Awesome Music / PC Only

This is the Awesome Music page for PC only games.

Note: Some of the music from the older games (Mostly DOS games before Windows 95) were composed with specific hardware in mind (Sierra games' music was made with Roland MT-32 in mind, for example) that are not possible to emulate on modern sound cards and DOSBox. Fortunately, as of summer 2011 the fans made considerable progress in emulating the Roland MT-32 hardware.

Alternatively, you can get around that by other means, one of which is to install soundfonts that faithfully replicate, or in some cases even surpass, the original music.

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• The Beatbuddy soundtrack is just jammin'. Have a listen, friends.
• Indie game To the Moon has "Everything's Alright" by Laura Shigihara, which is a big Tearjerker in context. Out of context as well.
• Indie game Hamsterball has good music tracks. Exhibit A: Wobbly Race (World of Daze), Master Race (Symphony of the Master), and Impossible Race (Absolute Rodent).
• The Far Cry menu theme - the way it kicks in at 0:30.
  • While at Far Cry 3 the soundtrack deserves a mention. And then you have Make it Bun Dem playing while you burn down a weed farm.
  • And now, we've got the DLC Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon. If you like 80's style synth music, you're gonna be ecstatic.
• The Dwarf Fortress theme is so awesome it's the only track in the game, played on a six string guitar by the Toady One himself. The haunting notes suspend one's sense of time's passage and accentuate the despair felt as Fun begins to propagate through one's fortress.
• EVE Online has this, which is just one song in a seriously awesome set of music tracks, saved especially for blowing stuff up. And then there are Below the Asteroids and Red Glowing Dust that set the mood perfectly. By now the Soundtrack of Eve Online consists of over 100 songs with many of them being candidates for this page.
• That Old Army Game, Nightmare Buzz, Buzz Battle, and Inside the Claw Machine from the Toy Story PC Game.
• Painkiller:
  • The battle music from the Leningrad level, the Soviet Anthem with the damned screaming in the background.
  • If you feel an aversion to all metal battle themes, check out this little piece of work from Monastery level, which combines chanting, bells in the background and creepy ambient music for incredibly atmospheric feel.
• Quest for Glory IV: Shadows of Darkness:
  • The main theme is simply epic.
  • If you fail to stop any of the elementals in Quest for Glory II: Trial By Fire, the music is very awesome, even though technically you lost.
  • Erana's Peace from Quest for Glory I: So You Want To Be A Hero, considered by many to be a classic of video game music. Even the original MIDI version is beautiful beyond words.
• Skyroads has some excellent tunes that fit the subject well.
• From an old Polish turn-based strategy game Clash we have battle theme, which tells you quite fast this is not a child's play, but an actual battlefield with all of its atrocities.
• Dawn of War has some great themes for each of the factions, matching them quite well.
  • Notable ones are the apocalyptic (well, it definitely gives that feeling) Chaos theme, Asian orchestral Tau Empire theme and the Military March-style Imperial Guard theme.
  • Unless you enjoy bolter rounds to the face, you'd better include the Space Marines' theme.
  • An' if ya don' wanta be krumped, youze better inklood Da Orks theem!
  • Overall, Dawn of War's soundtrack is so good, that for the last few years, whenever Games Workshop (The creators of Warhammer 40,000) need music for promotional movies on their own website, they use this game's soundtrack.
  • The Winter Assault expansion had some nice title music.
  • The best thing on the Dawn of War soundtrack may be an obscure little track called "Chant" that consists of nothing more than a mournful Latin chorus.
  • Dawn of War II used a new composer and didn't give us any remixes of the classic themes, but instead gave us "Dark Future of War" and sweet theme music for the Orks and Tyranids.
  • Even better, the entire soundtrack of Dawn of War II is downloadable on their website for free here.
  • The Eldar theme here took the ethereal, ancient race of the eldar and added a completely badass chant to them that makes the listener instantly want to pull out a singing spear and start impaling Mon-keigh.
  • Doyle W Donahoo's soundtrack for Dawn of War II is full of Awesome Music. Just a few examples are ''Angels of Death'' for the Space Marines and ''The Green Horde Rises'' for the Orks. The Tyranid themes perfectly capture the sinister, alien nature of their race, and nothing says run for your life like ''The Great Devourer''. The Eldar music explores both sides of the race: ''Khaine's Wrath'' paints them as the tragic heroes fighting for the very survival of their species, while ''For The Craftworld'' reminds us that they still can and will kick your ass.
    • And then the Retribution expansion gives us the Imperial Guard theme.
    • Pit of the Maledictum, anyone?
• When talking about Warhammer 40000 game music, it's considered heresy to not mention Chaos Gate.
  • While the Ultramarine Chant is a classic, people tend to forget its just as awesome Evil Counterpart, The Worldbearers March.
  • Other gems from the soundtrack include the hauntingly beautiful Lord of Battle and Waltz of the Damned, as well as the completely fanatical March Into Hell and the Chaos Gate Title Track.
• Codename Panzers: Phase One. It may be just an overlooked Hungarian game about the most commonly played war since the war itself, but, dammit, it has some good tunes.
• On the whole, Neverwinter Nights was unremarkable in this regard, but its soundtrack did include a few gems.
• Neverwinter Nights 2 tended to recycle its music from Neverwinter Nights, but its expansion Mask of the Betrayer had an impressive amount of memorable songs. Notably The main theme, Dream Battle, and The Faceless Man.
• The Neverhood has the impossibly epic Battle of Robot Bil.
  • It also has the brilliant "Pop Goes The Weasel" scene.
  • Skullmonkeys has the amusing and extremely satisfying Klogg Is Dead song.
