VG Frequency

Hey, I know we just recently sent out a mail on OC ReMix doing the soundtrack for Capcom’s Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix. Thanks for checking out our E3 week feature about it on Ars Technica: http://digg.com/gaming_news/Fans_go_pro_how_OC_ReMix_put_its_stamp_on_Street_Fighter_II

I’m actually mailing because today, July 25th, is the birthday of OC ReMix founder David Lloyd, better known around these parts as djpretzel!!! He also recently got engaged to the lovely Anna, which was revealed on OCR just a couple of days ago!

To help celebrate, I’m asking you to take a few moments out of your day to wish djp a happy birthday! You can make his B-day a good one by doing any or all of the following things:

***Well, djp started it all, so throw some birthday greetings to djp right here: http://www.ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=17434

***Buy a copy of this month’s issue of Game Informer magazine (with Wolfenstein on the cover), which features an interview with djp about OC ReMix and spotlights the video game arrangement community: http://www.gameinformer.com/Magazine/

***Buy a T-shirt, hoodie or stickers from the OCR store and fly the colors: http://www.ocremix.org/store/
***Purchase ANYTHING at Amazon through OCR and have (a much-appreciated) 6% of the sale donated to help pay for our sizeable bandwidth at no extra cost: http://www.ocremix.org/amazon/

***Leave a Review for any OC ReMix on the site. Comments don’t have to be essays, but let djp, or any OC ReMixer, know how you felt about a ReMix you enjoyed. Any ReMix is fair game, and it’ll make their day: http://www.ocremix.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=14

***Complete your OCR collection by downloading the ReMixes you don’t have. The only mistake I ever made when I first found OCR in 2002 was to only download about 30 mixes just from games I knew. If that’s like you, you’re missing out on free GOLD: http://www.ocremix.org/torrents/

***Join OCR on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2210239078
***Become a fan on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/OverClocked-ReMix/7350358374
***Join OCR on MySpace: http://groups.myspace.com/ocremix

***Last, but not least, just encourage 10 friends to check out OC ReMix. OCR is what it is today, because people like you have been kind enough to spread the word on the site, the 100% free music we offer (1500+ tracks and counting), and the amazing creativity of the ReMixers who take time out to honor video game music. Anyone who likes games, game music or just awesome free music should swing by and see what we’re about, so tell everyone you can!

THANK YOU as always for supporting OverClocked ReMix, downloading the music, and being a part of the OCR community. We appreciate it! And happy birthday, Pretz!

Larry “Liontamer” Oji
Head Submissions Evaluator, OverClocked ReMix
Creator, VG Frequency
Staff, VGMdb
www.ocremix.org
www.vgfrequency.com
www.vgmdb.net

By: David Lloyd, dlloyd@ocremix.org

“Whether I’m writing an original or remixing something from a video game, my inspirations never change. My music listening history is one big collage, and I try to pull on all of that.”

- Dain Olsen, OC ReMix Interview

June 21, 2008

Fairfax, VA — OverClocked ReMix today published an interview with OC ReMixer & Dance Dance Revolution musician Dain “Beatdrop” Olsen, in addition to posting a brand new ReMix of his from the soundtrack to Capcom’s Mega Man X3 for the SNES. Dain talks about the creation of his latest mix, his approach to mixing game music, and his involvement with Konami’s DDR competition, which landed him a spot on the soundtrack to Dance Dance Revolution SuperNOVA 2.

The interview is available online at:

http://www.ocremix.org/info/ReMixer_Interview:_Beatdrop_%28Dain_Olsen%29

Mega Man X3 ‘Revolutions’ is available for streaming and free download at:

http://www.ocremix.org/remix/OCR01727/

About OverClocked ReMix

Founded in 1999, OverClocked ReMix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation, preservation, and interpretation of video game music. Its primary focus is www.ocremix.org, a website featuring hundreds of free fan arrangements, information on game music and composers, resources for aspiring artists, and a thriving community of video game music fans.

By: Larry Oji, larryoji@ocremix.org

“A good tune is a good tune. That’s basically it! If a melody can stand the test of time when it’s being played with a one channel sine wave, then it can stand being a fully orchestrated piece of music. I guess really it’s substance over style.”

- Tim Wright, OC ReMix Interview

June 5, 2008

Fairfax, VA — OverClocked ReMix today published its first video game composer interview, with pioneering British VGM composer Tim “CoLD SToRAGE” Wright. Wright helped usher electronica into professional game scores with his work on the landmark racing title Wipeout, released in 1995 by Psygnosis for the then-emerging Sony PlayStation. The interview touches on other career highlights such as Wright’s days composing for the Commodore Amiga, his development of popular music creation programs eJay and MUSIC (a.k.a. MTV Music Generator), and his upcoming original album, CoLD SToRAGE HD, which functions as an unofficial soundtrack to Sony’s latest title in the Wipeout franchise, Wipeout HD for the PlayStation 3.

