Admit it there are few of us who couldn't hum the Mario title theme on a dare and how the familiar soothing piano tones of the Final Fantasy series letting us know sonically we are safe for the moment gives us a collective sigh in our gaming moments.
In North America if you wanted to or actually had an interest in the game soundtracks of the NES or SNES era you were forced to import from Japan. Thankfully with the Internet this has gotten considerably easier and the ability to track down every title and more that you could possibly want has been reduced to how much do you want to pay for it.
Sure there's a part of me that enjoys hearing bits of the of the old 8/16 bit tunes but I'm not running out to acquire the Complete Hits of Mega-Man. I'd rather have a mix tape of the old audio teasers from the arcade games of my past0, things like Gorf "Coin detected in pocket!" or Berzerk "Attack the humanoid, attack the humanoid" just for a bit of nostalgia. I realize I may be a minority in this as the recent interest in promoting Video Game Music tours has had both a success and a failure but still the interest was positive and it's nice to see something commonplace in Japan begin to get a grip here.
Game soundtracks for me have evolved in the later consoles and have "fit" the game better than ever. But rising above the game to be heard on it’s own? I never really thought about it before, sure I knew if I ever needed the Sword of Mana soundtrack I could readily purchase it but it wasn't something I wanted or missed hearing. Enter 1999 and the Dreamcast, the game, Jet Set Radio. Here was gameplay on the cutting edge paired with a soundtrack that kicked the combined experience of music and gameplay "up a notch".
I became obsessed with it; sometimes I wondered if I was playing the game to play the game or just to listen to the music. I imported and bought the soundtrack, I had to have it even if it was a curious mixture of styles on collision with each other, and it introduced me to the band Guitar Vader and to Hideki Nahanuma who samples and mixes stuff in a blender and throws a matching beat at it. It perfectly set the tone of the game.
Fast forward to the PS2/Xbox launch, what sold me on the Xbox was Jet Set Radio Future, the sequel to the Dreamcast title, the first trailer I saw had Nahanuma's "Concept Of Love" track and I was hooked, bought that soundtrack too! Alas, both games sold poorly and for a while most games just had that generic stuff music you know, you are dead music, you are attacking music etc.. nothing really too memorable to move me to a purchase, it’s not that they were bad but they weren't memorable or anything that I HAD to have on CD. Then Morrowind came out for the Xbox and slowly it grew on me, I would find myself playing back a few of those themes in my head and began to look forward to those moments in the game. I never bought the soundtrack as I can really only remember about 4 tunes in my head that I liked and that to me sounds like a like a single.
Along comes Katamari Damacy and again I get sucked into the music, the intro alone may me wonder just what the HECK was this game all about. I found a great example of where gameplay met soundtrack and the two combined to raise the game higher then either on their own would have done.
Soundtracks have come a long way since they were bloops and bleeps and North America is showing a hardcore fan-base but more importantly it’s getting easier for the average gamer to pick up a video game soundtrack like Halo at a local record retailer rather then going through an importer or website, other games are offering their soundtracks as “pack-ins” with the game itself more often than not are included on separate disc rather than some BGM test done in-game.
How long before game soundtracks start to chart?
Sure there's a part of me that enjoys hearing bits of the of the old 8/16 bit tunes but I'm not running out to acquire the Complete Hits of Mega-Man. I'd rather have a mix tape of the old audio teasers from the arcade games of my past0, things like Gorf "Coin detected in pocket!" or Berzerk "Attack the humanoid, attack the humanoid" just for a bit of nostalgia. I realize I may be a minority in this as the recent interest in promoting Video Game Music tours has had both a success and a failure but still the interest was positive and it's nice to see something commonplace in Japan begin to get a grip here.
Game soundtracks for me have evolved in the later consoles and have "fit" the game better than ever. But rising above the game to be heard on it’s own? I never really thought about it before, sure I knew if I ever needed the Sword of Mana soundtrack I could readily purchase it but it wasn't something I wanted or missed hearing. Enter 1999 and the Dreamcast, the game, Jet Set Radio. Here was gameplay on the cutting edge paired with a soundtrack that kicked the combined experience of music and gameplay "up a notch".
I became obsessed with it; sometimes I wondered if I was playing the game to play the game or just to listen to the music. I imported and bought the soundtrack, I had to have it even if it was a curious mixture of styles on collision with each other, and it introduced me to the band Guitar Vader and to Hideki Nahanuma who samples and mixes stuff in a blender and throws a matching beat at it. It perfectly set the tone of the game.
Fast forward to the PS2/Xbox launch, what sold me on the Xbox was Jet Set Radio Future, the sequel to the Dreamcast title, the first trailer I saw had Nahanuma's "Concept Of Love" track and I was hooked, bought that soundtrack too! Alas, both games sold poorly and for a while most games just had that generic stuff music you know, you are dead music, you are attacking music etc.. nothing really too memorable to move me to a purchase, it’s not that they were bad but they weren't memorable or anything that I HAD to have on CD. Then Morrowind came out for the Xbox and slowly it grew on me, I would find myself playing back a few of those themes in my head and began to look forward to those moments in the game. I never bought the soundtrack as I can really only remember about 4 tunes in my head that I liked and that to me sounds like a like a single.
Along comes Katamari Damacy and again I get sucked into the music, the intro alone may me wonder just what the HECK was this game all about. I found a great example of where gameplay met soundtrack and the two combined to raise the game higher then either on their own would have done.
Soundtracks have come a long way since they were bloops and bleeps and North America is showing a hardcore fan-base but more importantly it’s getting easier for the average gamer to pick up a video game soundtrack like Halo at a local record retailer rather then going through an importer or website, other games are offering their soundtracks as “pack-ins” with the game itself more often than not are included on separate disc rather than some BGM test done in-game.
How long before game soundtracks start to chart?
