2 Player Productions

Game Music, Music Production

Take A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Broken Age’s Music and Audio

April 14, 2015 | Michael Hoffmann | Comments Off on Take A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Broken Age’s Music and Audio Share this

As part of the backer updates on the Double Fine Adventure Kickstarter project, the game’s development process has been documented in a video series by 2 Player Productions. The multi-part documentary includes interviews with the staff, at various points of Broken Age‘s development cycle, and behind-the-scenes footage of the creation process. A select number of episodes feature content about the game audio side of Broken Age‘s production. The first fourteen episodes of the documentary are now available to non-backers on the Double Fine YouTube channel.

(The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra performing “Battle at Shellmound”)

Part of Episode 11, “Ship It,” takes viewers to Peter McConnell’s studio as he writes music for one of Broken Age’s cutscenes and explains his process for composing and finding inspiration for his music. There’s even more game audio covered in Episode 13, “Crash Landing a Plane.” This episode features Camden Stoddard and the rest of the Double Fine audio team working on foley and sound design, while McConnell works with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra to record some of the larger orchestral pieces for the soundtrack.

If you haven’t had the chance to watch the Double Fine Adventure documentary, it’s a fascinating look at the development of the first part of Broken Age. The episodes mentioned above are highly recommended viewing, especially if you’re a fan of the game’s music and audio. Be sure to check those episodes out, and the complete documentary itself.
Chip Music, Reviews

Ode To A Blip Festival: Reformat The Planet DVD (Review)

December 27, 2010 | Joshua Kopstein | 3 Comments Share this

It was an especially cold December in New York City this year. And it had nothing to do with the massive blizzard that was whipping 18 inches of snow around at speeds up to 35 mph. It had to do with the fact that, for the first time in a long while, the five boroughs (and indeed the world) was bereft of the joyous celebration known as The Blip Festival, the largest chip music festival that our tiny blue planet has to offer — 3 days of performances from musicians and artists from around the world, celebrating the musical and visual limitations of obsolete game consoles and other antiquated computer tech.

But fear not — Blip Fest isn’t gone for good. Not even close. Rather, it’s being rescheduled to take place later next year, in the brighter and cheerier month of May. Still, there’s a certain nostalgia associated with Blip’s wintery whimsy, frightful weather and the G train notwithstanding. And it’s fair to assume that thousands of chip music fans have been a bit down in dumps in light of the Festival’s absence from their 2010 calendar.

Luckily, there was a small bit of mercy left in Blip’s stead, and it came in the form of Blip Festival: Reformat The Planet, the comprehensive documentary on chip music and the Blip Festival, crafted lovingly over the course of 3 years by NYC filmmaking troupe 2 Player Productions. And lucky still, what they’ve captured on this DVD amounts to the closest possible simulation of the inspired artistry and impassioned mayhem that surrounds the half-decade strong Blip Festival.

Hit the jump to see how a skeleton crew of documentarians went about capturing the world’s largest and most exciting chip music event, and the indelible impact it had in the spreading of an exciting new form of electronic music to all corners of the globe.

(more…)
Game Music, Indie Music, Reviews

Live From The Arcade: The PAX 2009 DVD (Review)

August 20, 2010 | Joshua Kopstein | 2 Comments Share this

From webcomic to charity to convention, Jerry Holkins & Mike Krahulik’s Penny Arcade empire has quickly become one of the most successful properties in the videogaming world. So when the duo approached NYC filmmaking troupe 2 Player Productions (creators of the soon-to-be-released chiptune documentary, Reformat The Planet) and asked them to shoot a web series and document PA’s yearly gaming mega-event, the Penny Arcade Expo in Seattle, they jumped on a plane, moved to Portland and haven’t looked back. With PAX 2010 just weeks away from arriving at the Washington State Convention Center in Seattle, the PAX 2009 DVD offers a fond look back at last year’s Expo, ensuring that we’re all sufficiently pumped when PAX’s euphoric typhoon of live music, games and events hits Seattle once more in September.

Read on to see how the 2 Player crew captured one of the most exciting videogaming events on Earth.

(more…)