Case Study: The Home County Video Game
- James Smith
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Listen to the soundtrack here: https://open.spotify.com/album/6k7ACYxIRT9gCDu1LbNUdl
About
The Home County is a village-management game inspired by Edwardian Britain and was created by Cade Abrahams (Swanworth) over a period of 3 years. The game will be self-published on Steam as an Early Access title on 22nd September 2025.
The music was composed by Deer Park Studios composer, James Smith.
Behind The Music
Overview
The initial concept for The Home County soundtrack was to create an accompanying sound to a relaxed Edwardian setting in a village toward the north of Britain. With themes of unity and working together with the other villagers there couldn't be a better piece of music than Beethoven's Ode to Joy.
You will hear hints of this throughout the soundtrack as well as a nod to many other prolific composers that have shaped the background to British orchestral romanticism.
Music within the village
There are many areas of The Home County village to sonically explore, from the local pub The Kelpie, to its industrial foundation of mining, to the aristocratic Duchess residing over her estate. All have vibrant musical backgrounds within British culture which is celebrated within each area.
We have traditional Irish folk music for the pub creating that lively party atmosphere, a cacophony of brass band links to the mines and the matriarch of the village the Duchess is accompanied by her own concerto grosso in the style of the grandfather of western harmony J.S. Bach.
As the mines play such a large feature in the game, we have gone further by creating sounds that blend the original orchestra base of the over world with authentic instruments from the Roman, Saxon and Viking eras for each region of the mines.
These start off with a foundation based upon references to Gustav Holst' Moorside Suite in Underground Adventures and the Second Suite in F in Beneath heather and Stone where Holst uses the famous Greensleeves theme.
To blend the eclectic mix of rich orchestral themes from the sunny village into the industry of the era we brought in brass band session musician Lauren Willox to provide a bridging link on the Flugel Horn of the village to the mines below.
The third track for the opening to the mines, Veins of Black Gold, uses the same rhythmic and textural developmental techniques employed by Karl Jenkins in his Palladio and The Armed man. This track is an appreciative nod to Wales and Jenkin's link to the modern brass banding movement.
Main Themes
The developer and artists had created a vibrant and lush landscape for the village's setting with a brief of Downton Abbey meets the Lord of the Rings Shire themes. Instantly this put us in the orchestral sphere of scoring and we were able to focus upon the gentle, relaxed, and fun themes that needed to flow throughout each track.
We needed themes for each weather type, character and main area that flowed nicely between multiple characters with an overarching sense of unity.
This seemed like a straightforward task, but with the game being set in an Edwardian Britain I also wanted to celebrate the music around at the time from the likes of composers such as Elgar, Holst and Vaughan Williams.
You can hear nods to these composers in many places such as the opening to Song Beneath the Sun where the opening 4 chords quote Elgars Nimrod whilst the violin introduction resembles the introduction of Vaughan Williams' Lark Ascending leading into the spritely 3/4 theme.
Overall, the sound world created is quintessentially pastoral with the prevalence of balanced phrases in 3/4 giving a graceful lilt that gives us the sonic warm hug we need for cosy gaming.
Enjoy the Music!
