Top Pop'n

Joystiq thinks a version of Pop'n Music might come to the US. I've never seen the game before, it looks like a nightmare. But I'm feeling the video because it just goes to show that virtuosity can come in many forms.



More NYU-MVGRP updates on the old twitter.

Nom nom noms

Joystiq reports on the nominations for the Game Audio Network Guild awards, the development community's top honours for video game sound design and music. The PS3's Little Big Planet has the most noms with eight, followed by World of Warcraft (5), Fable II, Gears of War 2, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and Dead Space (4 each). The full list of recognized games -- aka titles to acquire for the NYU-MVGRP library -- is at the link above. Voting is open now at the GANG site.

From the perspective of this blog, the category list provides a useful classification system for audio design and music in games. The top award is for Audio of the Year, followed by Music OTY, Sound Design OTY, and Best Soundtrack Album. Then it gets into the nitty-gritty. Best Interactive Score, Handheld Audio, Audio - Other (??), Cinematic Cut-Scene Audio, Dialogue, Original Instrumental, Original Vocal - Choral, Original Vocal - Pop, Best Use of Licensed Music, Best Game Audio Article, Publication or Broadcast, and Best use of Multi-Channel Surround in a Game.

There's a lot of music business going on in that lot...