This is the forty-fifth installment of West Wind, your daily drop of thoughts, ideas, and info for this Season. This post has embedded media that you won’t be able to open in an email. Read in a browser or app for the full experience.
I used to play a lot of video games, back in the day. I went from the DMG Game Boy to DOS games, then to a PS1, the GBA, and finally a PS2. We inherited a Wii from my sister-in-law, but by that point indie PC games were really starting to take off, so I didn’t ever get any other consoles. Games were how I spent the majority of my free time, and after getting married, how we spent our free time together.
Out of all of the different parts of a game: the graphics, the writing, the art design, the gameplay; one of the most impactful elements has always been the music. I was so impressed by the music of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night that I bought a soundtrack CD from Japan, doing the same with Wild Arms 1, Wild Arms 2, and Kingdom Hearts. That led to downlading many more OST’s over the years, to the point now where easily 80% of my music collection is game soundtracks. If my kids hear us playing a song they don’t recognize, their first question is not “who is this by” but “where is this from?”
Now, as a working parent with a strong creative pursuit, I don’t have very much time to play games any more. What I can still do, though, is listen to music. While there are many soundtracks of my favorite games that I return to over and over, I’ve also experienced many games only through their music.
This is an interesting way to consume media, only through one part instead of the whole, though I imagine it would be similar to a deaf person watching a movie with subtitles. Normally when listening to a soundtrack for a game that I’ve already played, it will bring up the same memories and feelings I had when reaching that zone or scene in the game. Without that point of reference, I can form new memories around the music itself, usually in connection to my own creative works.
If you’ve read the serial version of Octave of Stars, you’ll remember Gayle and Azalea’s ascent through the tower, starting in Episode 37. The track I chose to accompany that scene was from 30XX, a modern platformer inspired by Mega Man.
The thing is, I’ve never played the game. I played it’s prequel, 20XX, but the next one wasn’t released on a platform that I could use, so I just listened to the music. The track is used in the game during a boss fight: (skip to 21:40 if it doesn’t take you there right away)
The song just fit the mood of the entire sequence, and has become Gayle’s theme for me. If I had played the game, the music would be tied up with the visuals, the sound effects, the controller in my hand, all of it would have made for a very different experience.
If you haven’t read Octave here on Extraordinary Seasons, why not? There’s accompanying music for nearly every scene, along with some author commentary, extra jokes, and even a few memes.
