Earlier this summer, developer Evening Star Studios and publisher Private Division revealed Penny’s Big Breakaway during a Nintendo Direct. While the throwback 3D platforming adventure looked great on its own, what caught a lot of people’s attention was the team behind it. Evening Star’s creative director and lead engine architect is Christian Whitehead, one of the lead developers behind 2017’s Sonic Mania. Whitehead isn’t alone, though, as various other Evening Star developers also worked on Sonic Mania. While we still have some time before the game’s release – it’s due sometime in 2024 – Sports Informer It has a special sneak peek at the music and can exclusively reveal three tracks from the game.
Sonic Mania and TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge composer Tee Lopes is scoring Penny’s Big Breakaway and you can get a taste of his score below:
Jigsaw up, Penny
Land Ho Diablo
Cobalt sand sparks
We also got some insight into the creation of Penny’s Big Breakaway and Loops’ score from Evening Star, diving into inspirations, creating the first track, bass music and more. Whitehead says the initial concept behind the game was always Yo-Yo, even from the early brainstorming sessions. From there, the team arrived at a simple setup: “The player is an actor in the Emperor’s court. One day, Yu-Yu’s routine goes horribly wrong. Yu-Yu goes rogue and rips the Emperor’s clothes to shreds. . The emperor is furious, and all eyes are on you. The performance hall is full of penguin guards. Use your yo-yo and make a break for him.”
Music was also a big part of the game’s premise, Whitehead says, noting that with Penny’s Big Breakaway being Evening Star’s first original game, “we felt that defining a musical style was important. It’s important to be different from other projects we’ve worked on in the past.” The studio also wanted the music to complement the game’s Bauhaus-inspired world. Whitehead says he was drawn to early synth techno sounds like Ondevolin and Moog, but wanted to add some “turn-of-the-millennium vibes” like Beck’s “Midnight Vultures” era.
Lopes says the first track he made was for “Vanilla Town,” which is in the first world and one of the first songs players will hear in Penny’s Big Breakaway. He says this track allowed the music team to establish the game’s sonic identity. “We started experimenting with all these different sounds and genres from different eras to create a sound that was quirky, yet cool, with classic and modern elements that I think really fit Penny’s whimsical universe. Accomplishes well.” Speaking of the contributions within the game’s score, game director Hunter Bridges provided guitar on “Vanilla Town”.
Whitehead and Lopes worked together on Sonic Mania, but Evening Star brought in composer Sean Bialo to give the score a “touch”.
“His compositions are bursting at the seams with passionate melodies that leave you with goosebumps, [so] When the opportunity arose to collaborate, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to infuse that energy into our character and bass themes in Penny’s Big Breakaway,” says Whitehead.
Bialo says he’s thrilled to join as a longtime fan of the work of Whitehead, Lopes and others. “T and Christian had done a lot to refine the game’s soundtrack by the time I joined the project, so it was about navigating their excellent framework with my own musical voice. was a blast,” he says.
Bialo uses his favorite bass in the game, Sheila the Sailor, to explain his musical process.
“Sheila the Sailor’s bass battle is wild, and it was a fun challenge to write appropriately intense music for it,” he says. “Early in the story, Penny and Sheila’s relationship gets off to a rocky start, with Penny chasing Sheila’s wrecked ship across the coast. I portray Sheila as a rough and tough sailor. But wanted to merge, and wanted to hold him as well. Obsessed with his boat being out of control.”
You can hear the Sheila the Sailor bass track near the top of this story – it’s called “Land-ho Diablo.”
While Lopes is the main composer, other team members, such as Jonny Atma on guitar, and Andrew Gomez to mix and master the score, along with audio director Jameson Sutton, help round out the full music team. are “I think the result is a soundtrack that’s full of personality, fun elements, and surprises at every turn, thanks to a very eclectic palette of styles. [and] I’m proud of what we achieved and especially curious about the reaction of the players.”
Whitehead says the whole project was about collaboration, teasing that he and Lopes collaborated to create the final track for Zaphhara, the electric desert world in the game.
To learn more about the game, check out the Penny’s Big Breakaway reveal trailer.
Are you excited about Penny’s Big Breakaway? Let us know in the comments below!