I've always felt like video game soundtracks are incredibly under appreciated, and are usually minor footnotes in reviews, which is a shame. Great video game soundtracks can not only elevate a game, but can serve as great listens on their own merits, so I thought I'd go through some of my favorite series and focus on reviewing their soundtracks one by one.
The first retrospective is going to be about the Super Mario Bros series. While his soundtracks are usually known for being peppy jingles, they contain some of video game's most iconic tracks, and when the music is good, it gets really good:
Super Mario Bros: What is there for me to say here that hasn't already been said? Super Mario Bros is one of the most important and widely-recognized video games of all time, so obviously its soundtrack has been discussed to death. Literally every theme, sound effect, and jingle is iconic, and Koji Kondo did a good job of making the music distinct and catchy with the limited hardware. Looking back, some of the songs do get a bit grating over time, the castle theme especially, but it's hard to be mad given how much of an influence these themes are for video game music as a whole.
Highlight: The Underwater theme, a beautiful waltz that's easily the most complex composition in the game. Apparently, it was the first song composed for Super Mario Bros, which just makes it even more impressive.
2/5 Stars
Super Mario Bros 2: A big improvement on the first soundtrack, pretty much every single one of Super Mario Bros 2's themes are catchy and upbeat, and utilize the chiptune pretty much perfectly. Koji Kondo managed to make the music for this game so much more complex with more recognizable background instruments and musical flairs. The only problem is that it's really short compared to the other NES soundtracks, meaning you'll be hearing the overworld and underworld themes a lot. Otherwise, it's a top-notch showing from Kondo.
Highlight: The overworld theme, obviously. It's so catchy and puts a smile on my face every time I listen to it, easily Mario's best NES song.
3/5 Stars
Super Mario Bros 3: Coming after the upbeat and high energy soundtrack for SMB2, this game goes for a much more laid-back soundtrack. It's still as peppy as you'd come to expect from Mario, though, and the sheer size of this soundtrack makes it the best of the NES games. The music for the athletic levels, enemy encounters, and boss fights are top-notch and rank among the best so far, but the real highlight of SMB3 are the map themes. Every single one of them is distinct and beautifully composed, and I genuinely wish I could listen to them more often in the game. However, I will say that SMB3 also has some weak points. The airship theme isn't very good here, and the overworld theme is quite possibly the least interesting one in the series. Still, the high points are high enough that I overall really like SMB3's music.
Highlight: I already mentioned my love for the map themes, with my favorites being those for the Water Land, Giant Land, and especially the Ice Land. Ice Land's theme is surprisingly intense and eerie, easily the darkest theme of the game and a great warning for the increasing difficulty.
3/5 Stars
Super Mario Land: Despite Super Mario Land's simplicity, its soundtrack is easily the best yet and still one of the finest in the whole Mario franchise. Pretty much every song here is distinct, memorable, and fits the environment well, from the peppy Birabuto Kingdom theme to the intense Easton Kingdom theme to the beautiful ending theme. Hirokazu Tanaka absolutely killed it with this soundtrack, tossing out banger after banger after banger. I highly recommend listening to it if you're in the mood for some chiptune goodness.
Highlight: The end credits theme is still one of the best of all time. It starts with a simple reprise of the overworld theme only to develop into the iconic and bittersweet melody that kicks off the game. Super Mario Land is a short game, but this credits theme will make you feel like you just went on a massive adventure.
5/5 Stars
Super Mario World: The first Mario soundtrack for the SNES is well-known for its quirky and iconic soundfont which definitely helps with make a lot of its themes that much more catchy, but the game's classical leanings result in some really beautiful compositions like in the title theme and castle theme. Most of the game utilizes the same iconic leitmotif, but Kondo does a great job of slowly tweaking it for all of the different themes so it never sounds old. Just like in SMB3, the map themes are also excellent, slowly developing throughout the game and peaking with the insanely catchy Special World theme. It's not my favorite of Mario's soundtracks, but it's a great followup to the NES games.
Highlight: The castle theme starts out as a somewhat darker version of the game's leitmotif, only to suddenly darken in tone even further halfway through the song. The second half, starting with that phenomenal downward scale, is absolutely bone-chilling. It's the beautiful and sinister piece of classical music that serves as the compositional peak of this game's music.
