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Just finished Undertale and realized how much I miss videogamey music. Please recommend games with awesome vg music.

Tiny Chihuahueño

Tiny Chihuahueño

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,343
Wow that was great.
I'm way late to the party but finally got to play Undertale and finished it two times
second time was the pacifist route
.
Holy shit the game was great and the music was I N C R E D I B L E . I just can't stop humming the entire OST, to the point my wife reminds me every now and then I'm doing it again.



The other game I've played recently that had this effect on me was Sonic Mania, with another stellar OST that gets in your brain, a couple of favorites:



Please ERA, recommend games with incredible videogamey OSTs, it doesn't matter if they're new or old, I just need some of those bleeps and a handful of blops too. Some funky tunes to dance to while I'm driving or working at my desk.

Don't bother with games with pompous orchestral music or 'cinematic' tracks I don't care about those at all even if they're the best in their genre. I just can't even remember them after 10 minutes.

Thanks!
 
Soulflarz

Soulflarz

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,799
Touhou music heavily inspired undertale so start there

Id endlessly shill Falcom Sound Team JDK osts too
 
Skittzo

Skittzo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
41,037
You picked the best two tracks in the game, well done.

I often go through the OSTs of Megamans 2-6, those are all phenomenal gamey tracks.
 

Deleted member 3208

Oct 25, 2017
11,934
Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia. The soundtrack is amazing from beginning to end.

I still recommend it though.

Western? Hollow Knight also has a great soundtrack.



Edit: I'm an idiot who cannot read. Doesn't matter, let's go with Xenoblade Chronicles 2 then.

 
JD_Lars

JD_Lars

Member
Oct 2, 2018
86
Celeste has a great chip-tune soundtrack, and the B-side versions are even better. It's definitely on the slower/lo-fi side compared to Undertale though.

Almost all the Street Fighter games had amazing soundtracks. SF2 being the standard.

Streets of Rage 2 is considered one of the best OSTs of its console generation. "Go Straight" still holds up.

Chrono Trigger is still the greatest of all time for me, though it is a much more orchestrated affair in most instances.

Based on your descriptions I'd say that the soundtrack from the Scott Pilgrim beat-em-up game from a few years ago is what you want. The whole thing was done by Anamanaguchi. Just go listen to "Another Winter" and see if that fits your tastes.
 
PSqueak

PSqueak

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,464
Shimomura's stuff in the RPG Mario games is peak videogamey music, specially in the original SMRPG.
 
Rotobit

Rotobit

Editor at Nintendo Wire
Verified
Oct 27, 2017
10,196
For some reason my first thought was this, and I don't even love Splatoon all that much, it's just very catchy:



Also Nintendo Land is a forgotten treasure trove

 
AfropunkNyc

AfropunkNyc

Member
Nov 15, 2017
3,958
You miss old school traditional VG music vs modern instrumental, you normally find in high budget games? One of the best video game music i tend to go back to is act raiser. Some part of the game attempt to simulate actual instrument, it still sounds like VG music in the process.
 
Atom Heart Mother

Atom Heart Mother

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,294
new jersey
If you enjoyed Undertale's videogamey music you'll probably really enjoy Touhou's. Toby Fox is a huge Touhou fan nerd, and was really inspired by the game's music. Both games music are composed the same way. Each song is composed the game is even, and has a specific idea of the character its going for. Each theme reflects the character in some way, which is super cool. To me, Touhou's music is probably some of the best video game music you can get. There's over 300 tracks in this series alone, not counting fan remixes.

Here's one of the most famous tracks:


TobyFox actually rearranged this song on piano and played it in his church when he was like 12:


My personal favorite:
 
Laser Man

Laser Man

Member
Oct 26, 2017
2,683
Undertale is one of the finest imo, if you can cope with the style then I would also suggest the Bionic Commando ReArmed OST





Heat Wave

It's not as videogamey as you probably are looking for but it still has some of it I think.
 
Swiggins

Swiggins

was promised a tag
Member
Apr 10, 2018
11,442


This was one of my favorite tracks from last year. Dandara was criminally underrated.
 
