Mick Gordon unlikely to work on another Doom game after Eternal’s OST release

[Man of Doom]

So since the open letter came out, I've been taking my time to collect all of my thoughts, and I'm unsure if I can just do a "TL;DR" version of them.

I will do my best to be concise, though.

Firstly, I want to apologize to id for jumping the gun on this whole situation and assume that this was probably just another Fallout 76 "Nylongate"-type incident. I was way too quick to jump to Mick's side without at least hearing something official from Marty or Hugo.

Not helping matters was that Chad Mossholder was getting outright harassed over an issue that, frankly, nobody had any control over really. Chad was just doing his best to work with what he can, and to see him get pilloried like this is outright shameful (and this should have never happened in the first place).

 

Secondly, I'm more than happy (and honestly relieved) to hear from Marty about what's happened during this OST debacle. It's also deeply disappointing to see that Mick was not the "totally blameless" party he made himself out to be. I mean, Mick really was given full reign to work on the official soundtrack release and he failed to meet deadlines every single time (not to mention that Mick was given the kinds of blessings most companies wouldn't even dare to give their most esteemed employees). That's not necessarily "executive meddling", that's reasonable business practices 101.

 

Next, I want to talk about Mick and his actions, because... hoo boy, I have some thoughts.

 

So was Mick definitely being salty about this whole thing, even to an unnecessarily petty degree? Definitely.
Was his recent behavior outright unprofessional? Most likely.

Was it possible that he was being outright malicious instead of just being plain frustrated with what's happened? Not really.

 

I mean, he was outright talking to internet randos about how he got screwed by The Man and how he wants to release his version of the OST without even trying to talk to anyone at id on what can be done going forward. I mean, it's an outright miracle that Marty is still open to an additional contract to have more tracks released with Mick's mixing.

I honestly wouldn't blame Marty, Chad, or anyone else at id if they decided they wanted absolutely nothing to do with Mick anymore, and considering what's transpired since then, there's a non-zero chance that Mick could get outright blackballed from the industry for this. I know this sounds kind of extreme, but imagine someone you closely worked with just deciding to shit-talk you due to a situation that neither party really had control over and then imagine that exact same shitshow on a professional scale (or in this case, a contractual scale).

 

So yes, it's true that Mick implicitly threw Chad under the bus for something that neither party had control over (not helping that the former gave the latter his blessing to finish up the OST at one point before changing his mind), but I'm sure that Mick legitimately had no idea that Chad was going to get harassed over this.

And that's pretty much the best way to frame this whole situation (or the best way I can think of).

 

I know for sure that Mick knew what he was doing (and that he was contracted for only a few tracks), but communication should have been made ahead of time so that him mixing the whole thing was a possibility (if only 11 tracks could be done under contractual obligation and nothing else could be done, just allow something so that two or three extra volumes worth of music are within the realm of possibility and call it a day).

 

 

I think what ultimately went down here was what happens when unrealistic expectations on all sides meets miscommunication, exacerbated by outside conditions. The Collector's Edition promising the Eternal OST by release pretty much made this situation next to unsalvageable, and it's just a lose-lose situation for everybody. There's really no villain in this story, and I truly hope this professional relationship is eventually restored on amicable terms in the future.

 

 

And if Mick does decide to respond to Marty's open letter, I think he should respond in kind with an open apology.

 

I believe that he should apologize to id (and *especially* Chad) for throwing them under the bus for something *only he* was obligated to complete, for subjecting several people to the Internet Hate Machine (unintentionally or otherwise), and for showing such unprofessional behavior on social media when he has an obligation as a professional to carry himself as such.

Additionally, I believe that he should also apologize to the Doom community and fanbase for misleading them and placing the blame on "Bethesda/corporate fuckery" when that clearly wasn't the case.

I know I said there were no villains in this story (and that's 100% true), but I think an apology would be a good first step in repairing this kind of relationship on both sides.

 

 

And finally, this is more of a hot take than anything, but just bear with me:

I'm well aware that Andrew Hulshult is a fantastic composer and he keeps getting brought up as a good replacement for Mick, but I don't think he should be chosen just because he's "a backup Mick Gordon". I mean, Andrew's work on titles like Dusk, Quake Champions, and Prodeus are unstoppable, and if he's chosen to be the composer for the DLC soundtrack, he should be chosen on his own artistic merits (same with any composer that might replace Mick).

