Eirik Suhrke

Eirik Suhrke is a Norwegian freelance composer and video game designer known for his video game soundtracks and original chiptune music under the alias of Phlogiston. He has composed for Spelunky, Hotline Miami, and Vlambeer games including Ridiculous Fishing and Super Crate Box. He has also directed and designed games, being one of the main contributors to UFO 50, Mossmouth's 2024 retro-styled game collection.

He is a long-time collaborator of video game studio Nitrome as well as the independent developers Derek Yu and Ojiro Fumoto.

Early life Suhrke grew up in Oslo, Norway. He started playing the bass guitar at age five and started making VGM inspired music in 2000. He credits Nobuo Uematsu as an early influence. In 2006, he co-founded the netlabel PAUSE (stylized as II) together with chiptune musician and videogame composer Disasterpeace.

Suhrke composed the music and sound on the Xbox Live Arcade version of Spelunky which released in 2012. The mid-tempo jazz album was inspired by early 1990s video games and was composed over two years using a 1986 synthesizer, audio software from the early 1990s, and live instrumentation. He also worked on Vlambeer's Ridiculous Fishing and Super Crate Box, and composed a track for Hotline Miami.

In 2015 Suhrke was approached by Ojiro Fumoto to compose the soundtrack for Downwell. According to Suhrke, Fumoto initially requested the score to sound "bright and motivating" and to take inspiration from Mega Man 2.

Suhrke is one of the collaborators on UFO 50, an anthology of retro-style games. He is the sole composer and sound designer of the collection. In addition, he also helped design the games Barbuta, Mooncat, The Big Bell Race, Warptank, Onion Delivery, Caramel Caramel, Divers, Pingolf, Rakshasa, Elfazar's Hat and the Campanella trilogy.

Critical reception Earnest Cavalli of Engadget described Suhrke's work as among "the finest indie gaming soundtracks in recent memory" in 2013.

Ludography

Discography Includes work released under the aliases of Phlogiston (†) and Pajjama (‡) as well as Suhrke's full name.