17 replies to this topic

[CommanderJB]

I happen to keep up with some game soundtracks; there's a lot of truly brilliant quality music out there made for games these days. One of my favourites was that of Conquest: Frontier Wars, composed by James Hannigan. He's also done the OSTs for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Republic: The Revolution (which again is beautiful), Sim Theme Park (don't remember much about it myself, but it won a BAFTA so it was probably pretty good), Reign of Fire, Freelancer, Evil Genius, FA Premier League Manager (which won another BAFTA) and many many others besides. Anyway, I was visiting his website, and on his list of upcoming projects is an 'Unannounced Title' by Electronic Arts for 2008, and in a slideshow on the left I just happened to notice a little box with a familiar-looking Soviet female commando and an armoured bear on it...
It's the box for Red Alert 3 (for X-Box 360, but I doubt they'd use a different composer for different platforms). I think this is wonderful news as he's done some fantastic music in the past and while I don't know what style he's going to choose, I for one will be happy to see something other than hard rock for a change. It's a shame that Frank Klepacki has been left out in the cold, but I'm very optimistic for good-quality music from James Hannigan.
Just thought I'd let you know...

[Overdose]

I know his work from Evil Genius. It's quite good.

[TheDR]

 Overdose, on 18 May 2008, 15:02, said:

I know his work from Evil Genius. It's quite good.

I have the Evil Genius Theme tune on my Mp3

This game could sound good

[Overdose]

The Main Theme song, Tranquil and the Brazilian Agent (=P) songs are my favorites.

[Stinger]

I'd rather have had Trevor Morris score the game after his offerings in Kane's Wrath. He nailed it with those mixes.

Nice find, though. After hovering the pointer over the image and clicking on it this came up.

Edited by Stinger, 18 May 2008 - 17:17.

[CommanderJB]

Yup, that's the one. Tiny (and I have no idea of the purpose of the slideshow really), but it's there.

[Dennis Freling]

I heard rumours that it's not just James Hannigan, it's two or three composers including him. I think even Frank Klepacki may be involved. Perhaps you'd better update with that when it gets official? Should be good though with these strong composers on board, who ever they all are.

[Kichō]

I hope Frank Klepacki is involved Hellmarch is well awesome.

Though his Generals theme would of been a better replacement for the USA factions but some of it was not good. D:

[Kaido]

Quote

Soundtrack

No mention of the nature or composer of the soundtrack was made during the initial announcements; initial fan reaction however indicated a desire for long term series composer Frank Klepacki to return for the game. When interviewed regarding the matter, Klepacki indicated a strong desire to do so, but admitted that due to the fact that he is no longer being employed by Electronic Arts and currently works for Petroglyph Games this may be contractually impossible.[8]

In the April issue of PC Gamer, it is stated: "Frank Klepacki's iconic 'Hell March' theme music from Red Alert will be updated for RA3."

[KiraSama]

 -Drag-, on 19 May 2008, 13:40, said:

letters

that doesnt mean frank kenpacki is working on it, they maybe only got the right to use/change the song but time will tell

[CommanderJB]

How very interesting... there's no slideshow on the website anymore. I wonder if this was something we weren't supposed to notice (whoever found the mention of it did brilliant work to do it so quickly if that was the case)... and I hope I haven't ruined somebody's day by finding it and posting it!

[Nem]

 The Dr, on 18 May 2008, 10:05, said:

 Overdose, on 18 May 2008, 15:02, said:

I know his work from Evil Genius. It's quite good.

I have the Evil Genius Theme tune on my Mp3

I gave you that I mixed tranquil and the main theme.

 Overdose, on 18 May 2008, 12:59, said:

The Main Theme song, Tranquil and the Brazilian Agent (=P) songs are my favorites.

They are great, He does good work.

[CommanderJB]

My apologies for the necro, but among the revealed information from the Community Summit was the composers list:

Quote

-Tim Wynn: has composed for TV and a few games. He's working on orchestral music.
-James Hannigan: composed for lots of games, and writes themes well. He's working on the Empire's music and some themes for the Soviets.
-Michael Sandgren: worked on Generals.
-Frank Klepacki: worked on almost all previous C&C games. He's writing Hell March 3 and another theme.

From the CnCFiles preview. Great news, they're all really good (and I was right about James Hannigan after all!).
Also, big changes to the musical styles. Again from C&C Files:

Quote

The style and approach to music is such. It is not serious, it is humorous and playful. It has lots of styles put together. It is generally light and breezy. There are some dark parts, but they don't last too long.

There are two game states. Either you're building and exploring, or there's combat! The non-combat music is live orchestral music, sneaky, somewhat like what you'd hear in The Incredibles (but not that over-the-top). Sort of like spy music. In combat, the music is punchy energetic ROCK!

They played a clip from a mission of the game with the music styles they were thinking of, and then they sent the video clip off to a bunch of composers to make demo music along with a style guide.

...

And to show us how things are shaping up, they played some early versions of tracks for us to critique. Rock was covered first. The Empire side has techno-based rock. Called J-Rock? The Soviets have darker Nu Metal style. For the most part, the tracks sounded good. The Empire tracks fit very well with their art style, but we suggested some changes for Soviets themes to sound a bit less old Russian. They didn't have any Allied rock tracks for us.

Now, all of this music is interactive, the game guesses if you're winning, losing or even in the battle and plays appropriate music. Fight music is really aggressive, Losing music is darker, Triumphal music is more uplifting. While exploring, the music depends on a few different factors based on the threat to battle and how much battle you've experienced so far. This music was rather entertaining. I will enjoy hearing this ingame, it provides a good counterpoint to the rock.

Sounding better and better...

Edited by CommanderJB, 27 June 2008 - 08:17.

[Amdrial]

Four composers were picked to do music.
-Tim Wynn: has composed for TV and a few games. He's working on orchestral music.
-James Hannigan: composed for lots of games, and writes themes well. He's working on the Empire's music and some themes for the Soviets.
-Michael Sandgren: worked on Generals.
-Frank Klepacki: worked on almost all previous C&C games. He's writing Hell March 3 and another theme.

Some details about the composers.

[CommanderJB]

Ah. Edit ninja'd. Oh well.

[Stinger]

Quote

Mikael Sandgren

He's the man responsible for the GLA music, and I believe his hand was influential in the direction of the USA and China scores, too. He has a MySpace page where you can listen to "Arabica" (best GLA track ) from Generals.

I'm not familiar with the works of Tim Wynn, but if his music is anything like his surname then we are in for a real treat.

[Kris]

How did you know about the creator of the GLA musics? I smell a C&C Nerd here

[Dennis Freling]

The composers have been officially announced:

Frank Klepacki
James Hannigan
Tim Wynn
Michael Sandgren.

If you read between the lines I think it's pretty obvious Frank is just going to be creating some key rock tracks (updated Hell March etc.) and the main composers of the in game music are likely to be Hannigan and Wynn. Which is no bad thing. A very cool balance if you ask me, that pretty much keeps everybody happy. But it was definitely a cool move getting Frank involved.