 

Plus, Mick's use of old Russian synthesizers and emphasis on electronic distortion via unusual methods is very distinct and feels like something that's very distinctly Mick, and it would feel unfair to start comparing composers based on Mick's body of work. So as I just stated, if a replacement composer does get chosen, it should be done on their own artistic merits.

 

EDIT: Just for further clarification, none of this means that Mick deserves to be attacked or harassed. This is NOT a call or invitation to start attacking Mick at all.
Both id and Mick are parties to a situation that led to nothing but frustration and indignance, and to attack either one is just going to exacerbate things even further. Let both parties handle this on their own terms.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Man of Doom

[thewormofautumn]

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

I believe that he should also apologize to the Doom community and fanbase for knowingly misleading them and placing the blame on "Bethesda/corporate fuckery" when that clearly wasn't the case

Jesus Christ people just go from one extreme to another. Some folks on that reddit thread now are attacking Mick without hearing his full response and the same is happening here.

 

seriously, NO ONE KNOWS everything. To attack id or Mick without having both sides is ridiculous. It’s nice that Marty wrote what he did. But how can any of that be validated? I work in contract law and can tell you there are a LOT of things on what he wrote that can be interpreted multiple ways, or there is a genuine reason for from the other party who believed they were acting in good faith.

 

Bring back science and critical thinking lessons in schools, please.

Edited May 6, 2020 by thewormofautumn
minor spelling/formatting error

[Man of Doom]

2 minutes ago, thewormofautumn said:

Jesus Christ people just go from one extreme to another. Some folks on that reddit thread now are attacking Mick without hearing his full response and the same is happening here.

 

Who said anything about attacking Mick?

 

I just stated that an apology would be a good start to repairing a professional relationship that went wrong, plus his comments and likes on social media were vague to the point where he only painted himself as just another victim of The Man screwing artists over. That being said, he does have good reason to be frustrated, but he could have channeled said frustration into more channels that would be conducive to helping him.

[Senor500]

1 hour ago, Man of Doom said:

I'm well aware that Andrew Hulshult is a fantastic composer and he keeps getting brought up as a good replacement for Mick, but I don't think he should be chosen just because he's "a backup Mick Gordon". I mean, Andrew's work on titles like Dusk, Quake Champions, and Prodeus are unstoppable, and if he's chosen to be the composer for the DLC soundtrack, he should be chosen on his own artistic merits (same with any composer that might replace Mick).

I'm also thinking, Andrew has been working on a lot of things for a while, would he now have the time for Doom I wonder? I hope he does, I don't expect him to do Mick's style, I just want him to do what he does.

However I'd still love for Mick to stay, he would be a loss.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Senor500

[MrHofmann]

On 5/5/2020 at 1:37 AM, D88M3R said:

"At E3 last year, we announced that the OST would be included with the DOOM Eternal Collector’s Edition (CE) version of the game. At that point in time we didn’t have Mick under contract for the OST and because of ongoing issues receiving the music we needed for the game, did not want to add the distraction at that time"

 

Why did they made the statement that was gonna be released if they did not know it for certain? That is on them, that is typical "AAA" gaming industry bullshit.

 

23 hours ago, Bauul said:

 

Because they didn't have to use Gordon for the OST.  If he didn't have the availability, they could (as they did) do it themselves, or hire someone else.  If they'd asked him once the in-game music was delivered "do you have time for the OST?" and he had said "no", then all of this would have been avoided.  But he didn't, he said "yes", and that's where all this went wrong.

 

This is most likely the case. Moving on:

 

"After discussions with Mick in January of this year, we reached general agreement on the terms for Mick to deliver the OST by early March - in time to meet the consumer commitment of including the digital OST with the DOOM Eternal CE at launch. The terms of the OST agreement with Mick were similar to the agreement on DOOM (2016) in that it required him to deliver a minimum of 12 tracks, but added bonus payments for on-time delivery. The agreement also gives him complete creative control over what he delivers.

...

