2001-Today

The SongBoy.

2001
Game Boy Gets Funky
Nintendo releases a new adapter for the Game Boy Color, and it turns the handheld system into a portable MP3 player. The $80 unit, called the SongBoy, attaches to the top of the Game Boy and equips the system with 16MB of memory (expandable to 32MB) for playing MP3 music files.

2001
Video Game Radio
The proliferation of Internet radio--particularly commercial services like Live 365 and Shoutcast--brings the inevitable: radio stations dedicated to all video game music, all the time. Stations like WGDG Videogame Music are still broadcasting today, playing past and present soundtracks and themes as well as random sound effects, 1980s video game commercials, audio interviews with game makers, video game cartoon theme songs, and original trivia.

2001
Super Smash Bros. Melee Mix
It was bound to happen: The video game remix. Much in the way dance and techno producers have long remixed classic songs, the music designers behind Super Smash Bros. Melee dropped remixed original game soundtracks and character motifs into this hit GameCube title. It makes perfect sense: The Smash Bros. titles are predicated on the idea of pitting heroes from various game titles against one another. And so here we have Mario vs. Link vs. Donkey Kong vs. Kirby vs. Fox McCloud vs. Pikachu. It's a wildly creative sound design--some motifs are character-specific, some are location-specific, some are faithful to the original, and some are completely reimagined. And somehow it all works. Check out our SSBM movies page for a taste of the remixed classic songs.

It may not look like much but Frequency offers an intense experience.

2001
Tuning in Frequency
Another entrant in the rhythm game genre, Frequency (from American developer Harmonix) features an all-star techno lineup including BT, Crystal Method, Orbital, DJ Q-Bert, Powerman 5000, and Paul Oakenfold. Frequency is notable in that it reduces visuals to a near-abstract level (it looks a little like an updated version of the arcade classic Tempest) and provides a gameplay experience that is primarily aural. Look at it this way--without the music elements, Frequency would be a circa-1986 Mac puzzle game. Watch GameSpot's archived movies for a glimpse.

2001
Enter the Xbox
In November 2001, industry behemoth Microsoft entered the fray of home console gaming with the highly anticipated Xbox. Sound capability was a major focus, and Microsoft promised "movielike" sound from its 64-voice I3DL2 audio processor. With 64MB of unified memory and a 200MHz bandwidth to the CPU, sound designers were given an enormous amount of power to work with.

2001
Nintendo Strikes Back
Nintendo's GameCube also hits retail shelves in November, with its own array of heavy-duty sound specs. A specially dedicated 16-bit DSP sound processor powers 64 channels with a 48KHz sampling frequency.

Pooh and Tigger are just two of the familiar faces in Kingdom Hearts.

2002
Magic Kingdom Hearts
A surreal adventure into genre-splicing and cross-marketing, Kingdom Hearts combines the RPG elements and basic style of the Final Fantasy series with--weirdly--characters and locations from classic Disney movies. Characters such as Goofy and Donald, plus others from films such as The Nightmare Before Christmas,Hercules, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan, are all represented with corresponding musical motifs. All of the important characters are voice-acted, with some being voiced by the actors who represented them in the movies. And the line between games and movies blurs just a little bit more… GameSpot's numerous movies are a great way to sample Kingdom Hearts.

2003
The Revolution Will Be Televised
It was really just a matter of time. Rhythm genre heavyweights Konami (Dance Dance Revolution) and Harmonix (Frequency) team up to deliver Karaoke Revolution, bringing the dubious recreational activity to home gamers. The game requires a USB microphone (included) and actually rewards players on their ability to sing in key--or, technically, within prescribed thresholds of timing and pitch. Song selection is a mix of karaoke classics and contemporary pop, and the lyrics scroll onscreen just like a pro karaoke machine. The funny thing is that the game can't actually recognize words, so as long as you're following the melody and changes, you can sing in French, Icelandic, pig Latin, whatever. Check out the available movies to see GameSpot editors as well as Jennifer Love Hewitt belting out tunes from the game.

Aside from licensed tunes, there's quite a bit of product placement in T.H.U.G.

2003
Going Underground With Tony Hawk
It's become expected that skateboard and other "extreme sport" titles will have rockin' soundtracks--in fact, it's become part of the genre definition itself. Tony Hawk's Underground is more or less the current state of the art. The soundtrack is huge, with more than 70 total songs sorted by genre. Artists include KISS, Deltron 3030, Murs, RA the Rugged Man, Bracket, NOFX, The Clash, and Sublime. You can actually disable entire genres, or individual tracks, depending on your taste and mood. Essentially, this suggests that one soundtrack is no longer enough and opens up the possibility that future games may offer multiple soundtracks in various genres. Check out GameSpot's movie footage for T.H.U.G.

2004
FF concert in LA
Square Enix announces that its first North American Final Fantasy orchestral concert will take place at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles in May. The concert will feature music from the Final Fantasy series of role-playing games, as performed by the acclaimed Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. While similar game music concerts have been previously performed in Japan and Europe, this marks the first major North American symphonic performance exclusively composed of video game compositions. Concert hall vendors immediately announced plans to switch concessions from wine and cheese to Doritos and Coke.

2004...and Beyond!
Next-Generation Platforms on the Horizon
Details on at least four highly anticipated new game platforms begin to circulate in 2004. Sony's PlayStation Portable (PSP)--designed to compete with Nintendo's Game Boy--is slated to hit Japan in late 2004 and global markets in early 2005. The handheld will feature 3D PCM sound with stereo speakers and headphone output. Next-gen home console successors the Xbox 2, GameCube 2, and PlayStation 3 are also expected in 2005/2006. Specification details are little more than rumors as of now, but all three are expected to compete ferociously to be first to market, which could mean technical concessions. Stay tuned.