Video Game Music
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one of many easy resources to find and discover VGM.
Music, now, is incredibly important to me. Late middle school, early high school, around that time, though, it was just video game tracks that I'd listen to. Enjoying that isn’t inherently bad or anything, but that was ALL I would listen to. Not good!
Sonic was my main gateway to ‘real music’. Crush 40 already inherently made me happy since I'd played SA2 over and over again as a kid, but it had the extra bonus of being close enough to what my Dad would listen to. Growing up, I’d hear KISS, Iron Maiden, Metallica, maybe a little bit of Bon Jovi on the car radio - all these likely subconsciously informed my future music taste.
A lot of games acted as this gateway for me; His World, one of my favorite Sonic themes, introduced me to Zebrahead, which eventually led to discovering more punk rock. Crazy Taxi and Tony Hawk, exposed me to The Offspring, and Goldfinger respectively, with me later getting into skate punk. Mostly punk lol :P
Unless I'm seeking it out specifically, I don't listen to all too much anymore, however. Some part of my mind seems to deliberately avoid it. Maybe fear of being tacky, or maybe a reminder of the box I put myself in, who knows.
This might be a bit of a nothingburger, but the point being! Video game music is rad, and acted as a launchpad for me to expand my horizons. There’s plenty of great music original to games and I wanna showcase some of my favorites here. I mostly wanna highlight more obscure tracks, maybe talk a little about ‘em a little. Anything more popular on here is probably something I have a lot of reverence for.
[Last Updated: 07/14/2025]
VGM
i loooooove pinball!! this ones from my favorite machine ever. the music is absolutaly a strong reason why but i just really like the playfield it has also. i will eventually make a pinball zine...
YOUVE GOT THE POWER!!!! YOUVE GOT THE MIGHT!! GET READY FOR BATTLE!!!! BEAT THE BLACK KNIGHT!
| Title: | Black Knight |
| Game: | Black Knight 2000 |
| System: | N/A (Pinball) |
| Year: | April 4, 1989 |
| Composer: | Brian Schmidt, Dan Forden |
this is really stupid im putting this here but oh my god its genuinely such an earworm. i m meen fascinates me. the flow of the song never goes with what feels right, he just keeps going.
you little BOOKwormmm....
| Title: | Intro |
| Game: | I.M. Meen |
| System: | DOS |
| Year: | August 11, 1995 |
| Composer: | Anthony Trippi, Peter Berkrot |
earthworm jim music kinda goes crazy. i think?? this information is correct. technically this is ripped from the saturn version, but i'm PRETTY sure it originates from the PC version.
| Title: | Anything But Tangerines |
| Game: | Earthworm Jim 2 |
| System: | DOS |
| Year: | November 15, 1995 |
| Composer: | Jean-Christophe Beck |
tommy tallarico..... i hate to credit the guy, but it seems like maybe he did contribute to this track? but also maybe it was just mark miller? or maybe he just arranged it? maybe it was Mical Pedriana? i dunno!!!
regardless, love the guitar on this
| Title: | Use Your Head |
| Game: | Earthworm Jim: Special Edition |
| System: | SEGA CD |
| Year: | March 15, 1995 |
| Composer: | Mark Miller, Tommy Tallarico |
gahhhhh the plok soundtrack is fucking crazy. Probably the most impressive SNES game, auditorially. that surely is not the best word i could be using but idk. a lot of it is just prog rock and thats rad as hell - i really really fw the guitars and harmonica in this. the follin brothers did it again..
