Poll: [Poll] Game Soundtracks: Are They Getting Better?

[InGrindWeTrust]

The soundtrack to Medievil on the ps1 was great, it still makes an appearance every Hallowe'en. So was Hitman:Contracts.

 

[psivamp]

Hitman 2. Awesome soundtrack.

 

[V8 Ninja]

That's a pretty vague question. It's all about the composition of the music, NOT the quality of the music.

 

[Plinglebob]

While I agree that game music is now bigger and more interesting, its not very memorable. The last 2 themes that ever really stuck in my head were Final Fantasy VIII's intro theme and battle theme with an honorable mention the TLOZ: Wind Waker for a kick-ass main theme which I haven't heard in years. However, if anyone mentions Tetris I start humming Theme A.

 

[Brandon237]

Red Alert 3 and any star wars game take the cake for me. There will always be crap and there will always be quality with the soundtracks. Although the Audio team of Red Alert (all 3) deserve commendation. Just listen to this.

 

[timmytom1]

I`d have to say that on the whole they are better than they were ten years ago though some of those old tunes will hold a special place in gamers hearts forever , like the soundbite for when you ran into a wild pokemon.And i would really like the Brutal legend soundtrack to be released on CD

 

[skylog]

Muramasa had a really good soundtrack. It can go from that intense feel of a long journey:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDOTZxaEo-g

...to the feeling you get when you've seen something few others have:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oF5mDw_ffyo

 

[Trebort]

I always love the soundtract to the Deus Ex games.

 

[HT_Black]

Dark Void. That is all.

 

[KaiRai]

I would say no because Kingdom under fire: Heroes has already been made, and the best game music ever is playable on Xbox and Xbox 360.

 

[minimacker]

Short answer, no.

Long answer :



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CBTZqO83WQ - Total Annihilation. HAR HAR Nothing else to say.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGa0Dfwu0Kk - Red Alert 2, could be matched with RA3, but personally I disagree. RA2 had the best soundtrack.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6u4EsjBlb8 - Knights of Honor. Badass orchestra

 

[Cowabungaa]

Contrasting to the highly thematic content of yesteryear, when we can all recall the themes of games like Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda, and Megaman at the drop of a hat and you'll see how theme has taken a nosedive in recent years. A perfect example of this is the score (soundtrack) for Super Smash Bros. Brawl; part of the wonder of that score is the amount of thematic content that brings back that sense of nostalgia from immediately recognizable themes used in games that are approaching or exceeding twenty years old. You just don't find that in today's world. Try and recall the themes from Modern Warfare 2 or Mass Effect 2... there's nothing concrete enough for you to hang your memory on.

So again, while the quality of instruments used in modern game scores are certainly higher quality, the quality of the scores themselves have left quite a bit to be desired.

"Well there's your problem." Bolding, of course, done by me. I became a really active gamer rather late, for a very long time my only games were Pokemon Red and Gex: Enter the Gecko. In the last 5 years or so my game collection sky-rocketed and thus it's recent themes I can recall very well: Metroid Prime, Bioshock, Uncharted, Mass Effect, WoW and TF2 just to name a few major ones other than Halo and FF (I can't actually recall any FF theme, never played a FF game except for 1, same with MSG). That's because those are the games my gamer-persona grew up with and thus those themes stuck around in my mind, not Mega Man, Sonic or Zelda (my first Zelda was Wind Waker).

Why themes from Mario and Zelda are iconic is not just because of the themes themselves. Virtually every gamer knows them and has seen and played a game in those series and pretty much every game in those series uses the same freakin' theme. The sheer amount of exposure mixed with the games themselves already having a huge status in gaming history makes the games as a whole instantly recognisable, this includes the theme.

Also, you name a couple of games from the old days that are well-known for their iconic music, but how large of a percentage are they from the total library of games offered in those days? For every Zelda, how many games were there with generic blips and blops you can barely remember?

 

[SavingPrincess]

"Well there's your problem." Bolding, of course, done by me. I became a really active gamer rather late, for a very long time my only games were Pokemon Red and Gex: Enter the Gecko. In the last 5 years my game collection sky-rocketed and thus it's recent themes I can recall very well: Metroid Prime, Bioshock, Uncharted, Mass Effect, WoW and TF2 just to name a few major ones other than Halo and FF (I can't actually recall any FF theme, never played a FF game except for 1, same with MSG). That's because those are the games my gamer-persona grew up with and thus those themes stuck around in my mind, not Mega Man, Sonic or Zelda (my first Zelda was Wind Waker).

Why themes from Mario and Zelda are iconic is not just because of the themes themselves. Virtually every gamer knows them and has seen and played a game in those series and pretty much every game in those series uses the same freakin' theme. The sheer amount of exposure mixed with the games themselves already having a huge status in gaming history makes the games as a whole instantly recognisable, this includes the theme.

Also, you name a couple of games from the old days that are well-known for their iconic music, but how large of a percentage are they from the total library of games offered in those days? For every Zelda, how many games were there with generic blips and blops you can barely remember?

I would challenge you to go to a piano, and figure out by ear (assuming you're not a pianist) the themes to any of the above games you mentioned. It has nothing to do with nostalgia, it has everything to do with melodic vs. harmonic composition. As a Film Scoring major, I can attest that due to the limitations of the old systems, harmonic composition was nearly impossible, therefore melody had to take the center stage. Now, with higher quality engines and samples, harmonic composition is the new "toy" that everyone is using.

Avatar is the biggest grossing film of all time, can you hum the theme from memory? Now what about Back to the Future or Indiana Jones... ... and there you go.

 

[GeneralGrant]

Mmmm I would say it's about the same. Some new games have great soundtracks, such as ME2. Most have forgettable ones. The same story was true for most older games.

 

[Cowabungaa]

I would challenge you to go to a piano, and figure out by ear (assuming you're not a pianist) the themes to any of the above games you mentioned. It has nothing to do with nostalgia, it has everything to do with melodic vs. harmonic composition. As a Film Scoring major, I can attest that due to the limitations of the old systems, harmonic composition was nearly impossible, therefore melody had to take the center stage. Now, with higher quality engines and samples, harmonic composition is the new "toy" that everyone is using.

Avatar is the biggest grossing film of all time, can you hum the theme from memory? Now what about Back to the Future or Indiana Jones... ... and there you go.

Then again, is melody per definition 'better' than harmonic composition? I mean sure, I can hum along with the Mario tune, but I don't prefer it over say WoW's soundtrack. Yeah, Mario is recognisable, but Blizzard created some jaw-droppingly beautiful music for WoW. I'd never ever pick the Mario tune over this:
Mario can frell off when I listen to this:
(That woman has the voice of an angel)
Or this:
Or this:
Can those even be compared with a few simple but definitely recognisable notes? Does the one fact that I can't hum along with the last video (I can with the others) mean it's of a lesser quality?

And yeah, I think I can recognise at least several of those modern tunes on the piano as well. Especially Uncharted and ME's main themes are ingrained in my mind. I couldn't for the life of me remember Back to the Future's theme though, I haven't seen it all that often.

 

[UnwishedGunz]

i dont think they are.

sometimes they dont know WHEN to start a soundtrack during a game i think they just do it at randim times during the game

most of the time i dont notice it

 

[King of the Sandbox]

I don't know if I've been ninja'd, but crossing into Mexico in RDR and hearing this come on


truly moved me.