Street Fighter also has soem very good tracks, thanks to the remix community. And some of the korean and japanese bands that cover them with guitars are just amazing. Blood on the Asphalt is a good example, i'm not a Ken fan but I can rock out to this all night :P
Nintendo games have been known for their fantastic and catchy music compositions. Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Earthbound, and Pokemon are classic examples of memorable themes, even if they aren't as popular (referring to Earthbound).
I have about 2500 game songs in my iTunes library. I love it.
Among my favorites are Command & Conquer, EarthBound, Mother 3, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3, Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic CD (Japanese version, US vocalized songs are crap), Super Metroid, Mega Man (all of them), Jet Set Radio, Jet Set Radio Future, Half-Life 2, Super Mario RPG, Donkey Kong Country (all three), Chrono Cross, Super Mario Galaxy, Castlevania (most of them), Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, and Streets of Rage.
I feel like most games are less packed with awesome music these days though. I feel lucky if a game has 2 or 3 songs I really love anymore. Most of it is just atmospheric or theatrical, and it's not really the kind of stuff I'd want to listen to when not playing the game.
Tracks like the SMTIII one above, HL2's soundtrack, Chaos Theory's OST, etc would lose half there charm with lyrics I feel. But I can respect people not wanting to hear them outside of playing the game.
I've gotten hold of Resident Evil 2's soundtrack as well, forgot how much I loved this tune
And this one I can (and have had) happily have on repeat while im out and about, makes me feel happier.
@Psyx2: Oh I hated Half-Life2's soundtrack. Well at least most of it. It just felt like a mish-mash of bad techno that made me say in a gunfight, "what the hell am I listening to!? Is this how the Combine are trying to win the fight? Because if it is, it's working."
This thread was fun, lets get some more opinions flying :)
Not quite game music technicly, but I feel it's worth mentioning as it must have taken the guy a long time to put out. I'm not such a fan of the music but the video itself I think is superb.
VGM actually makes up for the majority of music I listen to (the rest is black/melodic death metal, pretty much) and I just so happen to be listening to the Spyro the Dragon soundtrack as I type this. Normally I only listen to Japanese VGM though, since the Western VGM of late isn't VGM at all and more akin to film scores. I'm sure those are great soundtracks as well -- it's just not my type of music. When it comes to VGM I prefer oldschool chiptune (GameBoy and FM Synthesis music are my favs), rock/metal influenced VGM, RPG music, and adrenaline-pumping boss battle themes.
Here's one of my favorite boss battle themes that unfortunately was wasted on a horribly shitty game (I actually bought the game just for the amazing music hoping it would cancel out the overall shittyness of the game, but it was just too bad to force myself through just for the music).
Although I love music from a lot of different games spanning many generations, I'm a big fan of C64 SID tunes. My Commodore 64 was the first machine I owned, and my love affair with game music pretty much started there. The great thing is I can still hear the warbling effects of the SID chip being used in music today, with peeps like Luke Slater and NAPT incorporating the sound.
I recently bought both Fallout 1 and 2 (for the third time) from GOG solely to have OSTs of those games. Mark Morgan is an amazing composer! I lost count of how many times I listened to this track alone:
@Axersia: Due to the fact that I have not got the japanese version of the game I did not hear ... [more]
The musical score is also one of the main reasons why I love the game so much, and I've listened to the soundtrack a lot more than I've actually played the game. I even bought the 9 disc Kingdom Hearts Complete Box (damn, that thing was expensive) solely for collective purposes because... well... I already had a lossless version downloaded. So that one remains sealed until perhaps one day I get the chance to have Yoko Shimomura sign it.
BTW, have you listened to Yoko Shimomura's orchestral arrange album called "Drammatica"? It only contains a 4 KH tracks, but I think you'll like her other work as well if you're a fan of KH's soundtrack. My favorite track on the album is "The 13th Anthology" -- a medley of all the battle themes:
I love game music. I've purchased several over the years and sought out other for listening. A few game related songs I'd actually place on my "all-time favorites" list. In addition to Skygunner's "Wishing for an Eternal Sky" and Kingdom Hearts' "Simple and Clean", I've loved the soundtracks to Elder Scrolls: Oblivion and Jet Set Radio Future.
Aye, Video Game music is where it's at. My girlfriend actually hates video games and when I told her I loved video game music she made a weird face as if to say "That's just stupid. You really are an uber geek". Later on that day I put on some of my favourite, from Chrono Cross without telling her what it was. She said "This is really lovely music, what is it?"
"IT'S VIDEO GAME MUSIC. HOW'D YE LIKE THEM APPLES!?"
Which was fun.
Chrono Cross, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Phantasy Star Online, Okami, Ico, F-Zero, SIlent Hill, Mass Effect...and the list goes on.
Haha, thats an interesting story. It highlights the difference between game music and other commisioned musical scores. IE, there is no difference, good music is good music.
@natetodamax: i would have to agree. Mass Effects music is stunning. Remember when u first placed the game in your console and the main menu started up with the deep soulful music. i was like, shit this is gonna be good
@GrilledCheez01: If I remember rightly the trailer has Dio's Mob Rule as it's soundtrack. So I think you're right, it's going to be awesome :) I mean it's got LEMMY doing voice acting for gods sakes! LEMMY!! :D
to me music in games are important, they cant break a game or make it, i was surprised when i was playing fallout 3 and turned off my radio to find that the game has some amazing scores
This thread was fun, lets get some more opinions flying :)Not quite game music technicly, but I feel it's worth ... [more]
Dude.... that brought back some really warm memories since Half Life 2 is the most heartwarming game i've ever played with all its dangers and quests and im sure anyone who's been in Freeman's shoes and walked his path feels the same... wow man, thank you, best music video ive ever seen!
Um, guys, when you say soundtracks of games you mean, what, like they take the music from the game's main menu and the music when the credits roll up, and turn them into long compositions and sell them as albums?
So many games have great music. I've bought soundtracks in the past, but rarely ever listen to them. For me the music is often too associated with specific emotions and other stuff experienced in the game; I don't like separating one from the other.
Log in to comment