| Title: | Plok's Theme |
| Game: | Plok! |
| System: | SNES |
| Year: | September, 1993 |
| Composer: | Tim Follin |
love-de-lic (and all the companies the devs are now at) have such fascinating games and gahhhh i hate that chulip is stuck on ps2. Thought it was crazy when i bought a copy for $60, now its $200. i despise the retro game market, it really sucks. sad that so many of their games aren't translated either. Chulip itself is rad though!!! one of my favorite games :]
| Title: | Happy Shabby Life |
| Game: | Chulip |
| System: | PlayStation 2 |
| Year: | October 3, 2002 |
| Composer: | Hirofumi Taniguchi |
im so glad my brother has a ps5 cause i absolutley would NOT have played astro bot if not (astro bot is like. the singular ps5 exclusive game. its awesome but like. i would not spend $500 for one game). Nothing life changing or anything but just a really good and solid game. love the guy. it even has gex!! AND croc?? and you can be wander SOTC??? fuck yes man. this track in specific sticks in my mind so much. ennio morricone like
| Title: | Crash Site |
| Game: | ASTRO BOT |
| System: | PlayStation 5 |
| Year: | September 6, 2024 |
| Composer: | Kenneth C M Young |
castlevania stuff is rad in general but this track really grabbed me when i first played - like i just stopped to listen for a moment. no cover i've heard has really done it justice which is a little sad but im glad it exists to begin with
| Title: | Wicked Child |
| Game: | Castlevania |
| System: | NES |
| Year: | September 26, 1986 |
| Composer: | Kinuyo Yamashita |
LITERALLY me when the s blade has a hackblood charge
i'd imagine the game didn't have much budget which is why theres only one new seepage song but it's a little sad.. i dont fw the gameplay too much, but i think its a really cool way to expand the hypnospace universe.
| Title: | Break Me |
| Game: | Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengance of the Slayer |
| System: | Windows, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S |
| Year: | June 1, 2023 |
| Composer: | queenjazz |
speaking of. grahhhhhh!!!! hypnospace outlaw is so fucking good. 100% my favorite game of all time, and there's no way this site would exist without it. besides seepage, barnaby's choir was absolutley my favorite fictional music group. i'd always go out of my way to check in and see if there was new music. really like satellite electrica too. i dunno. this is just a really special and important game to me. unfortunate that dreamsettler got cancelled but more then understandable. hope we get to see some stuff from it sometime
| Title: | Corduroy (Barnaby) |
| Game: | Hypnospace Outlaw |
| System: | Windows |
| Year: | March 12, 2019 |
| Composer: | Dan Warren |
ive gotta replay cave story sometime.... anyways, this track was always my favorite. all the music is super memorable but the drums are such a good driving force here.
| Title: | Running Hell |
| Game: | Cave Story |
| System: | Windows |
| Year: | December 20, 2004 |
| Composer: | Daisuke "Pixel" Amaya |
my wonderful thing... truly i dont know why i have such a strong obsession with this game. out of all the b tier platformers this one always intrigues me the most. i really wonder what a world would be like if the series got to continue. like. glover 2 was almost done. glover 3 would be a possibility. do you know how rad a glover 3 on like the gamecube and ps2 would be.
| Title: | Atlantis 1 |
| Game: | Glover |
| System: | Nintendo 64 |
| Year: | October 26, 1998 |
| Composer: | Rob Lord, Paul Weir, Mark Bandola |
they were probably what the tracks originally sounded like but tbh i think the ps1 and windows versions of these tracks blow. the samples on the n64 version are so much more compelling to me. - a lot of n64 music is. just gives me a certain feeling. idk why all the gamerips are so long - i could probably edit them down but idgaf
| Title: | Atlantis 2 |
| Game: | Glover |
| System: | Nintendo 64 |
| Year: | October 26, 1998 |
| Composer: | Rob Lord, Paul Weir, Mark Bandola |
god. i know this is like a blast of glover music but all the atlantis tracks are just kinda wonderful to me. like no other video game track instills *this* particular emotion. the other tracks are good! but THIS is why i like glover. these levels hardly even feel like places in a world and i kinda love that. this bizzare realm a little guy's thrown into. i like glover :]
| Title: | Atlantis 3 |
| Game: | Glover |
| System: | Nintendo 64 |
| Year: | October 26, 1998 |
| Composer: | Rob Lord, Paul Weir, Mark Bandola |
sonic.... this one is absolutley one where like. this is not obscure in anyway. at all. i really don't think it gets the praise it should though. THIS is sonic. this is everything sonic means. crush 40 is rad but oughh. hits different
| Title: | It Doesn't Matter ...Theme of ”Sonic The Hedgehog” |
| Game: | Sonic Adventure |
| System: | SEGA Dreamcast |
| Year: | December 23, 1998 |
| Composer: | Jun Senoue, Tony Harnell |
i think i've fully gaslit myself into genuinely liking gubble. gubble fucking blows but i have such a strange obsession with it. everytime i meet someone new i ramble for 30 mintutes about gubble and no one ever fucking believes that its a real game. ever time i do this i slip in little bits of misinformation just for fun. thank you gubble <3
| Title: | COMEDY |
| Game: | Gubble |
| System: | Windows |
| Year: | 1997? 1996?? idk |
| Composer: | Seppo Hurme |
the track from this ost that usually gets it's praise sung is redial but something about this one always stood out to me. a little bit more stuff going on. way back in middle school i wanted to use this as my outro theme for my awesome youtube channel that never actually happened.
