Shadow of the Colossus: Roar of the Earth

This soundtrack is one of the BEST soundtracks I've ever heard: movie and video game alike. From the epic battle songs to the calmer/exploring tracks, this can rival the John Williams of the world, it's really that good! It sure fits the empty landscape of the giants from the video game, and even if you haven't played it, you can get the feel of being in a mystical place with great beasts. The battle songs sound like those from the soundtrack to Gladiator (powerful). Everything else is a masterpiece, from the chior to the soft, dream-like music.

Track Listing (everything's in Japanese):
1. Prologue: To the Ancient Land
2. Prohibited Art
3. Commandment
4. Black Blood
5. Resurrection
6. Sign of the Colossus
7. Grotesque Figures-Battle with the Colossus
8. The Opened Way-Battle with the Colossus
9. The End of the Battle
10. Idol Collapse
11. Green Hills
12. A Violent Encounter-Battle with the Colossus...Read more

Shadow of the Colossus is an epic game in which you battle giant beings on a desolate landscape with the aid of only your horse, your bow, and your sword. The game itself is filled with epic battles and detailed graphics but one of the main points of the game that add to its greatness it the score, composed by Kow Otani.

Otani, who has worked mostly on anime scores and a few videogame ones before this, fleshes out all his skills and creates not only epic battle songs that rival those in John Williams and Howard Shores scores, but also has more calmer tracks that serve to illustrate the large vast and almost empty world the beasts live in.

The game and soundtrack have raised the bar on how videogames should be treated as art in similar respect to movies and if you are looking for music to best showcase the talent put into videogames, this is the perfect choice.

I usually don't buy game soundtracks but I couldn't have missed this one. Full of adrenaline-pumping epic tracks ("The Opened Way", "Revived Power" and "Swift Horse" come to mind), as well as some of the most emotional pieces in the history of videogame (some of them brings tears to my eyes, like the opening track "To the Ancient Land", "The Farthest Land" and "The Sunlit Earth") this CD has it all. Highly recommended for anyone interested in good music. I only pray that Kow Otani composes for the next Team ICO games.