• The relatively obscure planetary air-trading sim Hardwar had a soundtrack entirely composed of artists from the Warp Records label, ranging from awesome techno-industrial to even funky drum n' bass.
• The Descent series had quite a few gems.
  • Let's start with the title theme, shall we?
  • Descent 2's soundtrack will make you feel dangerous. See Tracks 5-7.
  • Even the original FM MIDI soundtrack had its high points. It give the game a gritty, cybernetic feel.
  • Descent 3's soundtrack, although contested like the game itself, had several epic moments, such as the climax of Level 4, and Level 7(unfortunately not on the OST).
  • The Level 18, Level 11, Level 8, and Level 3 soundtracks from the original game. The last of which got a positively epic rock remix in the Macintosh port.
    • Level 5 Mac, a Made of Win techno remix of the aforementioned Level 18 PC music.
• RuneScape:
  • MIDI power! comes apparent in Route Of The Problem.
  • Some Dungeoneering bosses like Night-gazer Khighorahk have a great theme.
• Star Wars: The Old Republic had a few, most notably the main menu theme and the music of Balmorra and Alderaan.
• Practically any mid-90s release from the company then known as Epic MegaGames.
  • Everything from Jazz Jackrabbit.
    • The title theme!
    • And how about this Mario Paint Tubelectric remix?
    • Don't forget absolutely everything from Jazz Jackrabbit 2. Everything. Even expansion pack music.
  • Epic Pinball's music was from the same composer. It still rocks.
  • Not much love for electronic music around these parts, but the soundtrack to One Must Fall 2097 should bring back a lot of memories to a few. Awesome memories.
    • The music played in the Lightning Power Plant arena is probably the best of the arena songs.
    • Battlegrounds, though a lackluster sequel, has an ass-kickin' remix of 2097's main menu theme.
    • The reconstruction of the theme by Kenny Chou, the man who composed it in the first place.
  • From Radix: Beyond The Void, the first mission theme rocked pretty hard.
  • From Jill of the Jungle, the intro theme was pretty awesome given the limitations on sound quality.
  • Tyrian. Check Tyrian, the song, Sarah's Song, Rock Garden, Asteroids, One Mustn't Fall and Tyrian, the level.
    • Even more awesome is the fact that the music sounds much better with older sound hardware. General MIDI? Meh. FM Sound? Awesome cranked up to 11!
    • The AWE 32 soundcard in general. For direct comparison, here's the FM synth and here's an AWE32 playing the same track. The 8MBGMSFX soundfont that came with the card is awesome as well if your card has the sample memory to load it into.
• Baldur's Gate:
  • The BG2 Main Theme or the First game one or the song that plays when fighting When fighting dragons which is probably the most epic song EVER.
  • One of the first game's battle themes is particularly awesome.
• Skeleton of a Town(/Town of Targos) from Icewind Dale 2 is absolutely gorgeous, as is the rest of the soundtrack. But then, Inon Zur's soundtracks usually are.
• Star Control II:
  • While the music from is universally agreed to be mind-blowingly wonderful in general, the Yehat theme is considered to be the best.
  • Also the Orz and Ur-Quan. But we could argue all night, and the best would still be the combat theme. It's practically synonymous with the game! Heck, even the combat victory themes were sweet!
  • There's also Precursors Team — a remake project with original artists involved.
• While we're on the subject of Type-Moon, doujin Super Robot Wars clone Battle Moon Wars has some pretty amazing music as well.
  • Counter Attack. Original Generation character Haruna's theme. While it doesn't prelude any particular moments of awesome, you'll want to turn off attack animations so that it doesn't stop.
  • Reprisal. The theme for Irisviel and Kiritsugu. An anthem to the Power of Love. Also one of the more challenging boss fights in the game. Probably because of said power.
  • RoSHIaKI's theme. Because even joke characters need to have awesome music sometimes.
  • Ancient Weapon. Pretty much cements Kuu's status as a Lady of War and preludes a beatdown of epic proportions on your characters as she slams her chosen target with multiple, potentially unavoidable Wave Motion Guns.
  • Let It Go. The theme for the final boss. Let's just say it contributes to the entire Moment of Awesome and leave it at that.
• The music in the second half of the Chzo Mythos, especially the "you are going to die" theme, could probably be counted as one, if not for their unfortunate tendency of evoking memories of the Tall Man. The stealth based prequel Trilby: The Art of Theft is no slouch in the music department. Just listen to the eponymous track that plays during one of the harder areas.
• Basically everything from Rome: Total War.
  • Divinitus and Forever deserve a special mention.
  • The Middle Eastern menu music is a hell of a lot of fun, too.
  • True to the name, Medieval II: Total War doesn't disappoint, and opens the game with some amazing main menu music - two of them, actually.
  • From Shogun: Total War, the first mobilisation track and second battle track spring to mind.
• Iji:
  • The final boss' theme. Just add Macross Missile Massacre to it and you'll start bleeding awesomeness from your ears, courtesy of Chris Geehan and Dan Byrne McCullough.
  • And the regular boss theme. Also the artist made it a looping song, meaning if you add the beginning right at the end, it'll loop perfectly. Tom Mauritzon is a genius.
  • There's also a fair amount of awesomeness in "Kinda Green" and the strangely named "3 Cans Later".
  • Organ Smash, a song so awesome you'll wonder why the hell it isn't actually in the game.
• FX Fighter is an obscure MS-DOS fighting game from 1995. While the graphics and gameplay left much to be desired, it had a susprisingly good soundtrack.
• Battle Realms:
  • The "pragmatic" Serpent Clan's first theme song, "Fall of Serpentholm".
  • "The Swan's Pool", another Serpent theme, is also kickass.
