« Previous Entries

Featured

Featured, Miscellaneous

Jeremy Soule Takes to Kickstarter to Fund His First Classical Symphony: Support It!

04.10.13 | Jayson Napolitano | Comment?

[Disclaimer: I, Jayson Napolitano, was hired by the Max Steiner Agency to prepare and distribute a press release regarding "The Northerner," but I'm also sincerely passionate about it being funded on a personal level]

In case you weren’t aware, Jeremy Soule launched a Kickstarter campaign last month to fund his first classical symphony, “The Northerner.” You should care not only because Jeremy Soule is one of the most talented game composers working in the industry, but also because “The Northerner” channels a lot of the energies Soule visited while working on Skyrim just by the nature of its far North theme.

I ran a feature over on Destructoid with exclusive commentary from Jeremy Soule himself on the project as well as a preview on YouTube (above) and SoundCloud. Check them out, and support this project towards reaching its stretch goal of $100,000 to record at a prestigious recording studio before the campaign ends in just three short days!

Do you see this as a potential way to fund classical music in the future? Let us know if you’re on board for “The Northerner!”
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Composer of the Year is…

02.02.13 | Jayson Napolitano | 1 Comment

Composer of the Year is always a difficult category to judge because either there isn’t a single composer who’s done more than a single work in a year, or, in the case of 2012, all of our nominees had stellar years with multiple projects.

In this category, we select only one winner with no runners-up. So in case you’ve forgotten, our nominees:

Yuzo Koshiro
Daniel Licht
Jeremy Soule
Austin Wintory

And the winner is… (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Soundtrack of the Year is…

02.01.13 | Jayson Napolitano | 1 Comment

This was an incredibly tough category this year. Even with eight nominees, there were several other soundtracks that were released that we wanted to include. When it came to selecting the overall winners, however, the team here at OSV was pretty quick to agree.

I want everyone to take a look at our list of nominees once again and take note of how few sequels and huge big-budget titles made the list. I think that says a lot about where the industry is going, and it’s definitely a good thing.

So, in case you’ve forgotten our nominees for Soundtrack of the Year:

Double Dragon Neon
Dust: An Elysian Tale
Etrian Odyssey IV
Fez
Guild Wars 2
Journey
Max Anarchy
Offspring Fling

And the winners are… (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Best In-Game Soundtrack is…

01.31.13 | Gideon Dabi | Comment?

Kai Rosenkranz, composer of the Gothic series, once explained to me how a score can be too melodic. A great piece of music can be distracting to the player if it isn’t written with the experience at hand in mind. Often times, a beautiful piece of music does not match the action. That’s why we decided to have this category: to acknowledge the musical efforts of scores that enhance the drama perfectly within the context of the game, but that maybe don’t work quite as well as standalone works.

Here’s our nominees:

Darkness II
Dishonored
Dys4ia
Halo 4
Hotline Miami
Journey

Our winners….. (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Best Sound Design is…

01.30.13 | Gideon Dabi | Comment?

With surround systems becoming more and more affordable (and sophisticated), and Turtle Beach headsets conquering every in-store display, sound design has grown all the more relevant and essential to gaming experiences. The sounds of games seem to stick with us as persistently as the characters and gameplay. This year continued the trend with some jaw-dropping, eardrum-melting sound.

Call of Duty: Black Ops II
Far Cry 3
Gravity Rush
Halo 4
Journey
The Darkness II

Which of these wild games – all with sound challenges in their own right – won the day? (more…)
Doujin, Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winners for Fan Arrange Category!

01.29.13 | Patrick Gann | 1 Comment

We didn’t announce nominees for this category, but we decided that in simplifying our categories, we might have simplified too much. We skipped over a category that’s very important to us: fan arrange / doujin.

So, after the jump, we’ll tell you what our three favorite fan arrange albums of 2012 were. (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Best Arrange Album is…

01.29.13 | Patrick Gann | 1 Comment

There’s no question that Square Enix invested heavily in arranged music this year. Half a dozen “SQ” albums, four piano solo arrange albums, a full orchestra album, a rock arrange release … one might say it was almost too much. At least as far as one’s personal budget goes.