4/5 Stars
Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins: While not as great as the original soundtrack, Six Golden Coins takes inspiration from SMW's soundtrack by having most of the tracks based off of the same catchy leitmotif. Totaka does a great job of tweaking the instrumentation, vibe, and melody to perfectly capture each of the other locations, but oddly enough, the best songs in the game are when they leitmotif isn't followed. Star Maze and Wario's Castle are the hardest and most memorable levels in the game, and they feel even more impactful knowing that their themes don't follow the same structure as the rest of the game.
Highlight: It's a tie between Star Maze and Wario's Castle, for sure. I already mentioned their impact, but they're also just genuinely amazing songs. Star Maze has an insanely catchy and recognizable hook, while Wario's Castle slowly ups in intensity and complexity as the song goes on.
3/5 Stars
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island: There are two Mario soundtracks that I would say qualify as Kondo's best work on the series, and this is one of them. Every single theme in this game is great, from the catchy menu theme to the intense final boss theme. The soundfont is unique and perfectly captures the carefree nature of Yoshi's character while still feeling adventurous, and even incredibly dark and intense as well. There are also no leitmotifs this time, so every song is different and recognizable in their own ways. Kondo made sure to use as much of the SNES hardware as he could for this soundtrack, resulting in some of the most complex tracks on the system.
Highlight: Baby Bowser's theme is the most epic piece of music made for a Mario game yet. Its intro is suspenseful, with wailing guitar riffs that prepare you for the intense battle ahead. And then, once the massive Baby Bowser appears in the distance, the song becomes a fast and frantic heavy metal track packed with crazy riffs and hardly any breaks in the action. This song is just relentless, and I love it! Props to the normal boss theme too, it almost goes as hard somehow.
5/5 Stars
Super Mario All-Stars: Most of this soundtrack remixes songs from previous games, but I wanted to say how much I love the SNES' steel drum soundfont, and I think it not only fits the games but Mario as a whole pretty much to a tee. The original NES tunes are great, but these are easily my favorite iterations of these iconic themes.
4/5 Stars
Super Mario 64: Well, we've finally made it to the 3D Mario games, whose soundtracks tend to be even greater than the 2D ones! Koji Kondo really goes all out for this first installment, packing in tons of iconic and memorable themes in a soundtrack larger than anything Mario has ever seen. There's a leitmotif here, a great one, but it's only used in a few tracks so it never gets stale. And the range of songs in 64 is just plain amazing, from the calm Dire Dire Docks to the frantic Slider to the absolute bop that is Metallic Mario to the operatic Final Bowser theme. Kondo also tries to go experimental and atmospheric with some of the tunes like Lethal Lava Land and Big Boo's Haunt, but I actually don't think it works a lot of the time, these are actually some of the weakest songs in the game. However, when 64's music is good, it's really good.
Highlight: I really want to say Staff Roll for giving me chills every time I listen to it, but I already praised a credits theme and I really want to rave about Dire Dire Docks. This is easily one of the best underwater themes ever made, it's calm and knows when to breathe, but once the percussion comes it, it becomes an absolute bop. It's with songs like this where you can really notice the improvement in sound quality that came from the shift to the N64.
4/5 Stars
Super Mario Sunshine: Super Mario Sunshine's soundtrack is pretty fascinating since it's pretty much divided into two halves but still manages to feel super cohesive in how it perfectly captures the game's tropical vibe. The first half of the game is almost all Koji Kondo, with many tracks using the stellar Delfino Plaza leitmotif along with some of the series' best remixes. The second half of the game, on the other hand, was almost all from newcomer Shinobu Nagata and she freaking nailed it. Her music is weird, experimental, atmospheric, and often the unsung highlights of the soundtrack. She handled all the boss battles, most of the side levels, and all the stages post-Bowser Jr reveal, and makes tracks that are both some of the goofiest and most serious in the game while still feeling fundamentally tropical. Both halves of Sunshine's soundtrack mesh together perfectly to create one of the finest, most unique, and most consistently strong Mario soundtracks to date.
