Personally, I’m a huge fan of Hollow Knight, Ori and the (Blind Forest/Will of the Wisps), and Kingdom Hearts. Orchestral soundtracks are just something else…
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Undertale is my #1. Bully is my #2.
- Nanashi no Game
- Soma Bringer (only one song linked, there was no playlist available)
- Final Fantasy XIV
- The Last Guardian
FFXIV and Nanashi are notable as they’re by the same composer (latter game was done under a pseudonym) and even happen to share at least one song, in some form.
Soma Bringer has the most beautiful music of this list.
Last Guardian has the most inspiring music.
It’s undertale for me. What a magical soundtrack that is.
For focused work:
- Shenzhen IO
- Exapunks
- Opus Magnum
- Into the Breach
- Firewatch
- IXION
Other:
- Blue Archive Symphony
- 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim Branched Remix
- Minecraft
- Stardew Valley
- Spelunky
- Undertale
- Hades
- Helltaker
- Kirby
I really vibe with Minecraft. The nostalgia just hits different when I listen to it.
Legend of Dragoon soundtrack composed by Dennis Martin.
Bajo Kazooie soundtracks by Grant Kirkhope.
Donkey Kong soundtracks by David Wise.
Sly Cooper soundtrack (first game) by Ashif Hakik.
Ratchet and Clank soundtrack (first game) by David Bergeaud
Metroid soundtracks by Kenji Yamamoto.
All made insanely long lasting impressions where I could hear just a bit from one of the songs and instantly know what it is. Having played lots of video games, these seem to be the ones that have created the most lasting memory. They also absolutely slap as well.
The Legend of Zelda games BOTW and TOTK get mention here as well, though I don’t find it as memorable. the sound design in these games is just top notch though.
Tetris definitely deserves a shoutout.
LA Noire by Simon Hale is fantastic though it’s mostly just riffing off of Chinatown’s soundtrack and I wouldn’t say it really implants itself in the memory like the ones mentioned above.
Other honorable mentions
Vice City
Jet Set Radio – Hideki Naganuma
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater
I have so many favorites, Ori soundtracks are amazing, Kingdom Hearts, Genshin Impact, Minecraft
For more lighthearted yet genius silliness though: Part Time UFO
Not really a game but a visual Novel everyone needs to read and listen to: Umineko
I never realized that Minecraft used an outside musician for their songs. I always thought it was in house until one night my wife was listening to one of her sleepy time playlists and it suddenly started playing a Minecraft song. I asked why she was listening to Minecraft and she had no idea what I was talking about since she had never played the game. I checked her phone and sure enough it was on the artist’s album and not on a Minecraft one.
Genshin OST, especially Sumeru, Absolutely slaps
FFVIII or FFX
For me, FFVII wins But only because I payed through the rename recently and rediscovered how much I love it and then played the original again.
To Zanarkand is still one of my all time favourites
Indie games in general have great OSTs, MGS:R and Persona (and SMT in general) are obvious popular picks.
The World Ends With You is less mainstream (with one of the few gripes being the lack of boss-specific themes, at least in the DS original I played - but it makes up with the diverse overworld and normal battle themes), as is Etrian Odyssey.
I think orchestra is mixed, it’s either the best fucking tracks ever (often when mixed with electric guitar or other modern instruments, but not necessarily), or they kind of blend with other orchestral tracks I know and don’t end up being unique enough to remember.
The World Ends With you has amazing OST, thanks for reminding me!
The world needs more TWEWY and Etrian Odyssey love. Great picks.
TWEWY is grossly underrated in general, but when it comes to the OST, that’s doubly true.
Make’s me wonder what they were thinking when they made the anime that was so sparse, even void at times, of all this amazing music they had to work with.
Eh, on one hand it’s overrated when people keep saying “it’s a better Persona, those fans just don’t play anything except Persona 5”, I think that’s stupid. TWEWY genuinely has a lot of flaws. A slightly too fast endgame, the second screen, etc.
But for me the gameplay is just so goddamn fun and well designed (making your own set of attacks, combining input methods, all the risk vs reward difficulty systems), and it has a few really good ideas that make me want to recommend it to anyone. I imagine you can beat the game in like, 10 hours on Easy without optional fights too, so, it’s not a big time investment. (Though actually getting the game is difficult. Switch I heard sucks at controls, phone version doesn’t seem to work on new ones, emulating the DS probably sucks too)
Hades
Absolute bangers all the way through. Along with everything else in the Supergiant lineup.
I am wondering why this hasn’t been said more often, but Undertale! Also, the super smash series always had great osts too> Undertale
Doom 2016
There are so many good game soundtracks listed in this tread!
Here are some of my favorites:
- Chrono Trigger
- Diablo II
- Elden Ring
- Final Fantasy <insert number> (and pretty much anything by Nobuo Uematsu)
- Hades (and all of the Supergiant Games soundtracks)
- NieR: Automata
- Witcher III
Whole soundtrack for the Talos Principle. So peaceful.
