Dragon Age II Soundtrack Review

• Name: Dragon Age II Soundtrack
• Label: EA Games Soundtrack
• Composer(s): Inon Zur
• Number of Tracks: 29

With Inon Zur back behind the helm for Dragon Age II, there wasn't much doubt that this was going to be another top quality soundtrack - this is one of the reasons I wanted to pre-order the game - to get the awesome soundtrack of course - I'm not actually a fan of all the extra items would you believe (but they make the game easier so I'm not exactly complaining either).

It would also be a good exercise to review this before I got straight into the Dragon Age II review.

Artistic Merit (57%)
There I was talking about how great Inon Zur was and then... WTF? You only gave him 57% for Artistic Merit? Well hold on a second. There are a LOT of tracks in this album and while there are some true gems in there, most of the rest is padded by COMBAT MUSIC. While combat music is appropriate to the game, they're rarely excellent listening material on their own. Consequently, a majority of the music is quite forgetful.

However, the tracks that Inon Zur managed to incorporate the themes from the below two tracks tend to be my favourite. They're very heroic sounding indeed!





Incidentally, the main theme and the Hawke Family Theme song are my favourites.

There are also a few great vocal pieces in this where I believe a woman is singing gaelic (don't quote me on that, all I know is that it doesn't sound like English)? They're very good but sadly don't really get much airplay during the game (you get to hear it during the credits though).





Finally another favourite was the Tavern theme. I'd go as far to say it's probably the best tavern music I've heard in a fantasy game yet. It sounds very contemporary, almost like a John Butler Trio or bluegrass track (not that I listen to the John Butler Trio much if at all).



Value (100% - Good)
I managed to nab it for free, so the value is good for me!

Length (100% - Good)
There are a lot of tracks here, 29 to be exact. Admittedly, most of it is COMBAT MUSIC as mentioned before but that's okay.

Total Score: 8/10
For those who get the Signature Edition of Dragon Age II, it comes free. Unfortunately you require to preorder the game in order to get that IIRC - so it's already not attainable for most of you. For those interested in obtaining this album I think your best bet is on iTunes, which I don't use.