More Than Meets the Eye (Video Game Music Edition)

For those of you who know some about video games, you know that nowadays the visuals of a game are praised highly, maybe even overshadowing other wonderful parts of the game or masking the bad parts (for those who didn't know this, there was fact #65 of my day). If it wasn't sort of evident from the previous sentence, I disagree with the notion that great graphics make a great game. I could care less about the visuals of a game (to an extent, no MS Paint please), but what I care about is the soundtrack. I'd argue that video game soundtracks are like movie soundtracks: both are needed to make the media successful, both may go unnoticed in the moment, both have hidden gems somewhere in the medium.

Quick disclaimer on my part: I could possibly be a bit biased towards this music because I have played the games themselves and enjoyed them and the music. As a result though, I recommend all music I will mention and I also recommend all the games mentioned (if you’re not a gamer, the music is still great on its own). A final note, most music mentioned is earlyish in their respective games, leaving those who want to play the game spoiler free (yay!).

First up, a calmer piece from a series (not just a single game) that I honestly adore: “Dearly Beloved” from Kingdom Hearts. For the trend of being early on in the game, I think this one takes top spot, it is literally the first song you hear (title screen music). The whole piece (or rather all versions of it, 16 of them at the moment) is very relaxing with a piano dominating the song with string accompaniments, a whole orchestra, or even just the piano alone depending on the version. For those who want to play the games, be wary. There are currently eight games with one more on the way and ALL of them are canonical. It’s a bit crazy.     

Now that the calm is over, let’s release the storm. The storm being the mini-boss theme from Xenoblade Chronicles “You Will Know Our Names”. Mini-boss in this sense being a unique enemy that is not a main character/villain and can be encountered while exploring the field. Immediately when the music starts you are bombarded with guitars and drums (and the synth), making quite the dramatic entrance. That what I really enjoy about this piece, it makes itself known and changes the mood from whatever it might have been to a hyped battle theme. That and the guitar solo about one minute into the song (arguably it is solos plural) is just amazing. Side note, even though I said the graphics of the game don’t matter as much to me, this game has absolutely wonderful graphics.

Just to make a rule of threes, the final piece I would like to mention explicitly is from the game Kir-OBJECTION! The real game that was supposed to be mentioned was Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. Yes, the final piece is “Phoenix Wright ~ Objection!” from Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. All joking aside, when this song comes on it just give an immense amount of satisfaction as it only plays when you point out a contradiction in the witness’s testimony. Quickly to clarify, the Phoenix Wright games are visual novels based around Phoenix Wright, a defense attorney (not actually as boring as it sounds, don’t worry!). It’s also really catchy and loops well when listening to it for an extended amount of time. Even if you don’t like this version of the song, there is an entire jazz album with this song and others on it, so at least listen to that (don’t forget to smell the dark coffee while you do so).

Concluding this short list of favorites, I’d like to say I could probably go on for hours more about this (and I might later). For now, hopefully you enjoy these three songs and their various versions and for that matter the entire soundtracks of all their respective games. I also dearly wish that my point in proving video games are more than what they look like has also come across. Until next time!