Welcome, one and all, to the Nintendo Life Video Game Music Festival — or VGM Fest, if you like — a 'season' of music-based features, interviews, retrospectives, and more.
As you might expect, we're all lovers of game audio here at Nintendo Life, from retro-flavoured chiptunes to sweeping orchestral scores; from the old-school 'bips' and 'beeps' of sport and cosmic combat to chilling tunes that still have the power to induce blind panic; from twee ditties to earworms that had us spending far too much time perusing digital stores. We'll be celebrating all that and much more over the coming days and weeks in a Proms-style summer celebration of the aural delights of gaming.
We'll be publishing daily interviews with composers — ranging from a series of short, sharp Q&As to in-depth discussions on their catalogues and careers — plus looking at specific music-based games from Nintendo platforms past, speaking to people who have remixed and reimagined treasured gaming tunes, revisiting classic series, hearing staff favourites and playlists, and plenty more.
Here's a list of all the articles published so far — we'll update this list over the coming days and weeks:
Interviews:
- Feature: Tee Lopes Talks Sonic, Streets Of Rage, And Making Music On A PS1
- Feature: Minecraft And Celeste Composer On Nintendo Influences And Writing For The Biggest Game In The World
- Feature: How Fire Tonight Took A Decades-Old Synth-Pop Song, And Made A Game Out Of It
- Feature: Mega Man, Shovel Knight, And Save Me Mr Tako Composers On Getting 'That' Retro Sound
- Feature: Video Game Orchestra Founder Talks Live Music And Composing For Final Fantasy
- Feature: The Garden Path's Solo Dev On Hollow Knight And Final Fantasy Influences
- Feature: The Secrets Of Sounds, And The Joy Of Door Noises - An Interview With Celeste's Audio Designer
- Feature: Sayonara Wild Hearts Composer On Creating The First 'Pop Album Video Game'
- Feature: 'Bossa De Hyrule' Reimagines Zelda Music With Laidback Brazilian Beats
- Feature: "Metal Comes From Hell, Everyone Knows This" - Darren Korb Talks Loki, Lavtas, And Led Zeppelin
- Feature: Banjo And Final Fantasy On The Radio? VGM On Classic FM Was Only The Beginning
Quick Beats' Interviews
- Quick Beats: 'Journey' And 'Abzu' Composer On Star Wars, Neil Young And Podcasts
- Quick Beats: Streets Of Rage Composer On Musical Heroes And The Series He'd Love To Work On
- Quick Beats: Hades Composer Talks Weird Al, The Beatles, And Radiohead
- Quick Beats: Shovel Knight Composer On Q*Bert, The Prodigy, And Magical Bongos
- Quick Beats: Celeste Composer Lena Raine On Her Love For Ghibli, Hurdy-Gurdies, And Her Cat
- Quick Beats: Mega Man Composer Manami Matsumae On Ocarinas And Bohemian Rhapsody
- Quick Beats: Final Fantasy And Vagrant Story Composer Hitoshi Sakimoto Talks YMO And Dua Lipa
- Quick Beats: Final Fantasy Composer And VGO Founder On Road Trip Music, Rock, And The '80s
- Quick Beats: The Composer And Solo Dev Of 'The Garden Path' Talks Arcade Fire And Young Thug
- Quick Beats: Donkey Kong Country Composer Talks Aquatic Ambiance And Get Lucky
- Quick Beats: Mega Man Composer And Inti Creates Founder Talks Backdraft And Bongos
- Quick Beats: Sonic Mania Composer On Portuguese Rap And His Musical Hero
- Quick Beats: Save Me Mr Tako! Composer Talks Flyrule, Ravel And Star Wars D6
- Quick Beats: Pulstar, Mega Man, And Final Fight Composer Talks Joe Hisaishi And The Beatles
Features:
- Feature: Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix, Or That Time Mario Got Movin’ To Mozart
- Soapbox: Chiptune Is Great, But The Impact Of A Full Orchestra Is Unbeatable
- Talking Point: Which Video Game Song Could You Listen To For Ten Hours?
- Soapbox: Tony Hawk's Underground 2 Was The Basis For My Taste In Music
- Soapbox: Music Just Don't Come Spookier And Sadder Than Zelda: Majora's Mask
- Back Page: Ranking Every Version Of Fairy Fountain From The Legend Of Zelda
- Talking Point: It's A Golden Era For Video Game Music Fans, So How Do You Listen?
- Talking Point: What's The Best Sound In Video Games?
- Talking Point: Which Nintendo Console Has The Best Start-Up Sound?
- Soapbox: The Era Of Rock Band, Guitar Hero And Plastic Instruments Was Silly But Special
Staff Pick Playlists:
- Chill Music From Video Games - Relaxing Playlist
- Funky Video Game Music - Groovy Playlist
- Best Mario Music Ever: Our Top 10 Mario Songs - Super Mario Playlist
Without wanting to spoil too many surprises, you can look forward to hearing from such luminary composers as Darren Korb (Hades), Manami Matsumae (Mega Man), Yuzo Koshiro (Streets of Rage), Grant Kirkhope (Banjo-Kazooie), Lena Raine (Celeste), and Jake Kaufman (Shovel Knight). Look out for these names and many more, starting later today with a composer who's recently got to work on some of our very favourite gaming franchises ever. Keep an eye out — or ear open!