The interview is available online at http://www.ocremix.org/info/Composer_Interview:_CoLD_SToRAGE_%28Tim_Wright%29.

Conducted by site staff, OC ReMix interviews cover major aspects of a composer’s career, featuring targeted questions unique to each subject, as well a standard list of questions that specifically delve into a musician’s formative years, creative inspirations, and views on the current state of the game music industry. This unique format presents both a contemporary look at a composer’s recent activities as well as more comprehensive questions about the nature of video game music composition.

About OverClocked ReMix

Founded in 1999, OverClocked ReMix is an organization dedicated to the appreciation, preservation, and interpretation of video game music. Its primary focus is www.ocremix.org, a website featuring hundreds of free fan arrangements, information on game music and composers, resources for aspiring artists, and a thriving community of video game music fans.

Links

• Composer Interview: CoLD SToRAGE (Tim Wright)
• OC ReMix interviews
• Tim Wright Composer Profile at OC ReMix
• The Official CoLD SToRAGE Website
• Purchase the albums of CoLD SToRAGE
• Wright’s company, Tantrumedia Multimedia Solutions
• CoLD SToRAGE @ MySpace

Eleven years ago, Akihiko Mori passed away from cancer. Even though his last work was in 1996, he to this day stands as one of my favorite VGM composers of all time.

Works featured in this post:

• Gokinjo Bouken Tai (SNES)
• Kidou Senshi Z Gundam: Away to the Newtype (SNES)
• Mystic Ark (SNES)
• Shien’s Revenge (SNES)
• Wonder Project J: Mechanical Boy Pino (SNES)
• Wonder Project J2: Josette of Corlo Forest (SNES)

full list of works

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mori worked at a company called Mint, which did sound development for video games. Thus, in addition to composing for some games, he also adapted music for the SNES sound driver developed by Mint. Two such games, Bounty Sword and Lennus II: Fuuin no Shito (Lennus II: Apostles of the Seals, Japan-only sequel to Paladin’s Quest), were composed by veteran game and anime composer Kouhei Tanaka, and actually have rather decent orchestral soundtracks. The over fourteen minute staff roll from Lennus II is particularly impressive.

But I guess maybe I should go on with Mori’s own compositions?

“Land Exploration”
Kidou Senshi Z Gundam: Away to the Newtype (SNES)

“bon voyage! ~ Come On! To the Skies! Medley”
arranged from Wonder Project J2: Josette of Corlo Forest (N64)

“Mountain”
Gokinjo Bouken Tai (SNES)

I could devote an entire post just to Gokinjo Bouken Tai’s soundtrack, one of the very best the SNES has to offer, but I’ll limit myself to one more track. Mori’s battle themes stand out to me as some of the best done by any composer, with the normal battle theme from GBT leading them all with its jazz stylings and madcap energy.

“Battle”
Gokinjo Bouken Tai (SNES)

“Bad Dream”
Shien’s Revenge (SNES)
co-composed with Tsukushi Sasaki

Overall, Mori’s battle theme work shines brightest in Mystic Ark, the Japan-only sequel to The 7th Saga. Mystic Ark is one of three games Mori composed to receive a soundtrack release, but unfortunately the album is marred by a defect, a hiss in the left channel audio.

“Hey! Don’t Attack Me!”
Mystic Ark (SNES)

“Your Fighting Eyes Are Always Beautiful”
Mystic Ark (SNES)

“Are You the True Form of Darkness?”
Mystic Ark (SNES)

I suppose it’s rather cliché to leave the ending themes for last, but this is a post in memory of one of my all-time favorites, so I’m going to get as sappy as I want to.

“Ending”
Shien’s Revenge (SNES)
co-composed with Tsukushi Sasaki

“Ending”
Wonder Project J: Mechanical Boy Pino (SNES)

Just a quick plug today for M4G’s interview with the composer team of the very-soon-to-be-released PlayStation 3 exclusive Haze, Ubisoft’s answer to the Halo franchise in the latest round of the console wars.

Composers Christian Marcussen, Cris Velasco and Sascha Dikiciyan were joined by audio lead Graeme Norgate for an all-encompassing look at the creative process behind the game’s soundtrack. Norgate mentioned that if you’d like to see a soundtrack release, you can help by beating down Ubisoft’s door, so be sure to let the company know if you like what you hear!

Rockstar Games and Future Green Entertainment have announced the release of an original production album from The Evil Genius DJ Green Lantern featuring music from and inspired by Grand Theft Auto IV.

