Video game music has never gotten the recognition that movie music has. Whereas you'll find entire webpages completely devoted to reviewing music from films, you'll be hard pressed to find the video game equivalent. Some suggest that video game music is simply not as good as film music. However, the two are nearly incompatible; whereas music in films simply plays over sequences, music in games has to loop, has to dynamically change with the player's actions. Thus, it is significantly more difficult to write cohesive video game music with obvious themes and ambience that fits the tone of the moment. WIth the players in decision of what happens most of the time, all the composers can do is write music that goes with the tone. Film music and video game music are practically incomparable.
So, when a video game has a soundtrack that has powerful themes and impressive ambience along with a terrifically unique feel, it's impossible for one's ears not to perk up. Halo is one such game. Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori have created one of the most impressive scores of the digital age, featuring a truly unique s-tyle that hasn't been replicated since.
The trouble with Halo's score is its horrific album, a terrible presentation that is misleading for many reasons. First of all, the main theme, an intense and refreshing take on the Zimmer equation, gets very few showings in the album. The most impressive one is in the Truth and Reconciliation Suite, the obvious highlight to the album. It's rare that a main theme like this ever fits perfectly with the game; most of the time you get a cliched tune that goes well with the moment, but doesn't necessarily click perfectly. Halo's impressive main theme, however ethnically odd, fits with the game nearly perfectly. Thus, it's disappointing to see it get only one complete presentation on album.
Another issue with the album presentation is the stupidity of the first few tracks. Astonishingly, the music that plays over the Bungie logo - a brief electric guitar flourish - is actually included. This stupid choice of actually putting it in with the opening track is a very annoying inclusion and detracts from the track as a whole. Why not simply include it as its on separate track, titled "Bungie Logo"? Even 20th Century Fox has the intelligence to do that. Moreover, the way the tracks are presented, the only pieces worth listening to are Halo, the Opening Suite, the Truth and Reconciliation Suite, and Brothers in Arms. The rest of the pieces are terrible mixes of the ambience in the game.
Simply put, if one wants a good representation of the music you hear in the game, you're actually better off just playing it. But enough bashing of the album; no doubt you want to know about the music itself.
I'll put it this way: It's fantastic.
First, in the opening menu, you're greeted with a dark and foreboding Gregorian chant that aptly sets the tone of the entire game. It's one of the most famous motifs in music ever, and it's been used in advertisements and such across the world. Very impressive stuff. Despite its obvious simplicity, it's still a surprisingly apt motif that graces the game's various cutscenes several times. The chant represents Halo as a whole; most of the cutscenes depicting Halo and the characters' revelations towards it, this theme appears as the backdrop. Though one might expect something like John Williams' work, there is no such brass epicness to be found here. And guess what? This still works. Brilliantly.
The next few motifs you get is the primary "battle theme," the composers' crowning achievement. The theme is more constantly referred to as the main theme, the piece that flourishes at the center of Truth and Reconciliation Suite. The African drums opening the theme are catchy, and actually carry on the feel of battle alone. You get your usual cello and string ostinatos - and more intriguing is that they came before Zimmer defined the idea in Batman Begins. The usual patterns for Zimmer's music are all here; the string loops, the powerful percussion, and of course a stunning main theme. What's most impressive about the music here is how stunningly dynamic it all is. For buildup to the music, the game plays the drum beat repeatedly. When the battle escalates, the cello and string loops enter. Sometimes the main theme doesn't even come in, allowing the string ostinatos to carry on the intensity of the battles on their own, and this often works wonders. The game presents this theme throughout its entirety, and during the most intense moments of the game where enemies are swarming and you're desperately fighting for your life, the way the theme plays out elevates the gameplay to cinematic levels. The intelligent inclusion of it in the final desperate run of the Master Chief in the level The Maw is particularly impressive.
Other motifs make great impressions as well, such as the wonderful string themes in On a Pale Horse and the bold, militaristic beat to Brothers in Arms. While the recordings are fairly dry, their later representations in the sequels are simply phenomenal, and are all purely original pieces that easily stand against the waves of action music in Hollywood today. Brothers in Arms in particular has a great theme that is quite epic in its development, but the way the track is mixed results in the percussion overtaking it, ultimately damaging its appeal. The orchestral version in Halo 3, Follow Our Brothers, is an outstanding version that shows exactly what the composers had in mind when writing this music.
Another impressive motif is the one for the Hunters. This intense and well-written piece throws in ascending and descending bursts of strings, perfectly capturing the mood of the desperate battles against the hulking creatures. It's all very clever, and it's similarly impressive orchestral version in Halo 3 (Brutes) is also delightful.
As you move through the game, you find some impressive pieces as well, such as the percussively driven Drumrun and the near tribal Covenant Dance. Both are enjoyable pieces and fit well in game, and though they certainly aren't the best pieces, they earn their mark as worthy cues.
One cannot discuss Halo's music without also carefully observing its horror aspects. The sequences with the Flood take up a fairly large portion on the album, creating a bunch of pieces with seemingly meaningless string and synthetic ambience. It sounds awful on its own, though the difficult dissonance and twisted feel to the music fits amazingly well in game. The first time one plays the game and endures the sequences with the Flood, the music raises the horror to impressive levels. The entire Library Suite and other tracks are devoted almost completely to this idea, making them the most difficult tracks to swallow in the album. They aren't pieces you'll want to listen to more than once, though their effectiveness is uncontested.
The Good:
- Outstanding themes
- Great motifs
- Use of Gregorian chants is unique
- Impressive usage in game
The Bad:
- Terrible album presentation
- Flood themes are painful to endure
- Rock Anthem for Saving the World
In game, the score is great. There is no other way to say it. Its effectiveness and imaginativeness is huge, and though some of the pieces may be obnoxious (Ambient Wonder, A Walk in the Woods), they all do well in game. The album presentation is a terrible product, with no sense of narrative flow whatsoever and even less of a sense of a dominant theme. The final blow, the Rock Anthem for Saving the World, is a painful piece to endure and still is in the game, though it mercifully plays over the credits. Despite the obviously small ensemble to the game, the composers do a great job with the music, and earn their due recognition of composing one of the greatest video game scores of all time.
Music as it Appears In Game: 10/10
Music as it Appears on Album: 2/10
Overall: 9.5/10
*Note: This review does not include a track by track rating as it would sorely misrepresent the score as a whole.