The Best Video Game Soundtracks You've Never Heard -

[@Halak014]

Generally we don't think about How Much stuff is made over the years and how many of the things we miss or stay unknown. Then someone makes something like this and we get to experiences something "New" and that is good.

[@teksyndicate]

This is why I do it.. I hope more people find it because these tunes have really improved my life. I love having them on while I'm building Lego sets or working on stuff.

[@varg2315]

@@teksyndicate I know exactly what you mean, building gundam model kits to these chiptunes (and occasionally black metal) is something I can never stop doing. You should definitely check out the Der Langrisser ost too.

[@RosalinaSama]

​@@teksyndicateplease do another one, these are the absolute best!!

[@crovax3000]

When I was a kid, I would play Drakkhen on the SNES, and a couple times my mom would fall asleep to the music. I had absolutely no idea how to progress in the game, but good music.

[@CaptainGerBear]

Delighted to have someone articulate what I loved about the Daggerfall soundtrack. As much as I loved Skyrim, my favorite thing in it was hearing the bards in the taverns play the Daggerfall shopping song.

[@sleepyopossum3200]

Awesome video! I haven't heard most of these. Gonna check em all out! That Japanese version of the Castlevania soundtrack blew my mind

[@wardhale]

Same.. The first time i heard it I almost fell out of my chair. The injustice of it all! Lol

[@artichokeechobee]

What you gotta know about the Lands of Lore soundtrack @25:25 is that most of those simple noises are used for stabs or to highlight dramatic moments that are best expressed with a MIDI instrument. When you're actually playing this game it is completely rich with amazing music the whole time. There are never times where it feels like you're listening to garbage noise, it's just that there's a lot of those stabs, so proportionally the soundtrack seems small. Every dungeon location, every town, every forest, has its own amazing themes.

[@teksyndicate]

That's true, it's more of a film score than just a musical soundtrack

[@AndrewEvenstar]

Drakkhen and Lagoon on the snes! Their soundtracks are awesome! So glad you had Drakkhen in the thumbnail.

[@borisyeltsin6606]

incredible video, every time you upload something like this you send me down a rabbit hole of media/game exploration. So happy you're still making videos after all these years

[@Atthetta]

Something about the sounds and music of Drakkhen, the bizarre atmosphere and noises, along with the melodies, make it very memorable "HAK HAK DRAKKHEN!"

[@GuestOfGregoryHouse]

Thank you for making videos like this. Hearing such amazing music I've never heard before always spurs me on to continue with creative endeavours. Nobody mentions how down-to-earth you are in your videos too.

[@WavesNGames]

Thank you for bringing some light to Drakkehn! Super underrated soundtrack.

[@smokydogy]

I love videos like these, very pleasurable to watch

[@beowulf848]

The title tracks for Supremacy and Myth on C64 are both amazing chiptunes, as well

[@lanpartylandlord6123]

man i still listen to “lair” by you. i know its your old work and you probably dont care for it, but for me it reminds me of being 14 years old and building my first pc.

[@andrearovenski]

MORE OF THIS PLEASE!!!

[@MarshallHurtado]

I was actually really looking forward to this video

[@abztraktgaming]

I highly recommend Tim and Geoff Follin. Their NES and C64 soundtracks are otherworldly.

[@RikDraws]

Would be remiss not to add a couple of fun OSTs to the discussion: - Cho Ren Sha 68k for the X68000 - Devil's Crush for the PCE/T-16 - Wiz n Liz for the Mega Drive/Genesis - Anything by Tim Follin

[@gothakane]

You're like a big brother that I never had. None of my friends growing up ever appreciated chip tunes :( Awesome video, thanks!

[@AxisDimension]

for Journey to Silius I would definitely showcase the title screen and level 1; the level 1 music just rocks!

