Entry 207 - Koudelka

 

There are quite a few games that have excellent soundtracks that have been lost to the sands of time. The company has seemingly forgotten about them or they are lost in copyright hell. Koudelka seems to be one of those games, and it is firmly in the category of games I never thought would get a vinyl release of the soundtrack.

While the game itself is a bit of a survival horror and role playing game mashup, the music itself is a bit all over the place. You have a child's choir singing a prayer, a string quartet soulfully playing. In contrast to this the rest of the soundtrack firmly has the "PS1" sound-chip slapped all over it. It's quite the stark contrast.

The soundtrack itself is rather short, fitting almost on one side of an LP. The second side has a few bonus tracks of live arrangements of the music. I'll have to listen to them a few more times to form a real opinion, but they are a nice addition to fill out the time on the record.

While its been over two decades since I played and beat the game I do remember that it was quite creepy and challenging. I don't have much nostalgia for it though, so the music has to stand on its own for me. On that test it passes with flying colors.

There is something about old horror games and their soundtracks that hits me right. Be it Koudelka or any of its contemporaries from the PS1 or PS2 era, they all had some magic potion they were drinking. Almost all of the soundtracks from this era seem to resonate strongly with me. On that front Koudelka is a fine and welcome addition to the collection.