1992 Archives - The Greatest Game Music

Dune Soundtrack (PC)

Dune Soundtrack (PC), Stéphane Picq, 1992

It feels like early media adaptations of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic Dune were doomed to run into equally epic troubles during their production. There’s, of course, the convoluted story of how Dune finally reached cinema screens in 1984 after more than a decade of failed attempts, only to disappoint at the box office and alienate its director. The first video game adaptation of Dune equally struggled to actually see the light of day – to the point where publisher Virgin Games cancelled the game (and launched the development of what would become Dune II), only to find out later that Cryo Interactive had secretly continued work on Dune. Thankfully, there was a happy ending to the story. Due to its innovative mix of adventure and strategy elements, Dune became a commercial hit, with 300,000 units sold by 1997, paving the way for Cryo’s expansion and prolific output throughout the 1990s.

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Galahad Soundtrack

Galahad Soundtrack, Matt Furniss, 1992

It probably didn’t sway many customers towards buying a Sega Genesis, but one advantage that the platform had over the SNES was a reasonably steady flow of European computer game ports – particularly from the Amiga. That was undoubtedly due to the Genesis outselling the SNES on the continent, making ports a potentially lucrative undertaking. However, few – if any – of these conversions are particularly well-remembered these days. Mind you, that’s not necessarily due to a lack of quality, which means there are some hidden gems to be unearthed. Enter Galahad, previously released as Leander on the Amiga. While the game – a medieval-themed hack’n’slash platformer – didn’t do anything drastically original to stand out from the crowd, it was a prime example of a rock-solid title that still entertains decades later: substantial content, tight controls, lovely graphics – and one of the platform’s greatest soundtracks.

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Matt Furniss – Atari ST Works

Matt Furniss – Atari ST Works, 1990-1992

Many computer game soundtracks of the 80s and early 90s consist of only one longer cue, sometimes with a few shorter pieces and jingles added. As such, these scores don’t warrant individual reviews, even when these works are of outstanding quality. What makes more sense is to combine several such soundtracks by a single composer into one review.

Part of the ecosystem of European (and particularly British) home computers was that games were usually released across a range of platforms, including the C64, Amiga, Atari ST, ZX Spectrum, PC, Amstrad CPC and Acorn 32-bit – obviously to increase presence in the marketplace and thus sales. Due to the technological differences between all of these systems, they would also feature different soundtracks – or rather one score ported and adapted to each platform. That was the situation developer Krisalis Software (previously trading as Teque Software Development) and their in-house composer Matt Furniss found themselves in during the late 80s and early 90s.

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Nobunaga’s Ambition: Haouden Soundtrack (PC-98 – Soundware Version)

Nobunaga’s Ambition: Haouden Soundtrack (PC-98), Yoko Kanno, 1992

As with previous instalments of the Nobunaga’s Ambition franchise, Koei only tweaked details for its fifth instalment, Haouden. Clearly, Koei had hit upon a winning formula, happy to churn these games out to an audience hungry for their fix of historical strategy games that prioritised gameplay depth over fancy graphics. Not surprisingly, what stood out most about Haouden’s presentation was its soundtrack, provided by series regular Yoko Kanno.

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Sabre Team Soundtrack (Atari ST)

Sabre Team Soundtrack (Atari ST), Matt Furniss, 1992

During the second half of the 1980s and into the 1990s, video games starring burly soldiers defending the Western way of life were a dime a dozen (we can at least partially thank Rambo: First Blood Part II and the following wave of copycat movies for that). By 1992, the formula required a bit of tweaking to still elicit interest, and so Krisalis Software made the smart move to turn Sabre Team into a turn-based strategy simulation. Gamers put together a team of four elite soldiers, making the most of limited action points per unit to move them around the isometric maps and attack enemies. Details like the amount of noise produced by different weapons and the weight of their respective ammunition added a surprising amount of realism to the gameplay, turning Sabre Team into one of the Atari ST’s best strategy games.

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Streets of Rage 2 Soundtrack (Sega Genesis)

Streets of Rage 2 Soundtrack (Sega Genesis), Motohiro Kawashima / Yuzo Koshiro, 1992

Often enough, sequels to successful games or movies follow a predictable path – repeat the formula that made the first outing a winner, but make sure to tweak and polish your approach. If all goes well, the result is a product that doesn’t innovate, but makes a good thing even better. That’s precisely what happened with Streets of Rage 2. Its predecessor was a strong entry in the very crowded genre of early 90s beat’em ups. It didn’t stand out as a classic, though – but Streets of Rage 2 definitely got there. With nearly flawless gameplay and outstanding visuals, Streets of Rage 2 might well be the greatest beat’em up released for the Sega Genesis – and one of the entire genre’s all-time greats.

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Tamashii no Mon – Dante Shinkyoku yori Soundtrack (Soundware Version)

Tamashii no Mon – Dante Shinkyoku yori Soundtrack, Masumi Ito / Yoshiyuki Ito / Fiori Wakakuwa, 1992

It turns out 2010’s God of War clone Dante’s Inferno wasn’t the first video game based on Dante Alighieri’s 14th-century poem The Divine Comedy. But maybe that’s no surprise, given the work’s towering literary status and its vivid imagery of Hell’s nine circles, making it ripe for adaptations into other media. Another game inspired by The Divine Comedy was Koei’s Tamashii no Mon – Dante no Shinkyoku yori (literally: Gate of Souls – From Dante’s Divine Comedy). As one might expect, players assume Dante’s role as he struggles to find his way through the depths of Hell. The developers cast the game as an adventure title with platforming and melee elements while making excellent use of the ageing PC-98’s graphical capabilities. The clever use of a limited colour palette combined with fantastic sprite art truly brought the game’s nightmarish settings to live.

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Terminator 2: Judgment Day Soundtrack (NES)

Terminator 2: Judgment Day Soundtrack (NES), Geoff Follin, 1992

If you take a closer look at the history of movies and their video game adaptations, James Cameron’s 1991 Terminator 2: Judgment Day emerges as a watershed moment. At the time of its release, T2 became one of the highest-grossing movies of all time worldwide. Its futuristic, action-packed plot and revolutionary visuals made T2 an obvious candidate for a video game adaptation. What’s more, the film was released when the home video game market had diversified and matured, to the point where it could simultaneously support two console generations. The result was a glut of T2-related games, followed soon by numerous titles based on The Terminator. The creators of Terminator 2: Judgment Day were undoubtedly aware of video games’ commercial potential. After all, the film’s end credits finished with a message reading, “Play the hit Nintendo game from Acclaim/LJN Entertainment.”

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Wing Commander Soundtrack (FM Towns)

Wing Commandeer Soundtrack

Wing Commander Soundtrack (FM Towns), David Govett / George Sanger / Nenad Vugrinec, 1992

Very few games foreground their music as much as Wing Commander – and that’s only one way in which it proved to be a watershed moment for game music. Before the player gets to see the game’s intro or even title, game producer Chris Roberts inserts something else, something remarkable: the sight of a pixelated orchestra and conductor, set against the backdrop of a blue planetoid and star-speckled outer space. The orchestra tunes for a few seconds, before the conductor gives the signal to launch into a brief fanfare.

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