NOTE: We are giving away four codes to download this full album for free on bandcamp. To enter the running, all you have to do is a) leave a comment on this article OR b) retweet @OSVgamemusic’s link of this article. We’ll announce the winners in 72 hours!
Stephen White just released a mammoth-sized “mixtape” (OST + arrange) on bandcamp for the new indie game Break Blocks (from the studio Greater Good Games). This strange new rhythm-based block-breaking game was apparently in need of A LOT of music. And Mr. White delivered.
Can you keep up with this album’s pace? Is it all that good? What about those arranged tracks? These questions and more will be addressed after the jump. (more…)
We’ve got a fun episode for you guys today. It’s also a fitting follow-up to our previous episode, so … cheers to proper progression!
Brenna and I grill young-and-aspiring composer / violinist / audio engineer Jeff Ball on all topics related to Jeff Ball’s life. Okay, not all of them. But many of them. As Brenna is herself (re)learning violin, we get into the nitty-gritty of violin technique. We also talk about Ball’s work on the Globulous soundtrack, his performances in collaboration with Sam Hulick on Red Orchestra 2 and Mass Effect 3, his take on how to forge an identity (without getting pegged and typecast as, for example, “the violin guy”), and of course, we get the full backstory on how Ball even got started in the biz. Hint: GDC is a special, special place.
Download: Original SoundCAST Episode #015
Want to know which songs we used during the show? Find out after the jump. (more…)
Image source: @axyra
The above image is a small advertisement from the program included at the recent Piano Opera Final Fantasy concert in Japan. So, it’s finally happening. From the above image, some of the tracks on the album will be:
Theme of Final Fantasy XII ~ The Dream to be a Sky Pirate
The Royal City of Rabanastre Town Ward Upper Stratum
The Dalmasca Eastersand
Theme of the Empire
The Skycity of Bhujerba
No word yet who the arranger(s)/performer(s) are, but we have our fingers crossed for Casey Ormond, who did a great job with Sakimoto’s Valkyria Chronicles with the “Piano Pieces” album.
Thanks to Cedille from vgmdb for the tip, and Stephen Meyerink of RPGFan for the quick translation.
And it’s not Touhou!
About a decade ago, one-man studio Aeju Murasame created a trilogy of shmups. They were Gundemonium, GundeadliGne, and Hitogata Happa. The first two were horizontal (side-scrolling) shmups that took place in chronological sequence. The last was a very interesting prequel that was a vertical scrolling shmup and also featured a unique system that required kamikaze attacks, sacrificing precious (limited) lives for your dolls to move forward.
I’d have never played these games had it not been for localization firm / publisher Rockin’ Android, who released the trilogy as the Gundemonium Collection in 2011. To make the deal even sweeter, purchasing this trilogy on Steam will bring the customer a free bonus: full soundtracks for all three games, both in their original forms (from Murasame himself), and the new remixes from DM Ashura and Woofle.
I’m going to do a little compare ‘n’ contrast after the jump. Won’t you join me? (more…)
Rafael Dyll is no stranger to the game music scene. He’s done five game soundtracks in as many years, mostly for really intense, awesome shmups. But is Dyll ready to plunge headfirst into the realm of longform, fantasy RPGs?
Our interview with Dyll suggests he faced the prospect with some trepidation, but courageously nonetheless. (Congratulations, by the way, to the OSV/FB contest winner Dek on the free soundtrack!)
After the jump, I’ll be passing judgment on Dyll’s first foray into the world of RPG-dom, a full month before its retail release. Rainbow Moon Melodies, GO! (more…)
All photos courtesy of Derek Brad
The Legend of Zelda hit its 25th anniversary in 2011. To celebrate, the first three “Symphony of the Goddesses” concerts were performed: one in LA, one in London, and one in Tokyo.
In 2012, “Symphony of the Goddesses” has been expanded in terms of content and gone on a North American tour. Recently, OSV contributor Haroon Piracha gave his impression of the E3 2012 show in LA, and he also conducted an interview with SotG’s music arranger, Chad Seiter.
On Wednesday, July 25 2012, I finally got to witness for myself the concert about which Haroon and others had been cheering for. Better still, I got to take my wife with me to make it a (very rare) evening without the kids, and we also got the opportunity to speak with the concert’s creative lead / producer, Jeron Moore.
After the jump, I’m going to tell you the story behind the story. How it all got started, what it means to work with this creative team, possible plans for the future, as well as my own impressions of the show interspersed. Get ready, it’s going to be a wild ride. (more…)
I nearly lost it when Theatrhythm was announced for the Nintendo 3DS. I was already excited about the 3D visuals offered up by the platform, and a dream game combining the music of Final Fantasy with rhythmic elements was not only completely unexpected, but was seemingly too good to be true. But true it was, and I watched the game closely leading up to its release.
