The results from NeoGAF's Game Soundtracks of the Year 2013 vote are below. Additionally, we are still in the process of building out a discography for the winning composers, getting in touch with them to congratulate them on their work, and filling out the archive with all of the soundtracks that were discussed during the voting phase. Enjoy!
Results
1.
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance – 208 points, 12 honorable mentions
Composer: Jamie Christopherson
A Stranger I Remain
I'm My Own Master Now
The Hot Wind Blowing
I'll be screaming RULES OF NATURE until I'm senile. Rarely has a game's soundtrack gotten me so pumped, so ready to destroy everything -- In style. I've always been able to appreciate character-action soundtracks, but Metal Gear Rising tops them all. The way the songs progress throughout the boss battles in stages, until finally kicking into full vocals at the climax of the battle is just unmatched.
Remember when I wrote about The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword in 2011 and emphasized soundtrack dynamics as the main selling point behind that soundtrack? You could listen to Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance’s soundtrack over and over, love the themes, but not completely understand what exactly makes the soundtrack so good. When you finally see the music in action alongside what you are doing in-battle, it is only then that you will appreciate the sheer beauty and best technical aspects of this soundtrack.
Without a doubt, one of the best soundtracks for a video game of all time (of all time). Every track is intense, flows with the action perfectly, and during the boss fights when the vocals start kicking in on the tracks, it's a euphoric feeling that just amplifies the game. Bought the album and listened to it constantly, and it does not get old.
2.
The Last of Us – 162 points, 9 honorable mentions
Composer: Gustavo Santaolalla
Home
The Last of Us
The Path (A New Beginning)
Santaolalla composed a very interesting and low-key soundtrack. It perfectly blends in with the game pretty much all the time and provides a lot of atmosphere throughout the game. This is not an easy task, so even though most tunes aren't that memorable outside of the game it works absolutely perfectly in the game and Santaolalla deserves props for that. Action scenes are intense too and there is one particular scene near the ending where the music does rise into the foreground during gameplay and makes the scene all the more powerful and special as a result, because it comes out of nowhere and as a surprise. It made me cry.
This game without its soundtrack just wouldn't be the same, from the key moments that Gustavo's guitar plays in the game, or the powerful drums that accompany the combat sections of this game just make the whole package perfect. Even though the tone is more calm, I really really love to listen to this soundtrack while doing essays or other things. bravo for the sound design team from Naughty Dog.
3.
The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds – 111 points, 18 honorable mentions
Composer: Ryo Nagamatsu
Dark Palace
Lorule Field
Swamp Palace
The rearrangements hit all the right notes, with some amazing, at times wistful instrumentation and a great, upbeat tempo.
What I especially love about this game is how many different and still very creative variations of the dungeon theme there are.
The Eastern Temple is a great remix of ALTTP's
Sanctuary Dungeon, which both play throughout all dungeons of Hyrule, I think. But then in Lorule every dungeon gets a different theme, like in the
Ice Ruins, the
Thieves' Hideout or the
Desert Palace, but they are all variations of the same theme. And they finish with
this (location spoiler) wonderful theme.
4.
Fire Emblem: Awakening – 97 points, 13 honorable mentions
Composers: Yuka Tsujiyoko, Hiroki Morishita, Rei Kondoh
Conquest
Don't Speak Her Name!
Id~Purpose
Awakening does not represent an earth-shattering new development in video game music. But what it may lack in eclecticism it more than makes up for with some of the strongest compositions I’ve heard in recent years, replete with musical layers without ever becoming bloated or mechanical. That’s really what this soundtrack is – a collection of skillfully placed musical ideas that form an enduring emotional tie between the player, the game, and the music, ultimately becoming more than the sum of those parts. How can all this happen without sounding like rote science? I don’t know. But this soundtrack walks that thin line with confidence, and magnificently etches itself into memory.
Fire Emblem always had a consistent track record when it comes to music, and Awakening is no exception and arguably the best yet. I love the dynamic music that plays when you get into a battle and no matter how much I played the game (and I played ALOT, rounding up to 300+ hours), the music never got old. A lot of the music was memorable and I found myself listening to it almost every single day. That's why Fire Emblem Awakening has my favorite OST of 2013.
Just a really, really good soundtrack. The themes fading between "overworld" and "battle" variations was a brilliant touch.
5.
Super Mario 3D World – 71 points, 19 honorable mentions
Composers: Mahito Yokota, Toru Minegishi, Yasuaki Iwata, Koji Kondo
A Banquet with Hisstocrat
Ghost House
World Bowser
A soundtrack of many flavors, Super Mario 3D World inspires with its big band melodies and other playful themes.
The wide array of instrumentation in impressive, and it lends to the equally-varied game design.
The return of the king. Mario had been spinning his wheels for a while on the soundtrack front, but Mahito Yokota and Koji Kondo unearthed the legendary Saxophone of Inspiration and brought their A-game on 3D World from top to bottom. Fresh themes, a few remixed favorites and a brassy big band heart carves a musical sweet spot between Galaxy's orchestral majesty and the joyous, playful sensibilities of the past.