But it wasn’t just Square Enix that produced great arrange albums in 2012. As a refresher, here are our nominees in this category:

Piano Collections Final Fantasy XII
Final Fantasy Orchestral Album
25th Anniversary Rockman Rock Arrange Ver.
Re:Birth II / Romancing SaGa Battle Arrange
The Scythian Steppes
Tekaru Mechanical

Will Square Enix sweep all three medals? Or will Capcom, Superbrothers, or Tekaru prove superior? Read on to find out… (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Best Re-Issue Soundtrack is…

01.28.13 | Patrick Gann | 1 Comment

Reprints, compilation albums, and previously unreleased material. Generally, we love all of these things. When great music becomes unavailable, it’s a problem. On the other hand, a glut of reprints and compilation albums can be too much, so we’re not in the business of celebrating or honoring all of them.

But we have three out of our six nominees that we want to give special awards to. Again, our nominees are:

Bare Knuckle Original Soundtrack
Donpachi / Dodonpachi / Dodonpachi II Soundtrack
Shinji Hosoe Works Vol.1 ~Dragon Spirit~
Eternal Daughter 10th Anniversary Original Soundtrack
Live A Live Original Soundtrack
Rockman EXE Transmission Sound Track

Without further ado, the winners… (more…)
Experimental, Featured, Film, Indie Music, Japanese

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Winner for Best Other Release is…

01.27.13 | Patrick Gann | 2 Comments

Our “Other Release” category — a catch-all miscellaneous category for stuff that isn’t technically game music, but close enough that you all probably know about it — had some great nominees. There were plenty more than six albums to choose from. But we narrowed it to six, and now we’re going to give the bronze / silver / gold medals. Well, digital medals. Still pretty sweet, though (thanks Connary!).

So, in case you’ve forgotten our nominees for Best Other Release:

Black Ocean (IMERUAT)
FX4 (virt)
Indie Game: the Movie (Jim Guthrie)
Make Music, Throw Music (SleepyTimeJesse, et al)
Preschtale (C-jeff)
SOUNDSHOCK 2: FM FUNK TERRROR!! (Various Artists)

And the winners are… (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Nominees for Composer of the Year

01.26.13 | Jayson Napolitano | 1 Comment

2012 featured a host of emerging game composers. Some have come from television and film, and others from the ground up. The most important takeaway from all of this: these guys are good and we’re thrilled to have their music.

Read on for our list of nominees for Composer of the Year! (more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Nominees for Soundtrack of the Year

01.25.13 | Jayson Napolitano | 8 Comments

We’ve spent the entire week unveiling the OSVOSTOTY 2012 nominees, and it’s with great pleasure that we finally present to you our top picks for Soundtrack of the Year. This is always one of the hardest categories to come to a decision on, as you can imagine each staff member was fighting for their own personal favorites. We do, however, stand by our final list and think it represents the best of what 2012 had to offer.

I also wanted to take a moment to comment on the change in format for our fourth annual awards. In the past, we had separate categories for Soundtrack of the Year, Best Handheld Soundtrack of the Year, and Best Indie Game Soundtrack of the Year. With advances in technology and the rising prominence of indie games to the point where it’s difficult to discern what’s indie and what’s not, we believed it was important to combine these categories into a single Soundtrack of the Year category to level the playing field. We’ve opened the category up to eight nominees to accommodate, and you’ll find it interesting just how many “indie” games made the cut.

As always, chime in and let us know your favorite soundtracks of the year and who you’re rooting for. So without further ado…
(more…)
Featured, Game Music

OSVOSTOTY 2012: Nominees for Best In-Game Soundtrack

01.24.13 | Gideon Dabi | 1 Comment

Have you ever experienced music whilst playing your favorite games that made the dramatic moments so tense and the action so lively? And then, you bought the soundtrack, skipped over to that same part and – yeah, it was cool. But, you knew there was something missing from that listening experience. What was missing was living the moment in the context for which the music was written.

These moments are no less important than those that work just as beautifully separate from the game. It is for this purpose that we, here at OSV, choose to acknowledge those fantastic mood-enhancing and beautiful moments in a game’s soundtrack. Included in this category may also be games that did not receive a formal soundtrack release. Read on for the nominees! (more…)