Videogame soundtracks

[Jasede]

I can attest that we, KC and I, have linked to them very, very often.

 

[Lothers]

I see no one here have played System Shock 2 :shock: Cause this game had AWESOME soundtrack and no one have mentioned it yet... DeusEX was also good, and Witcher soundtrack is FENOMENAL in terms of adding to atmosphere.

 

[kingcomrade]

I mentioned pretty recently that I liked the self_esteem_fund song from Portal. It's ambient. They've got it on KHinsider and ffshrine. It's fenotypical.

 

[kingcomrade]

http://djpretzel.web.aplus.net/songs/Le ... _ReMix.mp3
This song is so awesome. It's pretty goofy.

 

[Mister Arkham]

I'm rather fond of Jack Wall's scores for Mysts three and four. Four especially is worth listening to if you can get a hold of it.

 

[Andyman Messiah]

I see no one here have played System Shock 2 :shock:

Eric Brosius

And yeah, it's good.

 

[Jedi_Learner]

But anyway, what games did you think had good soundtracks?

Top of my head, Planescape Torment, Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura, Baldur's Gate II and Throne of Bhaal and World of Warcraft. Go here and listen to BT_IllidariWalkHero09.mp3.

Eschalon: Book I has a wonderful soundtrack as well. The main theme is beautiful.

 

[Damned Registrations]

This is actually my favourite video game track (There are better quality versions floating around, but it's still pretty good even on the shitty sound system it required.) http://www.constantlimit.com/site/wordp ... ger-music/

 

[Ausir]

I'm a technofag so I like Alex Brandon (Deus Ex, Unreal, Unreal Tournament) and Rom Di Prisco (NFS 3-5). also soundtracks from Jesper Kyd (Hitman series and UT3, btw together with di prisco there)
I also like ToEE electronic ambient soundtrack. whoever made it.
Christopher Franke's fusion of electronic sounds with classical instruments is also fine in my book. though the only game on PC where you can hear that specific style of his music is fanmade B5 spacesim IFH.

Did they use Franke's music made for the cancelled B5 game?

 

[MetalCraze]

yes.

 

[barker_s]

Homm II was way better. Even the midi tracks were totally awesome.

I only played HoMM I and III (also IV and V, but I'd rather forget about them) so I cannot verify your claim at the moment .

Edit:
I did a small research and listened to HoMM II soundtrack and I don't see its superiority over HoMM III's. But maybe it's just nostalgia.

 

[Jasede]

Wait, what did you listen to?
You can not tell me these atmospheric tracks aren't incredible; and I am not even touching on the quasi-arias in the town themes.

 

[barker_s]

No, I'm not telling that they're bad or something. They're actually very similar to HoMM III's in terms of style and quality. I didn't say HoMM II soundtrack is worse, I just like HoMM III's more. As I said before, nostalgia might've something to do with it 'cause this game holds a very special place in my heart :wink: .

 

[Wyrmlord]

Oh man, how on EARTH could I forget Dawn Of War? That was one fantastic soundtrack!

 

[Crazy Tuvok]

Mafia.

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

Thanks for the link, that's awesome.

http://www.sound-test.org/soundtracks/f ... %20War.mp3

Here's an example of why I like Front Mission 3, even though it pales gameplay-wise to the original.

 

[Mojo]

Grim Fandango soundtrack was awesome. Pure classic era Bebop and Swing, with a latin tint and mexican folk music sometimes. Probably the only really great game soundtrack I ever really enjoyed, though I'm biased because I haven't played that many games.

I don't know though, game soundtracks are just usually...meh. Not only everyone goes for the generic techno/drum'n'bass or orchestral/epic bullshit, as the decent soundtracks also have questionable quality. Mark Morgan stuff was okay and it added to the games, but it was still just ambient music. Nothing anyone with half good taste would get excited about.

 

[Fat Dragon]

Edit: Also: Alexander Brandon, Eric Brosius and Mark Morgan. Fantastic composers. Does anyone know what they're up to these days? Brandon I think work for Obsidian now.

Brandon is currently the Audio Director for Obsidian. Brosius did some work on Bioshock I think, not sure what he's up to now. I think he's working for Harmonix.

Mark Morgan recently launched his own site and is planning to release a solo album.
http://markmorganmusic.com/
In an interview he did recently (link is on his site) he says that he still wants to work on video games. Why the fuck nobody is using his talent is beyond me. His Fallout and Planescape tracks were excellent.

