Hey Guys! Today is a very exciting one for project OUTBUDDIES! Our musician OGRE, formally known as Mr. Robin Edwin James Ogden, just released the game’s original soundtrack on Bandcamp!
Thoughts on the OUTBUDDIES sounstrack by Robin Ogden:
"We wanted any retro audio touches to be an oblique suggestion rather than an obvious throwback, but I definitely wanted to keep a clandestine 16bit flavour throughout Outbuddies. Most of the synth sounds you hear are generated from an old Yamaha TX81Z FM synthesizer, which is notorious to program, but has a lot in common with the old sound chips from the Megadrive/Genesis era. It was my go-to secret sauce. I wanted to splice in some of that time period's DNA on some level, so the soundtrack is a deep-sea pressure fusion of ancient analog and dawn of digital synthesizers mixed with organic and real acoustic instrumentation.
Outbuddies is an exciting new chapter in the metroidvania tradition, and I wanted to reflect the ethos of these types of games with my Berlin school influences (Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Michael Hoenig etc.): sequences, repetition, and evolution. Prior to composing the soundtrack, I was reading Steve Reich's collected Writings On Music, which I'd argue has similar ideas to Berlin school composition. It seemed natural to employ some of these aesthetic choices when working on Outbuddies' soundtrack, namely thematic sequences which evolve, distort and change as you dive deeper and traverse the game's levels. Mantras and repetition have so many spiritual connotations, which seemed to me a perfect fit for a game about Old Gods stirring in the deep."
The Soundtrack was recorded in January and February 2018 following the game’s Kickstarter campaign in 2017. We got a total runtime of 37:46 and I’m damn proud to be part of this. Having a soundtrack composed by a musician that skilled has by far been my smartest decision I made on my six-years journey to produce this game and I hope you’ll all enjoy listening!
You can stream the OUTBUDDIES’ soundtrack on Bandcamp for free, and I am really taking a break and listening to the awesome discography Robin has crafted over the course of many years dedicated to music. Cheers, Julian!
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About OGRE
Robin Ogden is a composer for games and visual media, self confessed tape loop splicer, spring reverb tickler, and harbinger of imagined soundtracks for films that don't exist. His work is grounded in a lifelong love affair with sound, whether produced from wonky analog synthesizers, contact microphones or strange and wonderful handmade instruments. His music can be found in the award winning indie games Actual Sunlight, This Is The Police I & II, and Hacknet: Labyrinths, HBO's Vice Principals, and he was an audio consultant for the BBC’s first VR experience. He is busily working away on several PS4 titles. Robin is featured in the forthcoming documentary The Rise Of The Synths, and is currently releasing music with Grammy winning soundtrack label Lakeshore Records.
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