The Greatest Game Music

Reviews of truly outstanding game music

  • Soundtracks
  • Composers
  • Companies
  • Platforms
  • Franchises
  • Music Genres
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Dragon Quest III Soundtrack (Nintendo 3DS)

Dragon Quest III Soundtrack

Dragon Quest III Soundtrack (Nintendo 3DS), Koichi Sugiyama, 2017

While its predecessors had been immensely successful in their own right, it was really with 1988’s Dragon Quest III that the venerable franchise turned into a commercial juggernaut. The original NES game itself sold a staggering 3.8 million copies in Japan alone. Add in a few more million copies for the game’s various remakes and Dragon Quest III turns out to be the franchise’s most successful entry (it also spawned an urban myth about the Japanese government blocking future releases of Dragon Quest games on school days to curb truancy). The game itself didn’t revolutionise the JRPG genre, but developer Chunsoft still expanded upon the gameplay of the first two Dragon Quest titles with the introduction of a character class system. This feature would become a staple of future Dragon Quest games.

After Dragon Quest II’s music had been a marked improvement over its predecessor, Koichi Sugiyama returned for the Dragon Quest III soundtrack, further expanding its breadth and diversity. Sugiyama continued to move away from the template he had established on Dragon Quest I, now including a greater number of location-specific compositions (as opposed to using the same composition for each town / dungeon / castle etc.) The NES score’s quality remained somewhat patchy, but the soundtrack also featured several highlights such as the magisterial ending theme “Into the Legend”.

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Tagged With: 2017, Chunsoft, Dragon Quest (Franchise), Koichi Sugiyama, Nintendo 3DS, Orchestral, RPG

Fast RMX Soundtrack

Fast RMX Soundtrack

Fast RMX Soundtrack, Bjulin / Manfred Linzner / Martin Schioeler, 2017

One of gamers’ great frustrations (at least at the timing of writing in 2020) remains Nintendo’s steadfast refusal to revive its classic F-Zero franchise. The last time fans got to enjoy a new F-Zero title dates back to 2004, when F-Zero Climax was released for the Game Boy Advance – only in Japan, adding insult to injury for Western gamers. Thankfully, German developer and Nintendo loyalist Shin’en Multimedia seemed determined to fill the gap with its Fast franchise. Kicking off in 2011 with WiiWare title Fast – Racing League, the franchise went from strength to strength with 2015’s Fast Racing Neo for the WiiU and 2017’s Fast RMX, a launch title for the Nintendo Switch. All three games received applause from reviewers for their stellar presentations and gameplay that created an overwhelming sense of speed, as well as its Ikaruga-style system of polarity switching to receive extra speed boosts.

Fast RMX essentially served as an expanded version of Fast Racing Neo, including all of that earlier game’s racing tracks and DLC, while adding a few new courses of its own. This was reason for game music fans to celebrate. Fast RMX gathered all of the outstanding music written for Fast Racing Neo and added more content still, arriving at 2+ hours of music spread across almost 50 compositions. The masterminds behind the score(s) were Shin’en Multimedia veterans Manfred Linzner and Martin Schioeler, joined by relative newcomer Bjulin.

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Tagged With: 2017, Bjulin, Electronic, Manfred Linzner, Martin Schioeler, Racing, Shin'en Multimedia, Switch

Hob Soundtrack

Hob Soundtrack

Hob Soundtrack, Matt Uelmen, 2017

With their two Torchlight titles – particularly the excellent Torchlight II – developer Runic Games had established their credentials in the action RPG space, even managing to hold their ground against all-mighty rivals like Diablo III. Their next title was Hob, which shifted focus towards an open-world adventure that bore a clear debt to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. The world of Hob is a giant machine, a contraption made of myriads of levers, dials and pulleys that the title character must utilise to repair and cleanse the land, which has been corrupted by a mysterious force. Hob’s concept of its realm as a titanic mechanical contraption is appealing and the perfect set up for many visual wonders and intriguing puzzles, although reviewers also pointed out the game’s more frustrating aspects, for example its combat.

What critics also highlighted were the game’s aesthetic strengths – its gorgeous visuals, but also its soundtrack by veteran Matt Uelmen. Having scored Runic Games’ Torchlight titles, Uelmen had celebrated a resounding return to form with Torchlight II. That soundtrack had felt like the apex of Uelmen’s meticulously composed trademark style that mixes electronics, orchestral and rock elements, setting his fantasy scores apart from the (often homogenous) competition. For Uelmen, Hob was an opportunity to expand his sound palette once more, as he was actively looking to avoid genre clichés – both those heard on other fantasy scores and his own common stylistic traits.

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Tagged With: 2017, Action Adventure, Matt Uelmen, Mixed Music Genres, PC, PlayStation 4, Runic Games

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