publicizing game music

I realized today that I've never heard of game music being on a radio station (aside from internet stations). Assuming that's true, that game music really is confined mostly to the internet, it makes me wonder two things:

(1) Is this due to lack of promotion by game publishers?
(2) Is this an indicator of the game industry's cultural relevance?

It might simply be a case in which marketing hasn't caught up with product advancement. It was not long ago that the production value of game music rarely exceeded MIDI files. The Mario theme is great, but the original recording is clearly dated (and it's really no more than a short ditty). Orchestral scores and CD-quality recordings are still relatively new on the scene. Perhaps publishers have not marketed their soundtracks beyond the internet yet.

If that's not the case, then why do film soundtracks make the radio and XM stations in TV satellite programming while game soundtracks do not? My gut reaction is that the audiences for those stations do not play games and still consider video games to be childish entertainment. Esteemed composer Danny Elfman's works from Fable (most of the music is by Russel Shaw) are not heard on classical radio stations, but his works from films like Edward Scissorhands are. Laura Karpman's work for Spielberg's Taken TV series might have earned her praise, but what about her work on Everquest 2?

To be honest, I'm not sure to what degree this issue is real or imagined, since I have no idea what is being played on the radio outside the Houston area. But here, at least, it seems only hardcore gamers care to hear game music once the controller is put down.

Screenshots on the wall

Ha! And you thought I was going to miss a day here. =P I finally thought of something to write about.

I was browsing the .pdf manual for my recent purchase of the Rise of the Witch King expansion for my Battle for Middle Earth: 2. I go to the options and it says something about ordering a print. I'm sure it only meant a print of the manual, but my first thought was that EA was offering to turn one or more of my game screenshots into a print.

Ok, so if I doubted before that I'm a geek, I don't any more... the idea of turning a game screenshot into a poster sounds pretty slick to me! For this game in particular, but I can just imagine having one or two screenshots from every great game I've played stretched out across my wall.

My wookiee ranger from Star Wars: Galaxies with his spectral snake pet. My skull-faced, spike-adorned blaster from City of Heroes tossing a fireball toward the camera. My goblin horde overwhelming the enemy with some help from the dragon Drogoth in BfME:2.

The problem, of course, is that blowing up a picture is hard to do and maintain clarity, especially in spottily pixelated game screenshots. But I bet a screenshot taken in 1600X1200 on a high graphics setting could turn out great, if only with a little tweaking.

Honestly, I'm a little surprised I haven't heard of a business yet that does just that... tweaks and blows up screenshots for gamers. If any of you decide to take it up, I might order some prints from you. =)