The project as whole started simple; I wanted to understand the impact that video games had on people in general. As I began work on this project, a specific question popped in my head that intrigued me.

Why is video game music so memorable?

My goal suddenly shifted to answer this question that brewed in my head. Video game music always meant so much to me and brought back so many memories, and I knew that I was not alone in this. I could list off specific songs that were integral to my gaming experiences as a child, but I could not place why they were so special to me. Of course hearing an old song from my past would bring back some nostalgia, but I always felt that the reason these were so special consisted of more than just the fact that these were old songs. Through my research, I intended to answer this intriguing question as best as I could.

I believe that it is important that we study and take a look at video games in depth. I believe that they really are a huge innovation in the realm of art. William Gibbons says, "In recent years the idea that video games are worth studying both as an important aspect of popular culture and as independent works of art has gained a certain amount of credence in academic circles. With such acceptance, scholars have begun to examine the elements that constitute a game, including the importance of music in the gameplaying experience" (Gibbons 40). Video games are in my opinion an epitome of artistic expression in that they combine a mixture of dynamic storytelling, music, and visual arts.

People, for all intents and purposes, are what this project hinges on. To have fully understood my topic, I needed to interview various gamers so that I could draw accurate conclusions about what they felt. It is one thing to just read what a book says about a group of people such as this, but it is important to get that hands on experience that will not only back up what a book might say, but will also give new and more personalised information.

I wanted to be able to get a wide sample of answers and data from people who loved both music and games, so I turned to the gamemusic subreddit on a website called Reddit. For all intents and purposes, it is pretty much just a forum for people who love the music in video games. I was overwhelmed by the amount of support and answers people gave. Many people were quick to list off their favorite games, the songs from those games, and why those songs were special to them. I was glad to have gotten such a diverse and extensive response so that I could weigh everyone’s opinions against each other to find patterns and to come to conclusions.

I would highly recommend checking out the Reddit thread if you would like to learn more about what people said and find tons of examples of good game music! There are seriously an amazing amount of different songs that people gave. You can find the link below in the sources.

To get a full understanding for my topic, I needed to not only get input from gamers, but also from someone who was actively involved with game music in some way. I had emailed a number of composers and cover artists, and Ace Waters was kind enough to respond and give rather detailed answers!

Ace covers pieces from video games using a mixture of synthesised and acoustic instruments. His most famous videos consist of covers from the game Undertale, but he covers a wide variety of both old and new game music that he deems special. When asked why he start making video game covers in the first place, he said, “I was doing covers part time while gigging and working a job, and I decided to cover a song from the Donkey Kong Country series because it’s some of my favorite game music ever. People really liked it and I really liked doing it, so I kept going with it and eventually shifted my focus to doing game covers full time.” Because of his love for video game music, he was able to grow an audience of over sixteen thousand people on Youtube and collaborate with many different talented musicians.

Carlos was a bit late to respond, but I certainly wasn’t going to count him out! He also covers video game music on his youtube channel with his most popular covers also consisting of Undertale pieces. The big difference though is that Carlos mainly covers video game pieces with his own jazz spin to them. His covers often have a mix of the original piece's melodies with his own original jazz melodies. When asked on how he got started making covers, he said,

I had seen other musicians cover video game music on YouTube, and I thought it would be cool to do! I was making animation tutorials on YouTube prior to my video game covering phase, and one day I decided to play the Super Mario Bros theme on my saxophone for that channel. I thought it'd be better to separate my animation stuff and my music stuff. Soon after making the new channel (the insaneintherainmusic channel that still exists today,) it became my main thing.

Many gamers feel a very deep connection to games and their music beyond the fact that they may just enjoy the sound of said music. Game music extends beyond the games and lives on through many diehard fans who love to listen to and even cover songs from their favorite games. A portion of the book Game Sound describes Karen Collins’ experience in listening to an orchestra cover classic game music. She writes,

The power of video game music to attract such an enthusiastic crowd— many of whom dressed up in costumes for the occasion— was in many ways remarkable. After all, symphony orchestras have for years been struggling to survive financially amid dwindling attendance and increasing costs. Video Games Live, along with Play! and other symphonic performances of game music, however, have been bringing the orchestra to younger people, and bringing game music to their parents (Collins 1).

It is no secret that video game music is impactful, but why? There are many factors that can affect it, but it really comes down to two big reasons.