Highlights: Delfino Plaza is one of the best and most iconic tracks in the series, so it should come as a surprise that it's not even in my Top 3. Deep Sea Of Mare is an truly heavenly water theme that somehow manages to rival Dire Dire Docks, Pianta Village is a banger final world theme with some of the best Yoshi drums in the franchise and a slight tinge of melancholy marking the end of this amazing game, and Sky And Sea is one of my favorite pieces of video game music ever in how serene and nostalgic it sounds. It's the definitive Gamecube theme for me, perfectly capturing the console's vibe.
5/5 Stars
New Super Mario Bros: New Super Mario Bros's soundtrack is so freaking good and the fact that barely any of it was reused for future games makes me so mad. Asuka Hayazaki took the helm here and it really shows, her quirky style defined the DS/Wii era of Nintendo and made for some truly unique, upbeat, and memorable themes. There's a great variety from upbeat themes (Overworld, Beach) to darker themes (Castle, Volcano) to just plain weird (Bonus Stage, Mega Mushroom), and we even get some carryovers from the Super Mario 64 DS soundtrack, which is always a plus. New Super Mario Bros's soundtrack is an underrated gem that fits Mario perfectly, and it being so good really harms the soundtracks that follow it and don't use it.
Highlight: I actually have three highlights here. The Mario vs Luigi theme is upbeat and absolutely iconic and fits right alongside some of Mario's best overworld themes, the Castle theme is chillingly beautiful and is way better than in the later games, and the Volcano theme is an underrated bop that makes the final stretch of the game just that much more special.
5/5 Stars
Super Mario Galaxy: Okay, here we are, one of my favorite video game soundtracks of all time. I don't really know what I can say about this one that hasn't already been said, Galaxy's soundtrack is leaps and bounds over any others in the series. The orchestral music is absolutely beautiful, the quality of all of the music is not only insanely high but impressively consistent, and the whole score just has this massive scope that perfectly fits Mario's biggest adventure yet. Galaxy's music ranges from epic (Buoy Base, Final Bowser) to peppy (Beach Bowl, Space Athletics) to emotional (Comet Observatory, Luma), and not only does it all fit together incredibly well but it still feels like it fits Mario's character to a tee. I love pretty much every single song on this massive soundtrack, and I think Mahito Yokota did an absolutely stellar job with his first Mario OST.
Highlight: Gusty Garden Galaxy is the best video game song of all time, it's a bonafide masterpiece from start to finish. It's a triumphant piece of music, with a dramatic intro, beautiful verse, melodic pre-chorus, and iconic chorus, all perfectly capture the intersection of fun and adventure that epitomizes Mario's time in space. But there's also Buoy Base, Comet Observatory, Space Junk, Melty Molten, and the Overture, which would easily be the highlights of any other game.
6/5 Stars
New Super Mario Bros Wii: New Super Mario Bros Wii is the overplayed radio hit of Mario soundtracks. While NSMBDS will always have the better soundtrack in my eyes, NSMBWii's soundtrack still feels like a nice change of pace in a world where the sequels don't exist. However, when all of its songs get reused multiple times, and then you have to hear them constantly in Super Mario Maker stages, it's hard not to get completely sick of them. Despite that, I still think this is a pretty good soundtrack on its own merits. It's a bit more laid-back than DS's soundtrack, but that can lead to some truly great and atmospheric themes, especially in the case of the map themes. It's especially worth listening to with headphones, it's really hard to pick up how rich some of the instrumentation is. Honestly, this soundtrack's only real flaw is its place in the series. It's a great score, it's not its fault I like most of the DS's tracks better.
Highlight: The one track that I think absolutely beats out the original game is NSMBWii's forest theme. It's upbeat, exciting, and perfectly captures the feeling of going on an adventure throughout the jungle. It's the one song that I can just never get sick of, even after hearing it countless times in Mario Maker. I also really like the title theme, which just gives me endless waves of nostalgia, and the Bowser Jr theme, which absolutely slaps.
