Music; Immersion

I don't often spend a lot of time looking up music randomly. In general, I end up listening to what my friends link me or decent songs I find in frag vids. Music in games, however, is different. If I play a game and liked it, I probably liked the music too. Often times I'll end up looking it up online at some point. Music can make or break a scene in an RPG, can be very memorable, particularly in an RPG.

The music can be a huge aspect of the immersion; sometimes not really evident until listening to the music outside of the game. I really appreciate it when a game has music that fits so well with a situation that it can really stand out and feel right when you hear it... I'm not sure how to describe what I mean by that, but the feeling is enough for me to say that the music is one of the most important parts of a game to me.

It's nice to go back and listen to music from a game I've beaten a while back. A lot of moments stand out to me because of the music more than anything else... Here's what I think of today...

Flying out of Ironforge into the snowy mountain regions... this was particularly strong for me when I first got the game and was amazed at the size of the world. It's impressive when you don't really know how to play well and you're just exploring; making a new character, perhaps. I'll always remember it for the feeling it gave me when I heard this song flying over the isolated mountains. (Dun Morogh - World of Warcraft)

Relaxing for a moment in camp, getting to know your party in between battles with the darkspawn.  The music is really peaceful, perfect for the private conversations; hearing Sten admit his respect for you, Morrigan's tales of being an apostate shapeshifter, Zevran's past, etc.  It's a short theme, but it works. (Camp Theme - Dragon Age: Origins)

Hearing this theme always made me proud of the Alliance; going through a lot of turmoil at the time, the Alliance was starting to show it's bad side more prominently. With humans acting on their greed more and more in the campaigns, the Horde was quickly looking to be the just side; to me, though, this song exemplifies the spirit and honour of the Alliance, despite the actions of some humans. (Human Theme - Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne)

Down to the final run, the suicide mission; realizing that you actually can have your team die after you've grown attached to them if you screw up your command. Then this music starts playing and it's about as serious as you can get in a video game full of aliens. Makes you feel pretty epic as you try to save everyone. (Suicide Mission - Mass Effect 2)

Everyone should know who Gordon Freeman is. And he has unlimited badass music following him around. This was one of my favourites from the Half-Life series. Shooting down gunships and all that. Science. (Kaon - Half-Life 2)

Inon Zur is amazing. When I first played this game, it was back when I lived in my basement. This was a game I would frequently stay up past 3 AM playing, obviously way before my current schedule started. (Because 3 AM is normal for any game with me now, it seems.) I would let the game sit on the main menu to hear this song play through. So honestly when I hear this song, I feel myself back in my basement with the lights off, mildly cold, but not uncomfortably so; I spent a lot of time down there, but this song makes me remember it the most. Maybe because basements and vaults are both underground? Seems legit. Regardless, the song is comforting to me for some reason. Really, all the music in this game is comforting to me, but the main theme moreso, I suppose. (Main Theme - Fallout 3)

That's all for today.
Edited 1/4/12 to fix broken link and add song titles to avoid confusion.