• Ready to feel your face melt from kickass nostalgia? Yes? Well, here you go: The Incredible Machine 3: Progressive (Soundtrack Version)
• Frank Klepacki composed the soundtrack to Star Wars: Empire at War. Three Words: Tyber Zann's theme.
• Every track from the indie game Aquaria is downright beautiful, only magnificently adding to the game's amazing Scenery Porn.
  • Examples: The Abyss, Remains, Icy Waters, The Sun Temple, and Open Waters. All three of them.
  • The boss music isn't too shabby either. Just check out the miniboss music.
• The FreeSpace series has excellent music.
  • It includes gems like Chaser, Monolith, Exodus, and the incredibly badass Revelation.
  • The best part is, Dan Wentz did the music for the Red Faction series too, so if you listen closely, you might hear some familiar themes from FreeSpace whilst playing the Red Faction games.
  • The Blue Planet: Age of Aquarius mod is known for its excellent soundtrack, which makes use of some pulse-pounding battle tracks as well as this utterly beautiful remix of "Joshua" from the original game. Blue Planet: War in Heaven takes it even further, featuring such songs as Globus' "Spiritus Elektros" and "Preliator".
• The music from Ragnarok Online.
  • Here's one from Gonryun. 'Not so far away', and another from job changes, 'Believe in myself', 'Dread and Bold'
  • We Have Lee but You don't Have of Juperos, Monastery in Disguise of Nameless Island's Cursed Abbey, Erebos' Prelude of Thanatos' Tower (Floors 1-3), Christmas in the 13th Month of Nifflheim town, and more songs that just aren't done justice by Youtube's quality.
  • Many of the city themes are epically awesome. Try Juno, Aldebaran, and Louyang.
  • Wanna Be Free!! deserves some love too. Especially the vocal version. Which is three different shades of awesome.
  • Nearly the entirety of the soundtrack (warning: free membership site, sorry) of Ragnarok Online 2 is simply stellar. Of course, it IS scored by Yoko Kanno...
  • Since one of the last Patches, Morroc Satan got revived, this deserves a place here.
  • Steel Me. Newcomers to Einbroch were standing around for hours listening to it.
• The Lord of the Rings Online has amassed a seriously impressive backlog of awesome music, with more undoubtedly to come.
  • The music at Tom Bombadil's house, which was also awesome because it's right in the middle of a really difficult and scary (at level 10 or so, anyway) forest.
  • Most of the songs that play in the Trollshaws are awesome (some play in Ered Luin as well). There's a clip of one of them in the first part of this trailer. And then Rivendell itself!
  • Most of the soundtrack in the Shire is really good, esepcially Hills of the Shire, which plays when trying to cross the Brandywine Bridge, leaving the Shire for Bree-land. It has a Dark Reprise called Warpipes, which is equally awesome and is heard when the Nazgûl comes to the Shire, as well as in the skirmish 'Trouble at Tuckborough,' during which goblins raid the Shire.
  • Mirkwood. Strangely, this music was in the official soundtrack before Mirkwood was added to the game. It is heard during the Ford of Bruinen skirmish. This is the perfect music for a Big Damn Heroes moment.
• Planetarian has mostly sweet, extremely melodious tunes for its soundtrack. They are simple, but extremely effective in setting the mood.
• Aveyond. Anything. From. The. Aveyond. Series. Period. Field of Wind, the overworld theme from the first game, a lush and melancholy theme.
• Sierra games are known for having some excellent scores.
  • For instance, the ending anthem to King's Quest VI. Literally crowning music of awesome.
  • Quest Studios for those of you unlucky enough to miss out on the awesome. These guys also composed their own Awesome Music for the AGD Interactive Fan Remakes. Their score for the KQ2 remake, especially the Air Gem tests, is on par with Sierra itself. The flash-forward scenes to King's Quest III "Daventry in Ruins" and "Walking with Connor" (with the King's Quest: Mask of Eternity character) incorporate the leitmotif from both games beautifully.
  • And while on the subject of Sierra games, let's talk Gabriel Knight, shall we? Here is a small sampling of the music from the first game, which includes the main theme. In addition to that: GK1 Intro + Credits, GK1 Wolfgang's Theme, GK2 Chapter 1 Intro, and GK3 Intro.
  • And while not a Sierra game itself, the music for Gray Matter was done by the composer for Gabriel Knight, Robert Holmes, so the music is similarly awesome.
  • Every single one of the eight faiths in Lords of Magic has its own theme music that perfectly encapsulates their respective philosophies in musical form.
• MDK's soundtrack. Facing the Inevitable is amazing, as is most of the game's music.
• Bonesaw: The Game has some awesome tunes. Listen to the OST here.
• Doujin shmup eXceed 3rd: Jade Penetrate brings to the table "Intersect Thunderbolt" and "The Fate of...", the themes of the final boss and her super form.
• The original theme song to the Nancy Drew games was pretty awesome by itself, as it excellently captured the mystery, suspense, and overall mood of the games. For that reason, many fans were unhappy when it got cut from the opening halfway through the series. When the theme song finally did return a few games later, it came with an all-new level of awesomeness.
  • And the various scores to the games. And those are just a few examples. Kevin Manthei has a knack for capturing the mood in each game perfectly.
  • Special mention should go to the fact that the series has a game set in pretty much every location you can think of (Hawaii, Canada, Paris, Japan, New York...) and that its themes always manage to convey the place and the feel perfectly. That is what good background music is. Happily, there is at least one fansite devoted to recording the series' music and offering it for download.
• Seiklus' soundtrack consists entirely of a bunch of previously-existing demoscene tunes. But the thing is, they're all good. What Clysm lacked in composition skills, he made up for in the ability to find incredibly catchy music. Particularly noteworthy are "Rainy Summerdays" and "Believe in Yourself (Extended Remix)".