Let us know below your favourite game series, composers and musical moments below — you never know, we might cover them! Otherwise, grab your headphones and welcome to the Nintendo Life VGM Fest.
Comments 39
Lena Raine? Ok I’ll come
Castlevania 4 tunes or GTFO.
Not my favourite, but I will always highlight Tim Follin, every song he did is a belter!
Daniel Olsén, Jonathan Eng, and Linnea Olsson's work on the Sayonara Wild Hearts doesn't get enough love. ignoring SWH should be a crime.
the entire game spans one breathily ethereal synthpop breakup album. tight compositions are filled out with fluttery synth lines, breezy hooks, and topped with Linnea's otherworldly vocals. It's absolutely ESSENTIAL stuff.
KOJI KONDO & KAZUMI TOTAKA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7lYuAP34gs&ab_channel=Shiromi
Composers from the Castlevania and Zelda series would be cool to hear from
Darren Korb? Count me in!
Very very cool. One guy that’s often forgotten is Dean Evans, whose Waterworld soundtrack on the SNES is absolutely fantastic. The game’s rubbish because it’s an Ocean game but the OST is far far superior.
Hiroki Kikuta (secret of mana & trials of mana) is my favourite composer, would be cool to see his work get more recognition. Squaresoft and Enix games of the 90s have some of the best music ever composed. And Falcom Sound Team rule too 🤘
Michiru Yamane or I riot!
I listen to video game music all the time, from games I've played and also from those I haven't. Looking forward to this.
Yay! This is content I have a lot of time for!
Would be cool to talk to Theophany who has gone from (Nintendo centric) video game remixer/cover artist to working on an original score in Kena.
Darren korb, grant kirkhope and lena raine? Hell to the yeah.
Would love to hear about David Wise and Christopher Larkin, two of my favorite VGM composers. And why not? Koji Kondo will always be welcome!
Here’s some video game music opinion for you. Yoko Shimomura gets a lot of hype for Kingdom Hearts, but actually to me her best score is Mario & Luigi Dream Team. That’s some music to remind you why you like video game music in the first place.
Great idea !! Thanks NL.
Exciting! I’m a big video game music fan.
Big standouts for me:
The Killer7 OST by Masafumi Takada is superb, would legitimately purchase a copy on vinyl if that were possible, there are easily 15 songs on it I absolutely love.
The Golden Sun GBA soundtracks are also gorgeous, particularly impressive given the limits of the system.
Finally, I love bands like the Advantage covering Mega Man tracks, the skill involved in actually playing something like Metal Man or Bubble Man from Mega Man 2 on electric guitar is insane.
Those who like Video Game music should check out the Guess the Game series on my youtube channel (same as my username here)
As far as remixers go, this fella's criminally underviewed music videos are definitely the silliest: http://youtube.com/mhshizz
Chrono trigger! Hearing frog's theme the first time, fit everything perfectly. Then robo's rick astley like theme to magus's! Awesome soundtrack. Cosmo canyon is another favorite.
MegaRan is a hip hop artist, that is sponsored by capcom. He has some good tracks on forever famicon and black materia, a final fantasy story/album.
@Lordplops I knooooooow, right?!!
Oh, and let's not forget, Yoko Shimomura! Super Mario RPG was a masterpiece!!
@ArsebiscuitsKarmasho tbh anything masafumi takada touches is great his work on NMH, the Silver Case and Danganronpa are all absolutely incredible sounding and songs I come back to on numerous occasions
Wicked stuff Nintendo Life! Video game music rocks!
Great to hear, NL! I've enjoyed so many BGM and song tracks from games over the years, and know so little about the composers, reading some interviews will be fascinating.
I particularly loved the music from Celeste, so it will be a treat to hear from Lena Raine. She and so many talented artists have poured their creativity and heart into these games we love.
@CharlieGirl
I'm sorry, could you speak up?
I'm listening to the Sayonara Wild Hearts soundtrack too often and too loud.
Looking forward to it. My favourite videogame composer has to be Motoi Sakuraba. The music he's done for Star Ocean, Valkyrie Profile, Golden Sun, Eternal Sonata, etc is easily some of the best I've heard in gaming
Love the music from Celeste and Hades can’t wait
I bought DKC Tropical Freeze twice, mainly because I could experience the amazing soundtrack again while playing through the levels. The same actually applies to Super Mario 3D World and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. Amazing soundtracks. And obviously Smash Ultimate with its giant selection of the very best music tracks and remixes.
@PhhhCough Yeah Chrono Trigger is a masterpiece, I love the title theme and Wind Scene. Cosmo Canyon is from FF7 isn't it? (great tune though).
Matt Furniss not get back to you? What’s going on?
Please cover Game & Sound's stuff, he makes awesome remixes but is super underrated. https://youtu.be/aX0mziOg98o
@SolBlazer yeah. Red xiii theme music.
Cave Story! The entire games music. Nuff said
Streets of Rage, Sonic the Hedgehog, Double Dragon’s final boss! You can also here it in the versus mode
Masafumi Takada better get SOMETHING.
Should have called it Last Night of the Roms.
I really didn't have a lot of browsing time this month, but I'm sure to read everything as a backlog, this is amazing!! ❤️
Not composers: but they are the greatest Nintendo musicians of all time: Keity.pop, Mari Kikuma, Rina Itou, & Alice Peralta
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