Dear Reader:
Super Mario Kart and Pilotwings composer to work on upcoming retro title, Orange Island
Today we are extremely excited to announce our collaboration with the legendary Soyo Oka who was the composer for many Nintendo classics like Super Mario Kart & Pilotwings!
— Orange Island 🍊🏝 (@orangeislandok) November 9, 2019
OI is the first NES game she's composed for since the 90s and we couldn't be more honored! Here's a clip! pic.twitter.com/oBIzk8iOin
London, UK - November 11th 2019 - Birthday Boy has announced yet another retro gaming music legend as a guest composer for their upcoming debut title. Soyo Oka, the composer behind several worldwide hits on SNES like Pilotwings and SimCity, is contributing several pieces of original music to Orange Island's stacked song list. This will make "OI" the first NES game Oka has worked on since a handful of releases in the early 1990s."I’m thrilled that she’s onboard," says Ted Sterchi, creator and lead developer of Orange Island. "Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined that I’d be working with Soyo Oka on compositions for my own game. Anything can happen if you take a leap of faith and ask nicely! We at Birthday Boy are honored she agreed to help us out."
Oka was in the news just last year when her soundtrack for the unreleased NES version of SimCity was unearthed and heard for the first time. Her composition on Super Mario Kart, Pilotwings, and SimCity (SNES) and time spent creating alongside Koji Kondo make her a verifiable Nintendo legend whose masterpieces are instantly recognizable to millions. She joins the game's guest composer list which includes the previously-announced Hiroki Kikuta, the composer for 1993's Secret of Mana – one of the most revered game soundtracks of all time. OI's soundtrack also features musical works by Ted Sterchi, artist Anton Corazza, and composer/music producer Mark Sparling.
Orange Island has shared a short clip of Oka's first contributed full song to announce the partnership. This story has already been covered on Switchaboo. Birthday Boy raised approx. $90k on Kickstarter to fund the game's development this July.
About Orange Island
On this mysterious island, the perfect Summer vacation for four young friends suddenly turns a little sour. What looks like a tropical paradise slowly reveals an ancient and complex past between human inhabitants and the local slime creatures. After learning mystical powers through the old hermit Mary, Azure and her friends must embark on a journey to find and revive the island’s magical orange trees, in hopes of making peace between Mary and the slimes. What they don’t yet realize is the stakes are much higher than originally thought...
For more information, please visit https://orangeislandgame.com