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• Chip Music, Game Music, Reviews

  Fake Retro, Real Glory: Dark Void Zero Soundtrack (Review)

  March 31, 2010 | Audun Sorlie | 3 Comments Share this Fake Retro, Real Glory: Dark Void Zero Soundtrack (Review)

  

  One of the first big title releases this year was Dark Void, which was released on PS3, Xbox 360 and PC early January. The game centers around a pilot during the WWII era who gets teleported into a different dimension where he meets Krang and battles the Technodrome. Well, maybe not that last part, but he did travel through dimensions, and we already reviewed the soundtrack and found it to be an enjoyable affair. While it may not have been the most memorable game, it did offer some excellent music, and one track in particular stood out among all these, the Mega Version 8-bit rendition of the main theme.

  CAPCOM seemed to take notice of this as they had previously had great success with retro inspired titles like Mega Man 9 and Bionic Commando ReArmed and announced a faux NES title would be developed on the DSiWare dowload service. Bear McCreary was brought in to score and arrange, which was surely a dream come true for the admitted videogame music fan.

  Hit the jump to see if they captured the NES feel! (more…)

• Game Music

  Ragnarok DS To Surely Have One of the Best Soundtracks of 2010

  February 4, 2010 | Jayson Napolitano | 3 Comments Share this Ragnarok DS To Surely Have One of the Best Soundtracks of 2010

  

  Regular readers of OSV should know by now that I’m obsessed with Ragnarok Online and the game’s soundtrack composed by Korean sound studio soundTeMP (it was our soundtrack of the month at one point). It should come as no surprise then that I’m incredibly excited about Ragnarok DS (they’ve apparently dropped the “online” bit since it was announced) that’s being released by XSEED this month. What we haven’t heard about until now, however, is how the game will sound.

  We checked in with XSEED to see if soundTeMP would be providing new music for the DS release, and while we were told that all the game’s music would come from the PC version, at least we know that they’ll be pulling music from one of the best soundtracks of all time. In the new trailer that XSEED recently released, we heard MIDI-fied versions of both “Theme of Juno” and “Streamside.” While I’m a bit disappointed that the sound quality is being reduced to fit the audio onto the DS cartridge, the MIDI versions do have a unique retro charm about them, so we’ll have to wait until next month to see what the final result is.

  Are you looking forward to Ragnarok DS? Do you think developer GungHo should have sacrificed some other aspect of the game in order to preserve soundTeMP’s amazing soundtrack?

• Game Music

  Biggest Nintendo DS Cart Ever Made Developed For Studio Ghibli Videogame

  October 2, 2009 | Jayson Napolitano | 7 Comments Share this Biggest Nintendo DS Cart Ever Made Developed For Studio Ghibli Videogame

  

  [Update: numerous people have pointed out that the cartridge is actually 4 gigaBITS, not bytes, which would put it at 512mb. Not quite as impressive, and we apologize for the error, but the fact remains that they had to develop a bigger cartridge just to hold the game’s soundtrack, which is pretty damn cool in my book]

  That’s right, and it’s all to make room for Joe Hisaishi’s fully orchestrated soundtrack for the game. According to the latest issue of Nintendo Power, Studio Ghibli is teaming up with Level 5 to create an RPG titled Ninokuni: The Another World for the DS, and Studio Ghibli music man Joe Hisaishi is on board to write a fully orchestral score, which also sounds like a first for the DS.

  A special high-capacity cart had to be created to make room for the soundtrack, coming in at over 4GB, which is apparently the largest cart ever created for a DS title. While not much is known about the game, from what we’ve seen, it of course looks quite beautiful. I can’t wait to hear the game’s score, as most of us here at huge fans of Joe Hisaishi (see our Ponyo, Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa, and Ghibli concert reviews).

  Are you looking forward to hearing Hisaishi’s score? Are you surprised that they’re going all out and developing a high-capacity cart specifically for the game?

  [via Nintendo Power]

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