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News Archive
2010 ---> 2 3
2009 ---> 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 10
2008 ---> 2 3 4 5 6 8 9 10 11 12
2007 ---> 1 2 4 6
2006 ---> 9 10 12
02.03.2010, Borderlands Soundtrack Review
For the last ten years a release of a new franchise has been quite a responsible and high-profile mission reminding of a space probe launch somewhere to Saturn – much investment, long flight and no guaranty of finding anything useful on the planet. New universes are reluctant to take roots, are often whimsical and naughty, and it takes a long way for them to rise from the dunghill. One can just look at the bunch of sequels and prequels released this year so as to realize this simple truth. So a postapocalyptic shooter with cel-shaded graphics (hey, comics!) and RPG elements like in Diablo couldn’t be more unexpected. One can only envy courage of 2K Games sponsoring the project. Welcome the winner of the Innovation Award! Read review here
27.02.2010, Mass Effect 2 Soundtrack Review
Saga’s laws are immutable. Science-fiction saga’s laws are irreversible, cruel and merciless.. but so very very epic and spectacular! And a soft, magic and natural first part is always followed by some dark, complex and bringing suspense second one. This is the way the ideal movie sequel to Star Wars «The Empire Strikes Back» was created, the same is true of the perfect second part of the Mass Effect game. Moreover, if to take into account the fact that vector of setting has greatly changed its direction towards noir, darkness and epos, the heritage of Mass Effect hasn’t been lost. You can import save files from the previous title; familiar design, favorite characters and music recognizable from the first chords – all can be found here. Of course the music has changed so as to match the grown sequel but it hasn’t lost its charm and a slight flavor of space naiveté. Read review here
27.02.2010, Dragon Age: Origins Roundtrack Review
It so happened that in Dragon Age’s universe, mechanics and design there’s absolutely nothing new. Besides that, all the elements of the universe, the game itself and all accompanying things are designed on such a high level that the Witcher’s developers will have to work hard when making a sequel. But they are not the only one who will have to do their best; the bar has been raised for all the genre of CRPGs. Music is not an exception either in an overall happy picture. Inon Zur who earlier fabricated rather than wriote music seems to have found his way under the vigilant canadian governance. Read review here
27.02.2010, Divinity II: Ego Draconis Soundtrack Review
It so happened that role-player games stand alone against the background of all known game genres representing per se an imitation of an individual’s life in a fantasy/fantastic setting. Sometimes the protagonist was given a bunch of various companions and the subsequent squabbles between the characters were a good bit of pleasure from the game. However, the main charm is still in exploring the vast and mysterious world, development of the relations between the heroes and long, sometimes tedious, pumping up your character. Read review here
17.02.2010, Interview with Tomáš Dvořák - Machinarium soundtrack composer
03.02.2010, Machinarium Soundtrack Review
The Machinarium soundtrack is an extraordinary work, it has just appeared but it has already become classics. It’s like Peter McConnell’s music from the best games by LucasArts, like Terry Taylor’s immortal projects for The Neverhood and Skullmonkeys, like sound illustrations by Daniel Pemberton for Little Big Planet. The distinctive feature of Machinarium is not just in the fact that with all the variety of music sub-genres these tracks never disharmonize but also in providing a full immersion in the game world – you start to believe irrevocably in a musical world created by Dvorak as a part of a graphic universe of Dvorsky. Read review here
03.02.2010, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves Soundtrack Review
Uncharted 2 took almost everything from the original game: the idea, the visual style, gameplay elements and even the leading musical motive. Compared to the first Uncharted Among Thieves is set in the Himalayas, where the protagonist has to find the lost city of Shambhala. This change of scenery is reflected in music as well: now there’re more ethnic features in it like national instruments, for example. All these tricks add some local color and mysteriousness to the music. But there’s a time for everything. Read review here
03.02.2010, NINJA GAIDEN Σ2 Soundtrack Review
The question “Why is the next review devoted to NGS 2?” has a detailed answer. First, the music of Japanese composers – not only of acknowledged classics – leaves few people untouched. It has lots of new and strange features, especially for a person who got used to European musical traditions. And secondly, the game itself is noteworthy. Read review here
03.02.2010, Halo 3: ODST Soundtrack Review
This year was poor for XBOX 360 exclusives that’s why Bungie had to quickly transform its underdone DLC (ODST was initially claimed as a stand alone disc game as a matter of fact) to a stand-alone game. As a result gamers got a nice though not very dramatically altered gameplay, outdated graphics and as many as 2 hours of music score. Fortunately, the rush hasn’t affected the quality of the product, nothing but its being annoyingly short. As for the music it’s quite the opposite – 2 disks after all. Read review here
22.10.2009, Spore Hero Soundtrack Review
This year has been definitely a successful one for Winifred Phillips. Let’s take a closer look. Electronic Arts released her music from SimAnimals in January, and it became Winifred’s first commercial soundtrack release. And the soundtrack from a fresh Spore Hero for Nintendo Wii and DS was made available already in October, nearly at year-end by the very same Electronic Arts. Read review here
26.07.2009, Michael Bross - Nomad (Review)
Nomad (EP) was released just a month after Dogs And Their Stars was issued for purchase (we consider it to be a rhythmical sequel of the album Everything is Now) but its roots are far more deeper extended to the very first Michael Bross’s album which is entitled Soul Fragments published in distant 1999. Read review here.
14.06.2009, Dark Horizon Original Soundtrack review
...It has already become usual to compose if not ambient then rather deep electronic music for both games and TV-series. Babylon 5 and Lexx may be the most shining examples. And if the very first composition of Tarr Chronicles called Fault of Ancients recalls classical Vangelis, the following track refers to Lexx cause the synths, rhythm and melodics are the same... Read review here.