[@ziongite]

The Japanese pioneered video game music, not only by putting more technology in the sound department, but even in who they hired, they hired full blown industry leading composers. They took the aspect of the music in the video game very seriously, because they recognised that without the feeling of music, a game would not have a true identity. Koji Kondo and Nobuo Uematsu are the main pioneers, the music in the N64 Legend of Zelda, Ocarina of Time, it was unlike anything ever heard from a video game, the compositions are still being played by orchestras around the world today. And then came Uematsu, another amazing composer. And then others like Masashi Hamauzu as well. The music they have created is amazing. Sadly even most current US games still don't put effort into their music, your common US game sounds like they are all using a random generic ambient orchestra music, it's nearly impossible to remember what the music even was on most US games, which I feel makes it's identity weak. There are a few exceptions, being the Elder Scrolls games. I wouldn't say these are up to par with the top Japanese compositions in games obviously, but still the Elder Scrolls games clearly have used real composers and they stand out quite a bit above the average US game for music quality. If only more US games could do that.

[@teksyndicate]

This is so true. I almost made a video lamenting the lack of melody in most modern games... but it's mainly the western AAA stuff. The indie scene is way more experimental... and melodies are still there. This shift away from strong melodies isn't just in the gaming world... movies also sound like randomly generated atmospheric stuff... even Dune was like this. It fit the movie, but I'm sure if we had some melodies it would have fit as well. I think some starting thinking that melodies aren't serious enough or something. Anyway, I never ended up making the video because in my research I found that many argue that "melody supremacy" is racism... And it's so stupid that I just stopped. I don't have time to explain to those morons that nearly all cultures have both melodic and droning styles of music.

[@Torzelan]

A lot of gold in here, never heard of Knights of Xentar but that Divine Punishment track sounds amazing, thanks for sharing!

[@petera7745]

There's a lot of obscure OSTs that I love like Zombie Nation (NES), Plok (SNES), Waterworld (SNES), Equinox, Psycho Dream (SFC), MUSHA (Gen), and lots more!

[@Robeebert]

Drakkhen's Character Creation theme was a solid track. So powerful in comparison to the rest of the mostly-ambient sound track.

[@bloomtodecay9353]

Awesome stuff, Logan. I am excited to dive in and discover new music.

[@Taelhyr]

Great music here, I'll definitely check it out. I appreciate including Brandish 2 and Xenon, they are some of my favorite soundtracks ever

[@necrosadotor]

some of my faves: gremlins 2 (NES), ufouria (NES), nemesis the warlock (C64), cybernoid 2 (C64)

[@yourpalmax6681]

Absolutely adore the Shin Megami Tensei series, so it was nice to see it on this list. The original was actually on Super Famicom first, but I've always had a particular hard-on for the PC Engine's sound chip, so double props there. If you like that game's OST, the rest of the series has just as many bangers worth checking out. A few personal favorites of mine are the PS1 version of the first Persona (mostly ambient and atmospheric soundscapes fitting the supernatural horror vibe the game has), Nocturne (sort of a mix of techno and metal), Digital Devil Saga (very grunge-inspired), and Persona 5 (probably the outlier here as it's Jamiroquai-esque acid jazz, but I like it).

[@harrylane4]

the early Ys games have fantastic soundtracks that don't get talked about much. Falcom's music department is absolutely stellar.

[@lechibredejeanmichetrogneu2455]

totally agreen Yuzo Koshiro and JDK sound team did a wonderful job

[@mrjaegel6946]

Another Great OST is the soundtrack from the game "Yo!Joe!" remember playing that with my brother on his Amiga 600... Have always loved that OST

[@wraize78]

I love video game music and listen to it all the time. Morrowind “explore” tracks are still my favorite chill music, but I so love the 8-bit soundtracks I grew up with on the NES like 8 Eyes, Ultima Exodus, Faxanadu, Contra, Castlevania, etc. I spent some time writing out transcriptions of my favorites, intending to play some of them on my cello, but there’s just not enough time in the day! Thank you for making this!! Always love finding new-old awesome video game music to add to my collection.

[@FeelingShred]

I also remember how BIG the loudspeakers were in these old Tube TV's in the 90's, the sound was HUGE and there was lots of BASS... amazing... hearing things like the Mega Turrican intro (Sega Mega Drive) was like a life-altering experience in itself 🙏🙏🤘🤘

[@U.F.O_0908]

This is what my geek soul needs right now. Thanks Tekman 💜

[@PsychoParasyte]

Literally bought Journey to Silius having no idea what it was from a pawn shop back in the day, and was floored at how good the music was!

