The soundtrack opens with, appropriately enough, the "Overture", which introduces us to the main orchestral theme of the game in a very light-hearted way. With other tunes such as "Starship Mario" and "Sky Beach", Nintendo were nice enough to put multiple versions of the track on the CD, with each version representing a different layer of interactivity, so people can pick and choose their favourite. In other tracks, such as the Overture and "Koopa, the Great Mighty King", the interactive parts of the track are layered on as the piece progresses, with I think works well. This being said, none of these things detract too much from any of these tracks. Personally I prefer a lot of those pieces with the added Yoshi percussion but I'd imagine other people would prefer them without. For example we don't get any speeding up or slowing down in "Ball Roll" or "Slide", and we don't get the percussion line that plays when you're riding Yoshi in any of the tunes either. As a result of this, we don't get some of the effect that we would get within the context of the game with some of the tracks. The main problem with presenting the music of this game as a soundtrack CD is that a lot of the Super Mario Galaxy 2 music is interactive. Koji Kondo, Mahita Yokota and Ryo Nagamatsu have done a great job in taking what was established from the original game and advancing it. There's less of the story and the cut scenes in this game, which I thought would harm the game and the soundtrack, but I was wrong. The only difference being that the order of the tracks rather than having the live tracks on one disc and the electronic ones on the other, the soundtrack is roughly in the order at which you encounter the pieces in the game. There's slightly less music than in the platinum edition of the first game, though it's not too big of a difference. This soundtrack is more akin to the platinum edition of the first game, featuring two discs of all of the music from the game. With the first game, we got a normal version and a platinum edition of the soundtrack. We also get some jazz thrown in for good measure, recorded by live instruments as per the orchestral music. More of the memorable orchestral music, synth music, quirky boss themes, and remixed music from Mario's past. Where the music is concerned, on a basic level we've got more of the same as the original game. The original was an absolute masterpiece too, but Nintendo somehow managed to improve on that with the second game it was more challenging yet more accessible (there's even a beginner DVD included with the game) and it had more variety too. Nintendo said they simply had too many ideas that didn't make it into the first game, which they felt a bit guilty about, so we got a second game as a result, and it ends up being officially one of the highest rated games of all time from game journalists. Their album release situation has left a lot to be desired over the past few years.Over two and a half years on from the original Super Mario Galaxy, we get a second offering.
![super mario galaxy ost almum cover super mario galaxy ost almum cover](http://ipv6.vgboxart.com/boxes/Wii/32875-super-mario-galaxy.png)
Nintendo really nailed this score.Īs for whether they nailed the OST release, I am going to be very, very pissed if even one track is missing. SUPER MARIO GALAXY is notable for being the first time that Nintendo actually USES an orchestra to provide most of the tracks in the game, and better yet, they even allow several tunes, like "Bowser's Battle Theme" (which, by the way, is AWESOME-lightyears above that of SM64 and SMSunshine, respectively), to add on other instruments without feeling choppy or forced. Not that last year's debut Wii Nintendo game TWILIGHT PRINCESS' score wasn't any good-in fact, it owns the title of being the most complex ZELDA score so far, one in need of an album release (even though the sound quality was inconsistent in places, although not too bad IMO). The music, in particular, is some of the finest I've heard from a Mario game or Nintendo in a long time. Speaking of which, I just received the game, and I am having an absolute blast with it. I ordered mine from NCSX, or whatever that place is.