As part of Diggin’ in the Carts, our series on video game music, we’ve asked friends of the Academy to provide lists of the soundtracks they remember the most. For this edition, we heard from Kidkanevil, the esteemed beatmaker and alumni of the 2010 Red Bull Music Academy in London. With an interest in video game music that borders on obsession, Kidkanevil is an ideal guide into this expansive world, and he takes us through some of his all-time favorite soundtracks below.

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Revenge Of Shinobi

I’m an ’80s kid, 16-bit generation. Sega Mega Drive, Genesis, was the pinnacle of my gaming experience. Revenge Of Shinobi is an amazing, super crazy game with incredible music by the legendary Yuzo Koshiro. He’s responsible for many dope Sega soundtracks, but I think this is one of his best.

I’ve chosen the piece that comes in right at the end of the game. You defeat this crazy wavy head dude and rescue your girlfriend, and then you just stand and check out the sunset. It’s a really beautiful, amazing panning scene. I think if I played this scene again today, I would probably cry. I can’t even front.

Secret of Mana

The other beast of the 16-bit era was obviously the Super Nintendo. The SNES had a really cool sounding audio chip – I think it was called the S-SMP – that had a really distinct quality to it. I think one of the best uses of it was the classic score for Secret of Mana, by Hiroki Kikuta. This was actually his first score, I think, and as I understand it he created a lot of his own sounds and samples uniquely for this score. The quality of the music and audio is actually pretty mind-blowing for a 16-bit console.

It’s beautiful music. I think it really demonstrates how amazing game music could and can be: the depth and emotion and quality that you can get in gaming music. It wasn’t just little bleepy melodies and funny drums. There really was a depth and a range, and a very advanced musicality.

Robocop

This is a piece that the English composer Jonathan Dunn did for a game version of Robocop, released on a bunch of consoles. It’s a chip music classic, really. There’s a few versions of this, but I think the most famous is the Game Boy version. This one, though, I think is the SID chip version – I think it’s for the Commodore 64. In terms of influence on my own music, it gave me the sense that you can push to be quite emotive, but using sounds that might not typically be associated with highbrow music, or however you want to call it. This is a really affecting piece of music, but it’s just a little beepy wave.

Shenmue

This is for their Dreamcast console, and it was a pioneering open world game, one of the first to really let you explore everywhere. We’re used to it now with Grand Theft Auto and The Last of Us and things like that, but this was a real pioneer of that kind of gaming. You’re wandering around a lot, just doing random things. The music is really key – it’s really beautiful.

I think it was Sega’s key composers at that point, Takenobu Mitsuyoshi, and Yuzo Koshiro again. This is quite a leap from the chip sound era, basically moving into film scores at this point, full orchestra pieces. It’s quite different.

Monument Valley

This is the iOS game Monument Valley, which has an amazing soundtrack. I actually just bought a vinyl – that’s how good it is. The design, animation, atmosphere – it’s just super beautiful and amazing. It’s a piece of art, really. The music is equally impressive. Very delicate electronica, with a real use of atmosphere and mood. I got a tweet from Ustwo, the company that developed this game, to say that Kidsuke, the album I did with Daisuke Tanabe, was on their inspiration playlist when they were developing the game.

That was super cool for me. I geeked out, because prior to that I’d been running around telling everyone how dope this game is. To have been so inspired by video game music, and then in some little way to have inspired it back, was a little full circle moment for me.