When starting to work on the music for Earthbreakers, we were wondering what would give this game some unique personality. I was thinking about what I enjoyed about FPS games, what I enjoyed about what I did with C&C Renegade long ago, but ultimately, I did not want to simply repeat myself. I prefer games having their own musical identity and not just being a copy of something else.
The initial ideas started with trying something that sounded like a typical hybrid-music style of electronic and orchestra instrumentation, and it just fell a bit flat. This has just been done to death and didn’t feel particularly special. So we went back to the drawing board and came up with the idea about drawing influence from something like the Dusk til Dawn soundtrack. That in turn triggered some other ideas for me where I thought, what if I tried a blend of classic rock, rockabilly, blues, and early punk?
The focus is on the rhythm section of guitar, bass, and drums. Tapping into the raw and dry sounds of older recordings adds character to the soundtrack, and once I started experimenting with a handful of different tones and song ideas, the next thing to figure out was where to put them, and where they made sense.
The more upbeat stuff certainly makes sense to have during gameplay. It’s a mix of fast and mid-tempo tracks that vary in sound and style to help keep variety so you don’t get burnt out on one kind of thing. I’ve found it to be quite a motivator on the battlefield. Counter to that, a slower fun bluesy number in a major key worked well for a win, while a minor key punk-ish tune worked well for a loss.
In the early stages, we were using rockabilly style music for the main menu. But once that got refined to a more mood evoking animation and storm scene, the next musical element that I thought would be fun to add to the mix was gothic surf. I then relegated the rockabilly intro to the character selection screen once you join a game.
I think there is a game here that is onto something special, I enjoy the cel-shaded art style, the base mechanics and strategies. I’m really looking forward to expanding on the soundtrack and audio as we continue to develop the game, because the personality is shaping up nicely, and allowing me to do something musically I’ve not been able to do in a game until now.
-Frank Klepacki