Thanks for giving these a listen, glad you liked them!
Funny thing is, with most of the songs I've composed until now, I ended up following a very similar approach to how I design KS levels: I start by trying out different samples/instruments in a single pattern, until I suddenly think
"Hey, this sounds like it could be a track for a [insert game genre / scenario here]!"... and then I compose the rest of the song with that in mind
For the
Star Carvo soundtrack, my main source of inspiration were classic shoot'em up games from the Genesis/MegaDrive era (e.g. Zero Wing, Thunder Force...). In
An Underwater Melody, all instruments are based on OPL2/3 FM synth samples, so the end result is very reminiscing of old DOS adventure games with AdLib/Soundblaster music (and probably heavily influenced by the games I played in my youth... hopefully I didn't plagiarize something inadvertedly!)