
Advertisement
SupraDarky: Bubbleman's stage is actually my favourite theme of the series, it's the first Mega Man song I added to the project. I love the darker feel during the first half and then the higher notes and faster pace coming in during the second half. The composer really has to be quite amazing to pull something like this in only 40 seconds—there's not a single second wasted.A few people out there think Mega Man's music is a bit overrated.
I think when it comes to Mega Man's music in general, the quality is so high that pretty much half of the themes could be called fan favourites, most notable the Wily Stage from Mega Man 2. I don't believe any of those are overrated at all.So why'd you set up the Best Video Game project then?
What triggered it was basically me searching for VGM on YouTube and realising that almost nothing game-related was there. Even by 2007, most of the classics weren't up there. I really felt like VGM deserved to be more popular in general and shouldn't be limited to the few classics all the gamers know about.
Advertisement
Repetition within a game means that the song gets stuck in your head much easier and for a longer time. You end up instantly associating the theme with the game and that's how nostalgia hits you. That's the reason why it's so easy to remember themes from RPGs since you end up hearing theme quite a lot. However, if a theme is great enough and plays during one single scene during the whole game, it can still be memorable even without the repetition factor—like "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy IV.Who are your favourite composers? I could only probably name two.
My favourites keep changing, but some of them are Nobuo Uematsu, Yasunori Mitsuda, Koji Kondo, Michiko Naruke, Michiru Yamane, Hitoshi Sakimoto, Koichi Sugiyama, David Wise, and Motoi Sakuraba.It seems to me that often some of the greatest VGM soundtracks are composed by people who never see a similar level of acclaim again.
Most of the time, composers reach a high level of acclaim when the ingredients are right: an exceptional soundtrack for an exceptional game. Unfortunately, not a lot of composers have the privilege to write for more than one or two of those high quality games, like Uematsu or Mitsuda have. But, you know, if the classic Mario Bros theme that everybody knows and loves had been the theme of another average NES game instead, barely anyone would have noticed it.
Advertisement
That's probably one of the baseball games I've played the most as a kid!Yeah, I loved it.
I rented it so many times. I guess I'll have to take a listen to its soundtrack someday. But I think there are definitely some gaps, particularly when it comes to older consoles than the 8-bit era and indie games. However, sometimes what people will perceive as gaps actually aren't. For example, I'll get a message asking me why these games or series aren't represented at all in the list, and the reason is that I simply don't like any of the music from them. It's important to keep in mind that this is all about personal taste and it can actually be quite challenging to let the project stay that way with the pressure of thousands of subscribers.Obviously you're a massive fan of the medium. Do you listen to VGM, say, on your way to work?
I actually don't have any means to listen to music outside of my house.Really?
Yeah. Not because I can't afford something like an iPod, but because I really like to be aware of my surroundings and hear what's going on. Sitting at my computer, there's almost always some music playing in my headphones so my ears really need to take a break. Even when I'm driving, I rarely turn the radio on.Finally, because video game music is a total aphrodisiac, could you list some of your favourite tracks for fucking?
Advertisement