Thank you Scarlett Moon Promotions for sending us this album to review!

I am a long-time fan of The Legend of Zelda, since the NES gold cartridge days, and I did enjoy (and review!) The Breath of the Wild. I also enjoy some hard rock; one of my favorite genres of music is progressive and instrumental rock, like Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Dream Theater, and Yes. So, when I was offered the chance to review this album, I instantly jumped at the chance!

In 2017, Ro Panuganti released one of his first game-related albums on Bandcamp, called "The Wild". While I can only guess how popular it was, it did catch the attention of the indie label Materia Collective. Now, with the release of Tears of the Kingdom, he released this spiritual sequel, "Return to the Wild".

Compared to the five tracks on the original 'The Wild' EP, this is a full CD-sized release, with nearly fifty minutes of music. Five of the tracks are remixes of the originals, while the nine others are all new, making this album fourteen tracks. All tracks are hard/progressive rock, and prominently feature excellent guitar playing along with percussion and other accompaniments. Below is a track list with my thoughts as I listened to each one:

Awaken - Nice piano intro with electric guitar and synthesizer melody, heavy drum beats, short start to the album, and sets the tone

Guardian - Strong Guardian theme via guitar plucking, battle notes have strong emphasis, then fades to background as heavier riffs come forward; melodies come and go, always lots of tension and shifting time signatures keeping the listener on edge; some saxophone later; mellow, acoustic ending

Riding Day - Piano to start, with signature tune for the outdoors that strongly points back to the game; calming with violins in the background and occasional guitar riffs; short

Hinox - Higher energy track, with heavy percussion and a strong guitar lead with synthesizers; very tense as battle music should be; also has alternating time signatures; some wood flute mid song before returning to heavy riffs; occasional jungle-like sounds, ends with harmonica and sounds of footprints

Kass - Heavy tones with a clear, strong melody with mostly guitar

Gerudo Town - Jam heavy, with a strong lead melody; lots of guitar and percussion; longer

Tarrey Town - More mellow, starts with piano and ocarina; jazzy presentation with calming lead guitar with ocarina given a prominent place in the melody; some country-ish tunes near the end

Zora - Lower distortion electric guitar with harmonics and prominent piano; relatively calm with a strong melody; mellow and enjoyable song overall with a strong lead guitar presence over piano

Korok Forest - Strong bass lines with a prominent violin, and acoustic guitar; very different presentation than many of the other tracks; very enjoyable for a jazz lover like me; lots of echo effects

Shrine - One of the most recognizable songs on the whole album for players of the game; starts acapella with stereo effects simulating the starting shrine jingle, and moves to low distortion electric guitar; moves into a harder sound, with more guitar distortion

Molduga - Starts with strong percussion, and jams into one of the heaviest songs in the album with strong rhythms and a heavy jam, with a melody driven by less distorted guitars; several time signature changes; this one is very metal

Rito - Begins with distortion and piano, recalling the theme of the area, and much more mellow than the previous song; nice low-distortion guitar with a strong melody; ends with a loud, hawk-like sound

Hyrule Castle - Starts with a bold announcer pronouncing doom; goes into a strong distorted guitar melody with heavy percussion, with some piano backing; later in the song, some great bass lines and harder riffs with the classic Zelda themes

Sheikah Tower - Begins with some echoing piano and guitar; a very atmospheric, mellow ending to the album

I feel like this album is best played in order and enjoyed as an album, as several of the song transitions are clearly meant to be from one to the next. I would say this does mean that it's a bit less ideal in a shuffle format, though you can certainly enjoy the tracks in that way, even if a few end a bit oddly.

Return to the Wild is a jam-packed album that I highly recommend to fans of Zelda music who also enjoy harder rock. I really enjoyed this album a lot; it is one of the best indie game-themed albums I've heard in a while.

Thank you Materia Collective for sending us this album to review!

My husband and I are fans of the Final Fantasy games and music. We have attended multiple live orchestral performances and own several Distant World and Black Mages/Earthbound Papas CDs. When I played and beat Final Fantasy VII on PC, I swapped out many of the original game songs to the Black Mages versions. By doing so, I made a great game even better! Before going any further, I must admit that I have not played the remake. With many gamers playing the remake and enjoying its music, it only makes sense to release an enhanced version of the soundtrack. Roborob delivers a nice selection of songs from this epic game in One Beat Angel FFVII.

