Super Meat Boy may be releasing on Playstation 4 and Playstation Vita this Tuesday, October 6th; but it will be sounding markedly different than the versions people have come to know and love. Danny Baranowsky, original composer of Super Meat Boy, has denied the use of his original soundtrack to be used with the PS4 and Vita versions of the game. Baranowsky parted ways with Team Meat a few years back, and ended up not being the composer for The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth despite being the composer of the original game. He cites the reason for the split as having nothing to do with creative differences, though declines to go into detail.
“I own all the rights to my music, and Team Meat approached me to license the music for the PS4 and Vita versions. I didn’t feel like the license fee and exposure through PSN they offered was enough to make me seriously consider accepting the deal. I decided to decline their offer. I wish them and the new artists the best of luck with the game.” – Danny B
Composition of the PS4 and Vita port will now be done by Ridiculon (The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth), David “Scattle” Scatliffe (Hotline Miami), and Laura Shigihara (Plants vs. Zombies). The game will be available on PSN for free for Playstation Plus members.
This lends a bit of timely weight to my recent article about game composer’s rights with regards to control over their music, and the need to be savvy with said control for the good of the composer and their livelihood. In this case, it sounds like Danny’s not out to screw Team Meat or fans, but is making the choice to keep a firm grip on his property for his own sake, which seems like a good call for indie composers these days.
Source: dannyBstyle
Tags: Danny Baranowsky, Game Music, Game Soundtrack, Licensing, News, Super Meat Boy!, Team Meat
I wonder if he negotiated at all. It’s sad to see people who created something amazing together have their final piece of art pulled apart due to rights. Keep the music all to yourself or give the art exposure and another round of love via a new platform? – well, I’d go with the latter option and share my work especially after it has had its long winded initial release (even if I wasn’t going to make as much as I thought I should).
Wow, that’s surprising and while I agree with Amanda and don’t see the harm in licensing it to spread exposure even farther, it’s great that he retains control over the music to do as he sees fit. The replacement collaboration between Ridiculon, Scattle and Laura might be something equally as special though. It might even move me to pick the game up and play through it again!
There will now be two versions of Super Meat Boy, Baranowksky and post Baranowsky – One positive is that there will be some new game music in the world from a different composer.