imagine you are playing MGS4 and reached the final boss and the background song was Beethoven's Symphony from Windows XP...........

Nowadays, the music in a great game and a mediocre game are still very similar. It's like movie special effects. Even the crappy examples now are better than some of the very best examples a few years back. It's really hard to get impressed these days.

Recent games with good soundtracks?

I like Gears of War 2.

Armored Prayer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0PYTMcaAAY
Hell Breaks Loose: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE7Bq6P6GKI
With Sympathy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-u_BrqXP8rg
March of the Horde: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHc_CmdKfq8

Though these may not be to your liking, Soleron.

Nice I like them :P

Especially the credits one. It has something unique over it.. Reminds me of xfiles or something because of the sound XD

Well mostly the whole soundtrack from UAW which you can download for free legally somewhere. it's one of the best soundtracks i've heard for a long time.

Some of the best tracks from the game though: (only a few. But most of the soundtrack is awesome so you should check it out if you like these)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrBV6cj-c0c&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCbvDPSBBD4&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=je538pGb9dc&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJvCl9t1e6M&feature=related

And ofcourse, the one in my post above :P

That's just from universe at war though. Ofcourse these are based on my taste entirely :P

Soundtracks help create the game's atmosphere, so yes it's very important to have a soundtrack that matches the mood and tempo of the game.

Soleron said: Mummelmann said: This is becoming quite rare though, I'm not sure what the composers are doing differently now as opposed to when I grew up or maybe its just me having changed? Game music is more ambient now and has fewer strong melodies. This might create 'atmosphere' but the tracks aren't catchy enough to remember or inspire emotion. It is also more like pop music because that's what they think we want. When music was '8-bit', you couldn't do ambience and you had to have a tune in order to stand out.

I think that was mainly bacause simple tunes are more easily remembered and are more easear to listen, modern music tends to be related to orchestrated music or to make the atmosphere, both arent easy to remember or to catch the melody as old vg music.

Example: FF12 had a very good soundtrack but most people dont like it because it wasnt memorable enought.