I enjoyed and reviewed Roborob’s Kingdom Hearts remake album, Kingdom Heartbeats. I recognized many of the tracks but it’s been a while since I played a Kingdom Hearts game so I’m not as familiar with the music from that series. Since I’m a fan of Roborob and Final Fantasy VII, I jumped at the change to review One Beat Angel. For the most part, I have no regrets. While this is an enjoyable 11-track album, I prefer the original and Black Mages versions over this.

Just like the Final Fantasy games, this album opens up with a spruced-up version of the prelude song which is quite fitting. The second track Fight On! Takes the iconic battle song to a new level. If you’ve won a battle in a Final Fantasy game, you’ll recognize the Victory Fanfare song. The Mako Reactor song is instantly recognizable even with the dubstep additions. Who Are You is also given an electronic dance music facelift in this album.

With the album called One Beat Angel, it should come as no surprise that One-Winged Angel is overhauled as well. Aerith’s theme is probably my least favorite song on this albumn since it’s not recognizable until the very end. On the flipside, the peppy Chocobo Theme doesn’t stray too far from the original score. On That Day Five Years Ago brings the seriousness back with some nice beats. Roborob’s rendition of Cosmo Canyon is decent, but I have to give the nod to Pandoh’s dubstep version. The finale song, JENOVA does not disappoint and brings this entertaining album to a close.

The gaming world is one of the most popular industries among today’s internet users and technology savvies. Video games are extremely fun and engaging and can take you to a completely different universe.

It is extremely interesting to observe how the graphic design and the functionalities of video games have changed over the last decade. From classic popular games like Pac-Man or Super Mario which used to thrive among gaming enthusiasts many years ago, to VR games. Thanks to technological advancements and the rise of machine learning, game developers have been empowered to create games that take players into an exciting digital world. These days, video games have evolved so much to the point where they offer a complex digital world with a multitude of possibilities for gaming enthusiasts.  

With the developments in the gaming industry, people are spending more and more time on video games, especially when there are thousands of video games out there and thousands more are created every year. Thus, the increasing demand for video game localizations. But, expanding into international markets would require a great deal of effort, particularly if you are an indie game developer. Budget wise, is it feasible to market your product into different languages?

Fret not, there are affordable options to localize your game. You can certainly minimize your spending if you target specific markets that essentially speak the same language—this would be a good start. You can also collaborate with a good translation and localization agency and ask for advice on how to cut back the costs of your game translation and localization needs. This is something most consumers are forgetting, you can always ask them to configure the service in such a way that it would turn into a win-win scenario. With this in mind, it would certainly be wise to localize your game or you might suffer embarrassing setbacks that might affect the playability of your game altogether (this is specifically true for games that are highly dependent on dialogue).

And of course everyone can remember the phenomenal video game translation fail of Zero Wing’s opening cut scene, “all your base are belong to us”, an improper translation turned meme that has entered legendary status, it all worked out for Sega at the time but nowadays mistranslations are just annoying. To avoid these embarrassing mistakes, one must certainly consider game localization services in order to ensure that your game projects its intended meaning. You would not want a twelve year old kid laughing at your blood, sweat and tears would you?

I can’t lie. I’ve always loved the games that the Quantum Dream team has made. Their games are masterfully designed, both visually and aurally. The stories, even more so. This team has definitely made a name for themselves in the saturated industry of gaming and it’s a name that is often associated with some of the best choose-your-own-adventure games to have ever been released.

And I think you know where this review is already headed, but still, hear me out, read on and learn what I’ve got to say about this game. Despite what you’ve heard, it’s a fun game to play. Also, it forces us humans to take a good long look at how ugly we, and the things that we’re capable of, can get.

And well, gaming has definitely evolved.

Thank you Borys Nieśpielak for sending us this digital film to review!

Making a video game that’s fun and stands out from the crowd takes a lot of time and effort. Many indie games remain obscure and don’t get insanely popular like Mojang’s Minecraft. In fact, many game developers get discouraged and quit once their game releases and fizzles shortly afterward.

We Are Alright is a sixty-four minute documentary about Lichthund’s founders Bartek and Rafel and the preparations/launch of their first title, Lichtspeer. The audio is in Polish, but thankfully, it’s subtitled. The film begins five months from release day and continues on though the game’s launch on Steam and PS4.

Until the launch, there are several bugs and issues that need to get sorted in order to get Sony’s approval. Time and money are tight, as the composer is seen asking for his money and in order to break even the developers are hoping to sell 10,000 copies or 300 a month to make ends meet.