Containing eight brand new tracks crafted exclusively for DJ Green Lantern’s “Liberty City Invasion” radio show on the in-game radio station “The Beat,” as well as eight new songs directly inspired by Grand Theft Auto IV, The Evil Genius DJ Green Lantern has created an epic urban soundtrack. This special album release features an incredible lineup of hip-hop, reggae and R&B superstars including heavyweights Busta Rhymes, Wyclef, Fat Joe, Styles P and Fabolous as well as up-and-coming artists Mavado, Uncle Murder and Future Green Entertainment’s own Johnny Polygon, Qadir and more.

Singles include “Where’s My Money” from Busta Rhymes and “Nickname” from the brand new artist Qadir. The perfect summer anthem “I’m So Fly,” featuring Fat Joe and Fabolous is inspired by Grand Theft Auto IV and while included on the album is not in the game.

“The Grand Theft Auto games have always featured stunning soundtracks and the amount of eclectic music in Grand Theft Auto IV goes above and beyond anything we have been able to do before” said Sam Houser, Founder and Executive Producer of Rockstar Games, “DJ Green Lantern’s contributions give the soundtrack a true New York flavor and we’re excited to be releasing his full album to fans.”

“From making mixtapes, to being on the radio, to touring with the biggest artists on the planet, and then for the biggest video game title to solicit me to create exclusive music is something most people could only dream about, it’s like a graduation,” said Green. “Rockstar Games understood what I bring to the table as far as not just presenting music, but creating music.”

Green Lantern originally came to prominence in the mixtape scene by consistently featuring exclusive self-produced music with hip-hop superstars like Eminem, Jay-Z, The Beastie Boys, Mike Shinoda’s Fort Minor, D-Block, Busta Rhymes, Mobb Deep and many more. This led to an acclaimed career as a proper music producer in his own right which has yielded such Billboard hits as “Number One Spot” by Ludacris and “In The Ghetto” by Busta Rhymes featuring Rick James as well as the street hits Akon “Ghetto” feat. Notorious B.I.G. and 2Pac, Uncle Murda’s “Bullet, Bullet,” and many more. Green Lantern can be heard every week nationally on his Sirius Satellite Radio show.

The Evil Genius Green Lantern makes his official production album debut with the release of Liberty City Invasion: Music From and Inspired by Grand Theft Auto IV. It will be available at all major digital retailers on May 20th with a physical release coming soon.

Grand Theft Auto IV is currently available for the Xbox 360 and the PLAYSTATION 3.

For quite a long time, the most comprehensive database of VGM albums was Japan Game Music Library, or J.G.M.L. The Japanese-language resource catalogs a whopping 7,243 albums, and is most impressively maintained by a single person, Fumiaki Kosiro.

On March 16, album number 7,244 was added to VGMdb, a five-track Legend of Zelda series fan arrangement CD, The Legend of Zelda EP, arranged and performed by Echo Park group Batphone. With this addition, VGMdb is now the largest VGM album database on the internet. The milestone occurred, coincidentally, six months to the day after VGMdb opened for public beta.

And the person who submitted the album? None other than Larry Oji himself.

The comparison to J.G.M.L. is a bit unfair, since VGMdb’s scope is much wider; J.G.M.L.’s focus is mainly on official, Japanese-released soundtracks and arrangement albums, while VGMdb also has many Western albums, fan arrangement albums, original works by VGM composers, game-related anime soundtracks, and so on. As such, there are still quite a few albums listed on J.G.M.L. that VGMdb does not contain.

Still, it was an exciting milestone to break, and there is still a wealth of unlisted albums remaining to be added, as well as other features and site improvements. Here’s to 10,000!

I wrote a while back about the launch of VGM Rush, a site devoted to Western video game music. VGM Rush had a promising start, featuring such content as an amazing interview with Alexander Brandon that I pimped in my previous post (seriously, read it if you haven’t), but since December or so, updates to the site have been sporadic. The original version of the site used static HTML for its pages, meaning updating the site could involve making edits to a lot of files and generally be difficult.

The reason behind the slowdown was that Rimo, the man behind the site, was working on an overhaul, including a switch to PHP and MySQL to store data and generate pages. The coding is complete, VGM Rush is back, and new content should be streaming in.

In fact, new content is already streaming in; since the relaunch, four new composers have had biographies and works list added to the database, and five album reviews were added, courtesy of orion_mk3, a fellow who works with me at Song of the Week. Check out the new stuff, and hope along with me that the vein isn’t tapped out for a long time.

Also feel free to shoot me for that last sentence if you deem it necessary.

Blue Dragon is an Xbox 360 game released on December 7, 2006, in Japan, and August 29, 2007, in the United States. The soundtrack, composed by Nobuo Uematsu, was released by Aniplex on December 13, 2006, in Japan.

A United States reprint will be released on March 25 by Sumthing Else Music Works, who publish a variety of different music, including the soundtracks to several Western games, like the Halo series, Gears of War, and Mass Effect. The album, which contains the same tracks as the Japanese release, is available for pre-order for $15.98 at Amazon.com.

