Call for Soulsborne OST responses
Added 2020-03-05 21:49:14 +0000 UTCHey folks
As we wrap up the first phase of our soundtrack series, we'd like to hear your thoughts on the Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1-3, Bloodborne, and Sekiro OSTs. As a reminder: When we do responses, we're looking to provide a platform for other people's opinions, not to debate, so please tell us your thoughts on the soundtracks, not your thoughts on our thoughts on the soundtracks.
Get these in before midnight on March 9th, please! Reply in the comments.
Comments
I have really felt like the progress made in Souls soundtracks has been excellent due to increased space for music in games. Bloodborne leaned heavily into horror cinematic sounds, choosing to lean into dissonances and timbrel experimentation, including the use of arco in the strings and flutter tonguing in the winds. This sound track also uses some excellent metrical experimentation, with frequent use of 12/8 and the highlight being Blood Starve beast utilizing 5/8. Dark Souls 3 is the crowning achievement of souls music, though. It’s use of solo voices strengthens the feeling of isolation that the protagonist feels. The boss fights, then use densely scored orchestration, with layers of melodies building an intense wall of sound. They use of rhythm also tends to accurately capture the movement of the bosses, most excellently through the frequent use of 6/8 to create a triplet driving characteristic. There is also excellent use of high ensemble tessitura to capture religious imagery in Pontiff’s theme for example. Also, Dancer’s theme isn’t in 3/4. That game theorist video is bs, but the use of an understated 6/8 meter is excellent for capturing the unique motion of the dancer. In general, as music recording technology has improved in games, composers have been given more tools in the their compositional tool box to be more creatively expressive beyond relatively simple melodies and rhythms.
Evan Grover
2020-03-11 16:17:31 +0000 UTCThe Souls soundtracks are uniformly good, but also their primary mode is Carmina Burana. Those tracks are effective at what they do, but overwhelming to sit down and listen to. It is a necessary trade-off to make the levels almost entirely score-less experiences. I think that emptiness helps the overall experience, but it would be nice if there were a few more Majulas in the mix, just for variety's sake. To that end, I decided to make a relatively small mix of just those non-combat tracks, and it turns out they are very peaceful. In fact, that mix has been used to soothe my infant son to sleep and, on occasion, myself. On revisit, I've found those tracks to have the most nuance, helping to convey these worlds' declining grandeur and the desperate clinging to humanity. Those are much more complex and difficult emotions to musically to convey than "Oh fuck! It's the Fire Demon of Oh Fuck!" Still, there are merits to those tracks as well and they have made my way into another mix, the one that greets Trick-or-Treaters as they approach our house on Halloween. As a side note, if you like these tracks, I would encourage you to listen to Motoi Sakuraba's score for Baten Kaitos, which is 95% incredible and only 5% ear poison.
Doug Lief
2020-03-09 21:46:57 +0000 UTCFirst time responding! I have really grown to appreciate the choral tracks of dark souls 3, particularly my favorite fight and soundtrack of the game “The Abyssal Watchers”. I feel as if the chorus transcends the physical fight into something mythical (in, perhaps, an opposite way that the Artorias fight creates a shift from the mythical to the physical). It imbues the gameplay with a sense of grandeur, bordering on the epic. I can understand why a player might not enjoy this because a step into the divine translates into a step away from the human (and in turn, might reduce the connection between the player and the game). However, I think as an aesthetic choice it allows for a broader exploration of universal themes: the sorrow of the abyssal watcher as all man’s sorrow, the fall from fainted heroism in society (hint: connection between the abyssal watchers and justifications for colonialism) , etc. I think this might be supported by classical literature like the Aeneid and to a more modern extend, The Lord of the Rings, which each uses the mythical as a way to explore the universal. I know you guys don’t love the loud blaring chorus, but have you experienced a game that (through any medium: gameplay, music, etc.) successfully plays into this sense of distant mythos without sacrificing player-enjoyment? Thanks!
Sharif
2020-03-09 16:52:25 +0000 UTCThe Dark Sun Gwyndolin/Moonlight Butterfly, Gwyn, Vendrick, and Mergo’s Wet Nurse fights all have tracks that highlight the tragic and desolate quality endemic to principal Soulsborne foes. This is in strong opposition, however, to the THIS IS A VERY BIG AND SCARY MONSTER tone that many of the boss themes in the series seems to dwell on. There is something about the rare subtle composition that augments the threat of its boss more so than the more overblown themes. For instance, in the case of the Moonlight Butterfly fight, the music emphasizes the feeling that you are in the presence of some truly great and alien beast, capable of both beauty and total ruin. It has no need or inclination to lord its brute power over you, you simply have stumbled across some terrifying scene deep in the woods that is hardly comprehensible. Its antagonism is not one of hate, but nature. In this way it reminds me of Akira Ifukube’s “Prayer for Peace” from the original Godzilla film. This subtlety works in service of grander Soulsborne narrative concepts as well, particularly in terms of the nature of hollowing. Hollowing is a threat in many ways is diffused away from personal animus and hardened towards immediate, perfunctory action. Gwyn and Vendrick really work into this theme as well. They have descended from being great leaders and have become animalistic husks that are acting by way of some outside script they are wholly divorced from. But let’s be real, King’s Field IV has the best OST. <3
Jack Taylor
2020-03-09 04:13:12 +0000 UTCI have played only Dark Souls I, Dark Souls III and Bloodborne so I listened only to those episodes and as I was re-listening to the soundtracks I thought to myself: THIS IS NOT FUN. In a hindsight I do not think that Soulsborne soundtracks are as good as the general consensus claims they are. They do deliver what they aim at, that is giving stakes to the boss fights and getting the blood of the players pumping, however Soulsborne's execution of this idea became a meme-worthy joke. Most song fall in of two categories; orchestral cacophony or ephemeral and sad wailing. They do not work as individual pieces of music, divorced from their gameplay. Obviously there are some positive exceptions. Gwyn's is a classic peace of video game music by now (and rightfully so) but it has an entire game to build it up and to work as a contrast to it. Cleric Beast is probably the only time they managed to nail the cinematic feel of the score in a way that it works and has me at a edge of my seat for the whole duration of the track, while The First Hunter has this somber melancholy perfect for a climactic duel. Iudex Gundyr and Vordt are in my opinion the best examples of the soulsborne boss music forumula, both setting the atmosphere for the fight and telling the players something about the their enemy. I beleive you haven’t talked about it in your episode, but the only track that I actually like to listen to is the menu theme form DS III. On the other note. Listening to these episodes made me think of to the lack of melodic music in video games. I did try to think of any memorable melodies from a video game from the recent years and the only examples I could think of was the main theme from Angry Birds (2009 so no that recent), basically the entire OST to Undertale (the orchestral medley of Undertale’s OST is my to-go work music) and Hollow Knight (although this is not as melodic). Nothing truly hummable in the AAA segment.
