Apr 302014
An X-ellent assortment of mutant melodies, plus a few jams from their 1992 Spidey crossover.
0:00:00 – Title Screen (Spider-Man and the X-Men)
0:06:33 – Gambit (Spider-Man and the X-Men)
0:11:40 – Spider-Man (Spider-Man and the X-Men)
0:21:46 – Title Screen (Wolverine)
0:22:47 – BGM2 (Wolverine)
0:32:20 – Title Screen (X-Men)
0:33:31 – Shiar Empire (X-Men)
0:37:26 – Avalon 3 (X-Men 2)
0:41:04 – Brood Queen (X-Men 2)
0:46:26 – Cyclops (Mutant Apocalypse)
0:48:02 – Beast (Mutant Apocalypse)
0:50:02 – Psylocke (Mutant Apocalypse)
0:56:24 – Weapon X Lab (Adamantium Rage)
1:06:51 – Stage 1 (X-Men Arcade)
1:09:08 – Stage 2 (X-Men Arcade)
1:13:15 – Ending (X-Men Arcade)
I don’t think I so much as rented an LJN game, having learned from my friend’s mistakes(Friday the 13th scared the hell out of me, being both creepy and a turd of a game). Add to that the fact that I only tended to read comics that nobody else knew about(I owned every issue of Nexus up through the mid-90’s), and that explains my lack of experience with pretty much any X-Men game.
I don’t know if it was mentioned on the Plok episode or elsewhere, but Tim Follin’s departure from the game industry is mostly due to the fact that he ended up doing amazing music for mostly terrible games(Plok, Equinox, and Dreamcast Ecco being notable exceptions), or games that never came out at all. It was a shame, because the games industry could always use more prog rock.
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great episode.
the Beast theme from Mutant Apocalypse sent me on the kind of nostalgia trip you can so rarely have anymore, with the internet shoving your childhood in your face holes at all times.
the arcade game has some excellent music I forgot all about as well. god, the 90’s.
As soon as the Spider-Man and the X-Men music started playing I had a rush of SNES memories come back to me. Even though it’s probably a horrible game in retrospect, I had a lot of fun with that back in the day, probably the most out of any X-Men game until Legends came out. I vaguely remember renting or briefly owning Mutant Apocalypse, although the music never stuck with me really. Either way, I love the superhero versions of VGMpire, brings back a lot of fond childhood memories.
ABOUT TIME you made an episode about the X-Men Arcade music, specially considering how it’s played in almost every single Cape Crisis episode 😛 (Which btw, those songs sound SOOO much better like this than as background music, whereas in Cape Crisis they often felt repetitive and annoying, here on their own I can appreciate those songs much better.)
Anyway, awesome episode! ^^ Didn’t really play any of these games growing up, but the range and style of each one is so varied that it made for a very interesting and fun to listen to episode (:
Oh Man, I remember Arcade’s Revenge! My brother and I had it for our Sega Genesis when we were young. I remember that game being ridiculously hard. We could beat the opening Spidey level and maybe one of Wolverine’s levels. I seem to remember that every other character was a chore to play – because even though they all had their cool powers they all had some level gimmick that made you stressed and unhappy.
X-Men 2: Clone Wars – on the other hand – is awesome. You can play as several different X-men and they all control differently. Nightcrawler is so fun to play as because you can teleport all around the screen and it really makes you feel powerful. I never really found a reason to play as anyone other than him and wolverine because they’re both so good, but I was happy that they included other characters like Cyclops, Gambit, Beast and Psyloche and made them all unique. I think there was even a way to unlock Magneto as a playable character.
Whoa! You guys blew my mind with the “Pride of the X-Men” reference. I never knew that was just a pilot that never took off. I actaully have (or had. Who knows if it still exists) a VHS of that pilot. I haven’t thought of that in years. I do remember it being a good episode. Nightcrawler almost dies and Kitty Pride feels bad because she’s mean to him when she first meets him. Crazy how you can sort of forget about these things for years but then remember them vividly when someone recalls them to your mind.
I was going to jokingly comment that Arcade’s Revenge just ripped off the premise of Kid Chameleon and replaced the fun aspects with licensed characters, but then I discovered the two games came out about the same time. Plus the X-Men storyline came out way earlier, so I decided I wouldn’t bring it up. But then i just did–oh, shit.
