Image via Complex Original
It’s 1988 and the backyard is peppered with leaves in shades of brown, yellow and orange. Mom is cooking some sort of funky casserole downstairs, and Dad isn’t home from work yet. Some of your neighbors are playing basketball across the street, wearing down the soles of their LA Gears.
And none of that matters. You’ve finally muscled your way to the Dr. Wily stages in Mega Man 2. Your heart’s racing not only because there aren’t game saves like we have today, but also because the adrenaline-inducing Dr. Wily stage music just kicked in. Nothing short of a power outage can stop you from playing at this point. Not with that music pulsing.
Years later, that stage music is still burned into your eardrums. It’s been seared into the edges of your brain. We’ve been lucky enough to have modern-era composers carve their masterpieces out of a few simple bleeps and bloops. Even though the notion of stage-specific music has ceded ground to more ambient orchestral themes that traverse the entire game, many of us remember certain game levels more for their music than the actual enemies. And many composers today have still managed to crank out some classics.
Listen on for some of the best musical compositions ever to accompany - and oftentimes define - a game level.
25. Contra (NES) 1987
Complex Says: Out of all the stages in Contra, the Waterfall theme was probably the most balanced. Even if it was 1 am at a friend’s sleepover and we were tired as hell, this music kept us moving through our 5th playthrough of the night. Only problem was that the music kept urging you to move up the level faster and faster, which killed your partner if he got left behind. Of course, he would just later steal one of your lives – i.e., pixilated karma.
24. Streets of Rage 2 (Genesis) 1992
Complex Says: Remember that episode where Homer took Bart to the steel mill and then C & C Music Factory kicked in and everyone started fabulously dancing? Looking back now, we realize this track from Stage 1 could have easily been used for that scene.
23. Final Fight (Arcade, SNES)
Complex Says: By this time, you might be on the last of the three quarters your dad gave you. So your heart was racing because you knew that Sodom could katana-slice that last quarter within 10 seconds if you weren’t careful. The music was as fast as Sodom’s cross-ring dash, which traumatized the hell out of us the first time we encountered it.
22. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in Time (Arcade, SNES)
Complex Says: So by the year 2020 we’re supposed to have hover disk skate thingies? Well, Robocop was also supposed to be cleaning up the tweakers down the street by this time too. We’re still waiting. But if the music is this great, then we’ll deal with the post-apocalyptic crap.
21. Final Fantasy XII (PS2) 2006
Complex Says: This track took us completely by surprise in the best way possible - like a cute kitten suddenly jumping into your lap with a Playboy Mansion Party Ticket tied to its collar. We weren’t expecting such a sweeping melody in a rather uneventful level of the game, but afterwards we kept coming back to Phon Coast just to listen to this song.
20. Mass Effect 2 (360, PS3, PC) 2010
Complex Says: ME 2 saved the best track for last. If you still think a game can’t evoke cinema-caliber emotions after running through the Suicide Mission, then you might as well sell your 360 on Craigslist. And don’t blame us when you meet the buyer in a shady parking lot and she steals your car, your innocence and the Xbox.
19. Pop’n Music 12 (Arcade) 2004
Complex Says: Maybe we’re cheating a little bit since this is also the opening song from Evangelion. Nonetheless, our inner otaku squealed with the power of a thousand loli’s when we unexpectedly found this stage in the game.
We were in an Akihabara arcade. It was hot. It was noisy. And when we got to this track, nostalgia punched us in the face like a giant Unit 01 fist.
18. Star Fox (SNES) 1993
Complex Says: Screw the barrel rolls and furries and whatever memes came out of this game. The Corneria theme is the best thing about Star Fox (well, besides the actual gameplay).
17. R-Type III (SNES) 1993
Complex Says: That opening riff of Stage 1 set the tone for the entire game. Our faces got melted off without even hearing an actual guitar, which goes to show the level of the composers’ skills back in the 16 bit era.
16. Blaster Master (NES) 1998
Complex Says: Normally we wouldn’t chase a stupid frog down a hole. But with this awesome theme music blaring, we’d chase a rabid skunk into the septic tank of that guy from Man Vs. Food.
15. Ninja Gaiden 2 (NES) 1990
Complex Says: This game was designed from the ground up to push you forward through the stages at a reckless pace. Ryu could already outrun Usain Bolt; once you threw in the stage timer and this music, it was literally game over as you ran off the edge of a cliff because you just can’t stop.
14. Metal Gear Solid (PSX) 1998
Complex Says: P.M. was one of the few bosses worthy of his own music. This haunting track kicked in during your infiltration of the underground base, when Meryl starts acting…oddly.
