Mess Around Mondays: Gaming Mixtape

Today’s edition of Mess Around Monday is inspired by Kendrick Lamar deciding to smack Drake in the back of the head one more time with his newest album (maybe mixtape?) GNX. So, to help me create gaming’s TDE, Shaun and Dwayne will be creating their own mixtapes as well. Welcome to Waypoint Records.

Shaun Cichacki – CONTRIBUTOR

Theme: The Build UP and the Break DOWN

The theme of my mixtape is split right down the middle: getting me hyped up for whatever I’m about to do and then bringing me back down once it’s come to a close. It doesn’t matter if it’s me getting ready to start a new day, or to go to a new place, I already know that these tracks are bound to get my blood boiling and my heart pumping. Indeed, the first five songs in my mixtape represent this and are used regularly to get me moving.

On the flip side, the second half of this mixtape is perfect to wind down after I’ve completed my tasks. The end of the day is one of my favorite parts of it, and these tracks can finally get me to stop and smell the roses for a little while. Sure, there may be even more peaceful songs that I’m currently forgetting about, but if I need to just chill out after a long day at work or after something stressful happens? I know I can count on these five songs to bring me down to earth.

The Mixtape:

1. Cybernator – We’ve Got To Do It
2. Plok! – Boss Theme
3. Payday 2 – Razormind
4. Hotline Miami – Hydrogen
5. Pizza Tower – It’s Pizza Time
6. Animal Crossing: New Leaf – 3AM
7. City Ruins – NieR: Automata
8. The Best Is Yet To Come – Metal Gear Solid
9. Mother, I’m Here (Zulf’s Theme) – Bastion
10. Song of the Deep – Main Title Theme

Fun fact of the day: the Main Theme of Song of the Deep was the song my wife walked down the aisle to during our wedding. During the main crescendo at 1 minute and 38 seconds in, she started to make her way down, and it still makes me swell up with tears when I hear this particular song.

Dwayne Jenkins – Managing Editor

Theme: Songs That Have No Business Going as Hard as They Do

You know that feeling when you play a game, and suddenly, that track kicks in? It catches you off guard, making you involuntarily bob your head as you wonder if the developers put the song in there by accident. Here, I want to compile a mixtape full of songs that unexpectedly hit me — but in the best possible way. The first five songs are tracks that are more so chill hype. They’re bops, but they’re smooth bops. You might not put these on your workout playlist, but you’ll definitely play them while you’re working and need something to mellow out!

The Mixtape:

1. Deadly Premonition – Life is Beautiful
2. The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Tarrey Town (Night)
3. Two Worlds – Play the Game
4. Banjo-Tooie – Witchyworld
5. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater – Snake Eater

These next five songs, though? Verifiable heat. This is the kind of song you’d play as you hype yourself up to fight someone. These are the beats that appeared and I had no choice but to put the controller down and take them in. I never wanted these to end when I heard them for the first time! If you don’t think these go hard, we can’t be friends. Ever.

6. Catherine: Full Body – Mussorgsky (Pictures at an Exhibition)
7. Final Fantasy X – Otherworld
8. GoldenEye 007 – Pause Menu Music
9. Killer Instinct – Orchid Theme
10. Hollow Knight – Sealed Vessel

Fight with me if you want, these are undeniable. Video game music? Perpetually underrated!

Anthony FRANKLIN ii – cONTRIBUTOR

Theme: Write Like Your Life Depends on It (Because It Does)

This mixtape is all music meant to zone me out and focus me up while I’m writing. Normally, whenever I sit down to do these articles, I’m either playing music in my headphones or a song is playing in my head. As I’ve said before, music is very important to me. So, it’s almost necessary for me to be listening as I write.

So, all of these tracks with the exception of one, have some level of bounce to them. I love video game music with some jump, though. Songs from the Sonic games are particularly good for this. And of course, Sonic 3 had to make my mixtape because Michael Jackson worked on that soundtrack. The Credits of the game, which made my list, are very obviously the bones that inspired “Stranger in Moscow,” one of my favorite songs.

The Mixtape:

1. Opening – WCW/NWO Revenge  

2. Credits – Sonic 3  

3. Title Music – NBA Live 95  

4. Character Select Theme – Smash Bros Ultimate 

5. The Magician – What Lies in the Multiverse  

6. Guardia Millennial Fair – Chrono Trigger  

7. Title Theme – Ocarina of Time  

8. Escape From the City – Sonic Adventure 2

9. Chemical Plant Zone – Sonic 2  

10. Gerudo Valley – Ocarina of Time