You know that when we need to use the sad Kratos picture the news isn’t good. God Of War Ragnarok has been praised by all for its incredible visuals, exceptional gameplay, riveting narrative, and its powerful soundtrack and audio design that enhances each of the other design pillars. Now we’re learning that perhaps the development of the soundtrack wasn’t as perfect as we’d have hoped, with Jessica Mao, a composer, and Music Production Intern at Santa Monica Studio on God Of War Ragnarok reaching out to Twitter to express some sad news, she’s not been credited for her work on the title.
Taking to Twitter, Mao shared the news that she hadn’t been recognised by the studio for her work on the game, saying
Better get this out before Twitter dies.
I’m so happy to see so many folks enjoying God of War Ragnarök! i worked on the editing/arrangement/implementation of the Freya chase scene and Thor boss fight music. you can hear to a bit of each scene’s music in this video!
I want to give a quick shoutout to Thor’s fight because that was a fun exercise in music arranging. the original mix was too fully orchestrated and had to be toned down to make room to grow in later phases. i made new stems using different combinations of the original stems…
…in ways that i felt worked best musically. the stem i’m proudest of is one where i removed all instruments and left just the percussion and vocals. you can hear it in this clip (under all the combat sounds lol). Sometimes less is more
Unfortunately, my name is not in the credits, and apparently it can’t be added in a patch update. i was told that to be credited, my contribution to the game must hit some “minimum criteria,” hence my tweet from Monday. Still not sure what this criteria could be…
This was incredibly disappointing and discouraging for me to learn, and i’d hate for anyone else to go through it. Game devs, please credit EVERYONE who participates in the development of a game. It only makes sense.
It’s sad to hear of Mao’s situation, although, as of the time of writing, there is yet to be any official comment by Santa Monica Studio themselves. Perhaps there was a mere oversight by the studio as they compiled the credits, perhaps there is in fact a certain criterion that Mao has not met. Either way, this story is likely to persist until a comment from the God Of War Ragnarok developer emerges.
