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Inappropriate genre mashup

The Earth-series from the Polish developer Reality Pump Studios was Europe's attempt to rival the strategy game hit, Command & Conquer, which debuted in 1997, just two years after Tiberian Dawn, for MS-DOS. The fact that hardly anyone knows the brand nowadays, and it met its demise almost 20 years ago with the third installment, Earth 2160, should highlight just how punchy this attempt was.

I'll admit openly that I probably wouldn't know a thing about it if the successor, Earth 2150 , hadn't been bundled with a GameStar magazine as a full version. While I had a lot of fun with that game - enough, mind you, to even buy the botched Earth 2160 - I can't say anything about the original and rely on my knowledge from the Wikipedia article and a brief gameplay video.

The story is quickly summed up: The year is (unsurprisingly) 2140, Earth is going down the drain, and resources are running scarce. After a devastating nuclear war, the two dominant factions, the United Civilized States (UCS) and the Eurasian Dynasty (ED), are now battling each other. It sounds like C&C and at least superficially looks like it too. Top-down perspective, base building, commanding units - you know the drill.

Acoustically, Earth 2140 takes an audibly different approach compared to its big inspiration. Instead of rocking riffs, the composer serves us something that can't be clearly placed. I intentionally don't use names because it's not entirely clear to me who actually wrote the score. Wikipedia says Joachim Schäfer, whom we might know from Emergency: Fighters for Life , while other sources like Amazon Music name Dirk P. Hassinger. Since this very question was asked in a thread with the developers on Steam and remained unanswered, I'll play it safe and accredit both artists.

The fact that two people were involved would also explain the musical fever dream emanating from the speakers. It almost seems like they took the music from a cozy city-building simulation à la SimCity , mixed it with a best-of from the 80s and 90s, threw it into a mixer, dialed it down to DOS level, and then added a bit of Might & Magic for good measure. I really can't describe what's going on here any better.

And I can't even definitively say whether I like what I'm hearing or if it's a hilarious cacophony of genres that unsuspecting players were exposed to back then. If I hadn't read otherwise in a YouTube comment, I'd almost doubt that these tracks ever played in the background of a strategy game where mechs and tanks with laser guns and rockets blew each other off the map. A bad joke might also explain the poor presentation of the OST, where Track 08 and 09, "Black Tech," are identical - but at least there's a real album, which isn't a given for a game from 1997.

But well, let's entertain the idea for a moment that this is indeed the music to be evaluated from Earth 2140 ; it's hard to make a qualitative statement. The tracks themselves are fine - it's just that as an album, this collection is absolutely incoherent. Sometimes we get a techno party like in "Child of 2140" or "2140," which opens with vocal skits before switching to disco beats. Then we're served with "Deep in the Bunker," "Before the Battle," and "Bubbles' Revenge," smooth jazz like Beverly Hills Cop or Detective Conan.

Barely one track later, "Hurricane" brings in disco, followed by synth-house in "Black Tech" and dark hip-hop/house in "Hope," which feels like it was layered over the ambient tracks of Command & Conquer . Not quirky enough? No problem, because it goes straight into electro-funk with "The Hunt," along with ballads "Everywhere" and "Birds," which seem borrowed from the Might and Magic-universe. The same goes, incidentally, for "Big Journey" and "Space," which scream more fantasy than sci-fi.

In fact, the only track that at least partially falls into the stereotype of futuristic strategy game music is the theme song, "Earth 2140." It plays in the background during the nearly six-minute intro film (which you should definitely watch for its glorious awfulness) and could also be from an early installment of the Soul Reaver-series. To cap it off, there are also a few tracks in the instrumental version, which are actually better than the vocal versions.

Now all that's left for me is to wrap up, which isn't quite easy after this experience. I'm equally a fan of experiments as I am of the tried and true. After all, one wouldn't stand out without the other, and vice versa. The attempt with Earth 2140 , for me, is like one of those experimental albums by artists who surely have their strengths somewhere but don't trust them enough, thus hiding behind the cloak of artistic free spirit.

In my opinion, the music is poorly chosen and unworthy of a sci-fi strategy game. Maybe I'm being a bit too harsh in my judgment with my 25 years of first hand experience in gaming and musical progress; after all, this was all new territory for the creators back then. Personally, I wouldn't voluntarily subject myself to this OST again. Maybe for money. Or with enough LSD. Just like in the 80s and 90s.

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Nr.	Title	Interpret(en)	Ratings
01	Earth 2140	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
02	Child of 2140	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
03	The Hunt	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
04	Birds	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
05	Deep in the Bunker	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
06	Hurricane	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
07	Before the Battle	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
08	Black Tech	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
09	Everywhere	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
10	Bubbles' Revenge	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
11	Big Journey	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
12	Hope	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
13	2140	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
14	Space	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
15	Earth 2140 [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
16	Child of 2140 [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
17	Birds [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
18	Hurricane [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
19	Before the Battle [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
20	Total Control [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	2
21	Everywhere [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3
22	Hope [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	4
23	2140 [Instrumental]	Joachim Schäfer; Dirk P. Hassinger	3