Mick also communicated that he wasn’t particularly happy with some of the edits in the id tracks. I understand this from an artist’s perspective and realize this opinion is what prompted him to distance from the work in the first place. That said, from our perspective, we didn’t want to be involved in the content of the OST and did absolutely nothing to prevent him from delivering on his commitments within the timeframe he asked for, and we extended multiple times."

 

I don't understand how can Marty say that Mick asked for a specific timeframe when the deadline is the release of the DOOM Eternal CE (or around that period) and can't be postponed much because of said potential legal issues? It seems to me that Mick, when he was contacted in January (only two months before release), didn't have a real choice and had to choose between letting id do the OST or at least try to pull something off, and of course he is going to want to try to finish his own work.

 

There is still a lot of missing context, like how much time was Mick given to do the 2016 OST and how long did it take to finish, because the "similar terms of the OST agreement to DOOM 2016" part is not saying much regarding deadlines and cannot be clearly compared to the situation now. Maybe 2-3 months is not enough because two hours of music is a lot of music. It looks like the pendulum is swinging back so people should stop blaming Mick now for being overly ambitious and not meeting the deadlines or whatever until he responds.

 

[thewormofautumn]

1 hour ago, Man of Doom said:

 

Who said anything about attacking Mick? 

 

I just stated that an apology would be a good start to repairing a professional relationship that went wrong, plus his comments and likes on social media were vague to the point where he only painted himself as just another victim of The Man screwing artists over. That being said, he does have good reason to be frustrated, but he could have channeled said frustration into more channels that would be conducive to helping him.

 

Your whole post was some strange put down on him.

 

I mean:

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

So was Mick definitely being salty

 

Really? Based on Marty's nice and detailed description for which there has been no rebuttal.

 

The rest of that post was similarly filled with righteous conviction.

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

Mick was not the "totally blameless" party he made himself out to be

 

Where did he say that. Or is this your own inference?

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

I mean, Mick really was given full reign to work on the official soundtrack release and he failed to meet deadlines every single time (not to mention that Mick was given the kinds of blessings most companies wouldn't even dare to give their most esteemed employees).

Based on one party's statement. Maybe there's an alternative view you haven't heard.

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

even to an unnecessarily petty degree? Definitely.
Was his recent behavior outright unprofessional? Most likely.

 

You've called him petty, and implied he's unprofessional. Based on one side of the story.

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

without even trying to talk to anyone at id on what can be done going forward.

 

How do you know exactly what's been happening between two private parties? Are you involved?

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

Mick could get outright blackballed from the industry for this

 

Jesus Christ...

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

it's true that Mick implicitly threw Chad under the bus for something that neither party had control over

 

(my emphasis in bold) You need to look up what "true" means. Hint, it requires proof. A well written and lengthy statement is not proof.

 

2 hours ago, Man of Doom said:

And if Mick does decide to respond to Marty's open letter, I think he should respond in kind with an open apology

 

What a massive leap to make. From hearing snippets from one side, then a detailed reply from the other, to then saying "an open apology" is required. You haven't heard anything besides one side's detailed story, and have made some massive leaps based on little information from the other side. Ever thought maybe Mick didn't give details because in general you don't discuss private negotiations and contracts in public? I thank Marty for being open, but I also cringe because a lot of the detail should be kept private.

 

There was more to your post I could lay into, but it's way too much effort. 

I suggest you step back and either wait for all sides to provide their statements, or (better option) just move on. 

 

There's a reason why the world is in the state it is... people are so quick to jump to conclusions, it's ridiculous. Few are willing to investigate all sides of an argument.

[slowtorturepukechamber]

hot take: i think mick's soundtrack was kinda eh. it certainly is a bummer how bethesda is handling the whole situation though, and i heard that mick is essentially the only reason the soundtrack had any heaviness at all. 

[Taurus Daggerknight]

1 hour ago, ditchdigger said:

hot take: i think mick's soundtrack was kinda eh. it certainly is a bummer how bethesda is handling the whole situation though, and i heard that mick is essentially the only reason the soundtrack had any heaviness at all. 

