The introduction says it all: "your list will not match this list, so don't bitch."

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/41663.html

That was actually a pretty cool list! I didn't expect to see #7 or #3 show up but I'm glad OWA wasn't on there.

Hey, I saw this a day or two ago and didn't even realize it was new.

Most of the picks aren't surprising, and number one is especially predictable (I must be the only guy in the world who doesn't slobber uncontrollably at the mere mention of Zelda), but I'm impressed with all the old school love.  They could've easily picked stuff like MGS and Halo but it looks like the classics prevailed.  Not bad at all.

You're not alone, man.

Good to know.

I figured I type this up since Zelda was brought up; am I the only one who doesn't like the NES rendition of the main/title theme? There are parts that seem way to slow to me and I'm a complete slave the version in A Link to the Past where it's the main overworld theme.

You're being a tad vague here; are you saying that you don't care for the version that plays during the opening story/items crawl - a version that was meant to be played up deliberately slow?  In my book, that one is still one of the most memorable versions of the theme after the beautiful end credits from A Link To The Past. 

If you mean the main overworld version, then I'm still confused.  It sounds moderately paced throughout to me; which parts exactly are slow?

I guess I could have been more clear:

The version I'm talking about disliking is track #56 "Title BGM" on the Famicom 20th Anniversary Original Sound Tracks Vol.1 album; track #57 "Overworld BGM" is the more straightforward version that was revisited in Link to the Past and is more to my liking.

The MGS and Halo soundtracks are so ambiently boring; I'm not surprised they DID NOT make the list.

IT COULD'VE HAPPENED

MGS series and Halo series have very popular and celebrated soundtracks.  Maybe not so much with us since we're HARDCORE, but for the average gamer, they possess some of the best soundtracks of all time.

Just so that no one misunderstands me, I'm not saying that you can't be a VGM enthusiast and favor an MGS or Halo soundtrack a great deal. (In fact, I happen to like the original MGS score, which is why I own it.  I don't think Halo is too bad either, although I'll take PD over it anyday.)  Just that the seasoned VGM fan tends to have a lot of different scores old and new which he/she might favor moreso, whereas the casual fan these days will more likely look at those two and not look further with the exception of other popular series like Zelda and Final Fantasy.

Well, I don't like the theme in any version, so...

Ocarina's is my favorite overworld theme of the series.

Couldn't agree more on that.  Its absence alone made this list for me. :-)

I was scratching my head at Duke Nukem, but I remember that it was quite popular. I think it was the partial nudity because I recall guys talking about it. Duck Tales was another surprise. And Gang Plank Galleon from DKC? I can understand the need to have Rare on the list, but if they wanted to capture the humor of that company, Mayahem Temple from Banjo Tooie would've been a better choice.

.

WHHHAAAATTT?! That's the version that deviated from the original theme SIGNIFICANTLY! Oh, sure, there were shreds of the original theme in there, but it was more so a remix or variation than simply the good 'ol theme really suped up. Unless of course, you're just joking, then I'm overreacting.

People actually complained about it quite a lot, that Nintendo brought back the theme for the overworld in Majora's Mask. Too bad not too many people played it, because they got annoyed by the whole time restarts thing, because it was a good game; liked it better than Ocarina. Plus, Clocktown was a nicely developed town. Not that one-screen pittance that comprised the Hyrule Castle town in Ocarina...

The main themes are pretty recognizable, but if you're buying the soundtrack just only after hearing the main theme, you're pretty much getting boned.

The first Halo's soundtrack, I remember being a lot of variations on the main theme, and a messload of generic, ambient tunes; I guess after listening to them in-game as much as the average Halo player does, they want to hear them all day long, but taken just as the music they are? Meh.

Metal Gear Solid 2 & 3 had some good damn main themes, but again, the music after that is so mystifingly boringly ambient, you'd only be able to point out the nuances and differences in the pieces after listening to them, again, in-game as much as you would playing the game.

The MGS2 soundtrack as a whole was good, but the printings they did mostly included only the cinematic themes, not the gameplay themes; it was the gameplay themes that REALLY stuck in my head, not the damn cinematic jingles that I only heard about once each, and couldn't even hear over all the talking, not that the cinematic music was much of anything, anyway. BAH! I'm just so disappointed over the MGS2 soundtrack releases; MGS2 was actually my favorite of the MGS games...despite Raiden.

Word.

  DUDE.

Maybe it was just me, but I was completely surprised to see #3.  The theme's been remade so many times before?  Wut?

Always glad to see Ducktales' "The Moon".  Great piece.

