A 1999 video game called Omikron: The Nomad Soul developed by Quantic Dream and featuring David Bowie will be available for free for a limited time in memory of the late great musician.
Bowie wrote eight songs for the soundtrack of Omikron alongside Reeves Gables over the course of a year; all the songs would later appear on his 1999 album Hours. Bowie also played two characters in the game: ‘Boz’, described by Bowie as “the internet as a sentient being”, and the lead singer of a band called ‘The Dreamers’, who play a number of Bowie’s songs written for the game.
When talking in a press conference about his aims in writing a soundtrack for a game, Bowie said “What we were trying to do more than anything else was provide an emotional heart to the game, because the one thing that I did find going through the games that I viewed before we started work, is a lot of the games have a cold emotional drive.”
With the recent death of Bowie after an 18 month long battle with cancer, Square Enix, who bought the game’s original publisher Edios Interactive, has announced on Twitter “in memoriam to David Bowie’s legacy, we are giving away free digital copies of his video game, ‘Omrikon: The Nomad Soul’, for a limited time only.”
Omikron for free in celebration of @DavidBowieReal. RIP NA: https://t.co/vshkDLqqVG EU: https://t.co/NbSCM4WDsP pic.twitter.com/N6RJky3CYn
— Square Enix (@SquareEnix) January 15, 2016
The game will be available for free until 22nd January using the code ‘omikron’ at Square Enix’ online store. You can watch Bowie perform ‘Survive’ with his virtual band ‘The Dreamers’, below:
