Al Emmo soundtrack and reviews

[eriqchang]

Lots of great Al Emmo reviews. Most all of them are glowing! I enjoyed the latest AdventureGamers.com review but I disagree with the bit about the soundtrack.

(from my post on the the AG forums):

Great review of Al Emmo. I agree with most of it. The part of the review I completely disagreed with was the music. During the production of the game, I was sent the soundtrack. I listened to it extensively for about a month late at night (with the cool breeze blowing through my window) while working on the website. Sometimes I felt like I was actually working by a campfire in the desert - totally atmospheric. Calling the soundtrack "fairly negligible" is a disservice to the musicians. The soundtrack was agreed to be made a promotional item towards the end of the project due to overwhelming response from players and reviewers.

Am I going to push the purchase of the soundtrack? HELL YEA. And not only because I designed the lovely packaging ... but because it's truly quite an amazing body of work. From one HUGE Sierra fan to another, If you appreciated all the Roland MT-32 music from the Sierra classics, you owe it to yourself to buy this soundtrack.



"The music of Al Emmo has nothing to be jealous of compared to the music we used to listen to in the classic Sierra games."
- Adventure Europe

"... Superbly done. The original soundtrack really adds a Western atmosphere to the game world at large and punctuates some of Al's predicaments."
-Four Fat Chicks


I LOVE the music! Fantastic job! It's probably one of the best sound-tracks I've heard for any adventure game (and I'm an "old fart" who's played a lot of adventure games) The music set the mood and the feel of each scene and area of the game perfectly and added such a "natural" flow to the pacing of the game and various scenes. Myself being an amateur harmonica-player, I can much appreciate the obvious skill and effort that went into creating the many varied musical scores within this game.
- Don McPherson (aka Barbarian),Hong Kong

The soundtrack was magnificent. Being a musician that plays 4 instruments and sings, I can definitely appreciate it when you can close your eyes and listen to a track from a game, and see everything about the room completely just from the melody. Even down to the pianist hitting the random off note, everything was a masterpiece. I can tell a lot of work went into it, and I know from experience it takes a lot of heart to make music to match ANYTHING. Salut on a fantabulous job.
- Sean Swartzwelder (aka Neodraven), Wisconsin, USA

BUY A COPY NOW!!! IT'S MADNESS! IT'S SIERRA CARPET MADNESS! IT'S MADNESS! IT'S CARPETS! IT'S CARPET MADNESS!

[Tom Lewandowski]

Not a real 'glowing review' all the way around, but interesting, nonetheless.  In regards to the soundtrack's "old west themes", I think that was the goal Dianne and I set out to accomplish.  Since we had never before composed 'old west' style music prior to AL EMMO, I'm going to take this reviewer's remarks as a compliment -- we pulled it off.

[eriqchang]

"variations" on old western themes is not what I thought the music in this game sounded like at all. I'm not a big fan of "old west" music myself but this soundtrack had that special something that made the tunes infectious. I thought it was fantastic Tom. If I can spin something for more than a week (almost a month!) while I'm working, it's gotta be good.

[GameDevBrit]

I agree, Eriq.  I was puzzled by the reviewer's comments at AdventureGamers regarding the music in the game.  I think saying the music is anything less than fantastic would be inaccurate...

I'm not saying this because of bias either.  This is more an integrity issue for me--I feel that it is nearly lying to say that the music isn't downright awesome.  It would be like saying, "chocolate is absolutely disgusting!"  Yea, some people might not like chocolate, but the overwhelming majority absolutely love it.  So, I feel it does a disservice to MOST people who read the review, because if they listened for themselves, I think they'd really enjoy it.  Hopefully they'll disregard those comments in the review and listen for themselves!

[Angelus3K]

The music was brilliant!! I can't wait for my soundtrack CD to come flying through the door!

I can just hear the main theme tune right now Dun duh dun da daaaa!!! (mainly cos the game is running lol)

[GameDevChris]

Yep, the review certainly does make the music out to be very mediocre -- that's the impression I got.  I was a little surprised at the exact wording used to describe the score!  

Honestly, I couldn't imagine the soundtrack turning out any better than it did for this game!  Tom and Dianne nailed every piece and composed each and every tune to perfectly suit their counterpart scenes.

Music and sound make up a huge portion of a storytelling experience and, in my opinion, the soundtrack to Al Emmo compliments the story in the best way it possibly could. True, it's difficult to be innovative with game music, but to generalize that the soundtrack is nothing more than a variation of other Western games is a pretty broad and unsubstantiated claim to say the least. It's just a shame that some people will base their final opinion on those comments without further investigation.

[Tom Lewandowski]

We really appreciate all the positive feedback.  Honestly, I'm not at all offended or affected by the Adventuregamers review of the music portion of Al Emmo.  I see it as someone who provided a very cursory look at the music with no real knowledge in that area.  My very frist response when reading his review was, "What game is he talking about?"  The soundtrack is 'typical or stereotypical' western music when it's purposely meant to be.  Just like Anozira is designed to be a typical old west setting, some things are meant to be.  

[opitzs]

I got the game with the soundtrack and I am glad I got it, it is better then I hoped for. It fits the game to the point and how many game soundtracks can make that claim?

Sven

[rtrooney]

As I posited on the AG forum, I thought the music was absolutely perfect, if not of Elmer Bernstien quality.

[Marian]

I just wanted to say that I thought the music was great and perfect for the game.  I have no idea what the Adventure Gamers reviewer was thinking when he made those comments about the music.  I've played plenty of games before where the music could be described as negligible, and Al Emmo doesn't fit that description at all.

Keep up the good work, people.  I'm looking forward to your next game.  

[Afex]

Hi!
Just wanted to let you know (since the e-mail adress isn't working for some reason) that a new review of Al Emmo appeared on the russian website Absolute Games. Here's a link:
http://www.ag.ru/reviews/al_emmo_and_th ... hmans_mine
 
I gave it 76% out of 99 and it is the 5th highest rated adventure game of the year.
Thank you for the review copy and for the whole experience. Hope to see more games from Himalaya in the near future.

Best regards,
-AG.ru