Anybody inspired by videogame music?

[juggahnaught]

So yes, I know that Talkbass generally frowns upon busy basslines, but bump that, because I love them.

I grew up listening to ROCKIN' TUNEZ on my NES, SNES, and my friend's Sega Genesis. And man, I still love that music. (Enough that last year, I formed a videogame band with some people because I loved the music so much. It didn't work out, but I wouldn't hesitate to try again.)

I'm into music from Final Fantasy VI, Chrono Trigger, the Megaman X series, and so much more. (I'm a huge nerd about this stuff and will talk your ear off.) Tonight, I've been playing the following tunes:





Worth it to note - this may be "chiptune" music to some, but these games are scored by professional composers, and so much of this music is iconic.

Anyone else inspired by videogame music? Chime in!

 

[RumbleBot]

So much yes! Our band is heavily influenced by video game music. We've been known to throw some covers in once in a while.

Dropbox - 02-04-2019-Zelda_Temple.mp3 - Simplify your life

I write stuff like this on the side. We're learning one of them to play live.

Dropbox - Eleventeen.mp3 - Simplify your life

 

[RumbleBot]

These guys were an awesome band and did this cover...

 

[RumbleBot]

Also, if you're not familiar with Shovel Knight, it may be one of the best classic NES games that didn't exist until recently. And Jake Kaufman killed it with the soundtrack.

 

[FeltTipPen]

I grew up with a video game playing brother (and I have played on occasion). There are some amazingly talented composers in the video game industry!

juggahnaught, your band sounds fun! Hopefully you'll be able to form another that sticks longer when it's safer out there!

 

[PWRL]

In a weird, roundabout way, yes. I don't play video games. I spent some time in arcades as a kid, but never got into video games. However, I played in a weird, studio improv group for many years, with an amazing keyboard player who was really into video game music, and our music was heavily bent around that genre. I actually like a lot of video game music, even though I don't play any games. That's definitely where some of the great modern composers are.

 

[RumbleBot]

Some of my favorite video game music is from the original Nintendo console. The sound chip in that thing really only had five channels: two square wave, one triangle wave, and a noise channel. There was a sample channel but it wasn't used very much. So only three notes can sound at a time! Not a lot of full chords happening. The good composers on that console really knew how to work counterpoint.
Sometimes tight limitations can bring out some great creativity!

 

[Spectrum]

I've never played it, but I grew up with it. I am old school and remember arcade games from the early 80s. Earlier music is not as extravagantly composed as the 90s and later stuff, but there are some gems. One of my faves music wise was Moon Patrol.



In the 90s I was into PC games pretty heavily and a couple of them really stand out in my memory. Dune 2: Battle for Arrakis is one of them. These soundtracks were all MIDI files, so which sound card your computer had determined what the music would really sound like.



Another 90s PC game I remember was called Laser Squad. Very 80s movie music, loved this game.

 

[RumbleBot]

I love old school PC graphics. Loves me some highly visible dithering!

 

[Spectrum]

One more 90s PC game I will never forget: MechWarrior 2! The CD/ROM this game came on had one track for the game itself, and the rest were the soundtrack tracks. You could put this in your CD player and listen to it as an album. I used to drive at night to this. Awesome game with awesome atmosphere. The 90s were the golden age of PC games IMO.

 

[RumbleBot]

I loved the Monkey Island series. Actually been playing through them again on Steam.

 

[MonetBass]

Good stuff! I loved Dune II, and played it for hours on end. Dune 2000 was even better, though! And the soundtrack was great, also.

 

[Gustopher]

Absolutely! When I was a kid, even before I played an instrument, I would sit with my NES then later my SNES and record the tunes I really loved on a small cassette tape recorder. Castlevania, Megaman, Rygar, R-Type, Ninja Gaiden, F-ZERO... so many happy memories listening to that stuff over and over. It definitely comes out when I try and make my own melodies now.

 

[350125g0]

The Batman game for NES made by Sunsoft, in my opinion, is one of the best game scores of the 8-Bit era... it's so incredibly, mind-blowingly good!!! And how the composer for The Adventures of Bayou Billy was able to make some extremely stanky funk come out of a game cartridge is totally beyond me, but I'm very glad they did.

Also, I'm not affiliated with the channel, but Niko's 8BitStereo on YouTube has a MASSIVE archive of old NES music that he mixes into stereo. I listen to stuff on his channel while I work quite a lot. I'm listening to the theme from Contra as I type this... memories...