The whole game is filled with such variety in its soundtrack, from jazz, to metal, to even disco. And of course, the orchestral pieces are beautiful as well,
notably the Ghost House theme.
6.
Ni No Kun: Wrath of the White Witch – 66 points, 6 honorable mentions
Composer: Joe Hisaishi
Imperial March
Kokoro no Kakera
Main Theme
Joe Hisaishi's talent has been proven time and time again in the last 30 years, and his first foray into video games music is a huge success. The memorable melodies and great orchestration add tons of charm to an already very charming game.
Ni no Kuni's music is the one consistently fantastic part of an otherwise very mixed bag. Listening to it really sweeps you up with a sense of adventure and doesn't let go. Many of the pieces are great at making you feel a sense of scale. The main theme and overworld especially. They mix up instrumentation and tempo in such a way that one moment everything feels very distant and calm, and the other moment up close and personal. It makes for perfect adventuring music. The people involved really knew their stuff. Easily the prettiest part of an already very pretty package.
7.
BioShock Infinite – 63 points, 7 honorable mentions
Composers: Garry Schyman, Jim Bonney, Ada Ruth Habershon, Charles Hutchinson Gabriel, Samuel Lover, Scott Joplin
Lighter Than Air
Solace
Will The Circle Be Unbroken (full version)
It tells much of its story with its sound and music because its part of the plot, something insanely complicated to do. And the versions of famous music, in ragtime, boudeville and barbershop quartets (some of my favourite type of music) are out of this world.
Bioshock Infinite music probably won me over during the fantastic introduction of the game with
Welcome to Columbia and
Will the Circle be Unbroken played back to back. Mesmerizing, with an almost frightening crescendo, then the calm piano when the player discovers the city above the clouds, and finally the incredible choral, which made me stay in the "church" longer than I should have. A magical moment, and the soundtrack played a big part in it.
As soon as you encounter the Barbershop Quartet singing
God Only Knows, you know that there's something more going on here. Shout out to this
awesome scene as well.
8.
Shin Megami Tensei IV – 57 points, 12 honorable mentions
Composers: Ryota Kozuka, Kenichi Tsuchiya, Toshiki Konishi
Boss Battle
SSDS IV
Tokyo Overworld
Shin Megami Tensei IV has the best soundtrack in gaming this year. The variety is astounding, the production values are of a high quality, and is just an all-around solid choice. It's got this electronic 80's funk/rock nature to it at times, sometimes dubstep (
wubwubwub), chill rock tunes, and really incredible battle music, with throw-backs to the older games in the franchise.
The variety of music in this game is astounding. Not once could I find a section of music that I didn't like, nor could I find one that didn't fit the game perfectly. I would argue the use of this music in this game is some of the best i've heard, with the music being a device to completely fill in the the atmosphere of the world you're exploring. It’s a character in and of itself.
The moment I stepped onto the
Tokyo Overworld I could not believe what I was hearing. With all of the great music tracks/compositions this year, there were very few moments where I would stop playing the game and idle on screen just to listen to a particular piece. This track was one of them.
There is no weak element to SMT IV's soundtrack. From the battle themes to the dungeons to the overworlds, every track is consistent, confident, and memorable. Ryota Kozuka did more than meet expectations for an unknown composer, he completely knocked it out of the park and in doing so, created one of the strongest SMT OSTs around and my personal soundtrack of the year.
9.
Tearaway – 53 points, 7 honorable mentions
Composers: Kenneth Young, Brian D'Oliveira
Gibbet HIll
Renaissance Hop
The Traveller
Gleeful, haunting, memorable and unique. The wide range of instrumentation and influences is particularly notable, as a harmonious hodgepodge of fiddles, pipes, accordions, percussion, common objects, kazoos, sea shanties, celtic folk, dance music and more coalesces into a surprisingly cohesive whole. Can't wait to hear what Brian D'Oliveira, Kenneth Young and the rest of the sound team at Media Molecule come up with next.
Tearaway's musical palette is about as colorful as the game's papercraft world itself. It's unique and playful and it's not afraid to come up with something as bonkers as
"Dubstep Folk" along the way. Even Kenny Young, one of the game's composers, admits that something like that shouldn't work. But it does.
10.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney-Dual Destinies – 50 points, 7 honorable mentions
Composers: Noriyuki Iwadare, Masakazu Sugimori, Hideki Okugawa, Toshihiko Horiyama, Shu Takumi, Akemi Kimura
Ace Attorney 5 ~ End
Pursuit ~ Last Promotion Version
Thought Route ~ Resonance of the Synapses
This soundtrack reeled me into the mysteries, humor, and exciting courtroom shenanigans and revelations found in Dual Destinies.
Character have great theme music that fit their personalities well, be it goofy, bubbly, slightly sardonic, serious, and so on. The music in this game also keeps the thrill going in the heat of a courtroom battle.
Making music for a Lawyer ‘em up (this may not be a real genre, just a hunch) may sound a bit bland to those looking at the series from a distance but Dual Destinies always has the right music on hand to match a situation, whether you’re meeting a zany character or stumbling across a crime scene the music plays a role in helping set the scene, jubilant, mournful, puzzling, all these words can fit Dual Destinies soundtrack at one time or another.
