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Which Fighting Game Has the Best Soundtrack?

Derek Kaniowski

Derek Kaniowski

Someone who still plays 2D fighters
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One thing I've always loved about fighting games is the music. Every fighting game I've played has had an excellent soundtrack. I still think Third Strike has the best out of all of them, the music in that game was SO good imo.
 
Skullgirls, Blazblue, and Guilty Gear for me
 
Maybe not the best, but MvC2's soundtrack is criminally underated. Always pains me when I watch old matches when I watch old match videos and the soundtrack is hacked to some run of the mill electronic shit.
 
Guilty Gear.
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Brawl, definitely. Way too much good stuff.

If we're talking about mostly original soundtracks, though, it's way too difficult for me to call with certainty. Tekken Revolution is probably my favourite all around, although there's also a few remixes (albeit of pieces from the same series) in there. Most other OSTs have amazing tracks, too, of course. But in the TR one I can't find one I don't like to at least some degree, whereas dislike or indifference towards tracks happens more often elsewhere.

Best single song is In Just A Moment's Time/Hitomi No Kioku. No Question.
 
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SG and Melty Blood, IMO.
i've only played these ones, but I like the OST, so whatever
 
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That's a very tough one... <:3

Skullgirls, Soulcalibur I, Guilty Gear series, Blazblue series, King of Fighters series (namely Maximum Impact and 2002 Unlimited Match), Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold and Nightwarriors: Darkstalkers' Revenge are all worth a nomination in my book.
And special mentions to Persona 4 Arena and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure All-Star Battle.
 
More votes for Skullgirls/Guilty Gear/Melty Blood/BlazBlue.

Does Virtual-On count as a fighting game?
 
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can we narrow it down a bit? like "favorite tracks" instead of soundtracks?

there's a lot of gems in many different games...

still, i vote for guilty gear (series), SF3 (bees in my hair n'all), Skullgirls (obviously... the soundtrack is godlike) and some KoF specifics (Esaka and arashi no saxophone are amazing)
 
Virtua Fighter 4. that classic fighting game feels.
 
In no particular order (off the top of my head)

Guilty Gear

-Top notch heavy metal instrumentals. Every song sounds iconic, unique, and excellent.

Blazblue

-IMO the original games (Calamity Trigger) soundtrack was kind of hit and miss, and most of the remixes in Chrono Phantasma made it even worse, but overall there are a shit ton of amazing themes throughout the series that are on par with Guilty Gear. The "X character vs Y character" themes are pretty consistently amazing imo.

Marvel Super Heroes

-Like all the Marvel games, I don't think this one rises to the level of something like Guilty Gear, but there are some amazing tracks scattered throughout the franchise, and MSH has the highest concentration of them IMO.

Under Night In-Birth

-Same sound as Metly Blood mostly, but a step above it in terms of consistent quality

Melty Blood

-Really varied and pretty memorable tracks.

Skullgirls

-Well, yeah.

Third Striker

-Stylish, unique, and very memorable.

Deltron0 said:
Maybe not the best, but MvC2's soundtrack is criminally underated. Always pains me when I watch old matches when I watch old match videos and the soundtrack is hacked to some run of the mill electronic shit.

I must admit, some of the tracks in mvc2 are pretty nice. Ultimately though, I tend to use custom soundtracks for even games I like when I've played them for hundreds of hours straight (only exceptions being when it's truly one of my most beloved soundtracks ever, like Guilty Gear, SMT, or Ketsui). And Mvc2's kinda good but somewhat unfitting for fighting music tends to end up getting swapped out for other tracks when I'm playing it on ps3 and voice chat isn't turned off.
 
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I actually got into Guilty Gear just because of the music. Friend showed me a few of the songs and I was like "Who is this Kliff guy and why does his theme song kick so much ass?"

Also: Persona 4 Arena, Under Night In-Birth, and of course Skullgirls.
 