4/5 Stars
Super Mario Galaxy 2: Despite a large portion of the soundtrack being borrowed from the first game and generally striking the same grand orchestral tone, Galaxy 2's music manages to keep up that ridiculously high level of quality and churn out another incredibly consistent soundtrack. The old themes got excellent remixes with more instrumentation, and the new songs manage to hold up alongside classics such as Comet Observatory and Gusty Garden Galaxy. Otherwise, most of what I said about the first game's music applies here, it's easily one of the greatest video game soundtracks ever made. I also thought it was worth mentioning that this time around, Ryo Nagamatsu (from NSMBWii) worked on some of the music as well, and most of his contributions were great!
Highlight: Fleet Glide Galaxy is an incredibly intense piece that plays as you're flying through a wrecked, crumbling ship. It's tense, exciting, and keeps you pumped throughout one of the game's harder levels. Honorable mentions go to Starship Mario and Fluffy Bluff Galaxy, but I thought Fleet Glide's theme is one of the more unique tracks in the game.
5/5 Stars
Super Mario 3D Land: Super Mario 3D Land's soundtrack is all right. Half of it is borrowed from Galaxy (which is always a good thing), and the other half is just incredibly solid. The whole soundtrack has this light-hearted and jazzy feel to it even if I wouldn't say that any of the songs are absolutely phenomenal. Despite this lack of ambition in the soundtrack, I think it fits the simplistic nature of 3D Land pretty much perfectly.
Highlight: After seven remixes of the world map themes, Special World 8's theme managed to completely blindside me by being a remix of the iconic Mario Drawing Song, and it's so good. It just feels so magical and nostalgic, as if it's rewarding you for getting so far into the game.
4/5 Stars
New Super Mario Bros 2: Well, this is definitely New Super Mario Bros Wii's soundtrack. Okay, honestly, I'm probably more willing to defend NSMB2's soundtrack than most. Yeah, a lot of songs were just plain reused, but some tracks did get remixes like the title and staff roll themes, all the level themes were given more variants to account for the leaf and gold rings, and there are plenty of genuinely great new tracks like the bonus world themes and the fire Reznor remix. And honestly, I like the extra bah's, they give a punchy acapella vibe that I kinda wish was used throughout the whole score. Look, there's only so high a score I can give this one, but I literally just sang the praises of NSMBWii's music so I can't really say this is a bad soundtrack. Besides, it could get so much worse...
Highlights: Hot take but I really love NSMB2's version of the Athletic theme. It might just be my favorite athletic theme out of all the 2D games. I always felt NSMBWii's version didn't quite have enough oomph to it, but the acapella element really gives this variant a lot of drive and energy. And as I mentioned before, that Reznor remix absolutely rocks.
3/5 Stars
New Super Mario Bros U: Everyone trashes on NSMB2's soundtrack, but honestly, this one felt more insulting to me. All the trailers for this game boasted an entirely new overworld theme, leading you to believe the whole soundtrack would be different but nope. It's just the overworld theme, and it's not even as good as the ones in the last three games! All the other songs are ripped straight from NSMBWii, once again, with barely any changes. Well, okay, there's one map theme... that itself gets reused with slight variations for each world removing the sense of escalation that you'd get in all the other Mario games. The only thing I really find noteworthy of praise here are the admittedly charming Baby Yoshi variants, but that's really it. Most of the new music is fine at best and dull at worse, and everything else is reused.
Highlight: Oh, I don't know. I guess the Coin Edit theme is alright? I'm sorry, I'm really at a loss here.
2/5 Stars
Super Mario 3D World: The team behind Galaxy's soundtrack is back for another orchestral soundtrack, but this time, 3D World goes full jazz mode and it's absolutely phenomenal. Mario has had a lot of jazz soundtracks up to this point, but this is the first to use a real, live jazz orchestra and it sounds so good. All of the songs here are insanely catchy and complex, while also feeling entirely original to the series. We have upbeat jazzy tunes like "Hisstocrat", epic Galaxy-esque tunes like "Bowser's Bullet Bill Express", and more classic Mario tunes like "Sunshine Seaside". We even get some remixes of songs from Galaxy and 3D Land, and the better instrumentation and higher quality audio helps them completely surpass the original tunes.
Highlight: Similarly to Special World 8, World Bowser's theme completely caught me off guard in how catchy it is. It feels like Mario's attempt at electro swing and it fits Bowser's more flamboyant nature in this game incredibly well.
