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The Blending of Music and Games
Gamasutra has an opinion piece by the 'father of music games,' Masaya Matsuura, who questions the evolution of video game music (or the lack thereof) as the industry's technological advancements give rise to the capability for greater complexity. "Most games these days seem to use gorgeous orchestral soundtracks. While these large-scale soundtracks may generally be lovely to listen to, if we really think about it, isn't it all a bit lacking in imagination? Thinking about it from a simplistic visual perspective, while films are basically just watched, games are interactive." He also discusses the predilection for games to encourage "competitive fun," as opposed to "cooperative fun." GameSetWatch has a related article which talks about how excellent musical scores can help to create an emotionally charged experience, rather than simply occupying one's mind for a time.
Having the sprawling orchestral arrangements is nice, but as a video game music fetishist since the NES days I know that the songs big and small rely on catchy motifs to motivate the gamer and stick inside their head. You think the Minibosses gathered crowds by playing orchestra?
Many classic NES games have captivating, moody music - Wizards and Warriors' soundtrack is +1 underrated. Long-running series such as Final Fantasy and Castlevania have used some of the same titles and motifs throughout their entire series.
Hmm... the Gamasutra article struck me as a little pretentious, but maybe that's just because I actually like big orchestral scores for games. Some of my favorites include:
Wing Commander: Yeah, it was low quality midis, but at the time, it was jaw-dropping. It felt like you were playing a Star Wars movie on your PC and the soundtrack was a huge part of that. From the intro sequence, with the theme that was more than a little reminiscent of the ST:TNG theme, through to the battle music and the Kilrathi theme (also used for fun in Ultima 7), the music in the first 2 games was awesome. Who can forget the cheesy-but-classic "scramble" music that played before every mission?
Star Control 2: Each of the many alien races in the game had its own music and this played a huge part in setting the atmosphere for every encounter. The Ur-Quan and Yehat music, in particular, have stayed in my mind to this day as examples of great videogame music.
X-Wing: The Lucasarts I-Muse system which changed the soundtrack to reflect the progress of the battle was revolutionary. The audio cues from the music would directly influence your battle tactics. You knew that a few bars of the Imperial March meant that trouble was headed your way.
Pretty much anything Final Fantasy: Ok, perhaps the soundtracks haven't been universally stellar, but pretty much every Final Fantasy game has had a few tracks worthy of real notice. FF6's Overworld theme, FF7's Cosmo Canyon theme (and, of course, One Winged Angel), FF10's "To Zanarkand" and FF11's Memoria de la Stono all stand out as some of the best pieces of video game music ever.
Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The fantastic main theme, which is used appropriately throughout the story-campaign, does a great job in adding a touch of gravitas to what could otherwise be a rather lightweight story.
I haven't read the article yet, however I agree that video game music could be more interesting. A classic example is Super Mario 64, where the music changed dynamically with one's environment.
Redbook audio is nice, but some of my all-time favorite video game music came from cartridge-based games: ... Just a thought.
Mega Man 2, Super Castlevania IV, Crystalis, Super Mario World, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.
Chicks always get bored when I score high on expert at Guitar Heroes III and leave before I finish a song.
But whenever I clumsily play what looks like a love ballad dedicated to them while being drunk on my cheap guitar with rusty chords, they always stay for the end :)
Perhaps i'm just showing my age, but i think the older and simpler music had a much bigger impact than the music from newer games, even leaving aside the cases where they're not using licensed music.
The music needs to fit the scene for which it is being played, and outside of games specifically designed as "music games" i think that's all the interaction that's necessary. The music needs to be relatively simple and somewhat repetitive. Once you've gone beyond a certain level of complexity either you're not noticing the added complexity anymore, or you're paying more attention to the music than you are to the game.
Of course a certain level of complexity is good. I don't really look back on the "music" from the Atari 2600 with great fondness. However as the ability to play more complex music in games has increased there was a point where my interest peaked and then began a general decline. I think the peak for me was around the days of Final Fantasy 6. After that the music of games in general made less and less of an impression on me. I very much enjoyed Final Fantasy 10, and the music for it was well done and pleasant to listen to, but very rarely do i get a desire to go back and listen to it again, and in fact unlike a lot of previous games i have difficulty "replaying" most of the music in my head. On the other hand more recent music from the Advance Wars music has stuck with me much more because it was constrained by the format to be simpler and more repetitive.
Of course one could argue that being complex and varied enough that the songs don't etch themselves into your brain is a good thing, but from my perspective i'm going to get more enjoyment out of the music if i remember it fondly later, especially if it's paired with memories of a particularly fun game.
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For me, the Castlevania games (especially Symphony of the Night) are excellent at combining background art, character design and background music.
Example: SOTN library stage. Here's a fan playing "Dance of Pales" on his synth.
What can I say? With Castlevania, the music becomes part of the game and contributes to the suspension of disbelief.
Is the problem that the music sounds like a film score? I don't see the point of complaining about this, if you prefer beeps and boops instead of violins and pianos, that's legitimate, but it seems to have little to do with the fact that it's a game... those beeps and boops weren't about it being a game, they were about the limitations in the hardware. Different games have different music, just as different films have different music.
Is the problem that the music doesn't react to the actions in the game? But it does! Characters have themes, and the background music tends to reflect the most important character, it changes as you progress in the game, it changes as you enter different modes and areas.
Is the problem that the music isn't controlled somehow by the player? OK, I can see things that could be done. you select a theme for your character, and have the game generate some kind of algorithmic background music depending on the characters themes. You could have the player use musical cues to make actions happen (I had hoped that Ocarina of Time would do this, rather than have the music simply be a gimmick that you didn't actually have to learn). But you can do all these things without losing the lush orchestral scores.
So what exactly is the complaint?
See OCReMix.org for what can be done with old game tunes. The results are effing fabulous. Some of the contributors are having their works put into the new street fighter game. Great stuff.