Game music for the masses

Just a quick note to let you know of a significant site update.

If you click on the FILES part of the horizontal menu bar at the top of the page you’ll now be whisked to a rather large stash of videogame music in MP3 format. These are hosted on the RadioSega.net servers – all thanks go to SegaMark for his generosity.

More music will be uploaded over time – the collection should exceed 20gb when all is done. Simply click a column head to sort by that type. So click the DATE heading to organise the files in date order – which will allow easy identification of the newest content.

Enjoy.

If you see Sid, tell him

That synth melody gets into your head disturbingly quickly and, although Calvin Harris is trying too hard with the whole kitsch 80’s theme (he would have been, what, 12 years old or something?) 80’s mood + high pitched catchy melody = memories of C64.

That’s a win!

Odds! Ends! Osu!

This will be a shorter post than some of my recent epics and really serves to just give a quick update on some things.

Firstly, following yesterday’s post I recieved some criticism of the final point about using the mentality of “great sales = great game”. It was pointed out to me that this was a twisting of the original message. The correct message would have been to state that, had the games under discussion not been great games then they wouldn’t have sold like they did (we’re primarily talking about Halo here). Which, whilst an easier to swallow mentality is just as flawed as the sales=greatness one. A good game should sell well. However the suggestion that its quality is the driving factor for it’s sales is far too idealistic to be taken seriously – particularly of a game like Halo. This notion is further disproved when you look at the current game charts and see a game that’s scored very average reviews dominating the charts in the way that the Spiderman 3 game is. At the end of this week the poorly reviewed Pirates of the Carribbean 3 tie-in game will be released and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see it mimic Spiderman 3’s performance. We have Shrek 3 to look forward to next. A game like Halo benefits precisely from the same status as a film-tie in – it’s profile has been manufactured to be very high indeed. Far higher than the quality of its content. Halo 2 and, of course Halo 3, will sell because they’re called Halo more than anything else.

Quality should sell a product – but it doesn’t. It’s a factor but it’s not going to make a difference if the carefully calculated positioning of media, tie-ins, promotions, publicity, and sheer might that some companies wield. Sorry, but that’s a fact and examples are everywhere. Now, it’s nice when that works in your favour and you’re a Halo fan. But gamers will argue the exact same things when they feel a game they like isn’t getting sales it ‘deserves’ due to a game they don’t like dominating the charts. Remove your emotional attachment to the game and look objectively at the product, the market and the economics and you’ll see how it works. Choosing examples selectively isn’t really a watertight argument.

On a less controversial note I’d like to let regular readers of Koffdrop.com know that the site will soon be publishing it’s first guest-written piece. At this time I have absolutely no information to share with you as to the tone or content. All I can say is that I know the author very well and have always appreciated his input into topics we discuss. Look out for it!

Finally, the Ouendan 2 soundtrack is available to you via the Koffdrop.com files area. This isn’t an official soundtrack but a collection of all the individual songs that feature in the game (yes, there’s a difference between the two). I’m enjoying this soundtrack as much as the original and favour tracks 19 and 16 in particular. 16 is an especially good example of some absolutely batshit bonkers over-the-top j-pop-screaming. The game’s not bad either. Enjoy.

That game, that music

No doubt, those of you with an interest in games will now be familiar with a forthcoming title called LittleBigPlanet that appears to be creating considerable buzz.

I don’t know about you, but I found the footage shown to be very appealing and I think that a lot of that is down to that great soundtrack.

The music’s by a band called The Go! Team and is taken from their album Thunder, Lightening, Strike. If you want to have a listen to the ditty in question just push the button below.

Get it Together – The Go! Team

A new gizmo

I chanced upon a collection of MP3’s that went by the heading It Takes A Nation of Tossers recently. Naturally, my curiosity got the better of me and I took them to one side and had a listen.

What greeted my ears was what I can only describe as a cross between Eminem and Geof Boycott (well known cricketer of yore and outspoken yorkshireman). The artist is called Pitman – a reference to working down a mine pit – and the content was pretty accomplished and highly amusing.

It’s possible that I’m fond of it due to the fact I’m a southerner that’s now living ‘oop north’ – where terms like cob, mardy and calling people duck still seem a little alien to me.

Anyway, enjoy a new feature of Koffdrop.com – streaming audio – and have a listen to one of the tracks. If you want more just head to my files section and help yourself.

If you grab any files or stream the audio please write a comment and let me know if you found it useful and if the streaming speed was decent.

[audio:14.mp3] Pitman – It Takes A Nation of Tossers
“What’s the Point”