Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord Composer Winifred Phillips Wins Grammy for Best Soundtrack in a Video Game
Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord has won the Grammy for Best Score Soundtrack for Video Games and Other Interactive Media.
Accepting the award, composer Winifred Phillips thanked developer Digital Eclipse and the audience for “believing in music for games and recognising it and for breathing life and enthusiasm and energy into what we do. It means so much.”
Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord is the 3D remake of the first game in the Wizardry series. 1981’s medieval fantasy Wizardy is considered the first party-based video game RPG ever released, and is credited as inspiring the likes of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord is built directly on top of the original game’s code. You can even view the original Apple 2 interface as you play.
Phillips took home the prize ahead of big hitter nominees including Wilbert Roget, II for Ubisoft’s Star Wars Outlaws, John Paesano for Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Bear McCreary for God of War Ragnarök: Valhalla, and Pinar Toprak for Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora.
In a follow-up interview, Phillips said she was “blown away.” “I really didn’t expect it,” she added. “The category was populated with so much brilliance this year, and I have so much deep respect for the other nominees in this category. So to have been recognized is just a highlight of my career. It truly is.”
“We do a very unique thing,” Phillips continued. “We’re creating music that needs to accompany people who are having an experience and who are making choices, and having adventures and living a grand story, and we’re creating the music for that story. It’s such a wonderful privilege because you feel like you’re collaborating with the players. Like you know them and they know you. It’s really very special.”
Previous winners of the coveted award include Stephanie Economou for Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, and Stephen Barton and Gordy Haab for Respawn’s Star Wars Jedi: Survivor. The first piece of music from a video game ever to be nominated for and win a Grammy in any category was Baba Yetu, a song arranged by Christopher Tin for Firaxis’ Civilization 4, which won Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocalist at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards in 2011.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
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