You ever see a movie, play a game, watch a show, etc. and thought "Damn, this track is the shit" or something of that nature? What Original Soundtracks were the best to you? Maybe even point out a bad one.

My favorites

Anime
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FquprDNQiL0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMIVleLmAiE

Videogames
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwaCMbfHwmQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAUxhHz-LCM

Howard Drossin and Nobuo Uematsu always make awesome game soundtracks. I also remember the OST for a game called Dragon Valor to be really epic but I can't remember the composer.

Armored Core. They all rock as mech sim music. Best song is 'Why Won't You Come Down.'

Kämpfer said:
Metal Gear and EarthBound had great music.

EarthBound has to be one of my absolute favorites. Not just the OST, though it certainly helps the whole package.

I'm still in love with the Elder Scrolls IV soundtrack. It's blissful, it's stressful, it's perfect.

RioluKid said:
My favorites

Anime
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FquprDNQiL0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMIVleLmAiE

Videogames
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwaCMbfHwmQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAUxhHz-LCM

That Megaman X5 music; you have earned my full respect, sir.

God, that's tough. I adore the Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex OSTs. The OST for the first Transformers movie is awesome, too. The Pirates of the Caribbean and Nolan Batman film OSTs are great, too.

Assassin's Creed 4.

The sea shanties are just perfect.

Kämpfer said:
Metal Gear and EarthBound had great music.

Jugofthat said:
EarthBound has to be one of my absolute favorites. Not just the OST, though it certainly helps the whole package.

Did you know about the OST for Mother 1/EarthBound Zero that had English vocals? I haven't listened to all the tracks myself. Pollyanna, The Paradise Line, Bein' Friends and Eight Melodies were the only ones I knew about. Until I looked it up just now, I actually didn't know it was an official album or had more than those few tracks.

As for my own favorite OST's, I'm always so terrible at picking favorites. It seems it's easier to play favorites the less I care about a subject, and I love music. There's so many I want to mention, I could spend hours grabbing links for this post, but I'll try not to. So please keep in mind that this list is far from exhaustive and in no particular order:

For games, Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean is amazing all-around (and oddly still looks fantastic on my HDTV, despite being an SD GameCube RPG). The background music in Morrowind and Skyrim is very relaxing for me. Hardly needs to be mentioned, but you can rarely go wrong with a Zelda soundtrack. Plenty of great tracks throughout the Final Fantasy series (I don't even like FFX that much, but oh gosh, To Zanarkand ;~;). Siegfried's theme in SoulCalibur V gets an honorable mention.

I also like a lot of tracks throughout the Pokemon series, though people seem to be a lot more divided on those. I particularly like the orchestrations they usually do for the anime.

The only non-game I can think of at the moment is the anime Black Cat (incidentally my favorite anime, since I'm not huge into anime like I used to be).

∑asyZ said:
That Megaman X5 music; you have earned my full respect, sir.

Best Megaman ost Ever

Is it okay if I do a massive list of every music I can remember?

Edit: Eh, fuck it. It's not just about everything. I'm being considerate c:

In no particular order, the ones I liked:

I find this badass

Kämpfer said:
And often ruined by people screaming about mudcrabs.

I have the theory that Thalmor made a mudcrab invasion to distract people, because some of the few people that didn't talk about it sometimes said high elf wizards were rioting lol.

The Stanley Parable
I know this is probably a stretch because its not like, an original soundtrack but the songs on this are pretty freakin' rad and they fit so well.
NHL07

I could put tons more, but that would take me about 3 days lol

I forgot the soundtrack to the first Resident Evil movie.

Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu Black Label, and almost everything else by CAVE.

TheHuskyK9 said:
I find this badass

Yes. Max Payne 3 had a great musical score. Rockstar Games as a whole tends to have quality sounds and music in their games. Tho I have an extremely weak spot for anything Red Dead Redemption.

Songs like this, this and this are just some of all the excellent musical scores that have been featured in RG games throughout the years. My personal favorite of theirs is this one.

Although, there is one musical score I find myself listening to over and over, and in my opinion, it beats most classical musical scores by a long shot. The music of Lost scored by Michael Giacchino.

Just listen to these.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.