 

[Gnidrologist]

I thinki you're wrong about ambient. I was like you for quite a years, listening to rock, folk and calssical music, thinking, that all ambient music is just some musical white noise to set as a background music in some events. Boy, i was wrong.
Yes, it's true that it is mutch harder to filter out what is good and what is not in the field of most electronic music because of the sheer simplicity that has to be involved to make it, but that doesn't autmotically dosqualify it as a potential source for great music.
Morgan's soundtracks to the Fallout and Torment were major turning points in my appriciation to ambient music and i strongly disagree, that those pieces could be only appricated by people with bad/no taste. I've been music junky for longer than i've been living i thin, and without the bragging, i know the turf of most popular music out there. Those pieces still hit the spot that very few other do. And that's not nostalgic thing.

 

[Mojo]

Well, Morgan soundtracks for these 3 games ( I don't know about any other, I'm just familiar with Torment and Fallout 1 and 2 ) are good and they add to the game, i.e: they fullfill their purpose. They are are actually great in that aspect. If you take them as a musical work alone though, they are nothing to get excited about. That's what I meant.

I'm an aspiring composer and musician and a big appreciator of soundtracks and I must tell you that in my humble opinion, game soundtracks are still up for something really meaningfull regarding music. I don't know, the term "ambient" is quite derrogatory and I admit that there is great music that fits that category. Hell, you can even argue that virtually *all* soundtracks should be classified as "ambient music".But there's just some bad insistence on the part of game soudntrack composers in making music so shallow you hardly notice it and can't even stick in your memory. That's what I would call ambient music. Something that maybe works beautifully as a mood enhancer and doesn't detract from anything, but that is nothing but mediocre unmemorable music if you listen to it alone. I would say Mark Morgan falls into that.

Compared to Jeremy Soule and his bunch, it's heaven though. So I guess I know very well why you are so fond of it.

 

[Gnidrologist]

Yeah, ia can understand where you're coming from, but i still disagree on the case of Morgan. In recent years i have grown to love both, the Fallout dark abient soundscapes, aswell as PST's quite meotional and at meny parts, very peculiar sountrack on theyr own.

I was quite sceptical on those so called ''osts'' myself some time ago, but there has been so many excellent standalone masterpieces of soundtracks, that i have grew to be fond of, that i can no longer percieve them as some kind of ambient ''ilustrative'' music for the certain circumstances.
One of the first great ''osts'' i fell in love, was the H.Zimmer's (i don't like most of his work though) score to the Thin Red Line. That soundtrack is something almost transcendental. I never had sutch an experience from a subtle backdrop music in any film. But that piece shown me that even in very restrictive land of muscial scores for whatever media entertainment, the creativity can reach a high value of musical art.
Have you heard the Amercan Beaty soundtrack by T.Newman? It's also quite subtle and ambient sounding, but it still pulls my strings.

 

[Jasede]

I never saw what the deal was with Mark Morgan, but then again, ambient music without any melodies to speak of just makes me ignore it.

I have no love for the Fallout soundtrack. PS:T is fair enough with some nice themes, but mostly forgetable also.

Tell me what's good about Mark Morgan in Fallout. I know the tunes fit the atmosphere perfectly - that is great. But that doesn't make them good music, does it? They're just melody-less random noises, mostly.

 

[Mojo]

My favorite movie soundtracks are probably the osts for 'Romeo is Bleeding" by Mark Isham and "Paris,Texas" by Ry Cooder. Simply put, masterpieces. There's a whole lot of brilliant music in movies , but like I said, games are still too see music on that level.

I haven't been playing games in a while though , but I figure that nowadays when you look at Halo/Oblivion/Half-life or whatever it's all the same generic cheap orchestral music. Amirite? or maybe I'm missing something...

Anyway, it all figures. When you look at most games nowadays and see they are... simply put *lame* as creative endeavours, you can understand why the music is lame as well. Even Mozart himself wouldn't eb able to compose a great score to something like Halo.

 

[Gragt]

Half-Life does not have generic cheap orchestral music. It has little music and it's more on the industrial side than the orchestral.

And seeing as Mozart is dead, we certainly can't test your claim.

 

[Mojo]

My bad. Generic Eletronica then.

And seeing as Mozart is dead, we certainly can't test your claim.

No shit Sherlock? I guess the understanding of irony and hypothetical thinking comes hard nowadays.