SimAnimals Original Videogame Score

From year to year the female part of society is more and more often choosing video games as their entertainment. So, for instance, as early as several years ago it was hard to believe that someday there’d be such web-sites and social network sites as Girl Gamer or Women Gamers. But they have appeared and pretty quickly I should say. One more interesting fact is that the number of women working in the game industry is also on the rise (nowadays there’re lots of female programmers, artists, even composers) and the competition between men and women is really cut-throating. An American music composer for video games and radio Winifred Phillips is just a one of a number of women who are contributing to game development. She’s good at writing epic orchestral music for God of War and driving, dance floor moving electronic tracks for Speed Racer as well as magical positive melodies just like her soundtrack for SimAnimals, a unique game made exclusively for the Nintendo Wii and DS in which you can venture into the wild world of animals like never before, that shares the tender warmth.

But for God of War in which Winifred’s compositions can be found together with tracks by some other composers (including works with another female composer Winnie Waldron, who is Winifred’s music producer as well), SimAnimals is her first independent work not relating to games based on movies. In fact SimAnimals is also a first commercial release of Winifred’s music. It’s a pretty important moment cause due to the special policy of motion picture companies, which own the rights for movie games, her soundtracks for the video games Shrek the Third, The Da Vinci Code, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Speed Racer were never released separately. It’s great that Electronic Arts really cares about music from its games and releases it immediately using its own digital distribution channel.

The album’s 19 tracks aren’t too long but these compositions are pretty much sophisticated. In SimAnimals the whole journey through the forest is comprised of many small musical moments that combine as the soundtrack. You can venture into the wild world of animals, where friendly deer, squirrels, and rabbits live together with badgers, bears, crows and other peace-breakers. This contrast is also reflected in the soundtrack: when the individual animals experience moments of pure happiness the music is tender, upbeat, joyful and light but when some trouble is happening the score becomes disturbing and dramatic.

Such a wide scale of emotions is emphasized through the great number of delicately played solo instruments, i.e. violins, small bells, strings and wind instruments of all kinds. What this ends up as for the listener is a wonderful musical journey, that is full of delights, as if you found yourself in Disney cartoons, Winifred’s music isn’t just a simple music score but it also acts like sound engineering work cause it imitates a life in the forest with the help of live nature sounds mixed in with compositions such as cheerful chatter of birds in a track entitled Trailhead. The gameplay in SimAnimals is casual and facile – it lets you explore a vast forest of wild animals and make it your own. The player can easily unlock new forest areas and music will follow him: when walking into the castle ruins you'll be listening to a downbeat Celtic piece entitled Castle Ridge, in the river valley – an easy melody called Grassy Glen.

The main theme of the game deserves special attention. It comprises all the best moments of the score and the composition Forest Song that closes the soundtrack. In fact “Forest Song” is not a song because it lacks any vocal at all, but it has such a rich arrangement that you understand – one can’t help calling it a song.