The Experience

The biggest factor that plays into the nostalgia behind game music is that playing a game is an active experience. Because of this, players become deeply rooted in the stories and events happening in the game. A video game is not a type of media that is consumed passively by someone just observing it, but it is something that requires intervention and interaction from a player. This in a sense turns the game into the player’s experience rather than an experience that the main character of a movie is going through. Because of this very personal connection with the game, when a player hears a song, he is not just reminiscing about that song. He remembers very specific moments and details about the world and everything that happened in the game. He remembers not just a piece of music, but rather he is remembering what it was like to be in that game world and to interact with it. Winifred Phillips summarizes this idea perfectly in her book A Composer's Guide to Game Music. She writes,

We know that a musical theme expressed within the body of a video game is experienced differently than themes in passive forms of entertainment, like television and film. In a game, a musical theme accompanies an activity that the players of the game are performing. The music has essentially become the soundtrack to the personal adventures of the players. When the music swells at a pivotal moment and a recognizable melody begins, the players hear that melody just as they are engaging in an activity they enjoy. This interactive engagement alters the way in which the music is heard and remembered. According to an article for Topics in Cognitive Science written by Michelene Chi (2008), psychology professor at Arizona State University, our ability to retain experiences, process information, and successfully learn new things is directly impacted by how engaged we are at the time—therefore, interactive experiences are better than passive ones (Phillips 56).

This idea of experiences being tied to these songs lined up with answers that I had received on Reddit. One user by the name of otah007 exemplified this idea when he said, “When I listen to MEGALOVANIA I remember how it felt to fight Sans, when I listen to The Streets of Whiterun I feel just like I do when walking around Skyrim's cities - safe, calm and in awe [sic].” For him and many others, very specific memories are tied to these songs. Whenever I myself hear one of Skyrim’s pieces again, it reminds me of that original sense of wonder and curiosity that I had when playing through the game for the first time. Because this music goes along with an active experience, it becomes so much more memorable to the player.

For music to have this effect to its fullest extent, it must also fit with what the player is doing in the game at any particular moment. With video games being an active experience, players can interact with the game in whichever way they please. A game composer must then compose in a way in which the music is either ready to change at any moment or it just stays at one similar dynamic level the whole time as to provide ambience. In his book Writing Interactive Music for Video Games, Michael Sweet writes, “This active interaction between the game and the player also affects how the music must change and react to player decisions. The music must be written in such a way that it is adaptable based on the player interaction” (Sweet 16). It is important for game music to never feel out of place no matter what the player may be doing.

Most of the time, composers write video game music specifically for the gamer’s experience. The music inside of a game has to be written to enhance the player’s experience as they go through the game. When Carlos Eiene was asked on the difference between game music and other type of music, he said,

Video game tunes are not only written to sound good as their own pieces of music, but they are written with another purpose in mind. That purpose might be to represent a character, establish a mood in a scene, or underscore a game cutscene. Regardless of what the specific purpose is, I think that the practical application of video game tunes is what defines them!

Video game music is meant to be practical in a way. In other words it is used as a tool to help immerse the player in what is happening.

In some cases experiencing game music can even mean moving around physically in the real world. During my research I attended an event with the music gaming club at Purdue in which people took turns playing the game Dance Dance Revolution. This type of gaming is quite different from the others in that it utilizes movements in the real world. After the Wii game console came out, there was a revival in games of this type in which players had to actually move to play effectively. While I was at this event, I watched a few different people play Dance Dance Revolution, and I was impressed with the skill of some of the players. Memorization and quick sight reading is the name of the game in this case. The more skilled players were familiar with a variety of songs from the list, and they had memorized a good deal of movements necessary to score the most points possible. Even though memorizing the music is an integral part of this particular game, I still believe it works much in the same way that it does with any other game in that hearing those songs in any other context will remind them of the times that they played that game. Even though the experience varies, it still has the same effect.

Simplicity

Game music had its origin on machines with incredibly limited hardware compared to what we have today. Because of this, composers could only use a small number of notes at one time. This forced them to put even more effort into the melodies to make sure that they sounded good. A song that consists of a really strong melody and not much else makes it easy to remember and certainly easy to hum. When Ace Waters was asked about the difference between game music and other music he said,

Well, in the beginnings of musical composition, limitation was the name of the game. Limited channels, sound choices, and time length all deeply shaped the craft of video game composition during its infancy. A lot of that you see true today, even as those limitations are lifted. This is also, in part, the reason why more modern triple A games with symphonic, movie style, soundtracks seem somewhat out of place in the game world or at the very least they are not terribly memorable. On the other hand, artists like Disasterpeace are crafting long form, ambient soundscapes for games that are some of the best game music for our time. So, honestly, although gaming music's roots gave it a very distinct sound from limitation, the further we move forward, the more you find game music is not so separated from "normal music."

I also managed to get a response from a guy named Michael on Reddit who plays with the cover band Extra Lives. Extra Lives does weekly covers of older video game pieces that were memorable to the band members. Michael wrote on the point of simplicity when he said,

It's said that "necessity is the mother of invention"--old-school video game composers were presented with a limited sonic palette, a fixed limited on the amount of simultaneous instrumental voices, a restrictive budget and the need for that music to be strophic and loopable. Composers responded to this unique conundrum by creating uber-memorable, emotionally effective (and affective) pieces that were inherently succinct [sic].

The limitations put on older game music actually ended up benefitting them in an unforeseen way in that the composers were forced to create memorable melodies. Pieces that sound more like modern film soundtracks are less memorable due to their lack of strong melody line, but they still serve to elicit emotion in the player. In the end, simplicity turns out to make game music much more memorable. The video linked below goes into more depth on the topic of simplicity in video games.

