The Doom Eternal soundtrack rocks, but it's also a victim of severe audio compression, a painful blemish over which composer Mick Gordon had no control. Upon its release last month, Doom Eternal was met with unanimously positive reviews. The game was praised for its righteous dedication to explosive first-person action, white-knuckle difficulty, and non-stop demon-killing mayhem.
Like its predecessor, 2016's Doom, the score for Doom Eternal was composed by Mick Gordon. His style incorporates old-school guitar licks mixed with electronic industrial processing, resulting in a unique score that feels like a mixture of straight-up heavy metal with science fiction sensibilities. The musical accompaniment of Doom Eternal was met with praise by reviewers and fans alike; by all accounts, Mick Gordon knocked it out of the park yet again, with a score for Doom Eternal that continues the musical journey started by Doom 2016.
However, there's something curious about the Doom Eternal soundtrack. As reported by Critical Hit Gaming, a Twitter user analyzed the waveforms of the tunes from some of the tracks on the official soundtrack release of Doom Eternal, and found that the game suffers from a severe case of audio compression, which has a decidedly impact on the quality of the music. When asked about the issue, Gordon confirmed that he was not responsible for mixing a significant majority of the music from this official Doom Eternal OST release.
Audiophiles have had a long-standing war against severe audio compression in music. For those unversed in the term, it's a symptom of many popular recordings from around the year 1999 onward, in which multiple instruments are mixed at the same volume. Rather than a dynamic tapestry of sound, music mixed in this fashion feels like it's always blaring at maximum volume, whether it's a sizzling guitar solo of a moody piano introduction. This causes the listener to feel fatigued, since there's no dynamic ebb and flow to the music; just maximum output at all times. To the untrained ear, this perceived loudness can feel immediately thrilling, but it quickly wears down the listener and makes it difficult to discern various instruments in a recording. In heavy metal music in particular, this is seen by many as a kiss of death in terms of being able to listen at high volume without getting a headache.
The Doom soundtrack deserves better than this poorly-mixed mess, and Gordon has already spoken out against the official OST release, clarifying that he only mixed several of the tracks from the collection. It's unclear why Bethesda or id Software chose to release the soundtrack in such a sorry state, as the OST didn't release alongside Doom Eternal itself, instead coming out a month later. Regardless, Bethesda has acknowledged the fandom's dissatisfaction with the OST, but stopped short of announcing any type of re-release or explanation for the poor audio.
Source: Critical Hit Gaming