Attending Game Developers Conference 2008, Destructoid’s Dale North had the scoop on No More Heroes composer Masafumi Takada’s presentation detailing his methods in composing for games. Featured in the presentation were several major titles in Takada’s portfolio, including Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles, God Hand, Killer7, and the critical hit No More Heroes. Be sure to read up for some informative details on Takada’s creative processes, as well as Dale’s quick account on a couple of other surprises!

Sure, there are a lot of VGM cover bands that encourage fans to rattle off songs to them as ideas for an upcoming album. But for an orchestral concert performance? Ok, I’ve seen Tommy Tallarico take dozens of suggestions for Video Games Live. But how about material from even further back?

Well, that’s what you’ve got in the C64 Orchestra working with nothing but Commodore 64 classics. With their initial concerts and debut album, Run 10, under their belt, they need your help deciding on what tracks to add to their concert series.

Officially attached to the concerts, Rob Hubbard and Jeroen Tel have their own nominations ready that you can pick from. Beyond that, however, you can also send by other suggestions for any C64 game music.

I’ve yet to mail in my picks, but you can be sure Tim Follin will be on my list. Be sure to read through the official MySpace message below for all the details you need to contribute your thoughts to a piece of video game music history. Auf Wiedersehen!

Dear C64 orchestra fan,

We hope you enjoyed the looks of RUN 10 as well as the tunes on the cd. As you will know this is only a small selection of the vast amount of tunes available!

For the coming live shows we want to broaden our repertoire with new tunes and we are looking for your help with picking the nicest. To make life a little easier for us we asked Rob Hubbard and Jeroen Tel to nominate a couple of games.

The C64 game tunes nominated by Jeroen Tel are:
1. Cybernoid 1
2. Poseidon: Planet Eleven (Title tune)
3. Rubicon (Title tune)

The C64 game tunes nominated by Rob Hubbard are:
1. Spellbound
2. Nemesis the warlock
3. Rasputin
4. Kentilla
5. Dragons Lair
6. Auf Wiedersehen Monty

So help us by mailing your most favourite selection and please limit your choice to 3! We also want to know which C64 game tune of other composers we definitely have to play in the future.Feel free to forward this question to your friends and anyone who will have an opinion on this quest for the best C64 game music.

Send an email to C64orchestra@ONinternet.nl

Regards

The C64 orchestra
www.myspace.com/c64orchestra

Matt Green, creator of Press the Buttons, linked to OCR in his latest old-school soundtrack review, which caught my attention. He’s been reviewing some pretty obscure cuts under his Beyond Beeps series, including Aero the Acro-Bat and Rockin’ Kats.

His latest one though covers A Boy and His Blob, with the caveat that the soundtracks he covers don’t have to be good. Coincidentally not linked was Mazedude’s 2002 OC ReMix from the game, “Cybrog Blobby,” which has its own crazy backstory related to how poorly regarded the in-game music is.

Definitely follow Matt’s series of soundtrack reviews for some good, under-appreciated game selections. I remember seeing Aero in ads from every gaming magazine I read in the early 90s, but I’ve never played nor seen the game. Meanwhile The Rockin’ Kat only came onto my radar when Polo submitted a sprite of Willy for our avatars over at the OCR forums. With the power of YouTube and TASvideos, it’s easier than ever to check out older games in action while not needing to be able to play them well. Go retro, son.

So, you may or may not have heard of this game called Contra 4 that came out relatively recently. The music was composed by one Jake Kaufman, who also occasionally remixes video game music under the name virt. It flew a bit under the radar, but it’s always good to hear about remixers getting their foot into the composition business.

Okay, so in actuality, everyone knows about Contra 4, and everyone knows how intensely badass the soundtrack is. virt absolutely nailed the classic Konami sound, and the music kicks your ass just as much as the game does. Which is a lot.

Contra 4 was actually released in the United States first, and has yet to be released in Japan. This might seem a little surprising, especially for a Konami game, although it was developed by the Valencia, CA based WayForward Technologies. The game is scheduled to be released on March 13, 2008, across the Pacific, and is available for pre-order on Konami’s Konamistyle web store for 4704 Yen, or about 44 USD or so with the current exchange rate.

Wait a minute, what’s that bit of text underneath the summary section in the product description?

コナミスタイル先着特典
「魂斗羅 Dual Spirits」オリジナルサントラＣＤ
オリジナルのサントラになります。詳細は今しばらくお待ちください。

Well, my Japanese isn’t the best, and by that I mean I’ve never taken a single lesson, but let’s see if we can’t make some sense out of that. The first part of that red text, “コナミスタイル,” that says “Konamistyle,” and the end means something like “first arrival special favor,” so it’s probably talking about some sort of bonus given to the first people who order, and…

Okay, the hell with it.

Konamistyle Early Order Bonus
“Contra Dual Spirits” original soundtrack CD
It is a soundtrack CD. Please wait for further details.

