Id Software Explains Botched Doom OST Release

<p>As we <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;doom-composer-mick-gordon-quits-id-software&sol;">previously mentioned<&sol;a>&comma; the official OST release of Doom Eternal left a lot to be desired&period; With a heavy amount of compression on most of the tracks&comma; the release was plagued by bad mixing&period; Which was a shame considering the soundtrack shaped so much of <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;doom-eternal-review-the-celebration-of-a-legacy&sol;">the game<&sol;a>&period; But a question may have lingered on all of our minds&colon; How did it happen&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Id Software&&num;8217&semi;s Marty Stratton released an <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;reddit&period;com&sol;r&sol;Doom&sol;comments&sol;gdg25y&sol;doom&lowbar;eternal&lowbar;ost&lowbar;open&lowbar;letter&sol;" target&equals;"&lowbar;blank">open letter on Reddit<&sol;a> detailing the events surrounding the OST release&period; In this letter&comma; Stratton gives praise to Gordon&comma; but also makes it clear that he has been difficult to work with&period; And it gives a clearer picture on what happened and why the official releases ended up the way it did&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Stratton makes it very clear that Mick Gordon was given ample time and creative freedom to do something better with the soundtrack&period; He also goes on to state that the personal attacks on the lead audio designer who put together the OST release are unacceptable&period; Which when you hear the full story&comma; you might be inclined to agree with&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote><p>&&num;8220&semi;Alternatively&comma; when mixing and mastering for an OST&comma; Mick starts with his source material &lpar;which we don’t typically have access to&rpar; and re-mixes for the OST to ensure the highs and lows are not clipped – as seen in his 12 OST tracks&period; This is all important to note because Chad only had these pre-mixed and pre-compressed game fragments from Mick to work with in editing the id versions of the tracks&period; He simply edited the same music you hear in game to create a comprehensive OST – though some of the edits did require slight volume adjustments to prevent further clipping&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p><&sol;blockquote>&NewLine;<p><img class&equals;"alignnone size-large wp-image-156199" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2020&sol;04&sol;02053432&sol;20200329190140&lowbar;1-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"I Have The Power&excl;" &sol;><&sol;p>&NewLine;<h3 style&equals;"text-align&colon; center">A Problematic Relationship<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>The letter makes it very clear that Id Software had several problems communicating with Gordon&period; From the beginning&comma; Gordon kept negotiating more time to deliver the soundtrack&period; He did at least make up for this by making a lot more tracks for the game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>But the biggest issue here is how Gordon has not really stood up for Chad&comma; who received the worst of the backlash&period; While he didn&&num;8217&semi;t directly throw him under the bus&comma; he definitely didn&&num;8217&semi;t do anything to stop the bus&period; But personal attacks are never okay&comma; regardless of the reason&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>We may never get a professionally mixed Doom Eternal soundtrack&period; But at least now we are more aware of why things ended up the way they did&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Stratton also makes it clear that Id will not be working with Gordon on the DLC&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s sad to have reached this point&period; But given Gordon&&num;8217&semi;s reluctance to work with Id in the future&comma; it seems to be the only outcome&period; We can only hope that Id will seek out Andrew Hulshult again for future Doom music&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>That being said&comma; Stratton makes it clear that Gordon is a uniquely talented composer&period; And he deserves all the awards he may get for his soundtrack&period; And that&&num;8217&semi;s a thing we can all agree on&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;