• Nuclear Winter's theme from Freedom Force.
• Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. Period.
  • Raptor and Nexus: the former plays during the first serious space battle of the game while the second comes with brutal Scenery Porn.
  • Vardrag, the track that gives Ominous Latin Chanting a new meaning.
  • Also, Haegemonia and its expansion, The Solon Heritage. Even better, both versions has the soundtrack in MP2 format without encryption, compression or custom codecs, neatly organized in the game folder!
• Diablo series:
  • The first game featured some ridiculously atmospheric tracks.
    • The hauntingly melancholy Tristram theme immediately establishes a mood of unease in a town facing destruction from an invasion from the forces of Hell itself.
    • Raise some hell. Sadly there is no studio version of this.
  • That's not to say Diablo II doesn't have its good tracks.
    • When you defeat Diablo, the introductory guitar riffs from Tristram's theme plays.
    • The Spider piece that's used for Act III's dungeons uses a remixed version of a portion of the theme that was used for the starting church levels of the original game. Nostalgia will hit like a ton of bricks.
    • The music in Act V, starting from the theme of Harrogath itself. The music really reminds you that 'this is it', you've defeated two Prime Evils, went To Hell and Back, and fought many difficult battles— and now this is the final struggle. Time to deal the decisive blow to the devils who have brought so many deaths and despair across the Sanctuary. You're not alone, the Barbarians of Harrogath are fighting alongside you. And if you're a Barbarian yourself, this is also a case of It's Personal: for the liberation of your homeland.
  • Diablo III has a whole OST full of awesome tracks, but the crowning one is "And The Heavens Shall Tremble", which plays during much of the action of Act IV.
• The entire soundtrack of RosenkreuzStilette, except for most of the talk themes (but not Dark Purple Moon, which was instead wasted.)
  • Of particular note are the intro stage theme The Ground Which Can Shine, Luste's stage theme 26, Freudia's boss theme 22, which also plays when she saves Spiritia from Iris, the first Iris stage theme, Red Pollusion, the theme of the Garden of Time, Space, and Chaos, Winter Breath, and the final stage theme, ys008 ~The Final Duel~.
  • Its sequel Freudenstachel has been showing strong signs of this: Zorne's new stage theme Eruption Trigger and Sichte's new stage theme The Ancient Cry are much more awesome than their original stage themes. Sadly, Eruption Trigger can't be found on Youtube... yet.
• For Tear Jerking Music, the battle theme in Rise of Nations, for when you are losing, really drives home the extent of your failure.
• A little-known game by Apogee called Rise of the Triad did this with half the music in the game. Instead of going atmospheric and moody like most first-person shooters of the time, Triad had music that made you want to charge in, guns blazing - and given that almost all the game mechanics revolved around the Rule of Cool, this was not only feasible, but totally awesome to do.
  • Goin' Down The Fast Way. Run Like Smeg. How'd I Do? Oww!!! And, of course, the Fish Polka.
  • It's made even better, somehow, through having a good chunk of the Doom fan-expansion Hell Revealed feature its music for a good portion of its frenetic stages.
  • To put it in perspective, someone remixed Goin' Down The Fast Way with Mega Man X instruments. Not only is it still awesome, but it would feel right at home in one of the SNES titles.
  • Since the game is getting a remake the songs will also get a remake too. Behold, the official Goin' Down The Fast Way remake.
  • "You Suck". The title doesn't make it sound too promising, right? Cue grand orchestra epicness.
• Grabbag, the theme of Duke Nukem from Duke Nukem 3D onwards. It has had plenty of fan and official remixes, and even the original version's MIDI was released. Other fan favorites include the first map music, Stalker, Aliens, Say Your Prayers!, Departure, Plasma, Ah, Geez! and Robo Creeping. The talented community remixer Norvak (also of OC Remix fame) produced a great remix album called ReDUKED.
• X3: Terran Conflict has a fair collection of "spacey" music, some uplifting, some haunting, most of it just being there, without you really noticing it. But then, one day, you make the jump into Kingdom's End and you get this.
• VVVVVV has what may be the best chiptune soundtrack in a new game since Cave Story.
  • For just a sampling, try "Pushing Onwards", "Potential For Anything", and "Pressure Cooker".
  • Most of the soundtrack is awesome, but the one that stands par to "Potential For Anything" in terms of awesomeness is "Positive Force". It takes "Pushing Onwards" and raise its motive to a whole new level.
  • "Predestined Fate" is also excellent.
  • Popular Potpourri, the credits is also pretty great.
• Vampire: The Masquerade – Redemption
  • The main theme, available in Dark Age and Modern Age variants.
  • The Tremere Chantry theme can be pretty thrilling the first time you hear it.
• Most of the Planescape: Torment soundtrack is made of awesome. A small taste is the Main Theme and Transcendent One. The latter is chillingly awesome in game, with its first appearance being right after the Nameless One has moved on after defeating Ravel Puzzlewell. The Transcendent One, aka the Nameless One's disembodied mortality (and final boss of the game) arrives and this theme starts up. He and Ravel proceed to have a truly epic battle against one another, which made the previous battle against the Nameless One himself seem like little more than a warm-up. Can be seen here. There's also a bit of Sigil Battle and the theme from Ravel's Maze to be heard there as well, which are cool in their own right.
• Killing Floor soundtrack mostly consists of industrial/trash metal like music. And when you have something coming up against you that has a rocket launcher for an arm, all you could do is abandon all...
• The music that plays when entering the Crash Site neighborhood of the Rikti War Zone in City of Heroes.
• Tubular Worlds, a shmup for PC, Macintosh and Amiga, has an absolutely amazing intro theme.
