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Soundtrack Review: Army of Two: The 40th Day (2010)

Posted by Jorn Tillnes On January - 25 - 2010

Game Music Review: This is a review of the video game soundtrack Army of Two: The 40th Day by Tyler Bates.

The anticipated sequel to the excellent co-operative shooter game Army of Two has finally arrived almost three years later than the first one. This on is titled The 40th Day and even though the game has improved technically, it still feels a little less fun than the original. Music of course has a big impact and this game feels different with Tyler Bates as composer. If you remember, the first game was composed by Trevor Morris who is probably too busy writing music for the excellent The Tudors Season 4. With Tyler Bates comes a different kind of game music experience, but is it good?

Track List

01. Introduction (****)
02. What Else Could go Wrong? (****)
03. Highrise (****)
04. Embassy (***)
05. Descent (***)
06. Bossa China (Interlude) (*)
07. Vertigo (****)
08. Can Your Contact Hear me? (***)
09. Highway (***)
10. Free Murray (***)
11. Get to Ground (***)
12. A Few Extra Bullets (**)
13. Zoo (***)
14. Cages (***)
15. Hospital Streets (***)
16. Auditorium (***)
17. Breznev (***)
18. Back to Track (****)
19. Bund (****)

Tyler Bates hasn’t got too much experience with game music, but he did provide source music for the game 300: March To Glory, but I suspect it’s not written especially for the game, but rather a case of music for the movie fitting the game. Then there’s Rise of the Argonauts from 2008 which has music especially written for that game. Tyler shows he is a very talented game composer, that is without question. His style is a bit different from most composers as he always try to incorporate a more movie-like feel into the scores. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, but I feel game music is a different beast to write for and shouldn’t necessary sound like its movie counterpart.

Different Sound

I’ve already mentioned that The 40th Day sounds different from the first Army of Two game, so if you were expecting more of the same, you might be disappointed. The music Trevor Morris composed had more spunk to it, it was more of an action score. Tyler has opted for a more cinematic and tense experience which works, but is less gung-ho than Trevor Morris effort. I feel that is where this score is lacking as Tyler tries too much to make it a cinematical epic experience instead of composing for the game. That being said, it works, but I feel like I’ve lost an old friend and the game isn’t like it used to be.

It doesn’t have any ground breaking cues that makes you go “wow, awesome!”. The closest it gets is ‘Bund’ which follows the style of the game, but it has a dark 5 note motif theme attached to it in the beginning which is excellent. It soon goes back into the same type of music as the rest of the game however. It still feels a little more tense than the rest. ‘Vertigo’ is another cue that is quite good and almost get top marks. The suggestive rhythmic patterns and the heavy percussion is a great effort and it even includes some ethnic chants. Close but no sigar.

Conclusion

Maybe Tyler Bates is trying to hard, but overall this is a good effort that gets better the more you listen to it. It lacks that balls-to-the-walls style that I loved from the first game, but it has it’s moments of glory. It falls between a game music score and a film music score, and it makes you wonder if only…