I've gotta play bomberman hero sometime..
| Title: | Milky |
| Game: | Bomberman Hero |
| System: | Nintendo 64 |
| Year: | April 30, 1998 |
| Composer: | Jun Chikuma |
Only doing one deltarune song cause i could put like half the soundtrack on here. It's so good…………… used to be my favorite deltarune song but some of the stuff in chapter 4 is so good. I NEED a reprisal of this at some point. Please mr toby fox i beg
| Title: | Vs. Susie |
| Game: | DELATRUNE: Chapter 1 |
| System: | Windows, macOS |
| Year: | October 31, 2018 |
| Composer: | Toby Fox |
I lied, deltarune gets a second one cause FUCK, dude. No game ever has consistently instilled this emotion in me, i love deltarune so so much. Chapter 4 is hype as hell. Check out this art from famitsu as an apology for lying ↓
| Title: | GAURDIAN |
| Game: | DELATRUNE: Chapters 3+4 |
| System: | Windows, macOS, Switch, PS4, PS5 |
| Year: | June 4, 2025 |
| Composer: | Toby Fox |
donkey kong :)
similar scenario where i just don't feel like any cover quite captures this exact feeling (the banzana remix sounds really good from what's been showed off so far though !). this is most certainly monkey music - david wise hit it outta the park with that vibe.
| Title: | DK Island Swing |
| Game: | Donkey Kong Country |
| System: | SNES |
| Year: | November 21, 1994 |
| Composer: | David Wise |
gahhhh. this is such a beautiful and wonderful song. littlebigplanet means the world to me and this blasts me with 1000 memories. my brother would let me watch, maybe play with him every once and a while and it felt magical. later on, he'd give me his ps3 and i'd play with friends.. take me back to plane bomb survival...
| Title: | The Orb of Dreamers |
| Game: | LittleBigPlanet |
| System: | PlayStation 3 |
| Year: | October 27, 2008 |
| Composer: | Daniel Pemberton |
BANGER ALERT !!
the steel wool games SUCK because Leon Riskin doesn't do the soundtrack anymore (outside of the general quality, that was genuinely one of the saddest things about security breach to me)
| Title: | 240 Bits Per Mile |
| Game: | Freddy Fazbears Pizzeria Simulator |
| System: | Windows |
| Year: | December 4, 2017 |
| Composer: | Leon Riskin |
it's stupid and silly but fnaf is really important to me. Like sonic, it's one of the few things that just seeing will make me inherently happy. I know people who are incredibly important to me because of it. this piece of music is so poignant to me. this is the end. it isn't a fnaf 3 or 4 situation, this is it. "this ends for all of us". More games would be made yeah, I doubt anyone would've thought otherwise (I mean, it would've been cool if cawthon made the desolate abandon..), but I think this provides a very clear cut jumping off point for the series story-wise. you can stop here and be completely content, never even acknowledge anything with the books or the steel wool games. i think very few series ever get something like that
| Title: | Credits |
| Game: | Freddy Fazbears Pizzeria Simulator |
| System: | Windows |
| Year: | December 4, 2017 |
| Composer: | Leon Riskin |
Arrangements
One of the first arrangement albums I came across!! I just think it's neat this is official, I dig the house feel. Overall for sure a tad messy - the voice samples in particular can be a bit much sometimes, but i dunno. i fw it. heehee! i got it!