• Pathologic: You need not go any further then the Main Menu to already know that you're in for some mind-blowingly scary stuff.
• Princess Waltz: The song "Battlefield of Steel" alone is worth the price of admission, and the rest of the soundtrack is pretty catchy too.
• The four-disc soundtrack to Cho Ren Sha 68k, which includes the already-awesome in-game songs, such as the music to Stage 4, "Infinity", as well as fan- and self-remixed songs such as this remix of "Impossible One"
• Medal of Honor: Allied Assault:
  • The music that plays in Allied Assault during the level where you hijack the King Tiger tank and go a merry rampage. Awesome.
  • The Nebelwerfer Hunt, originally from the Undercover in Crete mission in Medal of Honor: Underground.
  • Schmerzen, a reworked version of the Fort Schmerzen theme from the original game.
• StepMania holds competitions for songs—composing, writing steps, doing background art. Some of them are at least as good as the tracks in the commercially-released games. For example, Vienna Core by JAKAZiD.
• The IIDX-like game O2Jam has its share of musical awesomeness, such as:
  • V3 by Beautiful Day, a remix of Beethoven's "Pathetique" (the same song that the Pump It Up song "Beethoven Virus" remixes).
  • RoseHoliC by SHK, which is described as "digi-occult" music. No relation to the IIDX song "Holic" or anime series ×××HOLiC.
• Star Trek: Starfleet Command not only neatly avoids The Problem with Licensed Games, it also boasts wall-to-wall awesome music.
  • Highlights include the wistful Federation theme, the menacing Romulan march, and the gleefully retro Lyran theme. Go and listen to them. Go and listen to them now.
  • Inon Zur did a quite awesome job on SFC II, as well.
• Star Siege has some meh songs but Mechsoul sticks out.
• Secret of the Solstice 's BGM mostly qualifies for this. But the Magic Forest, and the Jotunheim theme are brilliant.
• Crysis theme was pretty awesome whenever it appeared in the game.
• Wing Commander 2: Vengeance of the Kilrathi. Pretty much everything, starting right from the main theme. The scramble music from this series in particular.
• Some of the scrapped/rarer Hellgate: London tracks (one in particular from Sascha Dikiciyan and Cris Velasco) are also decent epic stuff.
• Action Doom 2: Urban Brawl has a couple of great tunes, such as the Bridge music.
• Melty Blood:
  • Pe-Ri-Ca has been the backdrop to many an intense and high speed fight.
  • Seijaku no Fortissimo. 'Bad ending theme? I think you mean badass ending theme,' indeed.
  • Aoko's theme from the night version of the Grassy Field stage in ReAct.
• The opening music from SpaceQuest I VGA played on an MT-32. Awesome. It can be downloaded from Quest Studios' SQ1 digital music page here.
• Anachronox is considered by fans to have one of the best video game soundtracks.
• Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines:
  • Lacuna Coil's "Swamped" in the credits, when you (well, at least in one ending) walk out of Ventrue Tower that just blew up. With that asshole prince Lacroix inside. Awesome Music indeed.
  • Bloodlines, for all its problems, was blessed with a great soundtrack, both in terms of ambient themes and licensed songs. Chiasm's "Isolated" and Tiamat's "Cain" (the Asp Hole theme) tie in sublimely with the game's theme and mood.
• Da-da, da-da, da-da da-da da-da dah! Da-da, da-da, da-da da-da, MARATHON! Marathon's "SPLASH!" defines this trope. And Rushing, and Flippant.
• Fallout series:
  • If Fallout 2's Beyond The Canyon doesn't sound amazing to you, then there is something wrong with you.
  • Anything that plays on Galaxy News Radio. Oh, the Soundtrack Dissonance...
  • Even though it's not the same composer, it isn't surprising that Fallout 3's main theme can stand tall with these two.
  • On the subject of Fallout 3, This brief piece that plays when you step into the wasteland for the first time... magnificent. And then, of course there's "Civilization" and "Anything Goes", for all your Soundtrack Dissonance needs...
    • A mention of Mighty Man should be included for another beltable example. And Let's Go Sunning for a crown of dissonance.
    • No discussion of Fallout music is complete without the marvellous "Butcher Pete". Hack! Whack! Choppin' that meat!
  • Fallout: New Vegas has a beautiful main theme that's sort of a grandiose reworking of the already awesome Fallout 3 theme. And of course, you can't have Vegas without Frank Sinatra...
  • One of the developers contributed some surprisingly awesome songs for the different radio stations — some are original, and some are "Fallout''-ified versions of well-known tunes. "Home, Home on the Wastes" is "Did-I-just-hear-that" hilarious, and "Cobwebs and Rainbows" is downright sexy.
  • Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel may have had some ... questionable ... music choices, but the delightful "A Nuclear Blast" is absolutely spot-on.
• Ground Control:
  • The Main Theme starts as march and has quite a bit of shit around the middle.
  • There are also some very good tracks from the second game. Just listen.
• S4 League has tons of incredible songs— arguably one of the best parts of the game (if jumping and flipping and shooting don't do it for you).
• Evil Genius has a surprisingly badass main theme, for such a light-hearted game. As for the pause menu music, well... All the music is available for download separately here or as a package here.
• Nexus War has no music normally, but this makes up for it. It won't make sense unless you play the game.
• Jets'n'Guns. Brazilian developer Rake In Grass thought their game didn't feel old-school and PC-ey enough, so they hired Machinae Supremacy, a self-styled SID-Metal band. That's right, a SID chip synthesiser is one of their key instruments. Check it out.
• Just about anything from La Tale qualifies. The game is fun, but nothing amazing. The music, however, is very good. Most of it has a sort of upbeat techno feel, and it's very catchy. (The soundtrack can be found here, by the way.)