Gamers can have many unique reasons for loving a song, but the two underlying reasons that make game music so memorable are that it is part of an experience and that it relies on the techniques used in older game music that stayed true to a simpler sound. The music found in video games is a part of something more than just music itself; the music in video games is ingrained in the experiences and memories that a player can form. This in essence ties the music to something very real and very memorable. The fact that most game music is simple makes this type of music easy to remember and stick in the heads of those who have heard it. One may never remember the melodies to all the different movies they have watched, but the simplistic nature of game melodies makes remembering them a breeze. Video game music is so memorable due to the fact that it is tied with an experience and that it is simple.

Game music will continue to grow and expand as better and better games continue to be created by the minds of some amazingly talented people. I believe that even as music continues to grow, the experiential side of it and the underlying simplicity to the melodies will remain a constant. These two factors are defining in the world of video game music, and I see them remaining that way as video game music continues to be made. I believe that some of the greatest game music is being composed today thanks to the accessibility of powerful composing software and to the breadth of the industry due to the explosion of the amount independant game developers. I wholeheartedly look forward to the future and what music it has in store for gamers.

Undertale is a masterpiece of a game in many aspects, but one of the main reasons why is because of the uniqueness of the music in it. Undertale became a phenomenon that swept across the gaming world shortly after it came out. The characters and the story really struck players, and behind all that was a masterful soundtrack. Undertale’s soundtrack spans across many different genres of music all while still holding true to the fundamentals of game music. Reddit user otah007 explained to me how some of the songs were used by saying,

Each boss theme reflects not only the character, but also the fight itself - for example, Muffet's fight (Spider Dance) is very frantic, whereas Asgore's fight (ASGORE) is more focused on the character…. Toby Fox is not only a self-taught musician, he also composed a total of 101 tracks for this game, and many of them are similar to each other in subtle (or not-so-subtle) ways, creating sub-conscious links between characters and events. For example, Heartache and ASGORE are very similar in parts, because Asgore and Toriel were once King and Queen.

The Legend of Zelda is a personal favorite of mine, and I know many others think the same. This franchise always had the perfect amount of action, story, and problem solving that resulted in amazing and memorable games. Behind it all was perfectly written soundtracks by none other than Koji Kondo. Kondo is a veteran at Nintendo and wrote most of the old game music including the music for Mario, The Legend of Zelda, and many others. This particular piece is a rather peaceful and calm opening to what is considered one of the best games of all time, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Fez easily contains one of the greatest soundtracks in a game made by an independant developer. The songs in Fez help paint the environment and even serve a functional purpose with the gameplay in one instance. Fez’s soundtrack was written by Rich Vreeland, also known as Disasterpiece. In the soundtrack Rich often uses a combination of a drawn out rubato music style mixed with retro chiptune sounds to build unique and memorable ambiances to the varying areas in the game. In the example linked below, the song is not just used as a way to describe the environment, but it is also used as a functional part of playing the game. Platforms appear and disappear in time with the music to tell the player when he should jump. Most of Rich’s music in the game is written to tell a story or convey an idea, but this case is a good example of using music to explicitly give the player cues on how to play the game. The intricacies of the Fez soundtrack are quite impressive when looked at in detail.

“Aquatic Ambience,” a personal favorite of Ace Waters, sets the perfect backdrop for some of the levels in Donkey Kong Country. I never personally played much of this game due to the fact that I played this when I first started playing video games, so I never got really far. Nevertheless, the music stood out to me the most in this game. I couldn’t tell you anything about how to play the game or even what most of the levels look like, but I can recall the main melody of the song “Jungle Groove” any day.

Most of the music in Skyrim is not the kind that is as easily remembered as in other games (to me at least), but hearing the music instantly brings me back to the memories that I have of Skyrim. Most of the music serves as ambience to the game environment, and it does this very well. Skyrim was designed to have a sense of wonder and adventure to it, and hearing the music from the game again brings me right back to those same feelings that I had when I played the game for the first time.

Unfortunately, I do not have any personal comments for the rest of the games listed as I have not played them, but I thought I would include them anyways as these games came up multiple times during my research.

• Phillips, Winifred. A Composer's Guide to Game Music. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2014.
• Collins, Karen. Game Sound: An Introduction to the History, Theory, and Practice of Video Game Music and Sound Design. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2008.
• Sweet, Michael. Writing Interactive Music for Video Games: A Composer's Guide. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Addison-Wesley, 2015.
• Gibbons, William. "Blip, Bloop, Bach? Some Uses of Classical Music on the Nintendo Entertainment System." Music and the Moving Image 2, no. 1 (2009): 40-52. Accessed November 18, 2016. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/musimoviimag.2.1.0040.
• Waters, Ace. Interview by Samuel Ingram. Email. November 14, 2016.
• Eiene, Carlos. Interview by Samuel Ingram. Email. November 23, 2016.
• r/gamemusic Reddit Thread