Just for your information..

I was playing a game of Quake II on my home PC a little while ago. Naturally, I died. While dead, I picked up the CD case and started reading the credits and other fine print. I do that a lot on music CDs and even on movies. You would be surprised what you can learn. Anyways, I digress..

I saw a credit on the game case for music, given to a group called Sonic Mayhem. I scratched my head because the name sounded somewhat familiar when I suddenly had an idea.

I fired up the program I use to convert my CDs to MP3s and slipped my Quake II game in to the drive. The program immediately recognized all the audio 'songs' used as background music while you play the game. Of course, I immediately ripped them in to MP3 format, and now play them on my Empeg unit. The same thing worked for my Quake III CD as well.. but I have yet to try it out on the remaining few games that I have.

Anyone else think of this?

Yeah, i ripped the Quake II tracks a few years ago.... ah.. those we're the LAN days. Anyhow... I remember figuring it out because you could pop in another audio CD while playing the game and have that play as your background, so i figured that it must get it's own music in the same format. Good stuff. Haven't tried it on any recent disks... that hasn't been anything that had a soundtrack i liked that much anyhow. =]

Anyone else think of this?

Yes.

On sort of an inverse point, Smashing Pumpkins credit a clip from Doom as being in one of the songs on Mellon Collie, I believe. Once you're aware it's there, it becomes kind of apparent and amusing. (I don't remember what track it is right now -- I don't have that case in front of me.)

I remember being at home one day and watching my dad play Quake (I/II/III, don't remember) while being accompanied by classical music which changed tracks with the levels. It was quite an odd combination.

Did the same on the Mechwarrior CDs but that was a while ago.
You reminded me to dig them out and get those tracks again.

Trent Reznor did all of the music for Quake I. In fact, I think the menu within the game mentions it. Also, the nail gun ammo has a little NIN logo on it.

Outlaws by Lucasarts. One of the most kick a** soundtracks for a game(If you like spaghetti westerns that is).

Now I need to get a slow POS system together so I can play it again

uhh yah, as soon as quake was released and i realized trent reznor did the soundtrack, i was all over making a music only cd of it. MP3 wasn't really popular back then
(was it even around back then?)

I ripped the Quake soundtrack years ago and yesterday I have put them in my empeg... they create an atmosphere too cool when you are on the road!

God i hope some of the games we're showing at E3 this year will hold up to Outlaws, The Dig, Full Throttle, Grim, and some of the other amazingly story driven games of LucasArt's past... but i don't have much fait. There's a couple of really kick ass games coming down the pipeline though....

Stepheno - I couldn't agree more! It is earie driving with that playing!

That soundtrack was always a little confusing because I never knew if sounds were part of the game or part of the ambience in the soundtrack!

If anyone has seen (and liked) Lost Highway.... the David Bowie song has a similar effect when you are driving at night.

Yes.

To the point of having 75ish hours of game music on my empeg...

A good chunk is ripped from the game, either easially in the case of CD Audio, or by tearing apart the game data files. Others I have found available for download as well, so if it's decent enough, I'll go that route. Also, if it's a console game from Japan, you can probably find a good soundtrack CD for it.

Tribes 2 and Mechwarrior 2/Heavy Gear get played quite a bit, along with certain Final Fantasy soundtracks. Myst 3 is awesome as well. I still need to do some MOD->MP3 conversions for the Unreal and UT music. Plus Some of the songs from Deus Ex.

I'm glad I have a 60gb unit now. My 6gb Mark 1 was very cramped with 70% going to game music and They Might Be Giants.

well i tihnk dance dance revolution tops it for best music in a jap game

First one I noticed that on was Warcraft II. I can't find the CD anymore

What're the oldest games that used mixed mode CDs for the game and soundtrack?

The first PC games I remember that did this were FX fighter and Fire Fight (Sega CD games were doing this before PC games did, but I never owned one). I still listen to them every now and then. The music from Robotron X and War of the Worlds are also pretty good (WotW gameplay bit, but the music was good, especially since I have and enjoy the Jeff Wayne's musical CD). I of course really enjoy Warcraft and Mechwarrior music too. I wish that Full Throttle were done the same way, but oh well. Some day I'll actually get the Gone Jackals album Bone to Pick that has all their music from the game. I have no idea where to find Chitlins Whiskey and Skirt's song Increased Chances, though... :^)