Mateusz Swietoslawski
2020-03-07 09:12:01 +0000 UTCMy favourite pieces of Souls music are Lady Maria and Ludwig (the Holy blade specifically) because the songs sound like how the fights feel. For Maria the opening starts with fast violins which feels like two blade wielding figures closing the distance to one another. Midway through the song there are sharp punctuations of vocals. While I know this doesn't line up with when Maria is floating in the air, magic blood swirling around her, it sounds like it. For Ludwig the Holy Blade, there is a part of the song where the vocals rise with crashing cymbals. Each crash reminds me of dodging back and forth between Ludwig's sword beam blasts. Also shout out to the cult chanting when you wake up in the Hypogean Gaol, it really adds a lot to the mystery, fear and confusion that is supposed to be felt in that moment. I sometimes mimic it when I'm alone for goofs and I'm really glad no one has overheard me doing it because I have no idea how I would explain.
Matt DiTomaso
2020-03-06 20:11:37 +0000 UTCWhilst I was prepared for you to dislike the Bloodborne soundtrack, I was pleased that the songs you enjoyed pretty much shared what I thought [Gerhman, Maria, Gascoigne, Cleric Beast and Ludwig being personal highlights. However, I think you really misunderstood the music of Ebrietas in my opinion, and what atmosphere the piece is supposed to create. At this point in the game, it's generally intended that you're starting to understand the realities of what's been going on in Yarnham, and the otherworldly undertones that run through everything you've experienced so far. But running into Ebriates, it is clear that whatever is stood in front of you is of far greater importance to the universe than you could possibly understand or comprehend. The The epic and relentless choirs, grandiose swells and and tonal bombast reflect the sense that what you're dealing with is on another scale; one that calls beyond [pun intended] anything you understand. In my humble opinion it works perfectly to create this atmosphere, and shows the exceptional compositional skills of Yuka Kitamura, my personal favourite composer in the Soulsborne series.
Matt Simpson
2020-03-06 09:48:56 +0000 UTCFor me the composers From have worked with for their soundtracks have generally been really successful in capturing or helping define many of the characters and places in the games. Firelink, Majula, Gwyn, Gascoigne, the Abyss Watchers, Genichiro and Owl – I can immediately think of those pieces and they are indelibly connected to the subjects. It is part of what makes the games special even if I do eventually put a podcast on while playing most of them now, and it is also why I bought Bloodborne's soundtrack (on CD! In 2020!). I thought Yuka Kitamura handled the move to using exploration music for Sekiro really well with some great cues for the castle and outskirts in particular. Not only that but the way she was able to add character to different moments and bosses with a variety of sounds and styles is very cool.
Jon Cheetham
2020-03-06 06:28:18 +0000 UTCI feel like I have a somewhat different relationship with the Souls music, which is that they are one of my most-used D&D soundtracks. While you talk about these songs as actual songs that you listen to in 3-5 minutes, I frequently listen to extended loops of them for 30 min - 1 hour (I try to mix it up so players don't listen to one thing for too long, but sometimes I forget!). In that context, the later Souls game's songs that fade into the background isn't necessarily a bad thing for me. Sometimes you have a more mundane encounter, and it's OK to have a kinda bland song in the background to just give a bit of tone. My current game has players running through a Japanese style castle in the Feywild (a strange series of "Yes, And"s led me there), and there are SHOCKINGLY few soundtracks that are Japanese inspired without being overbearing and cliche. Sekiro's soundtrack, while I'm not crazy about it, has proven very useful for me to set tone without entering into Anime or Otaku territory. So I'm grateful for that.
Adam Bucceri
2020-03-06 03:58:37 +0000 UTCMy favorite individual track is the crowd-pleasing Majula theme (https://youtu.be/Z9zUkNBGVhs). It’s a constant companion every work week
Ross Foniri
2020-03-06 02:20:07 +0000 UTCMy favorite Soulsborne soundtrack by far is Demon's Souls. I'm not musically educated in any sense of the word, so I won't try to describe why, but there's something comfortably artificial, wistful, eerie about the instrumentation and melodies. Much like the game itself, its soundtrack is stuck in a time-warp, feeling like in belongs on the PS2, despite being on the PS3. To me, this is most obvious in the tracks Maiden in Black, Maiden Astrea, and Return to Slumber.
Juliet St. Moon
2020-03-06 02:16:07 +0000 UTC
