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Hello all, this is the thread where we rant and rave about our favorite video game soundtracks, composers, etc. I thought it would be a good idea to kind of set the stage with some background and examples of video game music from the early 8 bit era up until the end of the 32 bit console generation, so here we go. In Western musical vocabulary, you often hear the names of composers such as Bach, Mozart and Beethoven spoken when people discuss the luminaries of a bygone classical music era. These are composers that expanded the varying musical genre's of their day and created some of the most iconic music of that time period. In the world of video games, we have similar genre defining composers that helped shape the soundscape of the games we grew up playing and continue to do so with modern games. Names such as Uematsu, Mitsuda and Sakimoto are often spoken when discussing the subject of "best video game soundtrack ever". Historically, early video game music was limited to short introduction pieces or transition pieces in between levels. More often than not this was due to the limited hardware capabilities that were available during that time. It is very difficult to have active music playing in the background of an arcade game when you only have 8 channels to work with to play sound. In fact some early arcade systems sidestepped this hurdle by playing analog tapes of music, though this introduced technical challenges such as durability of the medium. By the end of the 70s and early 80s, arcade hardware had advanced to the point to where synthesized audio tracks could be included in games. One of the earliest examples of a dedicate music track was Rally X, released in 1980: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJxbkhFPgb8 As you can probably tell, the music itself is rather basic and cuts out when other sound effects are played, but this is an important step in the development of video game music. As technology improved throughout the 80s, video game music became increasingly more textured and complex. When the NES was released in 1983, composers had full 4 sound channels to work with, included an additional 5th which was used for low quality sampling. Despite the limitations of the hardware, composers were able to create very musical works. Here are a few highlights of NES era music to serve as examples. Mega Man 2 - Dr. Wily's Castle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJRoRt155mA Castlevania - Vampire Killer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbvkqNIx8JM Final Fantasy - Matoya's Cave https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR06uwC4e20 One important thing to note here is that early video game music composers often doubled as programmers. It's not uncommon for a composer to also be credited with sound effect design and general programming duties as well as creating the music for games. When the SNES and Sega Genesis consoles were released at the start of the 90s, the audio synthesis hardware had developed to a point to where composers/programmers had access to 8 simultaneous voices. In addition to this, voices were no longer limited to simple square/saw/sine/pulse sounds and could be shaped to more "realistic" sounds. With the advent of 16 bit consoles, video game music could be more richer and dynamic. Final Fantasy 4 - Troian Beauty https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQuckZer8H4 Sonic the Hedgehog - Spring Yard Zone https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ia71rCO55E Ogre Battle - Thunder (Revolt) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDAMxLKY2EY At the dawn of the 32-bit era, some games began to incorporate CD audio instead of synthesizing all of the music tracks with onboard hardware, however this was the exception rather than the rule. Data storage limitations on discs limited true CD audio, however synthesizer hardware improved to the extent that simulated instruments were close in quality to the real thing, depending on the MIDI sound font used. I think it's also important to note that the 32-bit era marks the turning point to where video game music became an integrated part of the gaming experience instead of an afterthought once the gameplay was finished. Of course this is just my opinion but some of the most influential and critically acclaimed video game soundtracks were released in the 32-bit era. Final Fantasy Tactics - Ovelia's Theme https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZerSeZBymF8 Legend of Dragoon - Royal Capital https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjoUI1ZVne4 Xenogears - Singing of the Gentle Wind https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZwRpUpf5nE With the release of the sixth generation of video game consoles, data limitations on physical media no longer was a limiting factor for music. During this time, video game soundtracks shifted from synthesized audio generated from the console hardware to audio being played from recorded media. This time period also marked the point where many of the "old guard" composers began retiring or lessening their output (Uematsu is a good example of this). Final Fantasy X - Besaid Island https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2SHDFt8pSc&t=112s Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories - Spread Your Wings https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGqTGRVGqiY Silent Hill 2 - Forest https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLq9DnkZHfU Now that we got all that exposition out of the way, post about your favorite video game OST, composer, track or whatever! As you may have noticed, I featured a ton of music from JRPGs and East Asian developers so it would be awesome if people could post tracks coming from Western composers and studios.
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Jan 26, 2017 19:42
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A lot of the EVE login themes are really really good, but I don't know how to describe why I like them. I guess because they tend to do a lot with very short melodies? They're all meant to get you to enter the game, so they usually take it slow to highlight how big and unknown the world is supposed to be: Exodus (addition of player-owned bases; first time players could claim territory?) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vucaKG-uXpc Revelations (addition of scanning/probing among many other things) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sxgak8VqL1g Apocrypha (addition of wormholes) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5u-9xizPuo Alternately the theme can bring in a shitload of tension: Empyrean Age (addition of faction warfare) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1Lais-oMG8 Incursion (zombies invade everything) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ba1hZO42wgc Incarna (huge graphical update) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzNCNBftZ1M Going to edit this post later, definitely want to say more besides "these songs are cool".
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Jan 26, 2017 22:05
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