Now it’s here, and I’ve had a lot of time to play it. Complaints are already flying that the game is built as a DLC platform, but is the game a whole lot more than that, and does it pave the way for other exciting Theatrhythm games encompassing other Square Enix franchises?
Check out our review after the jump. (more…)
The guys over at humblebundle.com are at it again, but this time with a music-only bundle. Now, we have a bone to pick with these guys, since their promotional material suggests that this is some sort of new/premier idea, to offer a bunch of music related to games and/or of interest to gamers. Anyone who knows the full backstory behind the creation of the Indie Game Music Bundle (gamemusicbundle.com) will either laugh or choke at the idea that this is the first big game music bundle, or that Rosen and crew only got this idea *now.*
But, laying aside that petty grievance, this bundle does have some really good stuff in it. There are a total of 6 albums here (if you pay extra to unlock everything). In my mind, the two coolest items here are Christopher Tin’s “Calling All Dawns” (Audi’s review here, our podcast interview with Tin here). Tin serves as a sort of front-man for this bundle, delivering a great video message to potential purchasers of the bundle. His flabbergasted response to the mere existence of Linux users is hilarious, and all in good fun. Considering Tin is a two-time grammy award winner (thanks to “Calling All Dawns” and, specifically, the new recording of the Civilization IV opening theme “Baba Yetu”), this album certainly deserves the headlining spot.
However, the bundle also includes an entirely new album. Sort of, anyway. It’s a digital-only “best of” album for Hitoshi Sakimoto’s Valkyria Chronicles music. This compilation album includes music from all three games, even with the third game being absent from the English-language market. Be sure to check out vgmdb’s listing of the album so you know which tracks are on the album (a total of 24 songs!). If you haven’t already imported some or all of these OSTs, that’s a mighty fine deal for some of Sakimoto’s best work in recent years.
Beyond that, the bundle also has a Jonathan Coulton “best of” album (Portal‘s Still Alive, and many others), MC Frontalot’s “Favoritism,” They Might Be Giant’s “album raises new thoughts and troubling questions,” and OK Go’s “Twelve Remixes of Four Songs.”
Great music for a good price. Seriously, if you don’t have “Calling All Dawns” already, that album alone is worth the price of entry, and I’d argue most any of the other albums are also worth the bundle “unlock” minimum (currently a little over $8). Enjoy!
Alternately, this post could have been titled “Limited Release Part Three.” It’s like a three-part series on new, immediately hard-to-find albums.
Square Enix has been doing these retailer-specific bonus discs for some time now. They did a Village/Vanguard bonus disc for SQ Chips (with all chiptune arrangements), and then they split the bonuses among Tower Records and Village/Vanguard for Cafe SQ (Jayson reviewed those here). All the comments on that post were along the lines of “why is Square Enix holding out on us?” I agree.
And I’m about to make you feel that way, even more, with this next batch. And it’s even more frustrating, since there are two unique tracks per disc and two shared tracks (as opposed to only one unique track per disc on the Cafe SQ bonus discs). After the jump, I’ll give the details. (more…)
It seems like it was only yesterday I was lamenting the lack of a full retail release of a game music album I really enjoyed.
Oh wait, that *was* yesterday.
Right now, I hold in my hands the full orchestral soundtrack for a game that’s not even out yet. And while I assume the full soundtrack will have, at least, a retail digital release (if not a physical release as well), right now the soundtrack exists in the form of about 100 CDs Runic Games had printed. Of this small lot, 25 were given away to fans of the first game via Facebook, and the rest were distributed at E3 (and perhaps some other conventions since E3) by Uelmen and the Runic team themselves.
I personally missed E3, but Jayson was able to snag a handful from Uelmen so that he (representing Destructoid) *and* we at OSV could provide early coverage of Uelmen’s groundbreaking soundtrack.
Is it really *that* good? Does it exceed Uelmen’s work on the Diablo series? Or am I just adding to the hype? I’ll defend my stance after the jump, and then you can leave comments to let me know whether or not I’m crazy. (more…)
So far, it seems that the new arranged album XI Chips -Final Fantasy XI Chiptune- (catalog # SQEX-10320) is available only through Square Enix Music’s e-Store. Some online retailers, like CDJapan, are offering it as a special order, with a marked-up price to boot.
I don’t know if S-E is waiting for, like, the North American 10th anniversary of FFXI to release this album on iTunes, or if they don’t realize what a gem they have in their hand.
After the jump, I’ll talk about this internal rival with the “SQ Chips” albums, and why I think it might be the unlikely winner of my heart. (more…)