 

A) That has nothing to do with Bethesda. That was the audio director for Doom 2016's original directive. Which might sound ridiculous, but give some credit; his intention was to avoid doing something that might be termed cliche'. Gordon himself seemed to respect that starting point, if anything he said in the post-2016 launch stuff is anything to go by. Also worth noting; no, the original direction was not "not heavy", it was just "not electric guitars". The initial focus on non-metal was still very much a heavy tone. 

B) Seriously, can everyone stop immediately going "Bethesda did a bad thing" at every single occurrence? This has nothing to do with Bethedsa by the accounts given, other than "made a commitment to the publisher to ship a product", which....news flash; in the case of a massively (and repeatedly) delayed product that they are, in part, financing? Yeah... they kind of have every right to put pressure on after a point. 

[Caffeine Freak]

1 hour ago, thewormofautumn said:

You've called him petty, and implied he's unprofessional. Based on one side of the story.

 

I would agree there's plenty we still don't know, and probably never will know with 100% certainty, but I maintain that some of the way Mick has responded to this has been unprofessional. Is it the 'post a drunken rant video on Twitter in which you cry and scream through tears' level of unprofessional? Not at all... but it's still unprofessional to cast doubt on a business relationship in a random social media DM, which Mick did a couple times. 

 

Obviously this is somewhat subjective, but when dealing with criticism towards a project you've just released and collaborated with others on, it's also unprofessional to answer with what essentially amounts to 'oh, that mistake you're seeing right there? That wasn't my fuck-up, I totally wouldn't have done that.' That's not a good way to maintain good standing with people you work with, and casts a negative light on your collaborators. You don't distance yourself from the people you've worked with when addressing criticism. Again, it's not a 'omg, how shitty of him' thing for Mick to do, but it's still what I would deem unprofessional, even if it's quite understandable how Mick feels about the whole situation.

[Man of Doom]

Well, here I go:
 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

Your whole post was some strange put down on him.

 

How so? If anything, I vehemently defended Mick when he first came out that he might not be doing soundtracks for future Doom titles, and all I did was post my thoughts on new developments that since came out. They're not exactly the most cohesive thing in the world, but it was the best two cents I could come up with. They're my two cents, not the gospel truth that demands to be fact-checked in every aspect.

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

Really? Based on Marty's nice and detailed description for which there has been no rebuttal.

 

The rest of that post was similarly filled with righteous conviction.

 

Again, I was stating my thoughts based on the new information that Marty brought to light. That being said, if I did come across as irate, it was because Chad Mossholder was the primary subject of a targeted harassment campaign.

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

Where did he say that. Or is this your own inference?

 

*gestures at first 6 pages of this thread*

Not only was Mick posting about how The Man wouldn't let him finish his work and how he got screwed and whatnot, he was even liking tweets that agreed with him. The thing is, you don't badmouth the company you're contracting for because that's a big part of how business works.

 

And look, Mick sounded like someone who did get screwed over in some aspect, that part I understand. But if it turns out Marty's information turns out to be 100% correct, that just puts Mick's social media stuff in a whole new light (unless he comes out with a statement of his own, of course).

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

You've called him petty, and implied he's unprofessional. Based on one side of the story.

 

Now you're just putting words in my mouth. I never said that he was unprofessional and petty, just that his recent actions on social media have come across as unprofessional, based on the information Marty provided (plus, this has never happened with Mick before). Mick was given several deadlines to finish his work on the OST, deadlines that he was well aware of. Again, all of this is based on what Marty has provided and Mick could come out with something entirely different.

Yes, I know that mixing music takes quite a bit of time and technical issues do occur. It happens.

 

However, at any point, Mick could have just said "hey, is it ok if we discussed something that allowed me to mix the entire OST instead of just 12 tracks?" and it was apparently Mick's idea to just hand over all the rest of the tracks over to Chad just to get the OST out the door in the first place so that id could avoid getting into trouble with consumer protection laws.

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

How do you know exactly what's been happening between two private parties? Are you involved?

 

NOBODY DOES. Which is exactly why I stated that the two private parties handle things on their own terms.

 

I get the whole "Mick should apologize" thing is technically forcing one of the parties to do something, but he's not obligated to do so. For all we know, Mick could come out with a statement showing that he really did get screwed over by "unreasonable deadlines" or some other unknown.