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Hard to say which FG soundtrack is the absolute best for me. Fighters tend to bust out some pretty good tracks overall, so it's hard to walk away from one without something getting stuck in your head. I like how the Skullgirls soundtrack opts to focus more on the tone of the environments than just the action of the fight (Maplecrest being a good example). It's an approach that I know can be hit or miss for some people, but I personally enjoy it.

Going back, aside from SF stuff, I've also been a fan of Killer Instinct's soundtracks for a long time. It's pretty impressive how much of an impact that series had despite riding on the heels of so many other major franchises, and I'd wager the soundtrack probably played a huge role in that. The new KI's soundtrack doesn't sound too bad either.

I was also a big fan of the soundtrack for Tobal No. 1. I even used to carry the game disc with me on long trips just to put it in my CD player. The soundtrack was a collaboration between some of Square's top composers at the time, and it definitely showed in the variety of styles they used. Unfortunately, Tobal 2's soundtrack was kind of a step down, but it's still good music. The shift in style bugged me a lot when I first heard it, but I've come to appreciate it a lot more in recent years.

And what the heck, I'll also give a shoutout to the music for Star Gladiator, particularly the first one. Sure, I guess I wouldn't call it the best, but it definitely showed range in Capcom's approach, and I think it gets overlooked a lot more than it should be these days. Listening to it again will zip your mind right back to an old 80's sci-fi flick, and that's a fun place to go to every now and then.
 
Deltron0 said:
Maybe not the best, but MvC2's soundtrack is criminally underated. Always pains me when I watch old matches when I watch old match videos and the soundtrack is hacked to some run of the mill electronic shit.

I WANNA TAKE YOU FOR A RIDE! *dun dun dundun dun*
 
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Skullgirls has my absolute favorite Fighting Game soundtrack (The Lives We Left Behind, Paved With Good Intentions, The Legend of the Skullheart, Pedestrian Crossing, In a Moment's Time, etc. :3), but there are so many Fighting Game soundtracks that deserve an honorable mention. For that reason, I will mention one that hasn't been listed yet: Melee.

Super Smash Brothers Melee had some really amazing orchestral covers of the music from several Nintendo games, with my favorite being Fountain of Dreams as the best cover of Gourmet Race ever to be in a Nintendo game. Even some of its original tracks were amazing, including the main theme, Target Smash!, and How to Play (which is my favorite track in the entire game, personally. It had no reason to sound that good).
 
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Ougon Musou Kyoku Cross a.k.a Umineko No Naku Koro Ni the fighting game.

Since the game takes the amazing soundtrack of the VN, we have an amazing OST that makes the fights simply epic
 
SF3 Series as a whole with 2nd Impact having the best jams. 3s music is sick too though.
 
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Not sure about being the best, but The Last Blade and it's sequel had pretty good tracks.
 
Skullgirls and most of all GUILTY GEAR. Also Darkstalkers' stages have some catchy soundtracks.
 
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Street Fighter Alpha 2. So many good tracks. IMO, the best remixes of the original characters, plus awesome themes of the new additions like Sakura, Rose, and Charlie. I honestly can't think of a bad track in that game.

Guilty Gear XX & Blazblue gets an mention as they are the only 'hard rock' type of music I can listen to.
 
Guilty Gear and BlazBlue are my top choices. I'd say BlazBlue is a bit higher.

Also Ougon Musou Kyoku Cross has great music, but mostly because it's based on the visual novel with one of the best OSTs ever.







That's not even half of my favourites. :P
 
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SF3 Series; SF Alpha Series, Sonic Battle, Skullgirls, etc.
 
1. skullgirls
2. guilty gear
3. melty blood
 
Skullgirls, Ougon Musou Kyoku, MvC series.
Also One Must Fall 2097 have some cool tracks.
 
juju_for_president said:
Skullgirls has my absolute favorite Fighting Game soundtrack (The Lives We Left Behind, Paved With Good Intentions, The Legend of the Skullheart, Pedestrian Crossing, In a Moment's Time, etc. :3), but there are so many Fighting Game soundtracks that deserve an honorable mention. For that reason, I will mention one that hasn't been listed yet: Melee.

