Simon Viklund
Birth nameSimon Wiklund
Born (1979-12-01) December 1, 1979
Stockholm, Sweden
GenresElectronic
Occupation(s)
  • Composer
  • music producer
  • sound designer
  • game designer
Years active2000–present
LabelsBMG
Websitewww.simonviklund.com

Simon Viklund (born Simon Wiklund, December 1, 1979) is a Swedish freelance video game composer, music producer, sound designer and game designer, who was first known for his work on the 2008 game Bionic Commando Rearmed, in which he was a creative director and composer. He is also known for his work on the Payday series as a composer and the voice of the character Bain.

In 2000, Viklund joined his friend Ulf Andersson's company, Grin, and worked on most of the company's games, which included Bionic Commando: Rearmed. Grin went bankrupt in 2009, leading Viklund, Ulf Andersson and his brother Bo to found Overkill Software. Viklund left Overkill in 2015 to become a freelancer. In 2016, he joined 10 Chambers Collective, another company founded by Ulf Andersson, while continuing his freelance projects.

Early life

Simon Viklund was born in Stockholm on December 1, 1979.[1][2] He began learning music through the violin as child, and later received classical piano lessons for about seven years.[3][4] He also taught himself to play the guitar and bass guitar.[4][5] As a teenager he sang in the local church choir, and was briefly a singer in a band established by his friends in high school.[5] He studied arts in high school, but later became more interested in music.[5] Wiklund began to write music in the late 90s with the help of a computer program called FastTracker 2.[6] None of his music was released at the time, because he was personally unsatisfied with his creations.

Career

2000–2009: Grin and early freelance work

Wiklund joined Grin in 2000 and acted as a composer and sound designer on most of the company's projects, starting with its first game, Ballistics. He later changed his surname to Viklund as people abroad often mispronounced his name, as 'W' and 'V' have similar pronunciations in Swedish.[7] Viklund was also involved in developing the PC version of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter (2006) and its 2007 sequel, which were published by Ubisoft.[8] He subsequently led the development of Bionic Commando Rearmed, a remake of the 1988 NES version commissioned by Capcom;[6] Viklund also composed the game's soundtrack, which was praised for its faithful reimagining of the original 8-bit arrangements.[9][10] Elements of Viklund's Bionic Commando Rearmed soundtrack were also incorporated into Bionic Commando (2009), which was mainly scored by Jamie Christopherson, while Viklund served as the sound designer.[11] Aside from Grin's projects, he also worked on Triotech's Wasteland Racers 2071 (2006).[12]

Viklund began work on Bionic Commando Rearmed 2 as its creative director in 2009, before Grin went bankrupt four months into its development. Development was transferred to Fatshark, and Viklund was hired as a creative advisor and composer.[6] He was also commissioned by Capcom for Final Fight: Double Impact (2010) and Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition (2011), for which he composed the music.[5][13][14]

2009–2015: Overkill Software

Viklund, along with the Andersson brothers and other Grin employees, founded Overkill Software in 2009.[15] At Overkill, he served as the creative director and sound designer for the company's first game, Payday: The Heist, and also composed its soundtrack, drawing inspiration from the 1995 crime film Heat.[1][11] He also voiced Bain, the main narrator and contract broker in the game. Viklund would reprise his role as composer and the voice of Bain in Payday 2, released in 2013.[1]

On August 18, 2015, Viklund left Overkill to focus on his personal and freelance music projects. However, he continued to voice Bain and produce music in Payday 2 as a freelancer.[16]

2016–present: 10 Chambers Collective

In 2016, Viklund co-founded a new company with Ulf Andersson, 10 Chambers Collective, while also continuing to work on his freelance projects.[17][18][19] He also signed an exclusive songwriter agreement with BMG in the same year.[20] Viklund composed the soundtrack to Robonauts in 2017,[21] and worked as a game designer, narrative director, and composer for 10 Chambers' first project, GTFO.[22][23]