Wait, are you still reading this? You should be figuring out how get an order in on this thing as soon as humanly possible. Go! This post will still be here when you get back.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl was released today in Japan, although final copies made it out before the release date. Advance screenshots have been making their way like wildfire across the internet, as have gameplay videos on YouTube.

One enterprising fellow by the name of ShadowHero1991 is one of those chaps who has been supplying YouTube with videos of the game in action, but he has also uploaded eight videos solely featuring music from the game. As stated in a recent interview between Nintendo Co., Ltd. president Satoru Iwata and SSBB director Masahiro Sakurai, Brawl has “thirty games worth of music.” On the 29th, Sakurai revealed a list of every single song available from the beginning, a list that contains a staggering 101 tracks. And who knows how many more tracks remain to be unlocked.

So, ShadowHero1991’s measly eight videos don’t even begin to scratch the surface of the music contained in SSBB, but they’re our first glimpse at whole tracks from the game, as opposed to the samples Sakurai has posted. In addition, only three of the videos contain full versions of samples from the site; the other five are completely new. Here’s my personal favorite and links to the other seven:

“Meta Knight’s Revenge”
Original pieces: “Revenge of Meta-Knight: Stage” and “Taking Over the Halberd” from Kirby Super Star (SNES)
Composed by Jun Ishikawa and Dan Miyakawa
Arranged by Noriyuki Iwadare

• “Boss Theme Medley” (from Kirby’s Adventure [NES], Kirby’s Dream Land 2 [GB], and Kirby Super Star [SNES], composed by Jun Ishikawa, Hirokazu Ando, and Dan Miyakawa and arranged by Kentaro Ishizaka)
• “Butter Building” (from Kirby’s Adventure [NES], composed by Jun Ishikawa and Hirokazu Ando and arranged by Jun Fukuda)
• “The Dark World” (from The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past [SNES], composed by Koji Kondo and arranged by Arata Iiyoshi)
• “Gourmet Race” (from Kirby Super Star [SNES], composed by Jun Ishikawa and Dan Miyakawa and arranged by Motoi Sakuraba)
• “Hyrule Field Theme” (from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time [N64], composed by Koji Kondo and arranged by Yutaka Iraha)
• “Ocarina of Time Medley” (from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time [N64], composed by Koji Kondo and arranged by Michiko Naruke)
• “Fire Emblem Theme” (from Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragons and the Blade of Light [NES], composed by Hirokazu Tanaka and Yuka Tsujioko, arranged by Shogo Sakai, and performed by Oriko Takahashi and Ken Nishikiori)

Not even 24 hours after the song’s official release, the recently renamed Bentley Jones (formerly “LeeBro” and “LB“) discovered that someone uploaded onto YouTube a copy of his recent remix of Crush 40’s Sonic Adventure classic “Open Your Heart” from the newly released True Blue: The Best of Sonic the Hedgehog.

Since Bentley has been kind enough to spread the word via his MySpace, we’ll also show off the video. Though the video’s only visual is a picture of the album art, you can still check out the album-closing “Open Your Heart (Crush 40 vs. Bentley Jones Remix)” in full with the full endorsement of Mr. Jones. Hop to it:

Petroglyph Games recently handed out a free digital release of Frank Klepacki’s Universe at War OST. The soundtrack is definitely a welcome treat this time of year, with 3 discs worth of material clocking in at over 2 hours. At the risk of selling Klepacki short, which I hope I’m not, his work here is full of the militaristic rock and electronic themes you’re familiar with if you’re a fan, so be sure to check it out.

In 2005, Steven “DarkWolf” Martin created a site called Video Game Music Quiz. He would post thirty-second clips of game music, and users would have to guess what games those tracks came from. Each track had a point value ranging from 1-9, with the more difficult tracks having a higher value. The site had a few other features, like groups, allowing users to join together and have a communal high score table in addition to the global one. OverClocked ReMix even had a group, moderated by Chris “Hemophiliac” Roman.

The updates became more and more scarce, until the site appeared dead in March 2007. Well, on November 24, it rose from the grave, complete with a new site design and new tracks. Gone are the groups and the ability to view all tracks easily, including ones that have been already guessed. Now, when you play, a track is chosen at random, and you can guess, give up, or skip it. After that, you get another randomly chosen track, and the game continues until all the tracks are exhausted. You can choose to clear the list of skipped tracks at any time if you later figure out what game a track comes from. In addition, the ranking system has been overhauled; tracks do not have posted point values, and overall rankings are recalculated once each day.

Old accounts were carried over, so if you once had an account, you don’t have to reregister. As a bonus, if you did have an account, your user profile contains your old score (351!). There are currently seventeen tracks available for guessing right now, and hopefully more will follow. If you once had an account, or never played VGMQ before, why not give it a shot?