[@stevetb7777]

Props for including Journey to Silius! I was thinking about that a few minutes into your video, thinking I'd mention in the comments since there's no way you would mention it. =D

[@BagofSchmidt]

Sunsoft, people who made master blaster and Silius, made a Japan only game called Gimmick!. It has its own chip like castlevania 3. Amazing soundtrack. The game is also really good. For sure my favorite nes game

[@MajorSkalle]

Fabulous game! It was also released in Scandinavia as Mr. Gimmick.

[@jaceydurland9098]

Brandish is definitely my favorite here.

[@Severe-Serenity]

Awesome video! I love video game osts, often times more than the games themselves!

[@SourHDHR]

Huge thanks for sharing ♥

[@GELTONZ]

Space Invaders '91. Look it up. A lot of people give the SEGA Genesis crap for its weird soundchip and admittedly there are a lot of games that sound worse on it than on SNES. But Space Invaders '91 is incredible. I think it was the first professional work of the composer who would later do the Grandia series soundtracks.

[@retro-junkie5741]

Journey to Silius.. FTW! Bravo

[@ArkanMylos]

Thank you so much for sharing your music culture, gonna listen to all these bangers!

[@Smumbo]

Great video, I hope you make more videos like this one. Daggerfall's soundtrack is great, they should totally bring back Eric Heberling for future Elder Scrolls/Bethesda games.

[@SturmAH]

Brandish on SNES is good, but never knew there was a different version (with better music as far as I can hear) Journey to Silius punches WAY over the weight of the usual NES sound chip. So good.

[@jeremysimanek2109]

The daggerfall soundtrack added so much atmosphere to the game.

[@gamelover2222]

I have Daggerfall and Lands of Lore boxes right next to me on my bookcase. Glad to meet fellow fans!

[@Roan7995]

These are great! Thanks for sharing them.

[@SurelyYewJest]

If you want more of the Journey to Silius-style NES music, play Sunsoft's second NES Batman game Batman: Return of the Joker.

[@MajorSkalle]

If you are not familiar with legends like Rob Hubbard or Tim Follin, you are in for a treat discovering what they did back in the C64/ZX Spectrum days. They are hardly underrated in their respective communities, but games like Solstice, Silver Surfer, Pictionary (NES), Gauntlet III (C64), Star Paws, Black Lamp, Monty on the Run, Knuckle Busters, Nemesis the Warlock... The list goes on. Even something like Flimbo's Quest might be worth checking out.

[@danmakuman]

Maybe someone already mentioned it but to clarify. Castlevania III doesn't use an FM chip, the game that used it was Lagrange Point with the VRC7 which is like a similar FM sound chip to the ones on the FM packs for the MSX and Sega Mark III FM modules. Akumajo Dracula uses the VRC6 which adds two pulse waves and one sawtooth.

[@panoramacircle3281]

The ROTT soundtrack was done by Lee Jackson as well who did the tunes that you showed. There is an interview "Composers Play Roundtable with Bobby Prince, Lee Jackson and Kevin Schilder!" on youtube, check it out. Also on my channel I have a large MIDI playlist with all kinds of older game music remastered on my pro Roland synthesizer.

[@Knuxsega]

I love chiptune, but it gets so overshadowed by other genres of VGM that good music is hard to find.. The only 'worthwhile' chiptunes I have ever purchased were the Chip=WIN compilation albums. Curious to dig into to your recommendations. Sick video p.s. I never knew about the FM sound chip. The JPN version of Mad Forest, holy sh**!

[@teksyndicate]

Yeah that Japanese version isn't even fair

[@RexyRonin]

Thank you for introducing me to a lot of other good chiptune ost! It seems like I'm always lost when it comes to searching for good new music in that genre! Instant sub!

[@Sc0ttyz23]

One game that you should have mentioned that had good chiptunes was Gimmick! for the NES and Famicom.

[@teksyndicate]

I always forget about that one because it has a happier sound... It's awesome but for some reason I usually go for the darker sounds

[@gjohnst4339]

Absolutely loved this video/content. Thanks!

[@McLeanDrawingBFA]

One soundtrack that slaps way harder than it should is: universal soldier for Gameboy.

