A Grammy for Ubisoft Montreal

The first Grammy for the new category “Best Score Soundtrack for Video Games and Other Interactive Media” was awarded yesterday to the composer of the plot of Assassin's Creed Valhalla: Dawn of Ragnarok, a Ubisoft Montreal production. The composer who collected the prize, Stephanie Economou, was also nominated for the same composition by the Guild of Music Supervisors.

The other nominated plots were those of the third-person shooter Aliens: Fireteam Elite, from the first person shooter Call of Duty: Vanguard, from the Montreal adventure game Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy as well as the strategy game Old World. Surprisingly, the plot for God of War: Ragnarök, which won the Game Award last December for best composition, was not among the list.

While the Grammys category celebrating music from video games is a novelty that speaks to the cultural acceptance of the artistic value of video games, it's technically not the first Grammy to be awarded to a musical production associated with a video game. Sure enough, in 2011, or twelve years after video game music became eligible for a Grammy, Christopher Tin received the Grammy for Best Musical Arrangement for his piece Baba Yetu from the game Civilization IV.

Is this-enough-to-restart-the-machine?

If the artistic recognition of Assassin's Creed Valhalla by the Grammy is positive news for the Montreal studio, its future remains uncertain. In mid-January, the parent company of the Montreal division of the video game studio said it was facing “major challenges” in a press release which also mentioned the sudden cancellation of three games as well as the postponement of the release of the game. 'expected Skulls and Bones. Moreover, Ubisoft had also canceled four releases in 2022. The company expects to end the fiscal year in March 2023 with a loss of around $700 million.

The studio, which 'has released no major titles in the year 2022 – no Far Cry or Assassin’s Creed – claims to have several major productions on the way for the next fiscal year which begins in April 2023. A video game adaptation of James Cameron's film universe called Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, Assassin's Creed Mirage< /em>, Skulls and Bones and another game that has not yet been announced are still planned.