Musical style and influences

Viklund's compositions are primarily based on elements of electronic music genres such as techno, big beat, electro-funk, or dubstep, but some have been based on rock, industrial music and rap.[11] In 2008, Viklund's music was labelled by Swedish magazine Nöjesguiden as "chip house" music, while Viklund considered his music to be from a variety of inspirations, ultimately becoming "8-bit-inspired dance music".[24] In an interview with VGMO, Viklund described the musical style of his tracks to be "a mix between the music I find suitable for the project in question, the music I enjoy, and the music I have the skills to produce."[11] In Ballistics and Bandits: Phoenix Rising, he cited the Quake III soundtrack, Fatboy Slim, and The Chemical Brothers as inspirations for the rock, techno, big beat, and industrial sound. When it came to the soundtrack of Bionic Commando Rearmed, Viklund was influenced by groups such as The Crystal Method and Justice, inspirations that he says can be "[heard] ... clearly in the music".[11]

The soundtrack of Payday 2 featured a wide variety of music, especially when it came to the music for the game's downloadable content. The trailer for "The Big Bank" DLC featured an opera piece composed by Viklund, who wrote the lyrics in Swedish and had them translated to Italian to be performed by opera singers.[25][26]

Composition

The music for his first two projects, Ballistics and Bandits: Phoenix Rising, were made with FastTracker 2, while the tracks for Bionic Commando series and Payday: The Heist, were made with Jeskola Buzz.[6][27] In 2013, for Payday 2, he moved on to using Ableton Live, supplemented with a Native Instruments Komplete keyboard and the reFX Nexus 2 Synthesizer plug-in.[27]

Works

Video games

Year Title Developer Role Notes
2001 Ballistics Grin composer, sound designer [12]
2002 Bandits: Phoenix Rising Grin composer, sound designer [11]
2006 Wasteland Racers 2071 Triotech composer, sound designer [18]
2006 Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter Grin sound designer [11]
2007 Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter 2 Grin sound designer [11]
2008 Bionic Commando Rearmed Grin composer, creative director [10]
2009 Bionic Commando Grin senior sound designer, music consultant [11]
2009 Wanted: Weapons of Fate Grin sound designer [11]
2009 Terminator Salvation Grin sound designer [18]
2010 Final Fight: Double Impact Capcom composer [11]
2011 Bionic Commando Rearmed 2 Fatshark composer, writer, creative consultant [6]
2011 Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike Online Edition Capcom composer [11]
2011 Payday: The Heist Overkill Software composer, sound designer, creative director, voiceover voice of Bain[11]
2013 Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons Starbreeze Studios music consultant [28]
2013 Payday 2 Overkill Software composer, chief engineer, sound designer, voiceover voice of Bain and Cloakers[29]
2014 Gear Up Doctor Entertainment composer trailer music[30]
2016 Dead by Daylight Behaviour Interactive composer trailer music[31]
2016 Pan-Pan Spelkraft composer, sound designer [32]
2017 Robonauts Qubic Games composer [21]
2019 GTFO 10 Chambers Collective composer, game designer, narrative director [33][23]

Discography

Viklund has released several of his compositions as albums and singles, both independently and on behalf of Overkill Software:[34][35]

Albums

Year Title Notes
2012 Payday - The Game Soundtrack
2013 PAYDAY 2 Official Soundtrack Features tracks by Gustaf Grefberg[36]
2013 A Merry Payday Christmas Credited to Hoxton, voiced by Pete Gold[37]
2015 Overkill B-Sides
2016 O.R.B.O.T
2018 Free Music
2018 RADIX - Music From and Inspired by Robonauts
2018 STHLM Hunters OST
2019 Badlands