• Gore Screaming Show:
  • The opening theme Distorted Pain is highly energetic while still maintaining a slightly creepy factor that sets the tone of the story.
  • Gore's theme, Madness Visitor, twisted and distorted circus music fitting of an eldritch Monster Clown.
  • And for when Gore is feeling in the mood for his more devious and deadly pranks, there is 2006式 SADISTIC SEXART 2006, retaining the circus flair but much more playful and energetic, perhaps a bit too much to the point that it enters the realm of madness.
  • And finally, Screaming End Roll, the credits theme, a fitting closure to this mad show.
• From the X68000 game Mad Stalker, we have Stage 1's theme. The game was later remade on the PC-Engine CD and PSX, but this song just didn't sound quite as good in those versions.
• The song 'Stones' from the Ultima games. It's been around since Ultima V (where it was bleep-bloopy, of course), but later versions keep making more elaborate arrangements. The version from Ultima IX and the vocal version from Ultima Online are probably the best, however.
• The Computer (Atari ST, Commodore Amiga and MS-DOS - well, MS-DOS if you have a proper sound card then and even then some corners were cut) versions of The Bitmap Brothers' Gods: Into The Wonderful. Way ahead of its time, even on the PC version if you paid for a good sound card back then. Too bad the SNES and Genesis version used a different theme (and thus sucked), and that's practically the only song in the entire game on the computer versions of the game.
  • But wait! On the PC version, if you have a Roland MT-32 sound card, you get an inferior version of the opening theme (without the voice samples), but the rest of the game inexplicably and suddenly had BGM!
  • To make up for it, however, the Genesis version had an awesome ending theme. Both SNES and Genesis versions also has the BGM that are only available if you own a specific soundcard in the PC version of the game.
  • The track was the work of Nation 12, whose members variously included Tim Simenon (Bomb The Bass), Simon and Kurt Rogers, and John Foxx (who supplies the vocals here). Nation 12 also did the theme music to Bitmap Brothers' Speedball II: Brutal Deluxe. The full version of Into The Wonderful can be found on the Nation 12 compilation Electrofear which is pretty readily available.
• Pablo Sanchez's theme from Backyard Sports is a mariachi theme that brings back great memories to any 90's kid. Kenny Kawaguchi's theme from the same series is also hardcore.
• Ever17 has the tear-jerking Karma, the rocking Drittes Auges, and the ecstatic Aqua Stripe
• Most of the soundtrack of Outcast, especially since the Moscow Symphony Orchestra and Chorus was used.
• The obscure fangame Dizzy Lives takes the in-game music from the Spectrum game Spellbound Dizzy and one-ups it with a remix.
• The Realms of Arkania games, little known outside of Germany, had quite impressive soundtracks. Case in point: the first game's intro theme.
• 4D Sports Boxing already had a nice theme playing on the title screen... then, somebody made a rock remix.
• Star Trek New Worlds. Dreadful game. Fucking FANTASTIC soundtrack.
• Blue Wish Resurrection Plus has some pretty good tracks. So does the creator, X.X's next game, Eden's Aegis.
• From Crashday: Another place, another time, another Crashday! All the similarity to the theme from Stunts is, according to the band themselves, purely accidental.
• MapleStory: While the first levels have pretty average music, recent updates gave us some really awesome tunes.
• You might not expect a racing sim like GTR 2 to have some epic music, but god dang.
• Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura. Absolutely amazing songs include "Demise of the Zephyr", The Main Theme, and the Villages Theme. Really though, the entire soundtrack counts. Bonus points for being free to download.
• Three words: The Incredible Machine. Each of the games has a fair share of amazing soundtracks, such as Rock, Jazz Fusion, New Age, and Progressive Rock. Opinion may be divided on the greatness of the songs, due to different tastes in genre, but overall, these games produce some kick-ass music.
• The trailer for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim ends in some seriously badass lyrics.
  • Even the song poking fun at it qualifies.
  • The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion has a truly beautiful opening song called Reign Of The Septims.
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R's music is pure distilled nightmare fuel. For your post-apocalyptic nuclear pleasure!
• Vangers: Awesome music for an awesome game, in particular Crazy Necross and Vangers Forever.
• Old, obscure DOS game Mystic Towers had little music, scratchy sound effects, and was generally somewhat forgettable, but the main menu theme is just pure early Soundblaster goodness.
• Transport Tycoon (and Transport Tycoon Deluxe) had some AMAZING pieces of jazz, easy listening, blues and so much more. Amazingly, this music sounds better on the old Adlib and Sound Blaster cards. Here, have a sample!
• X-COM: UFO Defense:
  • This game had some good music (such as the iconic "Geoscape" theme) across all versions: PSX, PC and Amiga. Laurent Lorcán' Horsch made a wonderful cover album for the open source version (OpenXCOM). It's titled Cydonia's Fall. Here, have a listen.
  • The original PC release had a rather enjoyable intro with a very 90's synth BGM (and tons of Cutscene Power to the Max). An enterprising fan has since remastered the theme to match the instrumentation of the 2012 reboot, to great effect.
  • The Tactical Legacy DLC for XCOM 2 shipped with a new soundtrack including several remixes of the original nineties game's soundtrack, including a remix of the original Geoscape theme for the main menu, a synth-and-guitar-heavy remix of the Interception theme, a slower but more epic version for the victory screen and several other blood-pumping synth tracks for tactical battles.
• Earth 2150 has some excellent pieces.
  • Each of the factions has a certain musical theme: the ED is militaristic/orchestral, the UCS perfectly illustrates the the state of the Earth and the LC is distinctly sci-fi.
