Eirik Suhrke is a Norwegian freelance composer and video game designer known for his

video game soundtracks Video game music (VGM) is the soundtrack that accompanies video games. Early video game music was once limited to sounds of early sound chips, such as programmable sound generators (PSG) or FM synthesis chips. These limitations have led to the ...

and original chiptune music under the alias of Phlogiston. He has composed for ''

Spelunky ''Spelunky'' is a 2008 platform video game created by independent developer Derek Yu and released as source-available freeware for Microsoft Windows. It was remade for the Xbox 360 in 2012, with ports of the new version following for various ...

'', ''

Hotline Miami ''Hotline Miami'' is a 2012 top-down shooter game developed by Dennaton Games and published by Devolver Digital. Set in Miami in 1989, the game follows an unnamed silent protagonist—dubbed Jacket by fans—as he commits massacres against the ...

'', and

Vlambeer Vlambeer is a Dutch independent video game developer based in Utrecht. Founded in 2010, the studio was composed of Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman. The studio is known for the games ''Super Crate Box'' (2010), ''Serious Sam: The Random Encount ...

games including ''

Ridiculous Fishing ''Ridiculous Fishing'' is a fishing video game developed and published by Vlambeer. In the game, players use motion and touch controls to catch fish and subsequently shoot them out of the sky for cash. The game was released for iOS on March 13, ...

'' and ''

Super Crate Box ''Super Crate Box'' is a shoot 'em up and indie game by Vlambeer. It was first released for Microsoft Windows on 22 October 2010, and was followed with ports to Mac OS X on 26 November 2010, to iOS on 4 January 2012, and to PlayStation Vita on ...

''. He has also directed and designed games, being one of the main contributors to ''

UFO 50 ''UFO 50'' is a video game collection developed and published by Mossmouth for Windows on September 18, 2024. It features 50 unique games of varying genres and length. The games are a collaborative effort by six developers over the course of seve ...

'', Mossmouth's 2024 retro-styled game collection. He is a long-time collaborator of independent game designers

Derek Yu Derek Yu (born July 2, 1982) is an American independent video game designer, video game artist, and blogger.Ojiro Fumoto , known professionally under his pseudonym Moppin, is a Japanese video game designer. He is best known for his work in the indie game space, developing the games '' Downwell'' and '' Poinpy'', as well as his contributions to '' UFO 50''. Career ...

Early life

Suhrke grew up in

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

, Norway. He started playing the bass guitar at age five and started making VGM inspired music in 2000. He credits

Nobuo Uematsu is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the ''Final Fantasy'' video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton Joh ...

as an early influence.

Career

Suhrke was educated as a

sound engineer An audio engineer (also known as a sound engineer or recording engineer) helps to produce a sound recording, recording or a Concert, live performance, balancing and adjusting sound sources using equalization (audio), equalization, Dynamic range ...

and taught himself music composition. He primarily works on video games in music and

sound design Sound design is the art and practice of creating auditory elements of media. It involves specifying, acquiring and creating audio using production techniques and equipment or software. It is employed in a variety of disciplines including filmmaking ...

. His compositions for games first began as a hobby in his early teens, for

RPG Maker ''RPG Maker'', known in Japan as , is a series of programs for the development of role-playing video games (RPGs) with genre-driven varieties as well as machinima, originally created by the Japanese group ASCII. The Japanese name, ''Tsukūru'', ...

indie games and other projects he found on online forums. He started making and releasing

chiptune Chiptune, also called 8-bit music (although not all chiptune is 8-bit music), is a style of electronic music made using the programmable sound generator (PSG) sound chips or synthesizers in vintage arcade machines, computers and video gam ...

music under the alias of Phlogistan. In 2006, he co-founded the

netlabel A netlabel (also online label, web label, digi label, MP3 label or download label) is a record label that distributes its music through digital audio file format, formats (such as MP3, Vorbis, Ogg Vorbis, FLAC, or WAV) over the Internet. While s ...

PAUSE (stylized as II) together with chiptune musician and videogame composer

Disasterpeace Richard Vreeland (born June 29, 1986), better known by his stage name Disasterpeace, is an American composer and musician. He first got started in music after learning the guitar in high school and started writing music around the age of 17. Kno ...