[@justinbladedemonsoul]

You forgot Dragon Spirit - The New Legend (NES) - Cutscene Theme

[@teksyndicate]

Haven't heard it.... But I'm about to fix that

[@koopatroopa]

I love the YM2151 and YM2608

[@blahblah8405]

You need to check out Ultima6 midi soundtrack, its one of the best out there. last ninja also had one of the best chiptunes

[@biostem]

100% check out Layla the Iris Missions for chiptune ecstacy. It's a recent rom hack of Layla, and the ost is incredible.

[@watcherzero5256]

My favourite game chiptunes would be Mystic Quest on the Gameboy (released in the US as Final Fantasy Adventure though it was actually the first in the Seiken Densetsu; Secret of Mana series), The Legend of Zelda, Street Fighter II, Final Fantasy 6, Desert Strike/Jungle Strike. My all time favourites though would be 1988's Grand Prix Circuit opening theme and Lotus Turbo Challenge 2 & 3 which had long soundtracks of great music. Also shout out to Rock'N'Roll Racing on the SNES which managed to reproduce famous rock and roll tracks pretty accurately.

[@OGM_OriginalGameMusic]

I was lucky enough to make a chiptune soundtrack for a real gameboy game recently! I did it on milkytracker with all the limitations of the gameboy (so 4 channels, 2 for synths, 1 for bas and 1 for noise). It was so wild. a complete learning experience as i was learning on the job. Making chiptune is so fun and i recomend people just go for it! shove yourselves in the deep end the game's called Gelatinous: Humanity Lost btw. and its such a fun game

[@vhsmemories504]

One of my favorite games OST was Devlish/Bad Omen. That album slaps so hard

[@kyler247]

5:18 there's actually a video on youtube that combines both the nes cv3 and famicom versions together and it sounds great

[@Rcmike1234]

Thanks for this video! I've occasionally hunted for older video game music but since i've never played a ton more than the obvious my knowledge is limited.

[@Rcmike1234]

god these tunes are so fucking good

[@SiimKuusik]

This is great my I prefer an artist who made such tracks as: "Sorry, You're Out of Time" and "HK 1985". Those tracks are still top for me from this genre.

[@Gordypow]

So cool!! Thanks for making this

[@DoomRater]

You cover Drakkhen, which definitely has some dope ass tracks. I was beginning to wonder if anyone else even heard them? Also the SNES game is millions of times easier than the computer versions.

[@Outshinedsg]

Love your picks, this is a great list! If I had to pick a Genesis soundtrack as "the most slept on" for me it would be The Hybrid Front. Basically no one has heard of this game because it was Japan-only and the soundtrack is insane. If you love that buzzing, "metal sound" on the Genesis, you're going to love anything by Technosoft; lots of people are familiar with Thunder Force 4 which is incredible, but Elemental Master, Devil Crash / Dragon's Fury, and Herzog Zwei are great too. You would probably like MUSHA as well. If you love progressive rock, you'll love Motoaki Takenouchi's soundtracks. Most people are familiar with his work on Shining Force 2 (another of the best game soundtracks of all time), but less known is Jewel Master, which has some awesome King Crimson vibes with it's complex time signatures and sometimes intentionally atonal instrument sounds.

[@FeelingShred]

HOLY FUCK thank you so much... because of comments like yours it's always worth devoting a bit of time scrolling down the comments... digging for gold... 🙏🙏

[@FeelingShred]

Turn Based Tactical goodness... I would love to play that, so many games did not make over to the west

[@FeelingShred]

someone mentions in the comments of that game that the soundtrack was composed by the same guys who would end up working on Sonic 3+Knuckles and also on Sonic CD?? the dream team of chip music pretty much, in their humble beginnings

[@Xioden]

Arumana no Kiseki between the cover and the first music track.. I know La-Mulana was inspired by the early MSX and Famicom games, but definitely some influence there. (And La-Mulana also has some amazing chiptunes!)

[@domm6812]

Nah, including midi isn't cheating. Early midi absolutely counts as chiptunes! It's what burned this kind of music into my brain as a child. So many great memories.

[@L4veyan]

Robocop 3 on NES had a really awesome soundtrack for the time.

[@ltloxa1159]

My favorite daggerfall track is Carol Of The Rising Sun. (Snow over Northmoor) Really though. House of the rising sun is like a reoccuring motif in that game.