I posted quite a while ago about a list of the ten best 8-bit soundtracks, according to IGN. Well, MSNBC has posted its own list of the “Top 5 most memorable video game songs.”

Well, that’s what they claim, anyway, although the list is actually not about specific songs, but rather the entire game the song is from. But anyway, let’s check out what they picked:

• Super Mario Bros.
• Halo
• Ms. Pac-Man
• The Legend of Zelda
• Final Fantasy 7

Some odd choices, to be sure. I had a knee-jerk reaction against Halo, but the chanting opening of the main theme is actually a pretty memorable part of video game music, despite being so recent. Maybe not top 5 material, but it definitely ranks up there.

Audio is also excellent, thanks largely to the top-notch soundtrack. Much of the music is made up of classic Mario tunes from a wide variety of different games, and it’s all modernized and orchestrated. These are some of the best renditions of these tracks since the originals, and you’re sure to be humming along as you play. - Alex Navarro, GameSpot

We’d be totally remiss if we didn’t gush about the amazing soundtrack too. Along with the cutesy classic Mario sound effects, the game features an amazing orchestrated original soundtrack that will surely go down in history as Nintendo’s best first-party effort to date. We found ourselves purposely hanging around on certain levels just to enjoy the fine new renditions of old-school tunes. - Bryn Williams, GameSpy

For what seems like forever Nintendo has been reluctant to use orchestrated music in its games. Super Mario Galaxy may seem like an unlikely candidate to get the aural upgrade, but once you hear the incredible music you’ll be thankful the developers went the extra mile. With over 26 orchestrated pieces, the music in Galaxy is the best ever in any Mario game. Not only does it sound epic, it is epic. The tracks are wonderfully composed and match the levels perfectly. Throw in a few remixes from Super Mario Bros. 3 and Mario 64 and fans will be soaking up the music in no time. - Craig Majaski, Gaming Age

And so on. The reviews for Super Mario Galaxy are almost universally positive, praising the game’s level design and gameplay, visuals, and, most importantly as far as VG Frequency is concerned, the soundtrack. There are several different things that can be referred to by “Club Nintendo,” but the one we most care about here is the Japanese Club Nintendo, a rewards club for Japanese consumers only. Points can be received from purchasing Nintendo products and be redeemed for nifty goodies. The latest batch of rewards are out:

The choices are a Wii Classic Controller shaped like an SNES controller, a Mario desk calendar, and a two disc soundtrack to Super Mario Galaxy. The soundtrack has 81 tracks: the 28 orchestrated ones that I’ve mentioned twice previously and 53 other synthesized tracks. The soundtrack says “Platinum Version” on the cover; no idea yet whether this means that another version of the soundtrack will be offered later, perhaps more generally to people other than Club Nintendo members. Those lucky stiffs.

On October 28, François Bezeau, better known as Rimo, finally launched VGM Rush, a site dedicated to Western VGM; that’s “Western” as in American, European, etc. as opposed to Asian, not “Western” as in Wild West cowboys and outlaws. The site features composer credits for a bunch of different games, associated soundtrack, arrangement, and original albums, and composer biographies and full works lists. VGM Rush is still less than a month old and obviously still growing, but it’s got some very good content for something so new and is definitely worth checking out.

One example of the burgeoning content is an interview posted on November 7 with Alexander Brandon, who composed for such games as Tyrian, Jazz Jackrabbit 2, and Deus Ex. The interview is excellent, covering Brandon’s game compositions, original work (including his latest original album, Era’s End), thoughts on the industry, and a whole slew of other good stuff. Brandon himself stated that the interview is “the most in depth interview [he’s] ever done.”

VGM Rush: Were you ever limited by a director when composing for a certain project or did you always write with complete freedom?

Alexander Brandon: I felt Deus Ex: Invisible War was more sparse than it should have been. The design lead really pushed “Thief” as a reference. Don’t get me wrong, I love that game series and all the audio in it, however DX I think has more depth to its gameplay choices and the music should have reflected that.

For just about all my other projects I provided solid reasoning into my decisions for either my writing or composers I would hire, and sometimes I’d get the usual “that sounds like a synthesizer” argument, to which I have a very powerful arsenal of responses now, but for the most part its complete freedom these days.

Just read the whole thing already. You won’t regret it.

The ultimate new resource on video game music albums is growing like a weed. On November 3rd, VGMdb creator (and music curator of Slightly Dark) Ken “Secret Squirrel” Moore announced what he dubbed a milestone for the database. It’s hard to disagree:

I’m pleased to announce that, as of this morning, we’ve surpassed the 5000 album milestone. While not every one of those albums is a perfect entry, with fully researched tracklist/artist information, I think we’ve made some great progress towards that goal, and we’re now offering a significant amount of information that was previously not available anywhere.

In addition, earlier this week we exceeded 100,000 total album page views. I’ve been particularly pleased to notice that many of our pages have top billing in the Google search results for their catalog number.