We also want to run a little experiment some day – instead of playing lullabies to our infant child from one of those Fisher Price toys, we’ll play this track instead. Just to see how the kid turns out. Hopefully we’ll get to check out the results before child services kicks our door down.
13. Katamari Damacy (PS2) 2004
Complex Says: The lyrics go a little something like this:
“I felt the beginnings of an impending crisis, stood up,
blew the walls off of my heart
A free mind and an overflowing soul,
I gave my spirit a heart to live in”
Meanwhile, you just picked up a piece of shrimp tempura with a giant ball.
12. F-Zero (SNES) 1990
Complex Says: In our opinion this became the definitive melody for F-Zero. It was a worthy track for a game that was truly ahead of its time technology-wise.
Also, we think of Falcon Punches (FALCON PAWNCH) when we hear this track.
11. Zone of The Enders 2 (PS2, PS3, 360)
Complex Says: Ken might have been annoying at times, but this epically beautiful melody put the aural equivalent of beer goggles over our ears. It made us ENJOY rescuing her, purely by association with this song, thus making her somehow more attractive. Even though this was a rescue mission, it was done right – the music really put the exclamation mark on the whole thing. Now that ZOE 2 is going to be released in an HD version, we can blast our neighbors’ walls in DD5.1.
Oh, and the easter egg you “earn” after taking her near the lava was the typical Kojima dime.
10. Double Dragon (Arcade) 1987
Complex Says: Yeah, we’re going with the Arcade rendition here. It’s more tonally complex than that of the NES version, or whatever.
Why is it that Stage 1 tracks in particular during the late 80s and early 90s are usually the most memorable?
9. Dracula X: Rondo of Blood (PC Engine version) 1993
Complex Says: While it’s more of an overture, compositions like this simply don’t exist anymore. Richter’s Theme is one of the strongest examples of the heights to which game composers had reached. Everything great about the 90s (except for the Reaganomics fallout) was captured here.
8. Final Fantasy XIII (PS3, 360) 2010
Complex Says: After dozens of hours of running through tubes, we FINALLY burst through the canyons and into the open expanse of the Archelyte Steppe. This song was the perfect accent to the sweet, sweet freedom that suddenly unfurled before us. Not gonna lie – we stood there for a good five minutes, just drinking in the vast landscape and absorbing this theme music through our pores.
7. Gradius III (SNES) 1990
Complex Says: We're usually too stressed out trying to avoid the tortuous swarm of projectiles and enemies constipating the screen to notice the background music in Gradius III. But the Stage 6 theme managed to force its way through the chaos and into our heads. It wasn’t even the catchiest tune in the game, but it had an uplifting quality that kept us going.
6. Soul Calibur 2 (PS2, Xbox, GC) 2003
Complex Says: Soul Calibur is known for its sweeping melodies, but this one is probably the most regal. It’s a fitting theme for Sophitia and Cassandra. Frankly you could make anything epically honorable with this song. Even if you got caught looking at cockroach fetish videos on the internet, all would be forgiven so long as you’re playing this song in the background.
5. Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES) 1988
Complex Says: Probably the most ominous theme of the NES SMB days. Nowadays it’s a bit kitschy, but when you were 10 years old it stretched out your heart like a rubber band about to snap. Your chest just tightened up, especially if you were storming an airship or tank in World 8.
4. Street Fighter 2 (SNES, Arcade) 1993
Complex Says: Everything that Japan saw in America was captured in Guile’s stage. It was the Japanese equivalent of Gung Ho in terms of how the countries perceived each other during those decades. Given the “America, f*ck yeah” chords of this theme, it seemed as if Japan understood us better than we did ourselves.
3. Mega Man 2 (NES) 1988
Complex Says: If the North had played Dr. Wily’s theme as a battle/march hymn during the Civil War, that whole scuffle would have gone by a lot faster. As in, the war probably would have been over within a week. It would have saved thousands upon thousands of lives.
2. Virtua Fighter 2 (Arcade, Saturn, PS2) 1994
Complex Says: You just lost your job. Your girlfriend broke up with you. Your car blew a head gasket. The family dog also ran away. The power went out, and all the food in the fridge spoiled. And it’s only Tuesday. How do you face the next day?
By blasting Ride the Tiger on MAX volume. That’s how.
1. Duck Tales (NES) 1990
Complex Says: We wonder what composer Yoshihiro Sakaguchi is doing nowadays. We’d hope that he’s relaxing somewhere on a house up in the mountains, living out his days surrounded by nature, being tended to by his wife and robot maid. Such a serene life would only be appropriate for the man who gave us the pinnacle hallmark of stage music from the NES era.
