Renowned composer Lena Raine unveils soundtrack for Earthblade, the shelved project by Celeste studio.

A concept album for the now-cancelled Earthblade from the studio behind Celeste has been released by composer Lena Raine.

Back in January, Extremely OK Games cancelled its “2D explor-action” game, which would have followed up the widely celebrated platformer Celeste.

A first look at Earthblade was shown in December 2022 at The Game Awards, but nothing has been shown since. As such, this new album from Raine provides a taste of what we could have expected.

Raine worked on the soundtracks of Minecraft, Celeste and Guild Wars 2, as well as Deltarune and Chicory: A Colorful Tale.

Earthblade – Across the Bounds of Fate is available to listen to on Bandcamp and can be purchased in full for $7.

It’s typical of Raine’s style, particularly with the focus on striking melody and a mixture of electronic and real instruments. The beautiful track Verdant Mysteries includes a strange vocal too, while the eight-minute long Lineage is a mesmeric piano piece and the opening Accept Your Fate begins with Vangelis-esque chords before a mournful tone takes over.

“[Earthblade] was in development for a number of years, and over that period of time I wrote quite a few pieces – both conceptual, and implemented tracks – that began to depict the world of the game,” wrote Raine in the album’s description. “Because we’ll never get a chance to tell that story in game form, I decided to cobble together every bit of music I’d written for the game to the point of its cancellation in order to tell my own version of it.

“Across the Bounds of Fate, more so than a soundtrack, is a concept album. The music I wrote for the game is highly dynamic, in the tradition of what I wrote for Celeste. I took it many steps beyond, in ways that temporally-constrained pieces of music can’t really do justice. But I did my best to arrange them into the emotional arc of their progression, much like I would for any soundtrack release.”

Raine’s inspiration includes the aforementioned Vangelis (best known for Blade Runner), as well as Joe Hisaishi’s score for Studio Ghibli’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, and Yoko Kanno’s work on animes Cowboy Bebop and Ghost in the Shell.

Said Raine: “For now, tuck in and enjoy around 30 minutes of music that paint the picture of what I hoped Earthblade might be.”

Extremely OK Games studio director Maddy Thorson called the cancellation of Earthblade a “huge, heartbreaking, and yet relieving failure”.

One factor leading to the cancellation was a disagreement about the IP rights of Celeste between Thorson and Noel Berry on one side, and studio founding member Pedro Medeiros on the other.

However, Thorson stressed “Pedro isn’t to blame”, adding: “In fact the split with him has given us the clarity to see that we have lost our way, and the opportunity to admit defeat. I feel many ways about it, but one big feeling is undoubtedly relief.”

Thorson and Berry are now prototyping again for a new project. In the meantime, we have Raine’s score as a lasting reminder of what Earthblade could have been.

“Melody encompasses so much of how I relate to music that it’s hard for me to just write a piece that sinks solely into texture and rhythm. I do it, obviously, but I’m always humming something on top,” Raine told Eurogamer in a discussion about her compositional style.