[@rudidellama3718]

Man so many good stuff is out there, Ryu Umemoto is like a legend to me, so many greats tracks, really sad that he passed away so soon. Old Nihon Falcom are awesome too, they have too many version of their own soundtracks to keep track off, personally I'm fan of Dinosaur specially the FM TOWNs version and Bradish 3, the track Maison alone makes Falcom seems like leagues beyond the competition at the time. Funny enough is that I participate every weeks in a small group that submit games songs for specific themes(that vary every week) to listen together on twitch, and probably (we havent fully decided yet) this week will be 80s games

[@rudidellama3718]

Actually I forget to write, while is a newer game I think more people should give a listen to the OST for the game Samorost 3

[@StiffAftermath]

My fave chiptune soundtrack has got to be “batman” nes, “shadow of the ninja” nes, and “shatter hand” nes. Also, “Gradius III” snes, “Arcana” snes, and “Brain Lord” snes. Amazing!

[@teksyndicate]

Batman is extremely good... The second one and the Genesis version are sent too... I forgot about brain lord. Better grab that one

[@Dumbledork_Prime]

Alright, video game albums I like and not many people are talking about: -¨The Turrican (Amiga) albums by Chris Hülsbeck. Absolutely brilliant. - Toaplan has some great soundtracks for their space shooters, but the best one by far is Zero Wing. - Jaki Crush on the Super Famicom. Not many songs in the game, but they are brilliant, especially the main table theme. - The Secret of Monkey Island (PC) - SD The Great Battle (Super Famicom) - Golden Axe (Arcade/Mega Drive), one of my favorite soundtracks of all time. - Gokujou Parodius (Super Famicom), and pretty much every Parodius game. I love the funny arrangements of the classical tunes.

[@Dumbledork_Prime]

I'd like to add Shadow of the Beast (Amiga), Agony (Amiga), and Apidya (Amiga)

[@sebsavic7763]

There are a few that shouldnt be missed like. S.C.A.T. on the NES. Thunder force 4 on Genesis/Mega drive. Metal masters on the gameboy. Anyways journey to sillius is amazing

[@genrai]

Love this video, I also grew up in that era but never knew about that soundtracks, great job. But until now, my favorite track is the OST of Elemental Master on Sega Genesis, I highly recommend

[@Kuzutetsu666]

the cover art for Dragon Knight 4 is by the same dude that did Dangaoih anime, love his artstyle!

[@Blackinterceptor999]

TOP GEAR OVERDRIVE FOR THE N64 It's a local band that was from my town named GRiNDsToNe, used to practice at a bar half a block from my house. I used to go to every concert I could back then!

[@Kwstr42]

i know its a year later but youtube just suggested this to me and i saw Drakkhen and had to watch cause i love its soundtrack lol. weirdest out of the blue video bit im glad it was. chip tunes and old game musoc is some of my favorites like Ys 3 shop music is one of my top favorites as soon as you played Dragon Slayer i instantly recognized the signature sounds of the Falcom JDK sound team who did the Ys games, i have been collecting any game they did the music for just because their stuff is amazing

[@MrPSaun]

I was going to send everyone over to Acceljoe's channel, but it seems to have been sadly taken down.

[@MelvinJave]

After the first 2 sentences 🙏🏼 … I liked & subscribed

[@jantestowy123]

Great video Logan!

[@ka7ana]

Thanks for sharing this treasures, one of my favourite chiptune soundtracks is from Langrisser or for the US market Warsong, you have to try it out! Very Heavy Metally :D Maybe you can make a short Video how to rip this soundtracks directly from the ROM files or how you have set up your foobar to play all the roms. I love your stuff man! keep on going!

