The lost art of good Music

[thelimper]

All the talk about the original Metroid has me thinking of one of the biggest things I miss about the NES, the music. Can anyone actually think of a game on any system in the past 5 years that had really great music? Oddly enough all of the game music I love the most came from the NES generation. There is just something awesome about the way developers took the simple sounds of a Nintendo and weaved them into songs I remember to this day.

I'm talking about the type of game music that when you hear it you are brought back to the time when you played the game for the first time. I do this all the time when I hear music from old Nintendo games like Metroid, Kid Icarus, Zelda, Mario, Contra, Mega-Man, and Balloon fight. Those aren't even close to all of the classics, those are just some of the ones on the top of my head.

I just think it's a shame that MOST games seem to have lost touch with how important game music can be. If Metroid had bad music, I feel it wouldn't be the same experience at all.

I won't put the blame completely on developers now, because I think that with all the technology and sound quality it is pretty tough to have the same effect of the NES.

So do you guys agree with me? Or am I perhaps going crazy and feeling too nostalgic for my childhood gaming days.

[Justin-RN]

I think the NES and SNES days definitely had more memorable music. I think it does actually have to do a lot with sound quality and the fact that all these midi tracks stuck out so much back then. Now with so many different channels of sound and all the advancements in audio technology, there's a lot of subtleties in making game music that we don't always catch, in comparison to NES games.

I really don't know if five or 10 years down the road I'll look back at the games I play now and think, "Wow, that music was so memorable." I think some of it has to down with the nostalgia factor and just the joy it was be a kid and have little to worry about, but having fun, getting new toys and playing video games. It seems like the only time I think a song is truly amazing in it game, it tends to be a remix of some classic NES track.

[Pilgrim John]

I don't think music is truly dead in games... yet. It's when people shove licensed shlock into the game's music library that music in gaming is getting ignored. "Ooh! ThIs 0Ne ha$ THat n00 50 Cent $awnguh!"
Pleh.
Truthfully, some new songs in games are memorable, such as the soundtrack to Tales of Legendia (other than the music, the game was a total flop), Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, etc.
So while you have your good songs, you've also got your bad songs. The NES' music was definitely imperfect--the music in games like Rocky & Bullwinkle and the 3 Stooges were downright headache inducing. Those games were bad anyway, but you get my point.
So I'll take great video game music wherever I find it.

[Justin-RN]

I definitely don't think it's dead, I just don't think anything will leave a lasting impression like the NES and SNES games did. Sure there was awful music to go along with it, but there was just more stand out soundtracks to outweigh them.

[Dan-RN]

zer0 said:

Truthfully, some new songs in games are memorable, such as the soundtrack to Tales of Legendia (other than the music, the game was a total flop)

... Have you played the game? If you have and think it's a flop, then fine, you're entitled to your opinion, but knowing you... I feel like I should ask this since you're bashing yet another game there's a chance you haven't played.

I have ToL and have beaten it pretty thoroughly. It has some flaws, yes, but it's a great game overall.

[thelimper]

I think a lot of designers are afraid to take the chance to have great music scores written for their games. They would rather just pay money to put some popular rock or rap bands into the game. I'd like to see some racing games with really good music like F-ZERO.

I just think a lot of games use music for filler or generic rock covers. I'd say the only genre that gets music right some of the time is RPG's.

[Jason-RN]

Recent game music isn't nearly as catchy as NES or SNES tunes like the Mario theme, Zelda theme, etc. However, I still think that current-gen games have some great music. Metroid Prime, F-Zero GX, and Wind Waker, for example, all have some nice soundtracks.

[Pilgrim John]

herooftime07 said:

zer0 said:

Truthfully, some new songs in games are memorable, such as the soundtrack to Tales of Legendia (other than the music, the game was a total flop)

... Have you played the game? If you have and think it's a flop, then fine, you're entitled to your opinion, but knowing you... I feel like I should ask this since you're bashing yet another game there's a chance you haven't played.

I have ToL and have beaten it pretty thoroughly. It has some flaws, yes, but it's a great game overall.

The killer app for all RPGs is the storyline, character, and music. Gameplay is almost always second. The gameplay's okay, and the music is definitely awesome (I already have burned a few CDs of its tracks), but where it fails heavily is the
*storyline,
*characters, and
*voicework.
Had those three been waaay better, it'd been just as good as Tales of Symphonia. But in a game genre that has over 100 great classics, there's really no excuse for anything less than great.

[Dan-RN]

zer0 said:

herooftime07 said:

... Have you played the game? If you have and think it's a flop, then fine, you're entitled to your opinion, but knowing you... I feel like I should ask this since you're bashing yet another game there's a chance you haven't played.