| Title: | Circuit |
| Album: | Mario Kart 64 on Club Circuit |
| Release: | December 26, 1997 |
| Composer: | Kenta Nagata |
| Arrangement: | AKOUST |
Gonna vaguely attempt to organize these by series. Absolutley one of my favorite mario themes, and I love this rendition.. just so joyous and pleasent
| Title: | Mario Adventures I (Main BGM #1) |
| Album: | Super Mario Land |
| Release: | September 1, 1989 |
| Composer: | Hirokazu Tanaka |
| Arrangement: | Ikuro Fugiwara |
I think I just really enjoy these wholly different takes on songs I know so well. These early 90s renditions expirement in really interesting ways. its rad!! :D
<-- the text is SO small.. its too late to fix it ;;
| Title: | Title Theme |
| Album: | The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time Re-Arranged Album |
| Release: | December 22, 1999 |
| Composer: | Koji Kondo |
| Arrangement: | MOKA |
f-zero and jazz is just kinda always rad. Don't have a ton to say about it, but overall this is one of the more intresting albums. check out the whole thing!
| Title: | Fire Field |
| Album: | F-ZERO |
| Release: | March 25, 1992 |
| Composer: | Yumiko Kanki, Naoto Ishida |
| Arrangement: | Robert Hill, Michiko Hill |
OUGHHHH its SO good, my favorite arrangement album by far. X's OST is my favorite in the series, and this builds ontop of it in the best way possible. Imagine a new F-Zero game with a soundtrack like this...
| Title: | Crazy Call at Cry |
| Album: | F-ZERO X Guitar Arrange Edition |
| Release: | January 27, 1999 |
| Composer: | Taro Bando |
| Arrangement: | Ryuichi Katsumata |
(probably more recognizable as big blue) the drums are this one are fucking crazy??
| Title: | Decide in the Eyes |
| Album: | F-ZERO X Guitar Arrange Edition |
| Release: | January 27, 1999 |
| Composer: | Naoto Ishida |
| Arrangement: | Ryuichi Katsumata, Taro Bando |
| Title: | Climb Up! And Get The Last Chance! |
| Album: | F-ZERO X Guitar Arrange Edition |
| Release: | January 27, 1999 |
| Composer: | Taro Bando |
| Arrangement: | Ryuichi Katsumata |
Mute City!! this one too has crazy drums. I've learned the drummer's name is Soul Toul, and thats fucking awesome.
| Title: | Endless Challenge |
| Album: | F-ZERO X Guitar Arrange Edition |
| Release: | January 27, 1999 |
| Composer: | Yumiko Kameya |
| Arrangement: | Ryuichi Katsumata, Taro Bando |
Dream chaser is SUCH a good song dude. i wish the Climax rendition got a version like this. i like hearing the teeny tiny orchestra hits in the background
okay end of f-zero blast
| Title: | Dream Chaser |
| Album: | F-ZERO X Guitar Arrange Edition |
| Release: | January 27, 1999 |
| Composer: | Taro Bando |
| Arrangement: | Ryuichi Katsumata |
SONIC BLAST !! I don't really fw most of this album but this one's interesting... pretty much an entirely new song with open your heart as a base
| Title: | Open Your Heart (Main Theme of Sonic Adventure) |
| Album: | Sonic Adventure Remix |
| Release: | December 16, 1998 |
| Composer: | Crush 40 |
| Arrangement: | Chris Vrenna, Mark Blasques |
Obligatory that I put this here. the Crush 40 version on this album is super interesting, but absolutely pales in comparison. neat that it changes the perspective of the song though. Regardless, i think i prefer the original overall.
