It’s coming! Thumper is only a few short months away and ready to either bury you under the weight of its ominous atmosphere or make you feel like a pure badass chromed-out beetle who can handle the darkest and most foreboding music and art a giant twisted head can spew down the track. The release date has been “Fall 2016” for a while now but today sees that window trimmed down to a specific day, and that’s the PS VR launch date of October 13. The game comes on both PS4 and PC, with VR support for each, and whichever version you choose it’s going to be an incredible ride.
Nice as the launch window is, the other news is that there’s a soundtrack coming out with it. It’s a project that had been in the works but is now official, and there’s even a Collector’s Edition coming from iam8bit going up for preorder tomorrow with a picture disk included. Yes, a non-picture disk would have been nice for better audio quality, or a two-vinyl set with picture and standard disc included, but it also includes a full digital soundtrack. (Which kind of defeats the point of getting it on record in the first place if you need to drop to a digital download to get better audio quality.) The soundtrack isn’t music straight from the game, because the audio is designed more to work with an interesting level than to kick back and listen to, so the tracks have been reworked to stand on their own. The preorders for the Collector’s Edition goes live tomorrow at $45 on the iam8bit store, and there are a pair of tunes available to preview the music. Thumper is on the way bringing its audio landscape with it, and the dread and excitement are fighting for top spot in emotional anticipation.
The digital copy might be good for those people who would love to take their music on the move with them but don’t have portable record players. So you see, they can listen to their lp at home and the digital file in the car! The author could also do this.
What a snobby and pretentious comment to make. If the author had bought any new vinyl recently they would know that most lps of new material come with download codes. Thus gives the lie to all of the other comments about sound quality as, while they may be true, it is clear the writer has not bought any brand new vinyl for quite a while, if ever.
The digital sountrack is pretty handy, honestly. It’s just that if you’re paying an extra $25 for a collector’s piece it would be good to have the physical component perform to an expected standard. Picture discs look great but don’t tend to sound very good. It’s basically there for looks, not performance, and that’s what the line about audio quality was meant to say.