I have ToL and have beaten it pretty thoroughly. It has some flaws, yes, but it's a great game overall.

The killer app for all RPGs is the storyline, character, and music. Gameplay is almost always second. The gameplay's okay, and the music is definitely awesome (I already have burned a few CDs of its tracks), but where it fails heavily is the
*storyline,
*characters, and
*voicework.
Had those three been waaay better, it'd been just as good as Tales of Symphonia. But in a game genre that has over 100 great classics, there's really no excuse for anything less than great.

Legendia's characters are far, far better than Tales of Symphonia's. The storyline wasn't the greatest, but neither was the story in ToS. The Tales series tends to be gameplay over story, and that holds true for both games. You can't really bash the story of Legendia and praise Symphonia when they're really quite similar. If anything, Legendia had more unique elements to it than Symphonia. The voice work could've used some work in places, but the main characters were all delivered well. Again, it's no worse than Symphonia. Honestly, the two games aren't very different. I just don't see how you can praise one and trash the other like that. If Legendia is nothing special, then neither is Symphonia. I've seen much better stories, characters, and voicework in other games. That's not exactly a valid excuse here.

[Greg-RN]

Too much of the music today is remixed older themes, and sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. Metroid Prime's music is my favorite, all-time, and Ocarina of Time is right behind it.

[Pilgrim John]

herooftime07 said:

zer0 said:

The killer app for all RPGs is the storyline, character, and music. Gameplay is almost always second. The gameplay's okay, and the music is definitely awesome (I already have burned a few CDs of its tracks), but where it fails heavily is the
*storyline,
*characters, and
*voicework.
Had those three been waaay better, it'd been just as good as Tales of Symphonia. But in a game genre that has over 100 great classics, there's really no excuse for anything less than great.

Legendia's characters are far, far better than Tales of Symphonia's. The storyline wasn't the greatest, but neither was the story in ToS. The Tales series tends to be gameplay over story, and that holds true for both games. You can't really bash the story of Legendia and praise Symphonia when they're really quite similar. If anything, Legendia had more unique elements to it than Symphonia. The voice work could've used some work in places, but the main characters were all delivered well. Again, it's no worse than Symphonia. Honestly, the two games aren't very different. I just don't see how you can praise one and trash the other like that. If Legendia is nothing special, then neither is Symphonia. I've seen much better stories, characters, and voicework in other games. That's not exactly a valid excuse here.

Big deal.
I like Symphonia more than Legendia... That's my opinion. OPINION. It doesn't have to match yours, and it shouldn't surprise you if it doesn't.

[Dan-RN]

zer0 said:

herooftime07 said:

Legendia's characters are far, far better than Tales of Symphonia's. The storyline wasn't the greatest, but neither was the story in ToS. The Tales series tends to be gameplay over story, and that holds true for both games. You can't really bash the story of Legendia and praise Symphonia when they're really quite similar. If anything, Legendia had more unique elements to it than Symphonia. The voice work could've used some work in places, but the main characters were all delivered well. Again, it's no worse than Symphonia. Honestly, the two games aren't very different. I just don't see how you can praise one and trash the other like that. If Legendia is nothing special, then neither is Symphonia. I've seen much better stories, characters, and voicework in other games. That's not exactly a valid excuse here.

Big deal.
I like Symphonia more than Legendia... That's my opinion. OPINION. It doesn't have to match yours, and it shouldn't surprise you if it doesn't.

Yeah, that's fine. If that's your opinion, I'm cool with it. In fact, I probably like ToS a little more. My problem is that you're bashing ToL for the same problems ToS had. I don't think that's exactly fair, especially when ToL doesn't really do anything worse.

[Pilgrim John]

I heard the voice acting and compared it to Symphonia's... and the voice acting is the biggest gripe I had against Legendia. The others are pretty minor in comparison and in retrospect.
Comparing the voices is like comparing the acting in a great movie to the acting in a second-grader play. Legendia is definitely inferior in that respect.

[Justin-RN]

zer0 said:

I heard the voice acting and compared it to Symphonia's... and the voice acting is the biggest gripe I had against Legendia. The others are pretty minor in comparison and in retrospect.
Comparing the voices is like comparing the acting in a great movie to the acting in a second-grader play. Legendia is definitely inferior in that respect.

Having never even played Legendia, I don't see how that comparison could be valide because that would mean Symphonia has great acting and it doesn't...at all.

[thelimper]

I prefer the voice acting of Resident Evil 1.