Are these OSTs eligible for submission?

[Pash Master]

Hi everyone,

I've had a look around the forums and FAQs, but was unable to find an answer to this. Apologies if I've missed the answer somehow.

Does VGMdb now accept game OSTs that do not have a physical release or download release, but instead were only released via streaming platforms by their composers / licence right holders. For example, you can't purchase the album anywhere, but it has an official release on Spotify / Amazon Music / Apple Music, etc.

I know a few years ago this was not allowed, but wanted to know if this stance had since changed with more and more OSTs being released on Stream-only platforms. I took a bit of a hiatus from submitting albums, so was curious if this rule had changed during my time away and if these were now eligible for submission, or not. I wanted to make sure before I did anything, as I don't want to fill the Submission queue unnecessarily and make more work for others to check over.

Examples of such stream-only albums:
- Immortals of Aveum Extended Soundtrack
- Aliens: Fireteam Elite Original Soundtrack
- Generation Zero Original Soundtrack


My second question is, does a Soundtrack which is purchasable but only accessible within a software /game itself as a DLC menu count as a release, and thus submission for a VGMdb entry? The title I was wondering about was a soundtrack that as far as I can tell was only released as part of a 'digital bonus pack'

The release in question is this one:
- The Persistance Soundtrack


And lastly, if the rule to Stream-Only titles has changed, would a soundtrack release which only contains Mainstream Western Music qualify? I would assume not, as it's mainstream music and not original work, but wanted to ask when the music was used for the entire game's audio. This is mainly for sport focused titles like EA Sport releases.

Examples of these releases:
- F1 23 Official Soundtrack
- NBA 2K23 Soundtrack
- WWE Battlegrounds The Official Soundtrack


Thanks for any help that can be shed on this.

[Secret Squirrel]

Hey Pash. The answer to both of those questions is no. We don't currently accept entries for streaming-only albums, and we don't accept entries for albums that can only be played on a custom player, and an in-game player would be an example of that.

I took this opportunity to update our scope to include these examples.

[razakin]

btw, Aliens Fireteam Elite is available to buy. And isn't that Immortals on Amazon for buy?

[Pash Master]

Originally Posted by Secret Squirrel

Hey Pash. The answer to both of those questions is no. We don't currently accept entries for streaming-only albums, and we don't accept entries for albums that can only be played on a custom player, and an in-game player would be an example of that.

I took this opportunity to update our scope to include these examples.

Hey Secret Squirrel, thanks for the post and clarification! I’ll stay clear of submitting any that I find are only available via streaming-only. It does make sense when I think about it, as changing it would also open the floodgates to YT uploads or partial releases to go up, and the chance any releases could disappear without trace at any point afterwards if taken down at the source. Plus from an Entries quality-standpoint of view it makes sense too.

Originally Posted by razakin

btw, Aliens Fireteam Elite is available to buy. And isn't that Immortals on Amazon for buy?

Nice catch, I’ll go ahead and submit entries for these if they haven’t been submitted yet. Cheers!


Thanks again to both of you for clearing things up for me! Really appreciate it, as I want to make sure I keep the quality of submissions as high as I can to make it easier and avoid giving all of you extra work when reviewing things.