Singles

Year Title Notes
2014 "Kid Icarus Remix feat. Brand0"
2014 "Drifting" Credited as "Pat Briscoe"; from the Payday 2 trailer "The Dentist"[38]
2014 "Criminal's Ambition" Featuring KwoteONE[39]
2014 "Ode All'Avidità"
2015 "Breath of Death" From the Payday 2 Jacket trailer[40]
2015 "The Flames of Love" Written by Viklund, credited to "Smokey Bennett & The Hoops"[41]
2015 "The Club" Reinterpretation of "The Mark" from the Payday 2 Soundtrack[42]
2016 "Chains is in a Pickle"
2019 "Steal From The Rich, Give To Myself"

References

  1. 1 2 3 Clay, Sam (August 13, 2013). "Music to heist to: Payday 2′s musical masterpiece". VG247. Archived from the original on August 18, 2013. Retrieved August 18, 2013.
  2. ↑ Viklund, Simon (December 2, 2010). "Simon Viklund - "Guru 4x4"". YouTube. Archived from the original on January 6, 2014. Retrieved January 6, 2014.
  3. ↑ Napolitano, Jason (July 28, 2008). "Comic Con 08: Interview With Bionic Commando Rearmed Composer/Director Simon Viklund". OriginalSoundVersion.com. Archived from the original on August 20, 2013. Retrieved August 18, 2013.
  4. 1 2 Good, Owen (September 4, 2008). "Rearming the Music — and Memories — of Bionic Commando". Kotaku. Archived from the original on September 9, 2013. Retrieved September 9, 2013.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Jolly, Bradley (August 23, 2011). "INTERVIEW: Simon Viklund (3rd Strike Online Edition - Music)". Level 3. Archived from the original on August 27, 2011. Retrieved August 18, 2013.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 jeriaska (February 26, 2011). "Sound Current: 'Back in the Swing of Things - Simon Viklund on Bionic Commando Rearmed 2'". GameSetWatch. Archived from the original on July 16, 2012. Retrieved August 18, 2013.
  7. ↑ Simon Viklund [@simon_viklund] (August 3, 2014). "My badge for ECTS 2002. ECTS was the E3 of London/Europe back then, but it doesn't exist anymore. We were there in 2002 to show Ballistics, our futuristic racing game. It was the most makeshift booth you've ever seen. I spelled my last name with "W" back then, but later changed it because people abroad mispronounced my name (W and V are pronounced the same way in Swedish). Gotta love that title too: Maestro. #GrinMemories" – via Instagram.
  8. ↑ "Something to GRIN About". GamesIndustry.biz. May 6, 2009. Archived from the original on May 12, 2009. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  9. ↑ Parish, Jeremy (August 13, 2008). "Bionic Commando: Rearmed Review". 1Up.com. Archived from the original on March 10, 2016.
  10. 1 2 "Postmortem: Capcom/GRIN's Bionic Commando Rearmed". www.gamasutra.com. January 26, 2009. Archived from the original on March 5, 2017. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  11. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Greening, Chris (September 20, 2011). "Simon Viklund Interview: Designer and Composer Alike". Video Game Music Online. Archived from the original on June 21, 2017. Retrieved April 28, 2017.
  12. 1 2 Mäki, Jonas (February 19, 2015). "Ljuddesign med Overkill Software i Gamereactor Academy". www.gamereactor.se (in Swedish). Archived from the original on September 30, 2017. Retrieved May 26, 2017.
  13. ↑ "E3: Street Fighter III:3rd Strike's new features detailed". Destructoid. June 11, 2011. Archived from the original on May 26, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  14. ↑ "GameSetWatch Download Remixed Final Fight: Double Impact Soundtracks For Free". www.gamesetwatch.com. Archived from the original on February 17, 2019. Retrieved April 8, 2021.
  15. ↑ "An Interview with Simon Viklund". Mad Gear Solid. September 11, 2011. Archived from the original on September 11, 2011. Retrieved February 15, 2017.
  16. ↑ OVERKILL Software (August 18, 2015). PAYDAY 2: A Message From Simon Viklund (video).
  17. ↑ Harris, John (January 28, 2020). "Q&A: How Steam co-op hit GTFO chooses depth over breadth in game design". www.gamasutra.com. Archived from the original on August 16, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  18. 1 2 3 "10 Chambers Collective - Simon Viklund". www.10chambers.com. Archived from the original on December 23, 2019. Retrieved June 26, 2017.
  19. ↑ Weber, Rachel (September 9, 2016). "Jobs roundup: New chief people officer for EA". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved November 18, 2021.
  20. ↑ "SC: Simon Viklund Signs with BMG". BMG. June 10, 2016. Archived from the original on May 26, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  21. 1 2 Doolan, Liam (September 20, 2017). "Review: Robonauts (Switch eShop)". Nintendo Life. Archived from the original on January 22, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  22. ↑ O'Connor, Alice (May 31, 2017). "Payday co-creator names new co-op FPS: GTFO". Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Archived from the original on June 6, 2017. Retrieved June 26, 2017.
  23. 1 2 Beckhelling, Imogen (October 22, 2020). "GTFO adds matchmaking and new difficulties in its latest update". Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  24. ↑ Hallstan, Johan (September 17, 2008). "Simon Viklund: "så får du ett exploderande huvud genom censuren"". NÖJESGUIDEN (in Swedish). Archived from the original on May 26, 2021. Retrieved April 28, 2017.
  25. ↑ Savage, Phil (June 9, 2014). "Payday 2: Big Bank DLC trailer shows moral quandaries, karmic comeuppance". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on September 30, 2020. Retrieved April 8, 2021.
  26. ↑ Viklund, Simon (July 6, 2014). "My first opera piece". Archived from the original on August 4, 2014. Retrieved May 25, 2017.
  27. 1 2 "What gear I use". simonviklund.com. July 26, 2013. Archived from the original on August 20, 2013. Retrieved April 28, 2017.
  28. ↑ "Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons - Official Soundtrack, by Gustaf Grefberg". OVERKILL Soundtracks. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  29. ↑ Simon Viklund [@SimonViklund] (August 9, 2016). "I voice Bain and the Cloaker, and I performed most of the death screams for all law enforcement characters" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  30. ↑ Viklund, Simon (July 24, 2014). "Gear Up!". Archived from the original on August 4, 2014. Retrieved May 25, 2017.
  31. ↑ "Simon Viklund". www.facebook.com. Archived from the original on January 4, 2021. Retrieved May 26, 2017.
  32. ↑ McKenney, Kyle (June 3, 2016). "Newly Unveiled Pan-Pan Seems Like the Perfect Game for a Lazy Afternoon". pastemagazine.com. Archived from the original on June 4, 2016. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
  33. ↑ Pierce, Tanner (June 2, 2017). "Payday Game Designer Reveals New Game GTFO". DualShockers. Archived from the original on June 9, 2017. Retrieved June 26, 2017.
  34. ↑ "Simon Viklund". Bandcamp. Archived from the original on November 8, 2020. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  35. ↑ "OVERKILL Soundtracks". OVERKILL Soundtracks. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  36. ↑ "PAYDAY 2 Official Soundtrack, by Simon Viklund". OVERKILL Soundtracks - Bandcamp. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  37. ↑ "A Merry Payday Christmas, by Hoxton". OVERKILL Soundtracks. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  38. ↑ Viklund, Simon (July 6, 2014). "Download the dentist song". Archived from the original on August 4, 2014. Retrieved May 25, 2017.
  39. ↑ "Criminal's Ambition (single), by Simon Viklund feat. KwoteONE". OVERKILL Soundtracks - Bandcamp. Archived from the original on November 16, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  40. ↑ "Breath of Death, by Simon Viklund". Simon Viklund - Bandcamp. Archived from the original on November 8, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
  41. ↑ "The Flames of Love, by Smokey Bennett & The Hoops". Bandcamp. OVERKILL Soundtracks. March 24, 2015. Retrieved November 19, 2021.
  42. ↑ "The Club, by Simon Viklund". Simon Viklund - Bandcamp. Archived from the original on November 12, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2020.
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