And here, I wasn't blaming Mick for what's happened; I was illustrating that this entire situation was predicated on misunderstanding and poor communication.

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

Jesus Christ...

 

Like I said, the blackballing thing is an extreme thing that has a 99.99% chance of not happening, but it's a non-zero chance if it turns out that Mick had been flaking out on contractual deadlines, then of course other companies are going to take notice.

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

You need to look up what "true" means. Hint, it requires proof. A well written and lengthy statement is not proof.

 

Because Mick had named Chad as the one other guy who worked on the OST, and he didn't sound too happy about it. Plus, the actual files of the lossless OST release show Chad's name in the tracks that didn't have Mick as the one who mixed it. And of course when Mick was confronted about why most of the tracks were all messed up (Loudness War, certain sections of the track not lining up with each other, etc.), he was all like "but I would never do such a thing!"

 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

What a massive leap to make. From hearing snippets from one side, then a detailed reply from the other, to then saying "an open apology" is required. You haven't heard anything besides one side's detailed story, and have made some massive leaps based on little information from the other side. Ever thought maybe Mick didn't give details because in general you don't discuss private negotiations and contracts in public? I thank Marty for being open, but I also cringe because a lot of the detail should be kept private.

 

So the reason why my thoughts were mostly about Mick and not about Marty's statement is because of something you just said yourself:
 

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

Based on Marty's nice and detailed description for which there has been no rebuttal.

 

The thing is, all we've gotten from Mick is a few vague comments here and there about how he's frustrated with this whole process and whatnot.

 

And yes, I'm well aware that Mick may not be at liberty to divulge major details about what went down due to contractual restrictions and NDAs.

 

Besides, there's one more thing you mentioned that I find interesting:

2 hours ago, thewormofautumn said:

I thank Marty for being open, but I also cringe because a lot of the detail should be kept private.

 

The thing is, Marty delivered this statement in the first place because there were reports that Chad was being harassed on social media endlessly and likely several other people at id were being subject to this harassment as well.

 

They wanted the harassment to stop more than anything else.

 

And like I said before, THERE ARE NO VILLAINS IN THIS STORY, NOT EVEN BETHESDA. What happened was a situation that was born out of misunderstanding and frustrated the living shit out of everyone to no end, and it resulted in a lose-lose situation that nobody was at fault for.

 

There's still information that we still don't have, and we may never get it.

 

EDIT: I think @Caffeine Freak in his above post sums it all up more succinctly than I ever could:

15 minutes ago, Caffeine Freak said:

I would agree there's plenty we still don't know, and probably never will know with 100% certainty, but I maintain that some of the way Mick has responded to this has been unprofessional. Is it the 'post a drunken rant video on Twitter in which you cry and scream through tears' level of unprofessional? Not at all... but it's still unprofessional to cast doubt on a business relationship in a random social media DM, which Mick did a couple times. 

 

Obviously this is somewhat subjective, but when dealing with criticism towards a project you've just released and collaborated with others on, it's also unprofessional to answer with what essentially amounts to 'oh, that mistake you're seeing right there? That wasn't my fuck-up, I totally wouldn't have done that.' That's not a good way to maintain good standing with people you work with, and casts a negative light on your collaborators. You don't distance yourself from the people you've worked with when addressing criticism. Again, it's not a 'omg, how shitty of him' thing for Mick to do, but it's still what I would deem unprofessional, even if it's quite understandable how Mick feels about the whole situation.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Man of Doom

[Smouths]

Here's what gets me about the situation:

 

Let's just take Marty's letter at face value for a minute. Knowing that the soundtrack is a big selling point of the new series, the decision gets made to throw it in with the Collector's Edition so they can ship more units than they would otherwise. They contract Mick to mix a minimum number of tracks, which he agrees to, because he'll have no say in the OST that ships if he declines. He fulfills his contractual obligation, albeit with mutually agreed upon deadline extensions, and it releases. Lo and behold, fans are upset, because it's pretty obviously rushed and subpar - it's not what they thought they were paying for.