Brandson

Brandson

Member
Oct 26, 2017
2,219
I haven't noticed too many truly catchy game music soundtracks lately. Probably the one that best fits that description is Yoshi's Wooly World. I don't think it got an official soundtrack release.

The best game music album I've heard in years is the Seiken Densetsu (Secret of Mana) 25th Anniversary Orchestra Album. A close second is The Legend of Zelda 30th Anniversary Concert. Although these game series have both benefited from great recordings in the past, these are probably the best they have ever sounded.
 

Deleted member 48813

Banned
Oct 20, 2018
1,281
Brazil
Undertale is great, played it for the first time recently as well (And just like you I've been listening to the soundtrack a lot). As for my recommendation, I choose Super Paper Mario. Great music and I feel really fits the "videogamey" vibe you're looking for. Doesn't hurt that it's an amazing game as well, it's a shame how underrated it still is:







 
Einbroch

Einbroch

Member
Oct 25, 2017
17,959
Ragnarok Online has the greatest OST of all time and I will not entertain any other opinion.




It's also some videogame-ass-videogame music.
 
oakenhild

oakenhild

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,863
In addition to all the celeste suggestions...I also like crosscode a lot (also on apple music and spotify):
 
Akita One

Akita One

Member
Oct 30, 2017
4,624
I'd also throw in the Terraria soundtrack...it's very well done and the music does a great job with matching up with the different biomes.
 
Varia

Varia

Member
Dec 23, 2018
16
If you loved Undertale's tone and music, obviously you need to play the Mother games. Undertale borrows very heavily from this series, and they all have similarly fantastic music and equally quirky writing. The first game (Mother) is best played via the fan translation patch for the GBA version, the second and by far the most popular game in the series is Earthbound for the SNES (you can get it on the Wii/Wii U virtual console or SNES classic), and the third game (Mother 3) is only available in English via another fan translation patch.

The Splatoon series is famous for it's soundtrack. I really can't say enough good things about the diverse, ridiculously large, consistently catchy, rock-heavy soundtrack. It really does feel like turning on your radio to a station full of pop music from another planet.

Shovel Knight similarly has some killer retro-inspired music, most of it very fast-paced. It's also a stellar game and a must-play for anyone who likes action-platformers.

Celeste has (IMO) the best soundtrack of any game this year, and one of the most moving stories too. It's extremely catchy, with melodies starting soft and slow but constantly evolving and becoming more complex and intense alongside the stages, and will absolutely burrow into your brain.

Classic Mega Man games are known for their catchy music, as are the Castlevania games. They tend to be pretty tough though. Vampire Killer from Castlevania and Dr Wily's Castle from Mega Man II are some of the most famous songs from the NES era, and the song Bloody Tears is by far the best part of Castlevania II.

Basically any game in the Zelda series other than Breath of the Wild will have terrific video-game-y music. There's a reason that the series is famous for its music. Link's Awakening, Ocarina of Time, and Wind Waker are my favorites, music-wise. Wind Waker especially has lots of tunes that are cheery, have great hooks, and will get stuck in your head.

Almost all of the Mario games have fantastic soundtracks. With the exception of the Galaxy games (which have terrific music, but are more chill and orchestral) the entire Mario series is known for catchy and fast-paced tunes. The NES games are obviously classics, and the recent Super Mario 3D World is criminally underrated. And of course, the most recent game, Super Mario Odyssey is full of terrific tracks, including some with wonderfully cheesy vocals.

In fact, any game with music by Koji Kondo will fit the bill.

The Donkey Kong Country series is famous for terrific music.

The Pokemon series (especially the first two generations, who pioneered a lot of the music later games would use) have a terrific blend of chill and exciting songs, all driven by catchy hooks.

Banjo-Kazooie is one of the best 3D platformers ever made and has a killer soundtrack.

I could keep going, but those are the first games that come to mind when I think of catchy, hook-driven videogame music.

Edit: I added links to some of the songs. This post would be wayyyyy too long if I included all of them, but here are a few standouts that I mentioned:







 
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