I’m going to have to look into Tim Follin’s X-Men stuff further, although I don’t see myself playing the games any time soon (a high school classmate gave away his SNES copy of Arcade’s Revenge to me and after playing it for 5 minutes I swore never to waste my time with it again).
I would love to see an episode dedicated to bad games with incredible music (Waterworld SNES & Lethal Weapon SNES come to mind).
The Genesis X-Men stuff didn’t really grip me as much. I think people who say “Genesis is better for a more rock-oriented sound” haven’t listened to the Mega Man X soundtracks.
The Mutant Apocalypse stuff by Setsuo Yamamoto freaking ROCKED, I’m totally going to listen to that OST now.
I liked the little aside with the X-Men TV show, although I have to say that as amazing as the cartoon intro theme was (and Powerglove’s badass cover of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNLL_lxL-bQ) I have to give it to the Japanese intro for having the best one (and ironically, better animation than the cartoon itself): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfjAbXrvkFw
I feel ya on the X-Men Arcade Attract Mode. I remember being reaaaally young and seeing that game in the arcades of a local (now defunct) bowling alley and wanting so badly to play it. If you guys ever make it out to MAGFest we have to hit up the 6-player X-Men arcade cabinet they have there (while braving the crowd’s Colossus roars).
The X-Men Arcade OST is really damn good…makes me want to boot up my PSN digital copy. I didn’t know it was delisted though! That’s a bummer.
Would love to hear more Marvel music from X-Men vs. Street Fighter & Marvel vs. Capcom…some really awesome original themes from the Marvel side in those games.
I play the X-Men arcade game on my iPhone. It’s not as impressive as the dual-screen awesomeness that was in the arcades, but it’s pretty cool to have as a hand-held game that I can play anywhere. The controls are a little weird at first, but you get used to them.
The other two arcade games I remember from around this time are the classic Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game and The Simpsons arcade game. I also have a Simpsons game on my phone which is similar to the arcade game, but they changed a lot of things about it. It still has the same essence as the original arcade version.
I’m still waiting for them to come out with the TMNT original arcade game on the iPhone. It’s been awhile since I’ve checked though…………..nope, still not there. Someone needs to get on that! C’mon, make it happen!
Okay Brelston,
I’m leaving this comment here because I don’t know if you get updated when new comments come to old podcasts.
I just listened to the awesome TMNT episode. Brett, the NES tracks are in stereo! How is that even possible my mind is meltingaaahhhhh!!! It’s not even a phase filter applied over the whole track; each channel has its own separate pan. Did your buddy rip each channel separately and apply panning individually before he mixed it, or was Konami making game soundtracks in stereo on a console that had no way of actually playing stereo? Help me, Brelstonimus! My paradigm has shifted and I’m having an existential meltdown!
I think most NES are / can be Stereo? Or maybe that’s just Game Boy w headphones? Dunno! Might be how they were ripped?
….I looked around; the NES is mono, but there’s an easy mod out there where you can pan each channel to however you like it. I am guessing this is what your friend may have done(or done it in emulation?).
http://www.chrismcovell.com/nesstereo.html
Man, that threw me for a loop!
played the hell out of Adamantium Rage and War of the Gems. I think i convinced myself they were GOOD at the time..
Dope episode! Arcade Revenge was the game that made me realize that I was really into game music. I never knew about recording the songs by stereo as I was not allowed to own actual consoles in my house until Dreamcast died(I pulled the rare collector’s item card). Somehow, I could own a Game Gear of all things(go figure). Anywho, I was really taken with X-Men at the time and played the games under assumption they were good as mentioned by others many times before lol The Shi’ar joint is the best track on the Genesis X-Men in my opinion.Arcade’s Revenge is best heard through the SNES. Really dug Beast’s theme from the SNES. If not mistaken, I believe Setsuo Yamamoto(hopefully I’ve typed this correctly) is also one of the composers on the Rival Schools soundtrack. If you listen to the track “Construction Site Of Evil High” you’ll notice an almost identical drum beat to Beast’s theme. Great episode! Thanks for puttin in your time to make this happen
hahaha I coulda swore I heard “Welcome to DIE!”