So anyway, I’d like to thank all of you for everything that we’ve been able to achieve here. It’s made me very happy to see a lot of new names on the active members list, many of whom have already made significant contribution; keep up the great work.

I’ve personally added a number of albums onto VGMdb, and fellow VG Frequency writer ‘Ili “CHz” Butterfield is on staff there as well, so I’m definitely glad to see the concept take off and do a great job working with all of the VGM catalog sites out there to not only aggregate the information, but provide an even more comprehensive, interactive, more easily expandable destination to learn more about video game music. Any site with me in the database has to be good!

Super Mario Galaxy, due out for the Wii on November 12 in the United States of America, is the next console installment in the main Mario series, following up 2002’s Super Mario Sunshine for the GameCube and 2006’s New Super Mario Bros. for the Nintendo DS.

Nintendo has published a series of articles on its Japanese Wii site entitled “The President Asks ‘Super Mario Galaxy,’” in which Nintendo president Satoru Iwata talks with different staff members working on SMG about the game, development, etc. Volume 1, “Producer/Director Volume,” featured designers Takao Shimizu and Yoshiaki Koizumi, and the second, “Development Staff Volume,” featured several members of the development staff, like Futoshi Shirai, map director for Super Mario Sunshine. Volume 3, “Sound Staff Volume,” is a chat with Koji Kondo, the legendary Nintendo composer who’s created many of Nintendo’s signature songs in the Mario and Legend of Zelda series; Mahito Yokota, who composed the music to Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat and orchestrated the teaser music of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, and Masafumi Kawamura, who’s worked on sound effects and sound effect programming for several Nintendo games, like The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventure and Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat.

All the interviews are in Japanese, so you won’t get too much out of them unless you know the moonspeak or enjoy gripping translations like “Now, which is headquartered in Kyoto in return, the MARIOGYARAKUSHI sound, responsible, staff are encouraged to talk to inquire.”

So what’s the biggest thing to take away from Volume 3?

Live orchestra.

28 songs on the soundtrack were performed by a live orchestra and recorded for use in the game. The interview contains two videos featuring music from the game: a video inside a recording studio of the orchestra performing (possibly the game’s main theme) and another featuring just a still image and the theme of “Egg Planet.” Check ‘em out; the songs aren’t half bad.

Other things of note:

• The game will have more musical tracks than those, but the additional pieces will not feature the orchestra and instead be synthesized.
• Kondo composed four of the tracks for the game, but his role was mainly as an advisor. Yokota composed the others.
• Maybe I should’ve learned Japanese after all so I could read more of this garbage.

Some people on the world wide internet weren’t pleased that Nintendo decided to forgo a live orchestra for Twilight Princess in favor of almost entirely synthesized music, but they’re taking a big step with Super Mario Galaxy. Hopefully the rest of the music will turn out as good as these two samples.

So Jayson Napolitano recently finished a stream of consciousness-like audio journal of Metroid Prime 3. As a non-gamer, I thought it would be a cool idea to work a similar idea but letting someone else do the work of gameplay for me. I was in luck, as last month speedrunner Jody “Upthorn” Northup (Happy 23rd birthday!) released a much-improved speedrun of Konami’s Rocket Knight Adventures for the Sega Genesis. The music team had a heavy hitter in Michiru Yamane, and the game always looked exotic back in the day. With Jody unleashing this new run, I figured why not take 27 minutes and 18.13 seconds to check it out.

The lead character’s name was Sparkster?! Yeesh. No wonder this didn’t take off as a franchise. But since this isn’t an editorial on the naming of Sparkster…

(Thanks to Project2612 for the VGMs, which are used for song title references.)

00:13 ~ The stage 1-1/1-3 theme had some pretty anthemic-sounding moments (including the Stage Clear jingle heard at the end of each level), before trailing off into some forgettable stuff. As least in my experience, you want Stage 1 music to stick in someone’s head no matter what the game. Even if the rest of the soundtrack were forgettable, Stage 1 is supposed to come through. Didn’t feel like it here, unfortunately.

01:13 ~ Stage 1-2’s airbound theme was definitely a high point of the game and a very underrated piece of writing that would lend itself well to orchestration. A very fitting composition for the level.

02:47 ~ The boss theme, with some good intensity, was encountered for the second time fighting some giant enemy…mechbug. The more industrial sounding aspects of the track fit in well with the techno-medieval theme of the game. (Yeesh, two sentences, two made-up words.)

03:31 ~ Fairly catchy stuff with Stage 2-1 with an almost faux-surfing vibe that matched well with the stage, for the first few seconds anyway before the terrain changed.

04:26 ~ Stage 2-2 had good tension for the precarious scenario of riding on a cart through an extended track with scores of bomb-throwing swine (think Donkey Kong Country but much faster), before transitioning into an almost irreverent comical routine and subsequently looping.

