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Music in Video Games VS Video Game Musicals
2 years ago
General
I am about to straight up spoil what may be the best scene in all of video game history. It's from Alan Wake 2 and if you've played it already, then you probably already know the scene I'm talking about. Even if you've never played it, it was already spoiled by the Game Awards and pretty much every YouTuber who reviewed it, so if you have any desire to play this game, please do before reading this. Alan Wake 2 is a third person survival horror game in which you fight people corrupted by evil shadow monsters. There's much more to it then that, but that would be getting into story specifics. What I wanna focus on is what I've been obsessing about for over a week now. Half way past the game while trapped in a time loop, you'll just be walking along and then THIS shit happens:
As Alan Wake, you enter into a music video time loop in which he, himself, is confusingly singing and dancing along with characters that he's met throughout his playthrough. Being led through this labyrinth of screens and stage props, Alan (you the player) need to figure out how to get out by solving puzzles and also fighting more shadow monsters, all the while the music video plays on as you go through a set of time loops basically breaking down Alan's entire life. This music video was done with the help of a real band and also fake band that also exists in the game called "Old Gods of Asgard." If they're not a real band, then they at the very least made a full album for this game. Here's the full music video:
What's even more crazy is that there's about 5 different versions of this one song "Herald of Darkness." An 8 minute radio edit, this 10 minute music video, the full version of the song at just over 13 minutes, and then the full FULL version of the song that includes ALL of the music video edits they used for the game at nearly 30 minutes long! What's even more impressive to me is not only is it live action, but the song is catchy as fuck. On top of that, they created an original synchronized dance number. Pay attention to that dance loop, it's so good! On top of THAT, the song switches up the genre, going from metal, to soft rock acoustic during the sad part of Alan's life. Once that part of the game is done, Alan's all like, "Oh good, I escaped" NOPE!! Straight up pulls a 1408, he's STILL trapped in the music video time loop as it changes the tempo AGAIN to coffee shop lounge jazz! His music video couterpart straight up singing that he needs to figure it out to bring the song to it's end.
At that point I was just like, wow this is pretty impressive. NOPE!! It's even more impressive when you realize that Alan's body actor ISN'T the same as his voice actor! They're 2 completely different guys! Which means the voice actor needed to learn the song, and the body actor needed to learn the song to lip synch to it and also the dance choreography. WHAT!? No no! It doesn't even end there! The guy standing next Alan on stage that doesn't say a word. That's Sam Lake! Better known as Max Payne, who made the fucking game! He included himself as a character to dance along with this music video! Are you fucking kidding me!? And once this scene is over, that's IT! End of the bit! Moving on! That's a fucking budget right there! Sooooooo much effort for this ONE scene. I have been to almost every fucking Marvel movie theater experience and not a single one of them have come even remotely close to giving me such an emotional thrill ride as this one scene. This ONE scene that I don't even think any of the reviewers for it were as blown away as I was. Like, "Yeah, that music video scene slaps." NO!... That music video scene fucking changed video games. The bar has officially been raised! There is hope for non-multiplayer video games after all.
A similar thing happened in Remedy's last game, "Control" which is an SCP game where you play as the new Director of the "Bureau of Control" and need to take down an evil Hivemind know as the "Hiss." You're given an object of power which looks like a cassette player that plays a song by, you guessed it! "Old Gods of Asgard" to navigate a maze. Like this was the test flight for the music video scene:
Control also makes several references to Alan Wake, so Remedy basically is just the new and clearly much better version of Marvel atm bridging gaps between each games. I LOVE this music video so god damn much and have been listening to it for a week straight. I don't think they'll be able to top it, but I'm excited to see what they do next. I just want games to be fun and not take themselves too seriously. Why can't we have more fun things like this?
11/10 There's still hope for video games.
As Alan Wake, you enter into a music video time loop in which he, himself, is confusingly singing and dancing along with characters that he's met throughout his playthrough. Being led through this labyrinth of screens and stage props, Alan (you the player) need to figure out how to get out by solving puzzles and also fighting more shadow monsters, all the while the music video plays on as you go through a set of time loops basically breaking down Alan's entire life. This music video was done with the help of a real band and also fake band that also exists in the game called "Old Gods of Asgard." If they're not a real band, then they at the very least made a full album for this game. Here's the full music video:
What's even more crazy is that there's about 5 different versions of this one song "Herald of Darkness." An 8 minute radio edit, this 10 minute music video, the full version of the song at just over 13 minutes, and then the full FULL version of the song that includes ALL of the music video edits they used for the game at nearly 30 minutes long! What's even more impressive to me is not only is it live action, but the song is catchy as fuck. On top of that, they created an original synchronized dance number. Pay attention to that dance loop, it's so good! On top of THAT, the song switches up the genre, going from metal, to soft rock acoustic during the sad part of Alan's life. Once that part of the game is done, Alan's all like, "Oh good, I escaped" NOPE!! Straight up pulls a 1408, he's STILL trapped in the music video time loop as it changes the tempo AGAIN to coffee shop lounge jazz! His music video couterpart straight up singing that he needs to figure it out to bring the song to it's end.
At that point I was just like, wow this is pretty impressive. NOPE!! It's even more impressive when you realize that Alan's body actor ISN'T the same as his voice actor! They're 2 completely different guys! Which means the voice actor needed to learn the song, and the body actor needed to learn the song to lip synch to it and also the dance choreography. WHAT!? No no! It doesn't even end there! The guy standing next Alan on stage that doesn't say a word. That's Sam Lake! Better known as Max Payne, who made the fucking game! He included himself as a character to dance along with this music video! Are you fucking kidding me!? And once this scene is over, that's IT! End of the bit! Moving on! That's a fucking budget right there! Sooooooo much effort for this ONE scene. I have been to almost every fucking Marvel movie theater experience and not a single one of them have come even remotely close to giving me such an emotional thrill ride as this one scene. This ONE scene that I don't even think any of the reviewers for it were as blown away as I was. Like, "Yeah, that music video scene slaps." NO!... That music video scene fucking changed video games. The bar has officially been raised! There is hope for non-multiplayer video games after all.
A similar thing happened in Remedy's last game, "Control" which is an SCP game where you play as the new Director of the "Bureau of Control" and need to take down an evil Hivemind know as the "Hiss." You're given an object of power which looks like a cassette player that plays a song by, you guessed it! "Old Gods of Asgard" to navigate a maze. Like this was the test flight for the music video scene:
Control also makes several references to Alan Wake, so Remedy basically is just the new and clearly much better version of Marvel atm bridging gaps between each games. I LOVE this music video so god damn much and have been listening to it for a week straight. I don't think they'll be able to top it, but I'm excited to see what they do next. I just want games to be fun and not take themselves too seriously. Why can't we have more fun things like this?
11/10 There's still hope for video games.