  • The sequel has foregone faction-specific music but in exchange, the soundtrack is EPIC with a capital E. The main menu theme is simply beautiful with the setting's cynical tone.
• Dark Reign has eight songs in the whole game. Sounds bad? Not when it's this good.
• Mabinogi:
  • When you're fighting the final battle of one of the chapters of this MMORPG, you can pretty much bet that the music which is playing will be awesome. For example, Glas Ghaibhleann from G1, Claimh Solas from G9, the Doppelganger from G10, Ouroburos from G11, and especially Nuadha from G12.
  • The synth and guitar solos in the Longa Ruins Dungeon theme will absolutely leave you gasping.
• Vindictus is not without its awesome music as well:
  • This music is always satisfying to hear, especially after you've gone through hell to complete a mission.
  • And from the most recent chapter in Korea, Glas Ghaibleann makes the jump to Vindictus, and his theme is suitably awesome.
• Psygnosis' Novastorm for Playstation had forgettable music, but the PC version of it was positively epic - in particular, Stage 4-1's approach to the Big Bad's space station, the evasion of the perimeter defenses, entry into the station itself, and a frenetic dodge-and-weave through obstacles are set to a pulsing techno piece that keeps building the energy right up to the stage boss.
• Creepy indie game The Path has some great music. In particular, there's the Forest Theme. It will haunt you.
• Tearing up Spacetime from Acid Tetris is ridiculously catchy.
• The soundtrack from Minecraft (available for download here and here) is simple but absolutely outstanding. The entire soundtrack, Sweden in particular, really sets you in the mood of being the only human alive.
• The Boss Battle theme from Terraria, much more awesome than the bosses themselves. And now that version 1.1 brought more bosses, we have more boss themes.
• Ni Miedo from the MMO Granado Espada. Nice and relaxing.
• Zoo from Sleepwalker. DAT BASS!
• The music in the third official trailer for TERA Online. The second half is just plain awesome.
• The overworld themes from the talkhaus production A Super Mario Thing are nothing short of excellent. Judge for yourself.
• Trample Machine from the freeware FPS game Another Bound Neo. Some really nice piano and violin.
• The Steampunk MMO Neo Steam: The Shattered Continent has this theme playing in Greticos - especially fitting for the PC's first visit to the national capital.
• Hearts of Iron gave us this masterpiece of music for the theme to their second installment, while the third game arguably topped it with its less intense but no less awesome theme here.
• The Shoot 'Em Up Hellsinker is known for having some rather unusual music but manages to set the mood regardless, from the multilayered Rusted Dragon's theme to the One-Woman Wail driven theme of the Apostle's of the Seed.
  • And there's the final boss.
  • But on top of the entire soundtrack we have the Shrine of Farewell.
• From the shmup game Sora, Rendezous, that is a sort of a long song but quite varied but awesome all the way through.
• Blood has some great pieces of music by composer Daniel Bernstein. The midi version sounds a lot more ambient than the CD. The two that stands out are The Haunting (CD version), -the creepiest levels in the game- and Unholy Voices (CD version).
• Westward had soundtracks for all 5 games in the series done by Daniel Bernstein as well. As you can imagine, every single piece is incredible.
• The theme for the city-building game Cities XL has an unexplainable "Hell Yes!" kind of touch to it.
• For such a dark and atmospheric game, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. has a lot of awesome music. Some notable examples include Fighting Unknown and Dirge for the Planet from Shadow of Chernobyl and the Outro Theme from Call of Pripyat.
• Crusader Kings II is full of epic music, as you'd expect from a Paradox Interactive game with Andreas Waldetoft in charge of the music, but Horns of Hattin and Aftermath is a particular highlight.
• PlanetSide:
  • The main theme radiates epicness, and the main menu music sets the mood for the epic battles you're about to take part in. You can thank Don Ferrone for the soundtrack, and his return to PlanetSide 2 cued much rejoicing.
  • The New Conglomerate music. FREEDOM OVER OPPRESSION!
• Aztec Wars is an obscure real-time strategy with some surprisingly great music. Have a taste of the Russian March.
• Although Dungeons of Dredmor has in general pretty good music, the track that plays when you enter (diggle) hell stands out, even if it's not exactly what you'd expect.
• Plants vs. Zombies:
  • The whole soundtrack is available for download from Bandcamp.
  • It's all awesome, but particularly "Plants vs. Zombies"/"Zombies on Your Lawn". And as a bonus, the composer released a Japanese version.
• While an Expy of the above, Mini Robot Wars has its share of Awesome Music as well, particularly the Waste Sands, Deep Ocean, and Iron Fortress stage themes. Too bad there are no places to download them. Sad.
• Torchlight II has some beautiful pieces, especially the track that plays in The Mapworks.
• League of Legends usually uses orchestral, atmospheric pieces at its logic screen for each new champion. That was, until Here Comes Vi, a track so popular players have delayed logging in just to hear it.
• For anyone who couldn't get enough of the MechWarrior 2 soundtrack, composer Jeehun Hwang returned to score the game's Spiritual Successor, Heavy Gear. Take a listen for yourself.
• The mostly forgotten Azrael's Tear has some really good sounding music, such as "Peaceful" (which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin), "Egyptian", and "Cathedral" (which actually sounds somewhat like real medieval or Renaissance music). It all really shines on a Roland Sound Canvas and even the normally mediocre AdLib/Sound Blaster cards. Not so much on the usually good-sounding MT-32.
• Company of Heroes had two soundtracks released. Oddly enough none of them contained the best pieces of music. Since there is no official release, the tracks have been nicknamed by the community.
  • A Stormy Night, March of the Britons, Month of the Valiant Effort (a variant of A Stormy Night) for the British.
  • We are Moving Out (different version) on the loading screen.