They just nail it, each time. Being on a winning streak in court, having all the odds pile up against you, trying to crack important testimony, the new mood matrix and final "put it together" segments...they just flow exactly as they should thanks to smart and catchy compositions.
11.
Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan – 40 points, 7 honorable mentions
Composer: Yuzo Koshiro
Misty Ravine
Ruins Touched by the Memories of the Ancient
Unrest - The End of Raging Winds
In a series known for amazing music, EOIV still somehow manages to stand out with its eclectic, orchestrated blend of melodic and atmospheric compositions. There is no question in my mind that, of what I've played this year, this game bears the most successful soundtrack of the bunch that could easily be, by default, a classic winner for most people regardless of taste.
First off: I'm still disappointed that they dropped the musical style of all the previous games. It was part of the series's identity and I always loved it. But then again, how can I stay mad if they still manage to make a soundtrack this awesome?
12.
Grand Theft Auto V – 34 points, 3 honorable mentions
Composers: Tangerine Dream, Woody Jackson, The Alchemist, Oh No
Diving
Repossession
The Grip
Tangerine Dream's involvement alone would be enough for this to land the top spot for me, but when you add Gangrene (Alchemist + Oh No), and Woody Jackson to provide 3 different styles for 3 different characters that go into a blender with the stem system used in RDR and MP3, it becomes special. Again though, the standout tracks are definitely the tense, ambient, and throbbing synthy electronic Tangerine Dream work that you hear from moment 1 as you're installing the game, through the heist build ups, to one of the more emotionally charged missions in the game. All 3 parties provide great backing tracks for different missions to capture different areas of the map, and specific characters. It all seems like a real mess on paper, but it works.
Tangerine Dream, Alchemist + oh no and woody jackson is just something that you think it wouldn't happen or even work. But with Ivan Pavlovich and Craig Connor (and obviously Sam Houser) being at the helm of rockstar's music sector, they created a soundtrack that conveys so amazingly what is happening on screen, and even outside the game, it's really easy to listen to. From casing the heists to going through a drug deal gone wrong, this trio of different musical style shines through in way that is something out of this world.
13.
Rayman Legends – 31 points, 9 honorable mentions
Composers: Christophe Héral, Billy Martin
Lost in the Clouds
Luchador
Medieval Dragon
It shouldn't come as a surprise that the sequel to Origins has an excellent soundtrack, but here we are. Legends come back with another eclectic mix of sounds, featuring popular instruments like the kazoo, high-pitched gibberish and whistling. Whenever I went back to the level select screen I'd find myself whistling along with music, which shows despite the silly and irreverent way the music has been put together it hasn't lost itself in its foolishness.
The soundtrack for Rayman Legends is a peculiar blend, it’s got its share of grand orchestral fare to fit the backdrops of old castles within a dense woodland, it’s also got sneaky spy themes with spoof Bond film track names pointing directly at their inspiration. Then there’s the distinct eccentric nature of the predecessor Rayman Origins own soundtrack that serves to tie all the various themes together into one lovingly mad whole, I hope you like Kazoos!
14.
Remember Me – 29 points, 1 honorable mention
Composer: Olivier Deriviere
Fragments
Nilin the Memory Hunter
Our Parents
Olivier Deriviere is one of the all-time greats. He deserves much more recognition for his unique approach to OSTs. Powerful and beautiful.
I haven't really heard anything like it in a videogame. The way the sounds glitch out and form is awesome. Usually my OST of the year goes to something new and wild and Remember Me fits that spot. I will be listening to this album for quite some time.
15.
Bravely Default – 28 points, 2 honorable mentions
Composer: Revo
Land of Light and Shadow
Wicked Flight
You are My Hope
I suppose what I appreciate the most about the Bravely Default soundtracks is that while it uses some complicated design and instruments, the whole product ends up sounding incredibly simple. Nothing seems overarranged or glaringly outstanding (in a bad way). Furthermore, every single theme on this soundtrack finds a way to progress and have more than one section as opposed to staying in one position and then looping that one segment. You can easily feel like the theme progresses. Instead of sounding like a showpiece for an anime come to life with some retro RPG touches like a certain other game’s soundtrack did, Revo gives Bravely Default his own touch from Sound Horizon’s general sound while still staying true to the game’s theoretical design era. It feels like a complete journey through all of the music that Japanese-developed RPGs exhibited, but with Revo’s take on it. This is the way it should be done, folks.
This was the year I started gaming again, so a lot of the games I played were not 2013 releases. But even so, the Bravely Default OST is still the best OST I've heard this year. I feel like when you listen to it in track order, it sounds like a story in itself. The use of piano, electric guitar and brass is sooo good.
Special thanks to theprodigy, who had the ballots counted for us less than a day after the voting period closed.
Past Threads
2013 Voting Thread
2012 Results and Archive
2012 Voting Thread
2011 Results and Archive
2011 Voting Thread
2010 Results and Archive
2010 Voting Thread
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