I’m a huge fan of the soundtrack to a game in development, but not released beyond a demo yet, called “Rhythm Quest”. It’s a button masher that feels like it blends a Guitar Hero and Mario kind of vibe. The person making the game is also the composer of the chiptune music in it.

Trailer can be found here.

They have released the first half of the game’s soundtrack on Bandcamp and it’s pretty good. Can’t wait to buy the full game when it hopefully releases. The developer puts out sneak peak update videos every few weeks.

The ost for the original Mother is the quintessential example of ‘they didn’t need to go this hard.’ For a Famicom game, they hired a rock musician to compose the score, who then went and made an entire album - lyrics and all - and collaborated with one of Nintendo’s top musicians to simplify it down for an 8-bit cartridge.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zS6anrmbG4o

He made this album twice btw.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXQNLq1huYQ

Pseudoregalia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQpSO8Z8OjY

by stillCrisp

Zero Time Dilemma

BGM08 (BioLab): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5bUx1-aIJk

BGM06 (Unliberated Library): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBAD_9r9ZII

BGM03 (Quondam Monitors): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzNS8Ah139Y

by Shinji Hosoe

• La-Mulana for sure
  • The gate of guidance theme really stood out to me.
  • Oh, and the village’s theme too, and several others.
• Virgo Versus the Zodiac Isn’t the type of game I’d normally look at if it wasn’t part of a bundle, but the soundtrack was so good (and the game itself was pretty enjoyable too).
  • The Time Keeper
  • Tzardom of the Sun
  • The Royal Servant

One of my favorite indie card rogue-likes, Monster Train 2, has an absolutely amazing soundtrack. Monster Train 1 is also good (same artist, Jordan Chin) but they really caught my attention, the games are criminally underrated.

Monster Train 2 track example: https://youtu.be/KlS3jkEhi7o

Hopefully more people play these wonderful games.

No particular order:

It’s kinda cheating, but the game Capsized is a decent XBLA-era side scrolling shooter-platformer with an excellent soundtrack. That’s because it uses the existing album Movements by Solar Fields.
Solar Fields actually scored a different game with an excellent soundtrack: Mirrors Edge

Uplink and Darwinia, Introversion Software’s first two games, have lovely soundtracks.

Nitronic Rush, a student game that got remade into the survival racing game Distance, has one of the greatest Christmas songs ever made on its soundtrack.

The original Lemmings and its expansions used quite good chiptune renditions of classical and classic pop songs. Each platform has a different soundtrack, but Amiga is probably the best.

PPPPPP, the soundtrack to VVVVVV is very crunchy chiptune. The last track is weird though.

Outer Wilds is simply amazing.

Psychonauts and Psychonauts 2 have great, varied soundtracks.

X-Universe games. Particularly X3, X Rebirth and X4.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lpPp2cMcDxB-9TdVyL-8u52xU0o_eWkIM

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2DE76FAF3D895DD0

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRNrultsQ-TjRZXR6TFg5rpRN2UzChGg4

All on Bandcamp because that’s where I get my official music :

Ridiculous Fishing: a weird fishing game that was available on iPhone for some time, then disappeared due to compatibility issues.

Guacamelee! 2: Kind of famous, but I like the soundtrack.

Eastward: a weird action RPG, like Chrono Trigger but more cozy, I love that game.

Axiom Verge: something something Metroidvania.

Indie Ace Attorney-like, Gyakuten Live, defined its own investigation, objection, cross examination themes. Given how beloved those themes are in the original games, they did a great job.

They sort of took it to another level with the idea of “final confrontation” cross examination themes. Last one for the newest case kind of goes insane, managing to build in both tension and uplifting battle elements. Rather than stop the music on one contradiction, it does the “rising instrumental” approach of layering the track up based on when you’ve found a key flaw in the argument. You can tell a lot of the effort for that sequence went just into getting the music to match up.

Neotokyo is a HL2/Source mod with an outstanding original soundtrack.

Mechanicus. To quote the great Mandalore “most music drop the bass, Mechanicus drops a pipe organ”.

Project Wingman. Love letter to Ace Combat that gets the music on point.

Rogue Trader. The most epic track on the OST is used for one minor fight.

If we’re talking obscure…

• Leap Year - the march DLC also has some good music, but I don’t think anybody’s uploaded it.
• Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga - Teehee Valley - definitely nostalgia speaking, but that game has a whole bunch of good music. It’s all crusty, by virtue of being a GBA game, though.
• Particle Fleet - Perhaps a bit too epic for the gameplay, but I enjoyed it while playing back when it came out, and coming back to it I’m still very much enjoying the tracks.
• Cultist Simulator - Not sure how well-known this one is, but it’s very atmospheric, mysterious, mostly slow
• CrossCode - as an example, Autumn’s Rise - Nice upbeat “overworld” type of track, and I might be a sucker for synths

The ost for I AM YOUR BEAST is what I imagine doing cocaine feels like. Great game, with an equally solid soundtrack.

No clue if this counts, but given how little I see it mentioned in online spaces I will suggest Frostpunk’s soundtrack. Even if you don’t play the game, it is an amazing soundtrack that perfectly captures both the hope and desperation depicted in the game itself. Especially “The City Must Survive” is an absolute banger.

The zero escape series has so many good ones. Virtue’s last reward in particular has the best ost. As an aside if you enjoy absolute bullshit storylines ala nano machines from metal gear, I highly recommend playing the zero escape games.