13.05.2009, World of Goo Soundtrack review
To tell the truth, music from World of Goo is kinda little chamber symphony. There’s no hint of casual game genre or any other toy like features. The OST almost doesn’t contain electronic music with the exception of a couple of tracks really strongly inspired by Vangelis. Neither the leitmotif nor the common main theme is the thing that runs through the whole soundtrack. It’s more likely to be a special set of music instruments, which Kyle is using: strings, harps, flutes and a choir. This very language he uses to tell the listeners a sad story about a conflict between goo balls and The Corporation. Read reivew here.
04.04.2009, Interview with Norihiko Hibino - Ninja Blade soundtrack composer
Norihiko Hibino... That name surely known by any Metal Gear Solid fan. He was responsible for the soundtrack to MGS2-4 and was closely collaborating with Harry Gregson-Williams. There are many good titles which he wrote music for but today we will talk about his latest work - Ninja Blade. Soundtrack for this Xbox360 exclusive consits of 90 minutes heavy ethnic-sympho-electronic and selling as a separate 2-CD pack. So, if you want to know how it was made, join our discussion! Also, there you'll find demo-samples from the soundtrack. Read interview here.
10.03.2009, Echoes of War album review
...The arrangements are very well-done and in fact they’re quite close to the original tracks – you’ll admit that it’s rather hard to reconsider an hour and a half of a high-quality music completely. Given the original symphonic style of Blizzard’s work professionals from Eminence only had to make a neat orchestration trying not to add a lot from themselves... Read full review here.
18.02.2009, Interview with Doyle W. Donehoo - Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II soundtrack composer
Today we have Doyle W. Donehoo at microphone. This composer isn't well known to gamers because of only few released projects (America's Army, Savage 2, Sniper: Path of Vengeance, Black Stone: Magic & Steel), but we are pretty sure this situation will change with release of Relic's blockbuster Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II. Soundtrack for original game was written by Jeremy Soule and that's kinda interesting what music awaits us in its sequel. Well, let's go! Read interview here.
17.02.2009, A witch with a twinkle in her eyes
GEM Impact, Inc. will be contributing to Bayonetta, helping create the game’s cutscene music. So as to make it happen studio will work alongside PlatinumGames sound director Masami Ueda (Devil May Cry, Resident Evil) and composer Hiroshi Yamaguchi (Okami). If you don’t remember I’ll refresh your memory – Gem Impact was founded by Norihiko Hibino who is globally known as a composer, arranger, and saxophonist, particularly for his brilliant work on the soundtrack of the famous videogame, the Metal Gear Solid series. “PlatinumGames is a studio that needs no introduction,” glowingly states Hibino, “We’re excited to be working with the many renowned game creators at PlatinumGames, and look forward to contributing music to Bayonetta.” There's still not a whole lot we know about Bayonetta. The main protagonist is quite a graceful witch. She has guns on her feet and can attack with her magical hair, which she also uses as clothing. She can command it to weave itself into different shapes, such as a huge foot that can kick enemies into oblivion. Angels, cherubs and God's other creatures are Bayonetta's main adversaries through out the game. What’s the point of defeating enemies? Even devs don’t know for sure yet. Bayonetta is set to be released in 2009 but the exact date is still unknown. The editorial board of Game-OST has a suspicion that CD soundtrack is likely to see the light of day. At least "Ninja Blade" original soundtrack 2-disc set produced by GEM Impact (Keep watching the site for the full interview coming soon!) was already issued. Via WorthPlaying.com.
13.02.2009, Army of Two 2 to be scored by Tyler Bates
Tyler Bates is a great guy who is best known for his film and TV scores (300, Dawn Of The Dead). His musical prowess is also crossing over in the world of video games. He has been recruited to score Army of Two 2 and it will be his second music project for a video game after Rise of the Argonauts. The most interesting fact is that Army of Two 2 isn’t supposed to be a sequel. It's more likely to be a reboot of a franchise, which hasn't raked in dough and gained much fame. That's why the first Ao2 score by Trevor Morris (a mix of electronic and symphonic music, which is rather dull at times) won’t be referred to in any way. From the ground up this game would be nearly completely re-conceptualized of what the game is. Given Bates’ love of experiments and music of Nine Inch Nails we can suppose that the new score will be a kinda conceptual combination of explosive synthetic and industrial sound. The composer is happy to have the opportunity to work on video game music again and to do something really interesting. According to Bates' words, in total, the music in the videogame will turn out to be about 55 minutes. Well, it's yet too early to talk about the separate soundtrack album release. Via IGN.
06.02.2009, Soundtrack to Allods Online creation - an interview with Vladislav Isaev about his collaborate work with Mark Morgan
Two talented men, i.e. Mark Morgan, a composer of a cult game Fallout, and also Vladislav Isaev, a creator of a project Scann-Tec, sound designer and a composer at Nival company, are announcing a final stage of work on a large-scale soundtrack to the unique Russian MMORPG Allods Online. Senior editor of Game-OST visited Nival’s office and had a talk with Vladislav Isaev about the aspects of such great soundtrack creation and close cooperation with Mark Morgan. Also, interview page contains 15-min long sample of Allods Online soundtrack!
01.02.2009, Interview with Winifred Phillips - SimAnimals and God of War soundtrack composer
Hey, people! Today we have really unique person over there. It is Winifred Phillips, who wrote epic music for God of War and recently composed full orchestral score for SimAnimals. What is really, cool that Winifred isn’t ugly bearded man, but stunningly beautiful woman. Interesting? Read below!
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