Takes a minute or two of buildup, but I am absolutely in love with how they all start off slow and calm, and then build up to a barrage of violins and pianos fighting for the center. Michael have also scored multiple other series/movies. Up, among them. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjAWAUc_33k

There are too many for me to list, but as of right bow I'm madly in love with the soundtrack from Unlimited SaGa

Mega Man 3
Silent Hill 1-4
Persona 3
Fallout New Vegas
LA Noire
Mafia

I am sure there is others but those are the first that came to mind.

Persona 3 & 4
Katamari Damacy
Alan Wake

That's all I can remember. Game music usually bores me enough to turn it off and switch to my own playlist.

As for anime OST? Neon Genesis Evangelion, Cowboy Bebop, .hack//Sign and Steins;Gate.

Blodsho said:
Did you know about the OST for Mother 1/EarthBound Zero that had English vocals? I haven't listened to all the tracks myself. Pollyanna, The Paradise Line, Bein' Friends and Eight Melodies were the only ones I knew about. Until I looked it up just now, I actually didn't know it was an official album or had more than those few tracks.

Yeah, I happened to know about that one but like you I haven't heard the tracks aside from those already up on YT. I find most of those a bit too cheesy for my tastes, though I'm pretty fond of the choir version of Eight Melodies / Mother Earth. It's especially nice how it uses both songs, and while there's no real mixing them together going on, it still sounds natural.

Gawd, these games have such enjoyable scores, all three of them. There's a bit of everything to be found in them, lots of memorable tracks and some can be hauntingly beautiful for a variety of reasons. Mother 2 stands out the most though, probably for its unsurpassed ability to make me feel bloody nostalgic. There's something about those early towns and their music that just gets to me.

As for others, well... I'm not much of a movie buff yet an avid fan of videogame music, so I've got little to link to in one regard and too much in the other. Hmmm, difficult.

One thing I can say is that I'm quite passionate about integrating a recurring (and transformable in mood) motif into a singular soundtrack, makes it feel cohesive and potentially more dramatic in a good way. Obvious example here would be the original Star Wars trilogy, but if I'm really to stick to one movie on its own, then it's definitely the reason for one of my favorite film OSTs being James Horner's score of The Land Before Time.

There's three distinct riffs that turn up everywhere throughout that movie in various forms and two are used in a transformable way, the most recognizable even ends up becoming the chorus of that Diana Ross ballad during the credits. It's a kids flick (though relatively dark as shit) but the soundtrack is very mature orchestral stuff.

This phenomenon is much more rare in games, in that there are lots of recurring themes within series but seldomly within a game itself, twice is usually the maximum. Radiant Silvergun is a very good example of an OST heavily relying on one or two themes, and it does work very well there I think. The first two (or three if you count SF2) Star Fox titles also do a lot with their respective main themes, though not as consistently. Now it's actually not something I'd want to see constantly as that'd get pretty boring, but I do really like when it happens.

Xch3l said:

Crash Bandicoot Series

Crash 1

• The Lost City / Sunset Vista

Slippery Climb / Stormy Ascent (Unreleased)
Road to Nowhere / The High Road
Temple Ruins
Heavy Machinery / Castle Machinery
Toxic Waste

Twinsanity had a hilarious soundtrack.

Also this

SirAntagonist said:
Twinsanity had a hilarious soundtrack.

I was going to include up to CTR because that was the last I played...

Also this]

Oh, I remember that game!

Moon_Moon said:
The Stanley Parable

@Moon_Moon I remember the first time I heard Following Stanley, it was epic! Adventure line FTW! lol

Ctrl f
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You guys need to step this shit up.

Civilization 5, good game, great soundtrack:

Fuck you Gandhi, ya backstabbing warmonger shit.

Pacific Rim, cool movie (if you like giant monsters or intricate machinery), better soundtrack

Mutha fuckin giant robots
Fightin' giant monsters

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery, unremarkable game, wonderful soundtrack:

Aaawwwww
Yissssss

-> There is also a cool remix album of the soundtrack with some nice songs in it.

Mix it up

Little Inferno, shit game, neat soundtrack:

Burn it all

Cloud Atlas, ok movie, really fucking long, pretentious, great soundtrack:

One
Two

Papers, Please, Great game, only has like 3 songs in it but the theme is really cool if you like the sound of oppression:

gib pprs plox or i rprt u

I could go on forever about soundtracks.