 

Then there's an ensuing public shitshow of vocally embittered fans, harassment of employees, bad blood and fallout, all of which would've been completely avoided had they not made the decision to ship it with the collector's edition. If they'd made it a separate release, instead of contracting him a couple months before launch so they could use it to bait more upgraded-sales from fans, then no one would've lost out. The only people who aren't for the worse here are id/Bethesda, since they get to keep those Collector's Edition sales now.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Smouths

[Man of Doom]

47 minutes ago, Smouths said:

Here's what gets me about the situation:

 

Let's just take Marty's letter at face value for a minute. Knowing that the soundtrack is a big selling point of the new series, the decision gets made to throw it in with the Collector's Edition so they can ship more units than they would otherwise. They contract Mick to mix a minimum number of tracks, which he agrees to, because he'll have no say in the OST that ships if he declines. He fulfills his contractual obligation, albeit with mutually agreed upon deadline extensions, and it releases. Lo and behold, fans are upset, because it's pretty obviously rushed and subpar - it's not what they thought they were paying for.

 

Then there's an ensuing public shitshow of vocally embittered fans, harassment of employees, bad blood and fallout, all of which would've been completely avoided had they not made the decision to ship it with the collector's edition. If they'd made it a separate release, instead of contracting him a couple months before launch so they could use it to bait more upgraded-sales from fans, then no one would've lost out. The only people who aren't for the worse here are id/Bethesda, since they get to keep those Collector's Edition sales now.

Actually, you may have hit the nail on the head as to why Mick is beyond frustrated when it came to the overall OST released and how it was promised as a Collector’s Edition bonus.

 

And the sad part is, I already saw derogatory comments about how the Eternal OST wasn’t going to be immediately shipped with the CE as originally planned, and that said comments mainly consisted of “lol Bethesda just being Bethesda lol”.

 

It’s a goddamn shame too because Eternal’s soundtrack easily rivals 2016 in terms of quality and that it was basically forced to be shipped out in an unreasonable timeframe, causing headaches for literally everyone.

 

And now because of this fiasco, bridges have already been burned, possibly for good.

[Gez]

5 hours ago, ditchdigger said:

it certainly is a bummer how bethesda is handling the whole situation though

Bethesda is not handling the situation at all, it's all between id Software and Gordon.

 

Bethesda is the publisher, but not the developer or director. You can blame Mick and Marty for the situation, they didn't need their Evil Corporate Overlords to get stuck in this mess.

 

2 hours ago, Smouths said:

all of which would've been completely avoided had they not made the decision to ship it with the collector's edition.

... or if they'd just promised a voucher for the soundtrack album, without saying the album would ship with the game.

 

 

I still think the best way out for both sides would be for id to contract Mick Gordon for a Remastered Soundtrack Album for, say, December; offer a 50% discount on that for those who have the official soundtrack album as released (either from the Collector's Edition or from buying it separately); and for Mick to issue an apology for throwing Chad under the bus. That would calm the fans and repair the bridges.

[Kronecker–Capelli]

So in short, and that a question, Mick missed all the deadlines (id/Bethesda several times postponed the deadline date) which cause id/Bethesda to say "Thank you for you work, but we questioning our future collaboration"!?

[Smouths]

1 hour ago, Kronecker–Capelli said:

So in short, and that a question, Mick missed all the deadlines (id/Bethesda several times postponed the deadline date) which cause id/Bethesda to say "Thank you for you work, but we questioning our future collaboration"!?

 

More like they were going to release an OST at launch, and they contracted him just a couple of months before release to do a minimum number of songs, so he only did the minimum because of the short time frame. I *suspect* they're probably trying to spin it (or at least more than mildly insinuate) that Mick was missing deadlines for PR's sake. If the bridge is burnt already, then their only obligation is to make it look as little like their fault as possible.

 

2 hours ago, Gez said:

...Mick to issue an apology for throwing Chad under the bus...

 

Unless I've missed something, I don't really see what he has to apologize for- the closest he came to throwing anyone under the bus was in saying that someone else had mixed those tracks. I doubt he's really all that eager to interact further with fans for the time being, considering how quickly momentum built around the few statements he made, and it sounds like he's already been in contact with id (or possibly Chad directly) about it.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Smouths

[Edward850]

1 hour ago, Smouths said:

More like they were going to release an OST at launch, and they contracted him just a couple of months before release to do a minimum number of songs, so he only did the minimum because of the short time frame. I *suspect* they're probably trying to spin it (or at least more than mildly insinuate) that Mick was missing deadlines for PR's sake. 

