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[Alex May]

Let's talk about unusual music!

You know what, though? I'd really like to see more adventurous musical accompaniment to games. It's been ages since I've played a game with a truly excellent soundtrack that didn't sound like either 8-bit noodling, John Williams phoning it in, or some terrible mix of rock and uninspired electronic drumming.

Actually, I don't know that I've ever played a game that didn't feature either one of those things or just vague ambient sounds.

Also, fish would like to see more Sonic Youth in video games. I once burned a Sonic Youth CD with a friend of mine, but I admit to my mistake now.

So, any games you can think of with unusual music?

A lot of Orisinal games have great music. I like the music from Pocketful of Stars and Windy Days.

Also, Immortal Defense has some great music in it, including some classical tracks and a super awesome jazz number from the 1920s or 30s, not sure which? Whatever, I love that stuff anyway. King Oliver is my favourite jazz artist from that time. I think that he and his Dixie Syncopators created some of the world's finest music ever recorded between 1926-1927. I think those are the right years. I have a compilation around somewhere. It's the best music I have. I shall never tire of listening to it.

What else, now? I guess Rose & Camellia has some interesting music that fits the theme of the game.

Any commercial games with unusual music you can think of?

[Alex May]

Fallout 3 teaser with The Ink Spots

This one made my hair stand on end... "I don't want to set the woooorld ooooon fiiiire"... brilliant.

[Terry]

Well, there's Clysm's take on the GameMaker Johnny series, "Johnny's Nightmare":

Q: Where did you get the music for this game?

A: The first song is from a Commodore 64 game called "Rupert & The
   Toymakers Party." I don't know the composer's name.

   The second song is "It's a Sin to Tell a Lie." The singing part
   is Brent Spiner ("Data" in Star Trek: the Next Generation). The
   talking part is Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard).

   And here's an unrelated song:
   http://hjem.wanadoo.dk/~wan13237/darkmateria_the_picard_song.mp3

   The third song is an excerpt from "Jack and the Beanstalk" by
   Sharda, from "Children's Disco Musical Stories."

If you haven't played it yet, this really is quite a trip, heh. I wasn't expecting the off the wall music when I played, so it was quite a pleasant surprise. Especially the last Nursery Rhyme one!

[fish]

from what ive heard so far from mass effect, the music there is amazing.
we had bioware guys give a presentation at out IGDA chapter about a year ago and the main sound guy kept talkinng about how they were trying to emulate that almost haunting quality film scores had in the 70s and 80s. He kept mentioning Vangelis and whoever it was that made all the sound effects for star wars.

ive been keeping an eye on this game and whenever i see in game stuff i try to listen to music and sound ambiance. the big 1up preview from last week had some footage of the galaxy map, and the music there sounded exactly like what sound-guy was talking about.

also, i like it when games build themselves a soundtrack from liscenced music that makes sense. im not talking about EA trying to be cool with the kids, im talking Jet Set Radio or the first tony hawk.

and random mention: BULLY had an amazing original score.

[Terry]

and random mention: BULLY had an amazing original score.

QFT! That game was so underrated. And had one of the only soundtracks I ever felt the need to copy to my MP3 player.

[fish]

and random mention: BULLY had an amazing original score.

. And had one of the only soundtracks I ever felt the need to copy to my MP3 player.

same here.
its the first thing that struck me when i played the game.
id ride the bike just to hear the bike riding theme, and get annoyed everytime id bail out and the music would stop and id have to start it over from the beginning.

[ChevyRay]

It'd be fun to have a game based on The Residents' music.

[fish]

or aesthetics.

not completely related but for WEEKS now ive been completely obsessed with snakefinger's version of kraftwerk's the model.

she's. a model and she's looking guuuud.

slide guitar FTW.

[Monothu]

Obake's got some pretty good music that unfortunately gets recycled over and over.  Kinda like the Demon Bat Boss in that game.  Out of Order has some great music that really fits each area well.  It's a good mix of ambient sounds and catchy tunes.  Cave Story's music is absolutely perfect.  Same with La-Mulana.  Chakan the Forever Man's music simply screams "I'm on the Genesis."  Earthworm Jim's music is interesting to say the least.  A Boy and His Blob has some catchy tunes that are marred by the painful to listen to high pitched notes it so loves to throw at you.  Mario's music is all around catchy.  Kid Icarus's music is pretty easy to recall, a good deal of which is due to you hearing it over and over as you die over and over.  Bionic Commando is pretty forgettable in terms of music except for one bit that can be heard at the start of this

