel familiar but new at the same time.”
From the unfamiliar intro, the Frostpunk 2 theme launches into passages from the original "Main Theme" and "The City Must Survive." Even the expansion's "The Last Autumn" theme is subtly present, operating as a "counterpoint melodic line." These familiar motifs grow in intensity and then suddenly vanish. The motif representing civil strife returns on brass, followed by a haunting sound of otherworldly string instruments.
"[It]'s also played sul ponticello," Musiał says of this ominous coda. As with the intro, we are given some foreshadowing of the tumultuous events that will transpire in the latter portion of the game. The soundtrack's occasional use of a post-production technique, where the composer pitched down the orchestra to create an "unreal sound," would figure into the music score on various tracks.
"After the recording I transposed all of the music in this segment an octave lower," the composer explains. "This could not be played by real instruments. This makes the orchestra sound kind of weird—a little unnatural. It's what makes it more disturbing."
These anxious moments serve as an emotional counterbalance against the euphoria of the city's growing confidence. The Steward benefits from thirty years of accumulated knowledge addressing how to defend against the effects of the storms. This optimism can be felt in "The Great Old Enemy." The theme plays during the first encounter with a threat resembling The Great Storm that closes the previous installment.
"The city is no longer so fragile," Musiał observes. "It is prepared."
Once an existential threat, the storms occur frequently in the Utopia Builder mode of the game. Therefore, the composer determined that he would revisit the "The City Must Survive" theme and “give it new meaning" by dialing back the intensity. As with other portions of the soundtrack, the reinterpretation of this theme benefitted from the collaboration of custom makeshift instruments designer Eduard Schneider.
"He is a great enthusiast of music, video-making, and DIY in both instruments and his own steampunk sculptures," the composer says of Schneider's inventions. "Weird stuff, but cool... It felt natural to search after instruments that are not polished and super classical—something that maybe could be created from scrap—from whatever you could find in the world of the game while scouting the Frostlands in search of resources."
Occasionally, Frostpunk 2 incorporates an instrument that sounds like a wailing apparition, dubbed the "ghost cello," which can be heard playing the social dissonance motif in "The Great Old Enemy." In the percussion, there is a driving rhythm meant to galvanize the player's determination. One might be tempted to draw comparisons with the chugging of a locomotive steam engine.
Technological knowhow has granted the city some brief reprieve from the struggle to survive, though powers demanded by the citizenry represent a new threat of destruction from within.
For the backdrop of Fervor Level 3, Musiał composed "Anger." The Faction War theme serves as a dramatic climax, building slowly as the player is tasked with adapting to the most strenuous gameplay challenges. "This chapter can go fifteen minutes, sometimes an hour," the composer explains. It required a new approach to the challenge of providing a musical climax.
Musiał decided he would counter expectations, feeling that a predictably louder and more melodic piece was insufficient to do justice to this climactic gameplay sequence. "This should feel really grand and open," he asserted. "It may sound slow at first, but there’s constant tension both in the music and the orchestra’s performance. The theme that starts the track, after the intro, is really broad. It's in a different time signature, and almost feels like some kind of largo movement."
Added to the forceful, climactic use of brass, the instrumentation also evokes the tense conflicts between the factions. "Underneath there's this underlying, hidden movement, like those kinds of shimmers," he says. "I call them clouds – strings playing very quick spiccato patterns, almost random and out of sync. 'Tonal chaos,' I would say."
In contemplating his strategy, Musiał viewed the climax of Frostpunk 2 as an invitation to adopt a new mindset. Whereas Frostpunk carved out a niche comparable to Vivaldi's use of rhythm in "Winter," the conclusion of Frostpunk 2 should lean into strenuous instrumental performances and grand, long forms along the lines of Mahler.
“Finales of some of Mahler’s symphonies have long and extensive, high power moments," he observes. "They can be exhausting, they are almost too much. But then, once that ends, it all feels justified. You get this sense of relief and accomplishment.”
This strategy would guide "Anger," but a nod to Frostpunk appeared inescapable, so the composer integrated a callback as the music track drew to a close.
“I wanted Anger to bring back more memories from the Great Storm," he says. "And this felt like the right moment to include a section with a similar power to the brass that you find in 'The City Must Survive.' The musicians gave it everything and it sounded huge on the stage.”
There are different variations on the ending theme of Frostpunk 2, depending on actions taken by the player. A more oppressive musical arrangement results from greater casualties, or if the Steward embraces totalitarianism by jailing citizens in large numbers.
Adding a personal touch, the designers included biographical details relating to the character of Lily May, a baby born at the moment when the generator is activated in the opening gameplay sequence. One ending presages a somber future for the metropolis, while another depicts a more hopeful outcome.
Musiał chose to showcase the most optimistic variation, entitled "United," on the soundtrack album. The melodic line played on cello in the opening scene of Frostpunk, the "motif of journey," returns in "United," reminding the player of all that has transpired.
"I really wanted to end Frostpunk 2 with music that would feel like a resolution—something that would reward the player," the composer says. "I went back to the theme that started it all. And it didn’t go unnoticed! It was rewarding to see that players recognized it instantly."
Part Three: Interstellar Clones
In 2022, 11 bit studios unveiled a science fiction title called The Alters. Departing from the society-survival perspective of the Frostpunk franchise, the company's latest original IP centers on a single individual trapped on the base camp of an uninhabited planet.
The studio's premiere playable demo launched during this year's Steam Next Fest event in June, offering players a hands-on impression of the introductory chapter. The story of laborer Jan Dolski asks what would happen if you could change the entire trajectory of a person's life by altering one crucial moment.
For the soundtrack, Musiał sought to create a unique sound for Jan's base and for the alien terrain of the planet. As The Alters depicts a technologically advanced future, the composer decided more synthetic elements should be adopted to set the tone of the science fiction narrative. The composer used post-processing on live elements to create an effect comparable to the "clouds" that figure in Frostpunk 2.
"Strings will not sound like strings. They will sound like a cloud of—maybe synthesizers. Maybe it is something that is difficult to define," the composer says. "There's a lot of abstract synthesizers. To enhance the feeling of instability, I let a reverb ring over it in such a way that it kind of fluctuates in pitch. It's not a typical reverb. It’s a tape-like wobble effect, making it feel unstable."
While collecting resources to build out his base, Jan can access a communications terminal to check in with the supervisor of his imperiled mining mission. Solar radiation inhibits the comms, limiting audio to static-filled sentence fragments. From these conversations Jan deduces that to shield the base from the lethal solar radiation, he will be required to mine a rare mineral, known as "Rapidium."
The designers requested a special musical treatment to communicate the mystery of these crucial mineral resources. The onboard quantum computer, interfacing with this "glitch crystal," allows Jan to clone organic matter. Using a DNA fragment sent over comms by his faceless supervisor, Jan miraculously clones a sheep.
From this first contact with life on the planet—a friend of his own creation—he begins a mission to transform the abandoned base station into his home. Musiał determined a sense of comfort should coalesce through the use of the score, like organic matter being formed into an organism under the influence of Rapidium: “In that base, Jan will feel more at home through the use of the music. He will feel safe. As he goes out to explore the planet, the planet will greet him with this abstract, ambient, maybe sometimes weird music.
“The music of The Alters feels a little unstable, like our protagonist Jan. He is going through a weird adventure. What's cool, I think, about The Alters is that the music will start getting more familiar and structured over time. As we arrive at the end of the game, the themes will have already made their way into your memory.”
Piotr Musiał is a composer and frequent collaborator on 11 bit studios productions – piotrmusial.com | Spotify Artist Page | x.com/pmcomposer