Speaking of Zelda's main theme, this is my favorite rendition of it.  Part Ocarina (lead up), part original (core theme), part Link to the Past (great finish).  Strange that you can only hear this version on the OOT/Master Quest menu of the Gamecube port.

I like the Metal Gear Solid soundtracks even if I think the first is overrated and I don't like Nobuko Toda. I found Harry Gregson-Williams cinematic themes for MGS2 so generic and boring, but he fortunately made more exuberant contributions to MGS3 and MGS4. Main reason I like the series' music is Norihiko Hibino though. I just love the soundscapes and rhythms he's created for the series -- case in point, "Tanker Incident".

No no, that's what I meant - the signature 'Zelda' theme drives me nuts. Ocarina's new theme is an all-around good piece, and I was actually pretty irritated that fan outcry impelled the return of the Same Old Theme. But then, I'm that way with a lot of traditionally recurring themes, so don't mind me.

Agreed. A great fresh theme. What I really loved about it was how it was truly interactive in the context of the game. The whole theme is built on 25 or so 15 second fragments but some pretty complex algorithms decide what's segmented where. Nintendo always leading the way in terms of interactivity...

As for NES Zelda, the opening theme was composed in a day based on the overworld theme after the intention to use Ravel's Bolero fell through. I like it in a kind of goofy way but I don't think much of the soundtrack on the whole. Most themes are good but there are just too few, especially the dungeon themes.

Really?

I wonder if the FDS was a factor -- Castlevania II uses less music than the first. I always wondered why...

There's some obvious stuff, like MM2, Mario and Zelda.
There's some stuff where they got the series right, but not the song, like Sonic. I mean, Green Hill Zone!? Come on! The entirety of Sonic 2 consists of far superior music. This should obviously have been Chemical Plant Zone, as any sane person would agree.
There's some What The Hell stuff, like Duke Nukem. I mean, for realZ!?

And then there's the "Wow, I'm not the only one who really likes that theme?"  stuff, like Ducktales.

This list could have been much, much worse.
In fact, it's pretty good!

As for Ducktales, I like the Amazon theme much better...but I seem to be the only one.

And if you're going for "wtf that could have been better", well obviously there's SO many FF tracks that could have been picked (eespecially the Prologue), then of course for the SD series I could probably come up with 50 tracks better...but I think they were in general going for 'defines the series' just as much as 'best'.

Yes, why exactly are you opposed to it? Overall a good list, but it was particularly nice to see a PC tune get some recognition.

I was completely surprised to see Ducktales on there, but after I heard the Moon music again, I remembered that it was my favorite piece in the game. Yeah, I actually played -- and FINISHED -- that game like a million times, heh.

And ohhh Zelda...

That MSNBC list is downright awful. Who the hell wrote it? They called the Halo theme "original" and then cited, as counterexamples, "Mario Party" and "Xenogears" as UNORIGINAL. Funny that both are Mitsuda, and even more funny considering Xenogears has a number of extrememly memorable and original tunes.

I also like that it's top five "songs" but they list soundtracks. "Final Fantasy 7" is apparently the number one song. And they also say it was SO popular, that it actually had a soundtrack published for it in Japan!  Wuh-wuh-WHOA!!! Like there aren't thousands of those out there, even for extremely unpopular games.

The sort of ignorance that goes into articles like the MSNBC one makes me want to hit my head against a brick wall.

Back to original post...

The top 10 from ScrewAttack is pretty good. It reflects their specific staff and culture very well. I wasn't surprised at all by their picks. Generally, I like what ScrewAttack puts out. It's a little on the fanboyish side, but at least they're intelligent (usually).

To be fair, what is being said is that Mario Party and Xenogears are "a far cry" from the generic soundtracks of contemporary games. That said, the list is pretty pointless, yeah...

OWA hate! No!

It is one of my favorite songs. I'll have to check out the list after class ...

Heh, cool video.  And not a deplorable list.  I wasn't so surprised by Amazon from Duck Tales.  It IS a really great theme and I remember it doing quite well on one of the recent chip tune contests on GFF.  The Duke Nuke Em theme seems to be popular and I've never played a game from the series so I don't really know...but the theme from the video sounded like crap. O_O  The Super Metroid theme was a surpriser for me.  Atmospherically it is a really cool and memorable theme, but I didn't expect so many people to think so. 

Oddly enough, one of my favorite songs from the entire video was the ending credits theme, "You're The Best Around" by Bill Conti from Karate Kid.

- Justin Pfeiffer

Never played Nuke'em either, at the time it just seemed like a DOOM Clone to me, and well I just kept playing DOOM instead since THAT was kick ass

Oh...yeah I was misreading that. I'm dumb.

Good call.