You have missed some extremely important details, namely the fact he was asked to do 12 songs and only managed to come back with 2, go back and read the letter again. The letter then goes on to explain that's not the reason for parting ways. 

And yes, we are 100% sure Marty Stratton isn't known to lie, that's not something you can spin around here. Suspect no longer because it's totally off base. 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Edward850

[Deimos]

This whole subject is an overreaction and will continue to be so... A self-feeding drama of sorts.

[Cardboard Marty]

I feel like a little reading comprehension here could help everyone out. Marty points out that they already had issues getting music they needed for the game delivered, but they really wanted Mick to do the OST and worked with him as best they could to accommodate that. I see a lot of people hyper-focusing on them making a deal for the OST in January, which was super close to launch, but it's important to note that this isn't "finish the game music within three months" but rather "mix and master the game music within three months". Mick has outlined his process of creating the OST for Doom 2016 and he does put in a lot of careful consideration for making a track flow like a song rather than just bits mash together. That being said, I think it's perfectly reasonable to get this done in that amount of time.

 

I'm sure there's some reason that Mick reacted the way he did, and maybe he's under a lot of legal red tape and can't speak up on it. Whenever this issue first came up, I honestly didn't believe the screenshots were real because it felt incredibly foolish to me to "burn a bridge" via a response to a random person on Instagram. The vagueness of his responses has only made the situation way worse. I'm a musician as well, I wouldn't want my artistic vision to be manipulated or tampered with in any way, but it sounds like id gave Mick a chance to do what he wanted to do. Deadlines are deadlines man.

[Smouths]

1 hour ago, Edward850 said:

...namely the fact he was asked to do 12 songs and only managed to come back with 2... The letter then goes on to explain that's not the reason for parting ways. 

And yes, we are 100% sure Marty Stratton isn't known to lie... Suspect no longer because it's totally off base...

 

>Yes, but he managed to do 12 after the extensions they agreed to.

>Didn't say that's why they parted ways.

>Never said Marty was lying, just pointing out that he's in a position where he has to cover the public image of his company.

>I read the letter several times before posting, and I stand by my position- though I could be wrong. And I'll admit my bias here, I used to be a musician, I dislike Bethesda, and I don't really like new-id (though I understand Marty's been there since Quake 2-ish.)

[Gez]

2 hours ago, Smouths said:

Unless I've missed something, I don't really see what he has to apologize for

You answer your own question:

2 hours ago, Smouths said:

considering how quickly momentum built around the few statements he made

He didn't do any attempt at damage control around these statements.

[Smouths]

11 minutes ago, Gez said:

He didn't do any attempt at damage control around these statements.

 

Fair enough, maybe we'll see a statement from him in the near future. Though I wouldn't totally blame him if he opted for silence at this point either.

[qdash]

Haha, Marty trying to spit in portfolio of Mick when Bethesda's reputation in total minus. Nice try. LoL. Where's Mick with his named know around the world and where's you - just recruited (d)effective managers.

[seed]

11 minutes ago, qdash said:

Haha, Marty trying to spit in portfolio of Mick when Bethesda's reputation in total minus. Nice try. LoL. Where's Mick with his named know around the world and where's you - just recruited (d)effective managers.

 

Please re-read who made a deal with who. Marty works at id Software, and Mick was contracted by them, Bethesda was not involved in this or the creative process in any capacity.

 

Quit spitting on Bethesda just because it's cool and accept people aren't "perfect".

[MrHofmann]

1 hour ago, Cardboard Marty said:

I feel like a little reading comprehension here could help everyone out. Marty points out that they already had issues getting music they needed for the game delivered, but they really wanted Mick to do the OST and worked with him as best they could to accommodate that. I see a lot of people hyper-focusing on them making a deal for the OST in January, which was super close to launch, but it's important to note that this isn't "finish the game music within three months" but rather "mix and master the game music within three months". Mick has outlined his process of creating the OST for Doom 2016 and he does put in a lot of careful consideration for making a track flow like a song rather than just bits mash together. That being said, I think it's perfectly reasonable to get this done in that amount of time.

