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I'll put this bluntly: There is a lot of awesome videogame music. However, not a lot of gaming music albums come out of Japan, save the (usually incomplete) ones you can get in special editions. Trying to import a CD you want is pricey, and the worst part it, you might decide you don't like the album after all!
So, what's a frugal gamer to do? Why can't you have the best of both worlds (without pirating)?
But wait… you can, and I'm here to show you how!
At the end of every month, I'm going to show you FREE albums that come out over the Internet. That's right, you can have videogame music in the time your computer takes to download the files! Granted, these are mostly fan remixes, but there are also Original Soundtracks that are released online that get easily forgotten.
Let's get to the good ol' freebies then, shall we?
Shiryu's Arcade Volume 4
In another edition of Shiryu's Arcade comes another edition of his interestingly remixed tracks. There's one or two tracks in there that aren't actually video game tracks (8-bit Nyan Cat comes to mind), but the vast majority of them are gaming tracks. Shiryu's remixes are certainly unique, and not everyone's cup of tea, but are worth checking out just for his unique take on classic game tracks.
Samples: The Goddamn Batman, 8-bit Nyan Cat
See More: VGMdb, Shiryu Music
Super Smash Land OST/Super Smash Land Secret Tracks
I bet a few people have heard of this game… heck, I didn't even know about it until I found the soundtrack! Super Smash Land is a faithful demake of the Super Smash Bros. series, and it is a great fan game. You can tell that the developers put a lot of love into the project in both the game and soundtrack. Both albums feature 8-bit Game Boy style remixes of popular tracks, and the tracks match the overall feel for the game… demake 8-bit fighting awesome-ness.
Samples: GourMEAT Race, Lavender Town (Pokemon Tower Flashy Mix)
See More: VGMdb (OST), VGMdb (Secret Tracks), Super Smash Land
Bloodrayne: Betrayal Official Soundtrack
As you could probably tell by the name, this is the actual soundtrack to the Bloodrayne game that came out recently on XBLA and PSN. Well, you can download the entire soundtrack for free, and as an added bonus, some of the tracks also received an 8-bit NES style remix! It's great if you enjoyed the game or its tracks.
Samples: The Crabpuncher, Sanguine Nightmare (NES)
See More: VGMdb, Ubiktune
Mega Man 9: Back in Blue
Every month or so, OCRemix releases a co-operative album based on a game or game series, featuring a bunch of different artists and musical tastes. This time they've pulled together an album of Mega Man 9 music, which had an overall fantastic soundtrack. OC Remix is well known for its quality, and you can expect no less from this album than from the rest of the site.
Samples: Smooth As Honey, The Skull Fortress
See More: VGMdb, Back in Blue OCRemix
The Gunstringer Soundtrack
The Gunstringer is a Kinect game developed by Twisted Pixel, best known for Splosion Man. Given a western-style game, the music is flavored with the old-time goodness we can expect… sort-of. Each set of tracks (like Classic Western and Samurai Western) have their own feel to them, but they all sound like something clearly Western-themed, as well. Best of all, Twisted Pixel is letting us have the album for free!
Samples: Classic Western – Echo Canyon, Day of the Dead – Lady of the Dead Battle
See More: VGMdb, The Gunstringer Official Website
/sing
Interestingly enough, this is a album released by the Video Game Music Choir. They're a choir group that remixes and sings gaming tunes. In addition, all of the tracks are (practically)acoustic: In other words, all the instruments, sound effects, and whatever else that is typically in the song are sung, which really has a unique effect on the songs. It's definitely worth checking out on the unique-ness factor alone.
Samples: Still Alive, Escape from the City (special bonus: someone wearing a Zelda costume)
See More: VGMdb, Video Game Music Choir
Portal 2: Songs to Test By Volume 3
Valve has been releasing its Portal 2 soundtrack in volumes over the last few months, and the third and final volume has finally been released. With this, you can now own all of Portal 2's OST, and if you were patient and waited, you can download them all at the same time too!
Samples: Reconstructing More Science, Your Precious Moon
See More: VGMdb, Portal 2 Site – Music
FamicomBit: Nine
FamicomBit is a relatively unknown video game metal band. However, they do provide great covers of old gaming songs, unlike some other bands who just offer a mess of guitars strummed vaguely to the theme they're trying to play. The band also is from Russia (forgive me if I'm wrong, but their comments are in another language and my computer isn't working well with myspace), so they have the exotic factor to add in as well! Their latest album, Nine, was released this month, and this album and all of their older ones are free to download.
Samples: Sorry, you have to go to the myspace page.
See More: VGMdb, FamicomBit myspace page
Rockin' Sockin' Cinder Blockin' (A Concrete Man Remix EP)
This album with only (yes, only) Concrete Man remixes is in response to the fact that OCRemix forgot to put a Concrete Man track in their Back in Blue release. To make up for the transgression, a member of OCRemix gathered together fifteen Concrete Man remixes into one supplementary album. That surely makes up for the error, right?
Samples: 10 Tons of Swing
See More: VGMdb, Album Thread
Thunderous Crash
With this album, we see the rise of a new video game remixing band, nicely named 'Do A Barrel Roll!'. The band has a very different sound to it: While it's metal-y, it's far from the screeching guitars you might be used to. The songs have an overall mellow feel, and the band incorporating sound bytes from the games of the tracks they're remixing is awesome and gives it a nostalgic feeling. All the bytes and the actual people playing are recorded live too, so the flow is never interrupted. It's certainly worth checking out the samples.
Samples: No youtube videos, but you can check the streamed tracks on Soundcloud.
See More: VGMdb, Do A Barrel Roll!
Navigator
Navigator is another game I didn't know about until I found its soundtrack… and it makes sense that I've never heard of it, because the game isn't even out yet! It comes out on October 22nd, and all I can really tell from what I tried to find about the game is that it's a puzzle game. Maybe. Regardless, the OST is free, but this is only the first disc; the second disc will be released closer to the game's release date.
Samples: Decision, Tuned In
See More: VGMdb, Navigator OST, PixelxCore
Oldie But Still a Freebie! Harmony of a Hunter
To round out the collection, let's throw in an album from a month past! Harmony of a Hunter was released in August, so it missed making the list normally, but it's so good that everyone should know about it! This is a Metroid tribute/remix track, and it features a lot of songs. The songs get an awesome sounding orchestral sounding upgrade too, so it really sounds epic. The album was made in honor of Metroid's twenty-fifth anniversary, and it's a fitting tribute to the series. Finally, the album became popular enough that the creators are going to create physical copies to sell, if you end up enjoying the tracks a lot, too.
Samples: Melting Sun, The Caves of Brinstar
See More: VGMdb, Shinesparkers
Whew! That's a lot of free stuff… make sure not to overheat your computer! That's all for this month's Album Overview. Come back next month to see what the fans cook up next… who knows what it'll be!