5/5 Stars
Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker: Captain Toad's soundtrack is an underrated gem and more people need to pay attention to it. I originally remembered there being a lot of 3D World remixes, but I was shocked at just how many original songs there were, along with how excellent they were as well. Captain Toad's music goes for a sort of Arabian vibe with its music, probably inspired by Super Mario Bros 2, and it's really good! There's a nice blend of atmosphere (Touchstone Trouble), adventure (Ruins), and catchiness (Battle Tower Blitz). And the 3D World remixes manage to be even better than the original, with higher quality instruments that breath new life into these already great songs. I was pleasantly surprised by Captain Toad's soundtrack and I think it deserves to be held up among the best the 3D games has to offer.
Highlight: Wingo's Watchtower perfectly blends all of the aspects I like about Captain Toad's soundtrack. It's intense, exciting, adventure, and utilizes its arabic inspiration that gives this game's music so much personality.
5/5 Stars
Super Mario Odyssey: I always liked Super Mario Odyssey's soundtrack, but something about it felt a bit underwhelming at first coming off of 3D World and especially Galaxy. In hindsight, I think it's because of how quiet the music is in game to make it come off as more diagetic and ambient, which is a shame because it's actually really good if you take the time to listen to it. Befitting the game itself, Odyssey's soundtrack is really diverse with each kingdom essentially having its own musical style. What aids in this diversity is that each of the three composers gets kingdoms entirely to themselves to work on, and each of them bring something to the table. Koji Kondo's penchant for catchy melodies is still intact and he plays around a bit more with electronica to neat effect, Naoto Kubo is an understudy of Galaxy's composer Mahito Yokota and brings a lot of that same grandiosity to all of his tracks (which are generally my favorites, hint hint), and Shiho Fuji has a more quirky and playful style that would really define Nintendo's sound throughout the Switch era. I'm very happy this game got an album that properly credited its composers for each track because it helped me gain an appreciation for its music that I didn't have before.
Highlight: When the first trailer to Mario Odyssey came out, I completely fell in love with the theme of "Fossil Falls". It perfectly captures the grand scope of Galaxy's music while blending it with Odyssey's more adventurous feel, and lo and behold, it was composed by Naoto Kubo.
5/5 Stars
Bowser's Fury: Bowser's Fury doesn't have much music in it, which is a shame because there's some really good stuff here. "Bounce Pounce Isle" is incredibly upbeat and adventurous, Plessie's theme is absolutely beautiful, "Crisp Climb Castle" is a chilling waltz that rivals some of Mario's best ice themes, and the music for the kaiju boss fights feel like One-Winged Angel if Bowser punched Sephiroth in the face and fought Cloud instead. However, the game does reuse a whole bunch of its themes throughout the game, and they do get a bit repetitive when you're scouring the island for those last remaining cat shines. Still a good soundtrack, there just should have been some more of it.
Highlight: "Bowser's Fury" is a nearly twenty-minute-long powerhouse of a theme covering all of the different variations of music whenever Fury Bowser appears. From the electric guitar riffs during the Fury Bowser sections to the operatic singing during the boss fights, this is easily one of Mario's most epic themes.
4/5 Stars
Super Mario Bros Wonder (updated 2023): Super Mario Bros Wonder's soundtrack is very different from any Mario soundtrack that's coming before it, 2D or otherwise. It's far more atmospheric and compositionally complex than what I'm used to hearing from the series, but I'm really into it. The varied instrumentation, genres, and styles makes for the most interesting and punchy soundtrack to a 2D Mario game since Hayazaki's score for the original NSMB, and on top of that, it manages to take cues from some of Mario's best music of years past while still feeling wholly unique and of its own. There's a very catchy leitmotif that's used well and sparingly, a ton of absolutely banging wonder effect themes, some truly serene hub themes, a bunch of well-placed remixes here and there, and some phenomenal Bowser themes as per the norm. This might be the best 2D Mario soundtrack we've gotten to date and I'd even put it on part with some of the 3D soundtracks like Sunshine and Odyssey, so I hope later games keep up this same level of ambition.