07:10 ~ Though it seems like he’s flirting with disaster above (complete with great facial expression on Sparkster), Upthorn made the fluctuating lava and water levels of Stage 3 look like a cakewalk. The great thing about auto-scrolling levels is watching the speedrunner entertaining himself and the viewer by toying with the potential of death. Meanwhile, the stage theme had some good music for the first 30 seconds before the other 30 felt a bit scattershot in terms of fitting well with the militant vibe the opening gave off. I’m a bastard that’s always looking for a hook, so sue me.

09:46 ~ Stage 4 sounded like a WWKD (What Would Konami Do?) of Sonic the Hedgehog 2’s Casino Night Zone, but what do I know. An airship level? Nah, not the mental imagery I got. Don’t miss the boss music again at 11:02 as Jody smack’s down the largest pig-inspired vibrator in God’s creation.

I also feel like it’s important to note that this was the last point in the speedrun where this game looked beatable by a human being. The sheer insanity of the game afterward leads me to believe that no one’s ever actually gotten much farther than Area 5 without the wonders of emulation. Why?

This…

12:02 ~ Look at Sparkster scandalously rubbing his pixels all over that rocket, a scathing insult to Konami’s sense of collision detection. Jody shamelessly navigated the maze of rockets, bullets and swines in this level to the point of absurdity. It might look reasonable at first, but I think you’ll end up agreeing with me pretty quickly if you keep your eyes fixed. Stage 5-1 here had a really upbeat, adventurous theme that I’d love to see someone at OC ReMix arrange.

13:39 ~ Stage 5-2 featured teleportation antics that really spiced up the gameplay, alongside the jazzy overtones of the stage music (offered in two variations), which sounded like one of Shnabubula’s compositions, only turning the dial down on Sam from 11 down to 4. Due to Upthorn quickness and the teleportations stopping the music, this ended up being one of the tracks you didn’t get to catch for an extended period of time.

17:08 ~ After the intro, the Stage 6 theme definitely coughed up some good spacesynth style composition (17:26) mixed in with the occasional warbly SFX breakdown. Just slow the tempo down, and you’d have some perfect material. Someone bug Mark Vera about it. In any case, a good fit for the fast-paced outer space level setting, but unfortunately not one you get to hear much of as well in-game.

21:37 ~ Yes, there are so goofy sounds mingled into the composition, but overall I was feeling the creepy vibe from the Stage 7 music, along with a criminally understated bassline. Felt to me like more of a run-and-jump platform level than what the area turned out to be, but whatchagonnado?

23:42 ~ The Final Boss music for the first leg of the ultimate showdown felt like a letdown in terms of being sinister and nerve-wracking. Too much to expect? I dunno, the final boss did look like the swine step-cousin of something out of Contra III.

28:29 ~ The cloud effect with Sparkster flying during the Credits was pretty cool stuff for back in the day, even if it is monotonous. But hey, if you wanted triumphant themed music, and you’ve actually beat this game, you earned it as it’s pulled off nicely for the game’s conclusion.

While feeling the soundtrack was a hit-and-miss affair, props to the Rocket Knight Adventures sound team for, in my opinion, getting the some of absolute best out of the Mega Drive’s YM synths. Clearly classics like Golden Axe and Altered Beast had their own memorable tunes, but Rocket Knight Adventures pushed the YM2612 near its creative limits.

The major majority of tool-assisted speedrun fans don’t look to videos like Upthorn’s to scope out the music, but I’m just that kind of guy. Perhaps we’ll do this again sometime. Happy 23rd to Jody and thanks for this nice run!

kingshriek is bankable when it comes to obscure or hard-to-find video game soundtracks in video game music formats. Offering up rare GBS (Game Boy), HES (TurboGrafx-16/PC Engine) & NSF (Nintendo/Famicom) format soundtracks, kingshriek’s Rip Page holds a lot of buried treasures.

And indeed, speaking of treasure, it was through kingshriek that I found out the previous existing soundtrack rip of Tim Follin’s 1991 NES soundtrack Treasure Master had two missing tracks. UNACCEPTABLE, I know.

Recognizing king’s efforts in propagating classic game music, it was great to read that late last week, he unveiled a preliminary version of the long-conceptualized, long-awaited streamable Sega Saturn Sound Format or SSF. SSF is based off the plugin format of Neil Corlett’s PlayStation Sound Format (PSF) plugin, Highly Experimental.

SSF is still in the very preliminary stages, so it’s far from optimization. Of note, the various programs involved in the format have been undergoing fairly frequent updates. But if you feel like you can’t wait to fire up the Panzer Dragoon II Zwei soundtrack and test things out, check out the SSF page, read through all of the information and get-a-goin’.

Depending on how quickly development on the plug-in moves now that mass testing is available via this release, maybe we’ll see SSF support integrated into OC ReMix’s Chipamp plugin bundle.