Frank Klepacki - Later Westwood Games

Later Westwood Games

In 1997, Frank Klepacki scored a Blade Runner adaptation. Though Westwood acquired the rights to use the original film score by Vangelis, the company was not allowed access to the original master recordings, and Klepacki had to recreate the themes by ear. Developers were satisfied by his attention to detail, feeling that his digital recreations sounded clearer than the originals. In 1998, Klepacki composed for Dune 2000. He attempted to update the music from Dune II into "this non-blip stuff," and worked in homages to the original style of the films as composed by Toto. Dune 2000 was panned by critics, though Klepacki's score was praised for adhering to the traditional Dune style. Klepacki considered 2000 to be a more definitive work than Dune 2, which was constrained by software and hardware limitations. He composed for Command & Conquer: Tiberian Sun with Jarrid Mendelson—with whom he would later collaborate on Emperor: Battle for Dune. He began by writing Stomp, an energetic rock piece intended to recreate the effect of Hell March for the new game. Coincidentally, one of the trailers for Command and Conquer 3 featured 'Stomp' as the soundtrack. Westwood instead wanted Tiberian Sun to feature darker, more moody music, and Stomp was shelved in favor of the current sound. Bereft of ideas due to the stark change in direction, Klepacki asked Mendelson to collaborate; he regards tracks they both worked on as the best. Tiberian Sun ultimately featured dark, ambient techno music and ambient space music suited to the game's post-apocalyptic and futuristic setting. Klepacki cited the piece "Mad Rap" as his favorite. An avid Star Wars fan, he enjoyed scoring cut scenes featuring James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader. The scenes also allowed him to integrate the Airstrike and No Mercy themes into the game's score despite the aforementioned shift. With the expansion pack Firestorm, he attempted to "set things right" by writing more upbeat songs and including Stomp, which would also appear in Command & Conquer: Renegade.

He next scored Lands of Lore III and Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2. Klepacki defined Red Alert 2's style with heavy metal guitar and fast-paced beats. Klepacki scored the game with a Korg TR Rack, Novation Nova desktop, and Roland XV-5080. Red Alert 2 included a remix of "Hell March". The return to high-energy songs was owed in part to fan criticism of Tiberian Sun. Klepacki maintained the energetic style in Red Alert 2's expansion pack Yuri's Revenge. For Command & Conquer: Renegade—the next entry in the series—Klepacki tried to update the style of the original Command & Conquer by making it "hipper and more elaborate." Several Command & Conquer mainstays appear as reworked versions, including Target (Mechanical Man), Industrial, Act on Instinct, and No Mercy. The main theme's melody comes from C&C 80's Mix, a piece composed for Covert Operations but scrapped before release. Klepacki's last contribution to Westwood Studios was the music of Earth & Beyond, comprising four albums of material. Acquired by Electronic Arts in 1998, Westwood was liquidated in 2002 and the remaining employees were relocated to EA Los Angeles. Several Westwood founders left the company. Though Frank Klepacki offered to score Command & Conquer: Generals and submitted a demo to EA, he was not contacted to compose. When asked in 2002 whether he'd continue scoring music after ten years in the business, he exclaimed, "ten down, next ten to go!" After Westwood's closure, he reflected on his past work at a dinner held by Joseph Kucan and other former employees.