Super Smash Brothers Melee had some really amazing orchestral covers of the music from several Nintendo games, with my favorite being Fountain of Dreams as the best cover of Gourmet Race ever to be in a Nintendo game. Even some of its original tracks were amazing, including the main theme, Target Smash!, and How to Play (which is my favorite track in the entire game, personally. It had no reason to sound that good).

I really liked Meele's soundtrack also. I prefer the Brawl versions though (the music from meele had a different sound quality in Brawl than in Meele).
 
For me its:

Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike
Super Smash Bros Brawl; (Melee is a better game overall imo though)
Vampire Hunter: Darkstalkers' Revenge
Marvel Super Heroes vs Street Fighter

But every Fighting Game I've played has a good sountrack, except Marvel vs Capcom 2 and Skullgirls (yes I said it) for me.
 
It really depends on the genre of music your partial too when determining the answer to this question.

Anyway this is a difficult question due to the sheer amount of fighting games with memorable and exciting music. Music is underrated in fighters simply because the music has to be chosen carefully if the player is gonna hear that song every time they pick that stage or fight against that character.

Anyway I'll list a few fighters with music I'm quite fond of…

Skullgirls - No big surprise here. The somber jazzy music with a Castlevania flavor is different then what you would expect in a fighter, but it works though to reflect the atmosphere of the characters and the game. Current favorite tracks are: Unfinished Business, The Dream/Lives We Left Behind, and Paved With Good Intentions.

Guilty Gear X2: You want to hear some killer rock tracks in a fighter then the GG series was the game to go. You can't help but want to play the guitar when you hear the music playing. Current favorite tracks are: Holy Orders (Be Just or Be Dead), Blue Water Blue Sky, and A Simple Life.

KoF XIII: Hard to pick a specific KoF for this, but I ended up opting for the latest one since it combines both the classics and great new tracks. Wide variety type of themes to represent the teams from sweet guitar riffs to soothing piano sequences.. Current Favorite tracks: KDD-0063, Esaka Continues/Goodbye Esaka (The Esaka tracks are pretty much the face of KoF in terms of music), and Purity Soldiers.

DoA 2: Moving on to 3D fighters have to give that game some spotlight. Great character themes from guitar riffs to violins to reflect the characters which is a shame since the later DoA games distanced themselves from that, but at least in DoA5U you can use most of the old past DoA tracks again: Current Favorite tracks: Vigaku, The Shooted, and Blazed Up Melpomene.

Under Night In-Birth: French Bread has improved themselves from branching out of Melty Blood to this fighter. Music has the Melty Blood vibe, but with more experience behind it. The music really "POPS OUT" during fights so to speak. Current Favorite Tracks: Sky Scraper High, Night Walker, and Blood Drain-Again- (Yes I know that was originally a Melty blood track, but the remix version as a character theme worked out really well in UNiB).

SSFII Turbo: I just want to limit myself to one Capcom game otherwise I would list several. It was a tough call between this game or 3S, but in the end I liked more of the tracks from SSFII despite REALLY liking a few of the 3S tracks. Felt Capcom really got a hang of finding the perfect remix track for the character stages by Turbo. Current Favorite Tracks: Guile Stage, Cammy Stage, and Ken Stage

Gonna call the list at that: Honorable Mentions to P4A (Shoji Meguro enough said), 3S (Alex/Ken, Makoto, and Dudley were really good), Night Warriors (Morrigan, Felicia, Dimitri) Marvel Super Heroes (Spider-Man, Captain America, Dr. Doom was well done to reflect the characters) and Rival Schools (Rooftop all day).
 
Guilty Gear X/XX

There is absolutely no question in my mind.


Pretty good soundtracks (but not even close to Guilty Gear) for a fighting game
KoF
Blazblue (got better as the series progressed, too)
Tekken

Great soundtrack but honestly I don't feel like its fighting music
Skullgirls
Soul Calibur



Honestly I either can't remember the music from most other fighters, or they are just plain obnoxious and gahhhh
 
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