.  Contra is easily recallable, a good deal of which is due to it's difficulty.  Duck Tales is pretty good.  Mega Man is mostly forgettable except for some of the tunes you hear after you pick a robot master to fight.  River City Ransom has some brilliant music.  I also rather like the style of Rygar.  Castlevania's music is pretty overrated.  8 Eyes can be good at times.  Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa is pretty good, though just a teensy bit better on the Famicom Disk System than the Famicom.  Wario Land is pretty interesting and catchy.  Umi Hara Kawa Se's music is pretty unique.  The Legend of Zelda's music is all around epic.  The Gunbare Goemon games have pretty good tunes here and there.  I remember Whirlo's music as being very good, although I cannot actually recall any bit of it right now.  Tiny Toons Adventures - Buster Busts Loose! had some pretty good songs, although I'm not sure if they were taken from the cartoon or not.  The Mission in Snowdrift Land music was fitting for a game set in a snowy landscape.  Sonic Heroes can be quite memorable at times.  The Amazing Spiderman's music was very catchy, although not very fitting.  Clean Asia's music is extremely odd.  Blocksum had some pretty good music as well.  Here is a demonstration of some unique music

.  I'm terribly sorry for the massive wall of text, and the boredom that will surely come from reading it but I'm too lazy to make it any better.

[Alex May]

You've listed a lot of games that have good music, but they're not very interesting scores. Like, with Cave Story, that music is great and fits the game, but it's pretty much synthy video game music that you can hear in any synthy video game. Know what I mean? I'm looking for games that went completely crazy and used music you just wouldn't expect to hear in a video game. Yeah, Clean Asia has a strange track that's made out of samples from Quake 3, that was a pretty hard listen, and not too bad in terms of unusualness.

[Monothu]

You've listed a lot of games that have good music, but they're not very interesting scores. Like, with Cave Story, that music is great and fits the game, but it's pretty much synthy video game music that you can hear in any synthy video game. Know what I mean? I'm looking for games that went completely crazy and used music you just wouldn't expect to hear in a video game. Yeah, Clean Asia has a strange track that's made out of samples from Quake 3, that was a pretty hard listen, and not too bad in terms of unusualness.

I would say that Cave Story has very unusual music.  It's maybe not massive-in-your-face-over-the-top-crazitude, but, I would say that it has some unique music nonetheless.  Like the Grasstown theme for example.  That isn't massively pure insanity like nothing else at all, but is still quite different from your average music.

[Chris Whitman]

That's sort of what I was thinking of, too.

Don't get me wrong, there are lots of games with fun little 8-bit scores. All the old Final Fantasy games managed to squeeze a lot of character into beeps and blips -- it's just that there's only so much you can do with that sort of music, and since game music had the option to go more 'hi-fi,' I don't see a lot of particularly interesting stuff being done.

I quite liked the music in those little Orisinal games. Good suggestion!

[Chris Whitman]

I would say that Cave Story has very unusual music.  It's maybe not massive-in-your-face-over-the-top-crazitude, but, I would say that it has some unique music nonetheless.  Like the Grasstown theme for example.  That isn't massively pure insanity like nothing else at all, but is still quite different from your average music.

I would disagree. I thought the Cave Story music was cute, and effective for what Cave Story was shooting for, but I didn't find it remotely original. But then, Cave Story wasn't original. It was a well executed take on the classics.

[Monothu]

I would disagree. I thought the Cave Story music was cute, and effective for what Cave Story was shooting for, but I didn't find it remotely original. But then, Cave Story wasn't original. It was a well executed take on the classics.

I would say that Cave Story was pretty original.  While it may not have introduced some immensely crazy new gameplay mechanic where the main character periodically turns into a bowl of pudding in the game, some of the weapons were much unlike what had been seen in gaming beforehand.  The machine gun and bubbler for example were pretty different than your average video game weapon.  Also, the weapon upgrading system in it is pretty innovative as well.

[Chris Whitman]

The term 'original' is pretty subjective, really, so I'm not going to disagree with you on that point. I'll just say that's not really what I would personally consider original. I've seen other games I feel were relatively similar to Cave Story.

[Alex May]

OK, let's look at it another way: Cave Story is inadmissable! :D

But seriously - I'm with I Like Cake, in that cake is good, but also that by the terms of the thread we are looking for games that depart from video game norms and use music that doesn't fit the stereotype. _{As for Cave Story being original, that's for another thread I feel.}

[Chris Whitman]

By 'other thread' you mean 'other flame war about the definition of words.'

That's a can of worms I'd really rather not open up, but I think we can all agree to disagree or agree to various degrees, as it were.

[Chris Whitman]

So how about that music stuff?

[Alex May]

There's a REALLY nice song in Wario Ware Smooth Moves, on the driving level. I'll try and find it by the magic of internet.

[Alex May]

THE INTERNET DELIVERS





Direct download! In you face!

This is the happiest song ever! It's THE happiest song! Ever!