Peekaboo said:
Songs like this,

Awww yeah, RDR. This guy knows what's good.

Awww yeah, RDR. This guy knows what's good.

RDR was a really atmospheric game and the music definitely plays a part in that. Would've liked having a few more 'hummable' tunes among the ambient though, but that's an issue I have with many modern titles in general. Praise the lord (and Japan) for sending us stuff like Xenoblade every once in a while.

Now if you ask me, that's probably the best OST of last generation right there. Very impressive stuff with a load of memorable songs, I love it to bits. And it's not like the rest totally doesn't measure up to it either. Anyone with at least a passing interest in RPGs and access to a Wii (U) or Dolphin should try that game, it's damn good fun.

My two favorites would have to be any classic Doom game's ost, and the Spelunky remake.

Also (le bump, why is this dying already) should mention I've been giving Symphony of the Night a lot of playtime lately. Classic game of course, and another OST that's full of killers. Everything Michiru Yamane touches turns to gold it seems, but out of her work this is easily top three material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REfbb0ZbuXc&index=1&list=PLR8BQUi55UEx2nzn-J5s8K6-a25cMVXHp

Dat Wood Carving Partita.

And uhh... Dance of Pales, Dance of Gold, Finale Toccata, The Tragic Prince, freaking Blood Relations, Rainbow Cemetery, Heavenly Doorway, Festival of Servants... Yeah, good stuff. Some very intricate, free-flowing writing going on but it never meanders off into senseless padding or wankery, every time an electric guitar turns up it's put to good use, and the classically influenced songs really feel quite genuine. It's another style of Castlevania music altogether from the uptempo, very much videogame-y songs of the games from the 8- and 16 bit eras, but I like it all the same.

• Phoenix Wright or Ace Attorney Investigations. That musical style.. Just about all of it is epic. Then there is the orchestral remix :)

You can check out Fuandon's Let's Plays on YouTube for a good sample of the tracks -- he's done LPs of basically every PW/AAI game that ever got released in English. (the games are also hilarious and touching)

• Ghost Trick. Techno + drama.. The great style of the game itself also ties in with it.

• Touhou. Any of the OSTs, and many of the (mindbogglingly numerous -- measurable in terabytes) remixes/arrangements. Not sure how to describe this, it's something about the rhythm, how basically every single tune is workable to dance to. ZUN just cannot lose at music, somehow.

• 999 (9 persons, 9 hours, 9 doors). Creates a really interesting atmosphere.. not even sure how to describe the genre.

• This isn't an OST, but it would be a shame to have a game OST thread without linking to ocremix.org .. For example they have an album of remixes of SoTN that you might be interested in, JugofThat.

• Tyrian (PC). An odd but very agreeable mix of comedy and drama, and pushes midi/OPL sound to the limits.

• Mega Man X. Every single game (at least up to X5) has plenty of great tracks.

• Fate/ Stay Night. Basically everything in it. OVERWHELMING PRESENCE describe a lot of these.

• Bahamut's Lagoon (SNES).

• Chrono trigger (SNES).. of course.

• Turrican 2 (PC) .. I'm not sure an OST exists, but it has great music and there are great remixes. Super Turrican is similarly styled but unfortunately less epic.

• Castlevania 4 (SNES)

• Sonic 1(SMS) .. I dunno, just kind of classic. A lot of SMS soundtracks aged badly, but this still sounds pretty good to me. All the Sonic Advance OSTs are pretty decent too, although the games are nothing that impressive.

• FF3/ 6 (SNES). Great OST, great remixes.

• Renegade (CPC) -- or the arcade version? Dunno what the arcade version sounded like. No actual OST for something this old, you have to record the output of the emulator basically.

• Nebulus (CPC) -- the other ports had good music too, but IMO the CPC port sounds best.

• Streets of Rage (Genesis) -- Kind of unique techno-y thing, not sure how to describe. A few tracks are really annoying, the rest are impressive.

• That's enough.

EDIT:
Oh, anime qualifies?

• Utena (Zettai Unmei Mokushiroku -- nuff said)
• Slayers (all of it. well, almost all. And there is a lot.)
• Gurren Lagann (yeah.. basically all of it, but especially the opening and closing songs)
• Cowboy Bebop. Dunno if someone else mentioned it already, but omitting it from this thread would be a crime.