Oh, that reminds me about something: check your email.
I thought about mentioning Earthbound, but realized that I remember liking the music but don’t remember most of the music itself.
Which remixes are worth listening to? I don’t really understand why this music needs remixing, but maybe hearing some good ones will convince me.
The soundtrack to Katamari Damacy is terrific and the We Love Katamari soundtrack only slightly less so.
The great thing about Earthbound’s soundtrack is that despite being an RPG, the tracks aren’t epic orchestral compositions. It’s very hard to describe, it’s pretty much unlike any other game music. It’s like what you’d actually hear in the background while wandering around the real-life analogs of the game world.
The mixes in that remix project are hit and miss for me, but a couple of my favorites are “Side Four Turns Winter”, “Vector Point Engineering Water Buffalo”, and “Get on the Bus”. Many of the remixes are pretty liberal with the melodies so I recommend finding the original soundtrack itself.
No love for the Legend of Zelda series, eh?
Check out Zelda Reorchestrated.
Oh, hells yeah. The original theme (as in, title music, not the overworld music) to The Legend of Zelda (in all it’s 8-bit beeping glory) is my phone’s ringtone. And the “da da da DA” sound that plays when you get a new item is my new text message notification.
And Ocarine of Time had fan-TAS-tic music. The Gerudu Valley music was very cool.
The Super Smash Brothers Brawl soundtrack is probably one of the best soundtracks I’ve heard in recent years, just because the soundtrack itself consists of remixes of so many great tunes of previous games.
The Donkey Kong Country series had some amazing music. Mega Man 2, Mega Man 3, and the first three Mega Man Xs also have stellar tunes. And chalk me up under the category of another Final Fantasy/Chrono Trigger music lover (although the recent ones haven’t been as up to snuff as the SNES and original Playstation FFs).
Also I love the music for Tetris Attack. It’s a lesser known puzzle game but I can play it for hours on end because of the music. 
Finally, can’t forget Doom. E1-1 is a classic video game tune in my opinion.
SSX.
The original.
Seriously, excellent soundtrack. Very nice electronic soundtrack.
Plus - and I’m not sure it was the first game to do this, but it was the first game I noticed doing it - the soundtrack is dynamic.
Play poorly? Elements of the current track drop out, until you’re down to the bassline alone.
Play well? The track will keep building, adding lines, until it ROCKS YOUR FACE.
I also love how when you take a jump the soundtrack fades (subtly) while you perform tricks. Then when you land - bam. It’s all back, and you can hear the crowd roaring.
It’s been about eight years since its release; this is still the game that made the biggest impression on me soundtrack-wise.
I still have a few of the tracks as MP3s, great game.
From the Tubrografix=16 CDROM world:
It Came from the Desert and Shadow of the Beast both had great music. And since they CD-Roms were just CDs with the first or second track being computer data, the music could be recorder or even ripped in a later decade.
I doubt more than one other person here ever played it, but I always loved the level music from Battlestorm for the Amiga CDTV.
I’m actually working on a Frets on Fire version ATM.
Total Annihilation had a great orchestral soundtrack that matched the game so well. It sounded like the best of every great science fiction theme song blended together. The change in music to accompany a battle often didn’t kick in in time, so a small clash was over by the time it changed, but I forgive it that.
The add on disc for Command and Conquer was rather chilled out, I welcomed being able to play it on a CD player. In fact I think I’ll dig it out and rip it onto my lap top for repeat listening.
Metal Marines on the SNES had one of those curious organ-sounding synthesised sound tracks that seemed to represent just about every games on the SNES and Megadrive during the 90s. It was a sort of overly dramatic bit of music that matched the silly science fiction setting of the game.
I love the soundtrack to the Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney games (Nintendo DS, aka “Gyakuten Saiban”). I think it really supported my enjoyment of the gameplay, making courtroom scenes exciting and giving characters more flavor. There are actually several variation CDs in existence, among them the excellent “Gyakuten Meets Orchestra”.
But apparently I’m not the only one who likes the soundtrack…they even have their own Wiki entry.
I adore Yatsunori Mitsuda. Scars of Time is one of my all time favorites.
Music is pretty important in a game, for me. Annoying music sucks me right out of a game, and a good fight theme pulls me back in. I do gravitate towards RPGs in general, though, so there are a lot of wonderful scores to listen to.
The PC game Mafia has a cute little swingy tune that plays while you drive your Model T around, it really gets stuck in my head, but not in a bad way!
And for the Chrono Cross/Final Fantasy song fans, I have to recommend listening to Eminence if at all possible. I saw them perform at Otakon 2007 and they did amazingly well with only a 5 piece orchestra, I only wish they could have brought the whole crew over from Australia. They played a mix of themes from several Miyazaki films (the Totoro theme was adorable!) and for their encore they did Scars of Time (see the YouTube recording of this very performance here ).
They are amazingly talented and it was a great show.
I always liked the opening piano piece in FFX. It sounds nice but also sounds like the end of the world is coming right around the corner.
The Myst soundtrack is one I still enjoy. American McGee’s Alice soundtrack perfectly evoked the sadness and madness the tragic heroine has to overcome. Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodline’s soundtrack is quite good too.
The music changes depending on the area of the city you’re in. The Chinatown area has this very goofy upbeat song with lyrics that actually talk about Chinatown.
I went through the trouble of stripping that out and adding it to my music library. Absolutely haunting. It’s a massive choir singing the piece, for anyone who’s following along at home.
I just looked up that *Homeworld *piece, I love choral arrangements - it’s gorgeous!
That’s great. I might have to steal your txt message idea.
On my previous phone, two of my ringtones were the victory theme from Final Fantasy (I used the one from the SNES FF4), and the opening music from Kid Icarus. Both work GREAT as rings! When I upgraded my phone, I was too lazy to reinstall them so I’m still using default rings, but I’m adding that to my todo list.
I’ve been playing through Metroid Zero, and I’ve always felt like that series had great music for setting moods. Brinstar has a nice upbeat feel to it, Norfair has a “ok, now the game is getting harder so lets get serious here” theme, Kraid & Ridley’s lairs have very creepy themes, and Tourian has a “dude, where the hell AM I?” tone to it. And the save/item room “theme” has a nice catch-your-breath and remember that nobody can hear you breathe feel. And the “getting chased” theme on the Pirates Ship is even more startling than the “you’ve been seen!” theme from Metal Gear Solid.