by Jason Epstein

While independent games have had a surge in popularity, some present themselves ahead of the pack with their story, art direction, graphics, or gameplay.  Bastion surpassed expectations with all of these things, but truly shined in the audio department.  The excellent voice acting and writing combine to provide a truly unique and engrossing narrative style, while the intriguing and immersive soundtrack permeates throughout, holding the entire game together like beautiful, musical glue.  I had a chat with composer and producer of Bastion’s award-winning soundtrack, Darren Korb about his music and the tech behind it.

SoundCtrl  - How were you able to keep the consistency of Bastion’s soundtrack so fluid sounding amidst such frequent narration?  Did any sort of editing or mixing technology aid this effort?
Darren Korb – As far as keeping the sound of the music consistent, I established some writing parameters for myself early on in the project.  I decided that if I kept all of the music in the same genre, that would provide the consistency I was looking for, without being repetitive, so I came up with “Acoustic Frontier Triphop” and I tried to make all of the pieces fit somewhere in there.  As far as the mix itself goes, it was definitely important to have the sounds and music get out of the way of the narration, so we used automation to duck the music and other sounds when the narrator speaks.

SC  - I understand this was your first time scoring a game.  How was this different with regards to the technology you used to achieve it from other television shows and movies you’d done in the past?
DK – I actually used all of the same recording tech (Logic Studio), but the integration tools were new to me.  We used XACT, which took quite a bit of getting used to!  It isn’t set up like any other audio programs I’ve worked with, in that it has no “mixing board” equivalent, no faders, or anything that would look familiar to an audio engineer.

SC - Bastion’s soundtrack was a whopping 60 minutes in length and netted you a Best Original Score at the Spike Video Game Awards among other awards and nominations.  You’ve set the bar high in terms of both quality and quantity, where do you go from here?
DK - I feel super lucky that the music from Bastion was received so well.  All I can do is keep making stuff that I find compelling and hope that people like it!

SC - Is there anything you can tell me about your musicality goals or new ways you will use audio technology for your next project?
DK – I’ve been curious about working with some stem-based in game mixes, so you can bring elements of a piece in and out based on gameplay states.  I’m also interested in getting some more obscure acoustic instruments involved in the future.

SC - What are some of your favorite video game soundtracks of all time?
DK - Marble Madness (NES), Fallout 2 (PC), Dungeon Keeper (PC)

Comments

comments