. Suhrke composed the music and sound on the

Xbox Live Arcade Xbox Live Arcade (or XBLA) was a video game Digital distribution in video games, digital distribution service that was available for the Xbox (console), Xbox and Xbox 360 consoles. It focused on smaller downloadable games from both major publisher ...

version of ''

'' which released in 2012. The mid-tempo jazz album was inspired by early 1990s video games and was composed over two years using a 1986 synthesizer, audio software from the early 1990s, and live instrumentation. He also worked on

's ''

'' and ''

'', and composed a track for ''

''. In 2015 Suhrke was approached by

Ojiro Fumoto , known professionally under his pseudonym Moppin, is a Japanese video game designer. He is best known for his work in the indie game space, developing the games '' Downwell'' and '' Poinpy'', as well as his contributions to '' UFO 50''. Career ...

to compose the soundtrack for '' Downwell''. According to Suhrke, Fumoto initially requested the score to sound "bright and motivating" and to take inspiration from ''

Mega Man 2 ''Mega Man 2'' (stylized as ''Mega Man II'') is a 1988 action game, action-platformer, platform game developed and published by Capcom for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in Japan in 1988 and in North America and PAL region ...

''. The soundtrack was later released on

vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

. Suhrke is a collaborator on ''

'', an anthology of retro-style games. He is the lead composer of the entire collection as well as the designer of ''Barbuta'', ''Mooncat'', ''The Big Bell Race'', ''Warptank'', ''Onion Delivery'', ''Caramel Caramel'', ''Divers'', ''Pingolf'', ''Rakshasa'', ''Elfazar's Hat'' and the ''Campanella'' trilogy.

Critical reception

Earnest Cavalli of ''

Engadget Engadget ( ) is a technology news, reviews and analysis website offering daily coverage of gadgets, consumer electronics, video games, gaming hardware, apps, social media, streaming, AI, space, robotics, electric vehicles and other potentially ...

'' described Suhrke's work as among "the finest indie gaming soundtracks in recent memory" in 2013.

Ludography

Discography

Includes work released under the aliases of Phlogiston (†) and Pajjama (‡) as well as Suhrke's full name.

References

Notes

Sources

{{reflist, refs= {{Cite web, author1=jeriaska , title=The Weblog PAX 2011 Q&A: Derek Yu and Eirik 'Phlogiston' Suhrke on Spelunky for XBLA , work=IndieGames.com , date=2011-08-29 , url=http://indiegames.com/2011/08/pax_2011_spelunky.html , accessdate=2017-06-07 , df=mdy-all , url-status=dead , archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20160512212907/http://indiegames.com/2011/08/pax_2011_spelunky.html , archivedate=2016-05-12 {{Cite web, last1=Williams , first1=Mike , title=Talking Shop: Freelance Composer , work=GamesIndustry.biz , date=2013-03-26 , url=http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-26-talking-shop-freelance-composer , accessdate=2017-06-07 , df=mdy-all , url-status=live , archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20161027095919/http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-26-talking-shop-freelance-composer , archivedate=2016-10-27 * {{Cite web , last1=Cavalli , first1=Earnest , title=Spelunky, Ridiculous Fishing, more soundtracks now 'pay what you want' , work=

, date=2013-12-23 , url=https://www.engadget.com/2013/12/23/spelunky-ridiculous-fishing-more-soundtracks-now-pay-what-you/ , accessdate=2017-06-07 , df=mdy-all {{Cite web, last1=Pitcher , first1=Jenna , title=Spelunky, Ridiculous Fishing composer offering 'pay what you want' for albums , work=

Polygon In geometry, a polygon () is a plane figure made up of line segments connected to form a closed polygonal chain. The segments of a closed polygonal chain are called its '' edges'' or ''sides''. The points where two edges meet are the polygon ...

, date=2013-12-24 , url=https://www.polygon.com/2013/12/24/5240672/spelunky-ridiculous-fishing-composer-offering-pay-what-you-want-for , accessdate=2017-06-07 , df=mdy-all , url-status=live , archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304051214/http://www.polygon.com/2013/12/24/5240672/spelunky-ridiculous-fishing-composer-offering-pay-what-you-want-for , archivedate=2016-03-04 Indie game developers Living people Norwegian video game composers Norwegian video game designers Year of birth missing (living people)