• World of Warplanes (the aerial-combat cousin of World of Tanks, both from Wargaming.net) really, really wants you to feel like you rule the skies.
• All of The Angry Video Game Nerd Adventures's soundtrack, but the final boss's theme is orgasmic.
• Though the gameplay itself was on the mediocre side, the mid-'90s adventure RPG Entomorph: Plague of the Darkfall did at least have a surprisingly good soundtrack, if you're into '80s-style rock. Listen for yourself here or here. Same is true for the previous game in the same setting (but otherwise unrelated 1st-person RPG), World of Aden: Thunderscape.
• Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden is not only a Funny Moment for gaming in general with its mid-90s RPG aesthetic and equally mid-90s plot, but it has some amazing music in it too. The theme song isn't really original to the game, as at the very least a mashup of the same two songs existed as early as 2005 to become popular on YTMND, and Eternity was in Blue Dragon first and is covered on the Nobuo Uematsu page, but there's also...
  • Epic Battle^note aka "johnathan taylor thomas", the theme for most boss battles.
  • Final^note aka "zalatar precious pellets", the theme for the final boss battle.
• The entire Kerbal Space Program soundtrack.
  • The title theme is an uplifting orchestral piece that sets the mood for exploring space.
  • The space music has an appropriately vast feel to it.
• The entire FORCED soundtrack is quite epic, but the final boss battle track (called "For Freedom and Glory") takes the cake. Guaranteed to cause shivers when the main theme kicks into high gear. (This happens at around 3:34.)
• The whole soundtrack to A Very Long Rope to the Top of the Sky is incredible. There is no bad track among the lot, but some of the best are "Cloud Farm", "Royal Metal", "A Better World", and "The Weed that Thought it was a Flower".
• You have not lived until you have heard the best first level music of all time: The Kitchen Theme from I Am Bread.
• Gratuitous Space Battles has plenty of tracks, with each faction getting their own unique music. It's great, grand, and of course, gratuitous. From the powerful Empire to the heroic sounding Federation Gratuitous Space Battles has no shortage of epic space opera music. But for the sake of being complete, some of the many mods also add music of their own, some of the highlights being the Uni-T theme and the Praetorian Industries Theme.
• Amnesia: The Dark Descent: Daniel's theme (and its variant Daniel Ending), which briefly changes from sad and forlorn to quite epic near the end.
• Reimagine :the game: has a great, albeit short, soundtrack. In particular, Nervous Countdown (the final boss theme) stands out as chaotic, a jarring shift in tone to match the battle taking place, and pretty damn awesome.
• A lot of the chase themes in Spooky's Jump Scare Mansion do a real good job in keeping you on your toes, two examples being Your Consenting Mind (Specimen 8) and We Have the Beef (Specimen 11).
• The main theme of ARK: Survival Evolved will really make you feel like you're on an mysterious island full of primeval beasts. Also featured in the original trailer, perfectly going alongside the footage shown. The theme for the Scorched Earth expansion (once again featured in the trailer) combines a desert-fitting tune with the epic prehistoric feel.
• The freeware racing game Turbo Sliders happens to have an excellent rockin' main theme.
• The somewhat obscure 2D arena shooter Soldat features an absolutely rocking soundtrack to fit with its fast pace and violence. If there is one track that fans consider synonymous with the game, it is Necromancide.
• Dungeons & Dragons Online opens with "Discover the Music of the Realms", a soaring two-minute anthem to the adventure and fantasy of Dungeons & Dragons, flavored with the clockwork rhythm of the Eberron setting's Dungeon Punk aesthetic. The composer, Chance Thomas, says it best in his testimony:
  "There's a raw energy underpinning the old melody, and then a classical turn. Yes! The classical strings feel perfect for such a classic IP! And then comes the choir, resonant and deep like an army of Dwarves. You can almost feel the voices bulging with bonus Constitution."
• Evil Tonight:
  • Being a horror game, awesome music might not be the first thing that comes to mind when playing the game as that kind of music is more often atmospheric rather than headbanging material. The first boss theme however, "First Act ~ I Deserve to be Heard", is a pretty kickass piano piece reminiscent of Kingdom Hearts that serves to give the whole thing a more stage like vibe fitting of the theme of the game.
  • The second final boss theme, fittingly named Finale ~ This is my Dream, offers a surprisingly fast beat track as you prepare to deal the decisive blow to that stubborn mule Violetta.
• The obscure Beetle Junior has catchy and upbeat techno music whenever you begin a level.
• Beyond Sunset has a cyberpunk / synthesizer-inspired score performed by Karl Vincent, who did an amazing job with the soundtrack. It magnifies the intensity and makes killing scores and scores of robots even more entertaining than it already was.
• Pingus, even if it is just a freeware version of Lemmings, has some surprisingly good music. The snow level theme is a melancholic and chilly-sounding, yet driving theme, while the unused track Rough Journey is repetitive, but heavy-sounding and menacing, and keeps getting more intense before slowly dying out.
• What do you get when you take Hoshi wo Miru Hito's soundtrack, which is infamous for its awful quality, and task people who know what they're doing to recreate it? The soundtrack of Romancing StellaVisor.
• Baldur's Gate III gives us Raphael's Final Act, a Villain Song boss theme sung by the villain himself. More than a few commenters compared Raphael to a Disney villain for this song alone.
• A standalone mod of Doom, The Adventures of Square has catchy tracks.
  • The upbeat disco tune Ice Cream Time Machine plays in E2A4, the level where you fight in the facility filled with toxic milk.
  • Incubutter is played in E2A7, the level where you fight on the magma river of the moon. It's an intense yet very beautiful tune, and it's also used in the official episode 2 trailer.

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