Has video game music become too boring?

[terry78]

I don't mean sound quality and what not, I mean is the composition pretty much nothing but the same orchestral type tracks and stuff like that there. Music used to be catchy like the Mega Man games, or they instilled original rock, techno or hip-hop like beats into it. Dudes like David Wise of Rare and Tommy Tallarico made some of the best music to date, and it wasn't licensed songs or whatever.

 

[Brainiac 8]

Super Mario Galaxy had some of the best orchestrated music ever.

 

[terry78]

Yeah, well Nintendo rarely falls short in that department.

 

[CELTICPRED]

Boring to you might not be boring to someone else.

O'Donnel's work on Halo 1-3, Behavior's work on Splinter Cell D.A., the music in Fallout 3. There's some fantastic work out there.

 

[TNC9852002]

Not to me, but nostalgia will always hold certain themes to heart..

 

[Why Are You Crouching Spock?]

I think certain action and fantasy games have been stuck into a kind of generic hollywoody sound.
Jesper Kyd MDK 2 soundtrack was amazing, I wish we had more stuff like that.

 

[Spidey-Bat]

Boring to you might not be boring to someone else.

O'Donnel's work on Halo 1-3, Behavior's work on Splinter Cell D.A., the music in Fallout 3. There's some fantastic work out there.

I found Halo 3's music to be boring.

 

[CELTICPRED]

I still give it a listen every now and then.

 

[Grievous]

Halo had some great tracks.

 

[Spider-Vader]

Yeah it does. If they ever make a Halo movie & O'Donnel is still working he better be the composer for it.

He also did a good job on Halo Wars.

 

[MadVillainy]

thats why I listen to movie scores when I play videogames at least the story mode

Batman Begins score = perfect for GOW2

 

[DACrowe]

Nintendo games (Mario and Zelda especially) always have magnificent, epic, sweeping compositions. I think the work in the Halo series (though I am not a fan of the games) is pretty damn memorable. The Metal Gear Solid games also have epic and emotionally-charged music. But most games are pushing to all-action (FPS, usually or GOW type 3rd persons) or casual gameplay (Wii Fit) and unless that casual game is Rock Band, both genres do not lend themselves to memorable or strong music. When you play BioShock you are playing to shoot everything that moves in an epic art deco atmosphere. Unless it's some retro rendering of Under the Sea, you're not going to notice the music. Did Gears of War even have music (that was a joke)? Resident Evil has never been known for strong music (albeit I thought RE2, CV and Remake had some nice touches), but RE5 had generic '90s action music blaring because it moved into that action direction and as those along with casuals make up most gaming, there is no need for anything that creative to be played in the background.

With that said go purchase Super Mario Galaxy, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Metal Gear Solid 4 or Halo 3 and enjoy some epic arrangements.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I rarely notice the music, to be honest. If a game's score sounds really good, I notice, but otherwise it just slides right by my ears. The most recent game whose music I genuinely enjoyed was Uncharted, and before that Halo 1's main theme. Music just doesn't really matter to me that much.

 

[terry78]

Games nowadays are made out to be more interactive epic movies than anything so the score reflects that I guess. I'm just stuck in a nostalgic time warp. Though my downloading of Mega Man 9 gave me a glimmer of hope.

[YT]6oXUhLh-mQ0[/YT]

 

[Havok83]

No. I think its just as good now as it ever was

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Games nowadays are made out to be more interactive epic movies than anything so the score reflects that I guess. I'm just stuck in a nostalgic time warp. Though my downloading of Mega Man 9 gave me a glimmer of hope.

[YT]6oXUhLh-mQ0[/YT]

See, I'm not all that nostalgic for MIDI tracks, myself. I think if those composers (if they even were composers, since back then games weren't quite so big-budget) had access to high-quality recording technology or 30-piece orchestras, they would've probably used them as well. Mega Man 9 is obviously an exception since they were deliberately trying to recreate the feel of the 8-bit Mega Man era, but other than that, look at Zelda and Mario and such. Technology's advanced and those franchises are still viable, so their themes, once very basic MIDI tracks, have expanded to include orchestral compositions as well. It's just the natural tendency as technology makes it possible, I guess.

 

[Soapy]

I generally think that most video game music today lacks any kind of personality or style. As terry78 said game developers are trying to make their games feel like an interactive cinematic type of experience and obviously they need to have a music design that fits with that. The problem is that not very many film scores, which is what they're trying to emulate, are memorable to me in any way; For better or worse. I wouldn't call it boring per se, but very few games have music that really stands out.

 

[TheBat812]

i cant really say that old music was really any good. In fact, i might go as far as saying it was terrible compared to today's music. Alot does sound generic though, but I mean, that's not terribly surprising given the sheer amount of material needed to sustain a game.

 

[Jick]

I know what Terry 78 is trying to say. And I agree. The music back on the old games weren't inspiring symphonies or something like that, but they were damn catchy and fun!
I still remember some of Mario World's music, Mega Man's and Maximum Carnage soundtrack.

 

[Gilpesh]

I rarely notice the music, to be honest.

Ditto. And with the fact that with the 360 you can just load up music from your hard-drive... the score ends up not being played much or all.

 

[Milu]

No. I think its just as good now as it ever was

Same here. It just sounds prettier now .

 

[Why Are You Crouching Spock?]

i cant really say that old music was really any good. In fact, i might go as far as saying it was terrible compared to today's music. Alot does sound generic though, but I mean, that's not terribly surprising given the sheer amount of material needed to sustain a game.

Alot of the C64 games had fantastic themes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sVPK7dX2-c

 

[SuperFerret]

I'm of the school of thought that plays their own music while playing a game, which is what makes games with voice acting and no subtitles all the more annoying.

 

[Brainiac 8]

To those who say that the older midi music wasn't any good obviously don't remember this:

 

[CELTICPRED]

Dare I say it's wrong to play your own music over video games (excluding MP)?

I personally couldn't imagine playing through Halo's campaign without all the horns and brass playing.