| Title: | HIS WORLD (Zebrahead Version) |
| Album: | Sonic the Hedgehog Vocal Traxx: Several Wills |
| Release: | January 10, 2007 |
| Composer: | Tomoya Ohtani, Ali Tabatabaee, Matty Lewis |
| Arrangement: | Zebrahead |
PEAKK!!!! this albums awesome, i love Sonic CD so much. I've listened to this way more then cosmic eternity (the song its based off).
| Title: | When we reach for you~Could it be right~ |
| Album: | Sonic the Hedgehog - Remix |
| Release: | December 7, 1994 |
| Composer: | Naofumi Hataya |
| Arrangement: | Naofumi Hataya, Yasu |
sonic cd bonus stage music makes my brain tingle in myserious ways..
| Title: | #8th SPACE |
| Album: | Sonic the Hedgehog - Remix |
| Release: | December 7, 1994 |
| Composer: | Masafumi Ogata |
| Arrangement: | Masafumi Ogata |
ive run out of insightful commentary about these. i like this one.
| Title: | Love You "Sonic" |
| Album: | Sonic the Hedgehog - Remix |
| Release: | December 7, 1994 |
| Composer: | Naofumi Hataya |
| Arrangement: | Naofumi Hataya, Yasu |
I've yet to play the msx metal gear games.... fake fan... but this is rad as hell, it transforms the original in a neat way. Also wowwee!! this one really really displays that I shouldn't have formatted it like this. so small.
| Title: | Return of Foxhounder (Arranged Version) |
| Album: | Metal Gear >> Solid Snake Music Compilation of Hideo Kojima / Red Disc |
| Release: | December 23, 1998 |
| Composer: | Iku Mizutani, Shigehiro Takenouchi, Motoaki Furukawa |
| Arrangement: | Kanichiroo Kubo |
Im pretty sure i just like the chiptune arrangements a lot. they almost alwasy capture the original song while also doing unique stuff.
| Title: | Divine Bloodlines ~Akumajo Dracula X: Chi no Rondo (PC-Engine)~ |
| Album: | Akumajo Dracula Tribute Vol. 1 |
| Release: | January 13, 2011 |
| Composer: | Michiru Yamane |
| Arrangement: | Yousuke Yasui |
chiptune is rad but the 90s rock albums.... GODD theyre so good.
| Title: | Beginning |
| Album: | Perfect Selection Dracula Battle |
| Release: | July 21, 1994 |
| Composer: | Hidenori Maezawa |
| Arrangement: | Naoto Shibata |
Smash Bros. Remixes
blehhhhhhh. what the hell.. i've gotta actually put effort into this cause if i just put a youtube link it WILL be taken down eventually. blows. i really like this arrangement though!! the snare and guitar at the end holy shit its sooo good. the little motifs of bonetrousle and heartache.... oughh
| Title: | MEGALOVANIA |
| Game of Origin: | UNDERTALE |
| Game: | Super Smash Bros. Ultimate |
| Composer: | Toby Fox |
| Arrangement: | Toby Fox |
out of every smash remix this one always sticks out in my mind. the brawl ones are so good in general but this is such a wonderful tribute to ocarina of time, that also still works well as a fighting game song?? just really impressive stuff. 1:38 always gets me... so good
| Title: | Ocarina of Time Medley |
| Game of Origin: | The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time |
| Game: | Super Smash Bros. Brawl |
| Composer: | Koji Kondo |
| Arrangement: | Michiko Naruke |
never played pilotwings in my life but i fw this crazy
| Title: | Light Plane (Vocal Mix) |
| Game of Origin: | Pilot Wings |
| Game: | Super Smash Bros. for Wii U |
| Composer: | Soyo Oka |
| Arrangement: | Masato Coda, RiRiKA |