Submitted 4 days ago by eru777@lemmy.world to retrogaming@lemmy.world
Not because it’s bad, but because it was so ubiquitous. I love that about late 90s and early 00s games. Examples: ace combat 2, klonoa. I just find it interesting, a thing of the era for sure. Do you remember any other games that had this type of music?
Haven't played many late 90's games, but I remember FFVII's Cosmo Canyon having a quite unique track in that sense, and Parasite Eve's opening being quite on the bass side.
FFVII’s Cosmo Canyon
Best song in the game. I will die on this hill.
Movies from that time period also had a lot of drum and bass tracks.
It was a (relatively) new genre in the late 90s and it works well for energetic scenes and gameplay.
GTA2’s Funami FM had some drum and bass influenced tracks. The GTA2 intro movie used drum and bass in a way that’s very reminiscent of the time period:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Z5O29rLRnw
GTA3’s MSX FM had some top notch drum and bass tracks from the legendary (by electronic music standards) Moving Shadow record label.
Unreal Tournament 99 had drum and bass tracks.
[Michiel van den Bos - Forgone Conclusion ](Michiel van den Bos)
System Shock 2 also had great drum and bass music.
I wish this trend of using drum and bass tracks would become popular again, it’s a such good fit for intense/energetic scenes and gameplay.
This is good read
The Impact of Jungle Music in 90s Video Game Development
https://pikuma.com/blog/jungle-music-video-game-drum-bass
Jungle and many other genres of EDM were a perfect match for the fast-pace games that were developed in the 90s. Most of the titles using a jungle soundtrack were from the second half of the decade, although the trend continued all the way up through the mid 2000s.
Consoles from this generation were also able to store and play CD-quality audio, which meant developers could really take advantage of the entire spectrum of frequencies and sounds that both jungle & drum’n’bass demanded.
There’s a list of games at the end including Wipeout, Rage Racer, Gran Turismo, Bomberman, Sega Marine Fishing
I’ve noticed on the radio that drum & bass is making a sneaky comeback. Usually not entire songs, but some modern songs will have a bridge or finale with a clear drum & bass beat. I like how younger people creating this music must’ve gone: “wow this ancient form of music has a sick beat, it’ll be cool in my song”. Same way as 90’s music often has references to disco.
Rollcage comes to mind straight away. 90s and early 00s games were full of jungle and drum & bass.
I was watching an interview of John Frusciante and he was telling this fan how he likes making jungle music. The fan said “oh, tribaly stuff?” lmao 😂
John Frusciante from RHCP likes making jungle/dnb?
My mind is blown!
I actually checkout his album on Bandcamp, it’s pretty good.
xD
Tangentially to all other comments. Though not as prevalent in the 90s as more conventional music software was getting more common also in game music.
But I know that for instance Unreal Tournament 99 used tracker music still.
Tracker music lends it self pretty nicely to the sample chopping origins of jungle/drum and bass.
I was recently part of a jungle compilation for the M8 portable tracker, and got addicted to how fun it is to chop and manipulate drum breaks in the tracker.
UT99 Facing Worlds map had a banger dnb track
Half-Life had quite the array of big-beat inspired pieces.
Snowboarding games always seemed to have mostly drum and bass music like SSX and Transworld. And then you had games like Sonic that had a ton of it plus some great rock from Crush 40.
NFS porsche as well
Asphalt Legends does, im getting some free enjoyment out of it on my handheld, kinda like how the ai doesnt rubberband, feels good to mantain a fat lead compared to burnout
DigDoug@lemmy.world 4 days ago
I think Wipeout was probably the progenitor of this - the entire pitch of the game was basically “Futuristic racer set to techno bangers”, and I think a lot of other games followed suit with their soundtracks.
Check out Sean Seanson’s PSX Club Mixes for some absolute bops and a nostalgia hit.