40% off all ‘Retro Video Game’ music albums3 min read

We’re holding a one-week sale with 40% off all our albums of “Retro Video Game” stock music!

Until Thursday, April 6th, 2023, these 5 downloadable royalty-free music albums are all $59.95 each (normally $99.95 each). 

These albums each contain about 11-12 tracks each of music that was made to evoke the sounds, feels and moods of classic video games and music from arcade games. In these tracks, more modern and “polished” synth, piano, drums and guitar sounds are combined with “chip sounds” and 8-bit, simple, beep’y synth sounds. The purpose is not to plagiarise or copy any one particular historical video game, but rather, to capture the spirit and mood of that music, but with new, original melodies. 

From the first widely available commercial arcade game (“Space Invaders”) to early Nintendo, SEGA- and Sinclair ZX Spectrum games, to later computer models including Commodore 64, Commodore Amiga, Atari ST, Nintendo Gameboy, and early Playstation, the music in thousands of videogames was masterfully created, often within the constraints of technical limitations such as only simple synthesizer operators and a strictly limited number of sound channels — not to mention lack of RAM memory for storing samples, meant that musicians had to be both musically creative and technically adept at understanding the underlying technology, it’s strengths and limitations.

30 years prior to writing this article, I myself worked full-time as a composer and creator of music for video games. I was one of the guys who understood the rows and columns of numbers of letters that we referred to as “Soundtracker” but to other people must have appeared to be a completely random and meaningless sequence of symbols. Ah, those days.

Millions of people were listening for hours and hours to the music playing in that video game level that they were trying for days to beat. To this day, even 30 years later, I personally still receive emails from people on the other side of the planet, thanking me for creating the music in their favorite game back in the 1990s. Not only have the games themselves become an important part of our cultural history, but the music in those games can also be said to have been a significant part of our recent creative history – and certainly, a very important part of the lives of many children and adults playing these games. 

At the time of writing this, there are no longer any technical limitations for what music can be included in video games. If game developers want a real live rock band, or a full symphonic orchestra, they can easily put this type of music in their games. But even so, in keeping with the spirit of the video game culture, and perhaps with some nostalgia, many game creators still put “old video game music” and sound in their new games. It just “goes well with the content”! It sounds nice, and gives us a good feeling while playing.

There are even quite a lot of people who will listen to vintage game soundtracks on Spotify or iTunes, because it gives them a nice feeling and perhaps reminds them of a more carefree time of their lives, many years ago.

Here are the 5 albums with the sound of classic video games music, that are on 40% discount offer this week:

	Retro Video Game, Vol. 1 11 main tracks + various alternate mixes, cuts, loops, stingers Regular price $99.95 Discounted price until April 6, 2023: $59.95
	Retro Video Game, Vol. 2 12 main tracks + various alternate mixes, cuts, loops, stingers Regular price $99.95 Discounted price until April 6, 2023: $59.95
	Retro Video Game, Vol. 3 12 main tracks + various alternate mixes, cuts, loops, stingers Regular price $99.95 Discounted price until April 6, 2023: $59.95
	Retro Video Game, Vol. 4 12 main tracks + various alternate mixes, cuts, loops, stingers Regular price $99.95 Discounted price until April 6, 2023: $59.95
	Retro Video Game, Vol. 5 10 main tracks + various alternate mixes, cuts, loops, stingers Regular price $99.95 Discounted price until April 6, 2023: $59.95