When I heard through the grapevine that they had used a piece from WAR's soundtrack in a promo for Fox's American Horror Story I felt in me the urge to expose a bit more of these blatant rip offs of game soundtracks. It happens quite frequently, people just don't notice because the target audiences for one medium and the other rarely meet. Except in me.
Example: where does TLC and The Sims cross paths? Me. You can imagine my disbelief and outrage when I hear something from The Sims 2 buy mode as background music for TLC's "Outrageous Kid Parties" promo. Mike believed me then but failed to raise an eyebrow in concern. Well, that wouldn't be the end of my battle for awareness to this issue. There were other instances where I've caught familiar samples of soundtracks in channel promos but damned if I could ever find them online, obscure as they were.
A few days after the TLC incident we were having dinner and on comes Solitary, a reality show in one of the multitude of Fox channels. This time I wasn't going to stay silent about it anymore. I absolutely loved this particular game and as soon as my brain unfroze and I realized what they had done I had to make it known. Mike didn't believe me on this one at first, seeing as he actually liked the show. But I showed him. And I'll show you.
The madness spreads. Mike began by turning his nose but there's no mistaking those strings.
Actually, I have mixed feelings about this, to be honest. Soundtracks are the unsung heroes of videogaming. I personally have spent way too many hours of my life burning images of menus on tv screens just because I liked the music as background for my daily chores. So, is it that wrong for other people to make use of someone's genius work and spread it further through another medium? Yes, it is, especially if credit isn't given to those who deserve it. But I like it that people who would otherwise never be exposed to them have and their lives are richer for it. In some miniscule way. Well, even if they don't know it, I do.
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