[@ivo215]

I was a nineties PC boy, with my (my mom's) 486DX33. And buying a Soundblaster card for it was a real game changer. I'm not sure of the model, I think it was the Soundblaster 16. Switching from the PC speaker to the soundblaster was a massive improvement. Suddenly the games had music, and sound! I can still here the tunes of Dune and Dune II in my head, well, bits of it. And then there was MOD music! Can I mention MOD music here? There weren't a lot of PC games that used MOD music. But Star Control II did, and it was awesome! Full Throttle changed it up. That game had live recorded music by the Gone Jackals (karloff5 on YT), which was a first for me. I hooked up a tape recorder to my PC and played through the whole game, so I could record the songs playing during the credits, and listen to them on my walkman. Then came Warcraft II, maybe it was the expansion Beyond the dark Protal. The CDROM was a hybrid and had normal CD music tracks on it, which played during the game. And yes, you could play them in a normal CD player too. Sorry, am I rambling? I got a bit carried away. Carry on!

[@unoriginalwebb]

Some of the ROTT music you credited to Bobby Prince was composed by Lee Jackson

[@teksyndicate]

I may need to make a correction video.

[@unoriginalwebb]

@@teksyndicate I mean you were half right for sure, Bobby Prince did split the composition duties but Deadly Gentlemen and How'd I Do were Jackson tracks

[@liefhebber6277]

Came here to comment this. Lee Jackson rules! He has a KZbin channel too Thanks for the vid @Tek Syndicate, I quite enjoyed it. Never knew games like Brandish and SMT sounded so much better on PC Engine!

[@ImMobile2014]

I had a demo cd of castlevania music and it had these tracks on it. I remember them sounding distinctly different from the American castlevania cartridge

[@fr_schmidlin]

Thank you for the recommendations! IMHO, Journey to Silius was a special entry on your list. They really made an impressive use of the NES soundchip. I'm really surprised you didn't mention any of the MSX soundtracks. This standard has some of the best chiptunes out there, specially for the OPLL and SCC soundchips. There are even some homebrews that combine PSG+SCC+OPLL for pure chiptune awesomeness.

[@Eucep]

Sunsoft made a lot of insanely good soundtracks for their games on the NES.

[@kathleendelcourt8136]

I really like Lands of Lore's FM soundtrack one of the very best on PC, it almost sounds like something Sakimoto (one of the era's FM synthesis gods) could have composed. And I'm not too suprised to see that a japanese composer contributed. To me very, very few DOS games FM soundtrack were on par with what we had on Mega Drive and Japanese computers in terms of rendition quality. It's like FM synthesis wasn't western (and especially Amercian) composers' thing. They seemed to be more comfortable with midi modules, there's absolutely amazing stuff on MT-32 and GM modules (Barry Leitch is a MT-32 genius).

[@claytonlatone8959]

The Tower of Heaven OST by Askiisoft is one of the most beautiful soundtracks I've ever heard. Also, look up the Infinity Blade Trilogy OST. Criminally underrated souls-like soundtrack Also VVVVVV and Super Hexagon have great chiptune OSTs

[@LBP2Saperoth]

please keep puting videos up on this channel regardless of the topic. i love your music

[@joebonar]

Dude these tunes are sweet.

[@1-eye-willy]

the sharp10x1000 midi channels of castlevamia is tight

[@Larry]

Aww, nothing on the Amiga?

[@teksyndicate]

Never had an Amiga... Was mostly playing dos back then. Any I have to check out?

[@Larry]

@@teksyndicate Have a look at stuff like Geoff Crammond's Grand Prix or anything by Tim Follin, super impressive stuff.

[@jamesburchill7522]

I'm in for this, however... if there aren't any C64/Amiga/ Atari ST titles in here, we need to talk. I've definitely heard the FM from the Japanese Castlevania 3. They did it with a ton of Famicom games. Also. I do like the NEC PC98 products, but to the TG-16 (You included a PC Engine Title) from the same company had some amazing sound design. NEC always ensured quality sound was part of the package.

[@xxHUNGRY4THETRUTHxx]

Dude I really like this stuff. Might I suggest Midnight Resistance for the Sega Genesis/MD & Atomic Robo Kid (Arcade Version)? Two of my favorite VG OSTs I can think of at this time. Gaming soundtracks have become my obsession for the past few years.

[@lorenzosandoval7328]

Two other gems I found are "Crusader: No Remorse" and "Crusaders: No Regret"

[@Silver_Adventures]

for anyone who wants to make pc-98 style chipmusic on modern computers checkout bamboo tracker!

[@renzaburotaki9993]

Very thx to talk about marvelous Pc games OST , oh yes many jewel OST 🙏🏽🥰