 

Marty's letter is perfectly clear. No one is blaming him for deciding that ingame music was of higher priority at that point in time, in fact I would argue that everyone agrees with his decision.

 

Regarding the OST, the game music segments have to be combined in a way that the entire track would be coherent and that is not always easy to acomplish. Sometimes you need to create new stuff in order to connect two segments. You can hear this stuff in almost every track mixed by Mick. Best example of this is The Only Thing They Fear Is You track where you can hear many parts of the song which cant be heard in the game. So no it is certainly not only "mix and master the music" but rather "finish, mix and master the music" and that takes a lot more time than three months, especially for 60 tracks, or even 30 (2+ hours) as Mick intended.

[Gokuma]

I think both sides messed up somewhat and neither is wholly to blame.   Did I read right that Mick was asked to do the soundtrack when they delayed Eternal?   That's pretty late in the development.   He may have agreed to a deadline he couldn't meet and sent poor quality files of the unfinished stuff but if they asked way earlier in the development he would have plenty of time and things probably would have turned out much better.  Seems everyone was stuck in a hard place with pressing deadlines building frustration and stress.  I hope somehow things get resolved civilly and the soundtrack gets improved but we can only hope.

 

In the meantime, what's the definitive list of the tracks are really finished and not the super compressed stuff?

Edited May 6, 2020 by Gokuma

[Vic Vos]

7 hours ago, Gokuma said:

In the meantime, what's the definitive list of the tracks are really finished and not the super compressed stuff?

 

[Kronecker–Capelli]

22 hours ago, Smouths said:

More like they were going to release an OST at launch, and they contracted him just a couple of months before release to do a minimum number of songs, so he only did the minimum because of the short time frame. I *suspect* they're probably trying to spin it (or at least more than mildly insinuate) that Mick was missing deadlines for PR's sake. If the bridge is burnt already, then their only obligation is to make it look as little like their fault as possible.

Did Mick said something in his defense?

Because all drama around this situation looks like a total joke slash people started slowly losing their minds because of a quarantine. Why? Because starting point of it was not a "hey, it sounds somehow wrong, mind to explain it Mick?" but "hey, Audiacity shows that spectrogram of a previous version of this track looks different from the current, mind to explain it Mick?". And that means that nobody even hear a difference in track, until resource extractor has been created.
And even more, nobody can even now are able to figure out which tracks are "finished" and what are "not finished".

[Gez]

19 minutes ago, Kronecker–Capelli said:

And even more, nobody can even now are able to figure out which tracks are "finished" and what are "not finished".

Am I the only one who looks at music file metadata?

 

Quote

Finally, Mick was concerned that we’d given Chad co-composer credit – which we did not do and would never have done. In the metadata, Mick is listed as the sole composer and sole album artist. On tracks edited by id, Chad is listed as a contributing artist. That was the best option to clearly delineate for fans which tracks Mick delivered and which tracks id’s Lead Audio Designer had edited. It would have been misleading for us to attribute tracks solely to Mick that someone else had edited.

 

Obviously if your access to the soundtrack is through Youtube videos, you may miss this detail; but if you have the actual album any half-way competent media player should show you this information.

[Gokuma]

"is this what coronavirus does" - Mick Gordon (watching this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxwL-FCt0iY&t=3545 )

 

 

Anyway I have the Doom 2016 double CD soundtrack coming to me eventually.   In the meantime doing a search I found a util posted on reddit to extract Doom Eternal's soundtrack and convert to OGG's.   But it's well over 1000 files simply numbered to sort through.   Mostly short pieces as well as stuff from other Doom games such as the classic ones.   I noticed 1040 is based on the E1M3 Dark Halls but not a complete song by itself.   I'm making note of the longer pieces so I can compare them against youtube or whatever postings to ID them.

Edited May 7, 2020 by Gokuma

[Castle Dreadful]

Hire Meshuggah and the keyboardist from Fear Factory's Obsolete days. Mick absolutely pulled inspiration from these two.

Edited May 7, 2020 by Castle Dreadful