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…)
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…)
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…)
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…)
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…)
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…)
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…)
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