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Thank you so much for taking the time to listen and to leave such a thoughtful comment! I appreciate you reading the story I wrote - I try to let my music speak for itself, but since I had such a specific idea for the game story, I wanted to share it with others! 

I would be happy to share my process! BLUE was the first track I wrote and I didn't really have anything in mind before I started other than I really wanted to convey a sense of being underwater in a serene blue environment, so I spent a decent amount of time working on the pads and atmosphere before the piano, which largely started as  improvisation, was added. I think I had images of Finding Nemo in my mind while creating the atmosphere I was going for.  Afterward, I knew I would have limited time during the week because of my work schedule, so I decided to tackle what I knew would be the most time-consuming production which was DEEP. By completing my two biggest tracks first (and FLOW third), I knew that I would also have plenty of time to leave and come back to them with fresh ears after a couple days so I could really fine-tune them.  For the majority of my later projects, I had specific references of other video game water music that I was listening to on repeat since the beginning of the jam to get a feel for the types of compositional tricks that make up a "water" sound. Then for most of the tracks, I took a melody-first approach and filled in the accompaniment after to match the mood and style I was shooting for based on the story elements that I had in mind. I have lots of recordings on my phone of me singing different variations of the melodies before I settled on what became the final versions. :) I'm not a purist when it comes to selection of orchestral instrumentation - my philosophy is that if I have the capability to combine any instruments together, I might as well choose whichever ones fit the needs of my project and the emotions I'm trying to convey. My tracks always start with 10 instruments or so that I think would fit the vibe I'm going for and then I get partway and think "Oh, I need a high-register instrument to fill in the gaps for this melody, maybe a flute would work?", for example. Then as that continues it often snowballs into many additional instruments. I think this is an area of my composition that I could improve in the future, for purposes of time efficiency and acoustic space economy. Then again, I also operate under the mantra that if it sounds good and I like it, then chances are other people might feel the same, whether it is "proper composition" or not. I always seem to still be writing my last track on the final day before the submission is due so SINK (the last track I wrote) maybe didn't get as much revision love as my other tracks, but I think it turned out far better than I was expecting it to! 

This was fun typing out my process. I hope I answered what you were curious about. Thank you so much once again for your support!