Highlights: The Airship theme blew my mind when I listened to it for the first time, a heavy metal remix of the original SMB1 airship theme they added in Super Mario Maker, and it goes so hard. I don't even think I can go back to the original airship theme anymore, this is such a massive improvement! Honorable mention goes to the heavenly Petal Isles theme, and Bowser Jr's super catchy boss theme that manages to liven up what were otherwise pretty average boss fights.
5/5 Stars
Top 10 Mario Soundtracks:
- Super Mario Galaxy
- Super Mario Galaxy 2
- Super Mario 3D World
- Super Mario Sunshine
- Super Mario Odyssey
- Super Mario Bros Wonder
- New Super Mario Bros
- Super Mario 64
- Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
- Super Mario Land
Brief spinoffs section (because if I did every spinoff, we'd be here all day);
Mario Kart: Mario Kart's music has always been consistently strong. These soundtracks are fast-paced and upbeat, incredibly fun to race to. I think most of the Mario Kart games are overall solid, they have their high points (MKDS's title theme and N64 Rainbow Road especially) and are consistently fun and catchy. I love the vibe that the MK64 soundtrack provides, and MKWii has a fantastic collection of songs, but Mario Kart 8's is easily the high point of the series in terms of music. I already thought this era of Mario's jazz music worked incredibly well, but in the case of Mario Kart, it felt like a match made in heaven. Every single song in Mario Kart 8's soundtrack is excellent, and these fast-paced, thrilling, and exciting jazz tunes make racing through these wacky courses that much more enjoyable.
Favorite Soundtrack: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
Mario Party: Mario Party's soundtracks tend to be somewhat on the generic side, they're your usual happy-go-lucky Mario themes that definitely evoke the feeling of having a party, but they don't manage to stick out as anything amazing a lot of the time. There are some standouts, though, especially the beautiful soundtracks for "Mario Party 3" and "Mario Party 4", as composed by Ichiro Shimakura, which have this incredibly light and breezy vibe that feels almost dreamlike. I also really like the soundtracks for "Mario Party", which is composed by none other than Yasunori Mitsuda (composer of Chrono Trigger), and "Mario Party 9", which feels like the perfect encapsulation of the best soundtracks of this little side series.
Favorite Soundtrack: Mario Party 3
Mario & Luigi: Yoko Shimomura is my favorite composer of all time and the fact that she can make such epic music along with incredibly light-hearted soundtracks for these Mario RPGs shows absolutely incredible range. Some of the earlier soundtracks like Legend Of The Seven Stars and Superstar Saga are pretty much entirely upbeat, and they're fantastic, but it's the soundtracks like Partners In Time, Dream Team, and Bowser's Inside Story that easily stick out to me due to the underlying darkness in a lot of their themes. For example, Dream Team's boss theme starts out incredibly upbeat but slowly gets more and more sinister as it goes on, and the end of the soundtrack contains works that wouldn't feel out of place in a Kingdom Hearts or Radiant Historia game. Pretty much every one of Shimomura's Mario soundtracks are top-notch and consistently strong and rank alongside the Galaxy games as some of his best OSTs.
Favorite Soundtrack: Mario & Luigi: Dream Team
Paper Mario: Paper Mario's soundtracks have been much more inconsistent compared to the Mario & Luigi games, but most of them are great in their own ways. The first game's music is incredibly quirky and unique, perfectly fitting the children's book aesthetic. The second and third game goes for an electronic soundtrack that lead to some serious bangers. I already love TTYD's iconic soundscape but the emotional depths that Super Paper Mario goes for leaves me to call it even more of an improvement. The fourth and fifth games have jazzy soundtracks, and I already said how much I love Mario's forays into jazz music. Color Splash in particular actually had my favorite Paper Mario soundtrack for a while, at least until Origami King came out. Origami King's soundtrack is on another level and is easily one of my favorites of all time. It perfectly blends all of Paper Mario's previous genres into one massive seven-and-a-half hour-long OST, yet despite this massive variety and length, the whole score is not only insanely high quality but shockingly consistent throughout. There's so much love and soul put into Origami King's soundtrack that it easily ranks among some of the best in Mario's history.
Favorite Soundtrack: Tied between Super Paper Mario & Origami King
Next up, we're going to check out the soundtracks to the Legend Of Zelda series...
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