Nintendo Music App Expands with Massive Retro Soundtrack Library
A Library Worth Listening To
Nintendo quietly rolled out a massive update to its Nintendo Music app this week, adding what the company describes as its "most comprehensive retro soundtrack expansion to date." The update includes full soundtracks from over 80 titles spanning the NES, Super NES, Game Boy, and Nintendo 64 eras. Highlights include the complete scores for Super Metroid, Donkey Kong Country 2, EarthBound, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, and F-Zero X, among many others. For anyone who grew up with these games, it is an extraordinary collection.
More Than Nostalgia
What makes this update notable is not just the breadth of the catalog but the quality of the presentation. Each soundtrack includes liner notes with background information on the composers and the development context of the music. The Koji Kondo selections alone are worth the price of a Nintendo Switch Online subscription, which is required to access the app. Hearing the full, uncompressed versions of tracks that many of us experienced only through the limited audio hardware of 1990s consoles is a genuine revelation. The SNES library in particular shines, with titles like Chrono Trigger's soundtrack and ActRaiser sounding richer than you might remember.
The Curation Question
The selection is not without its blind spots. Several notable first-party soundtracks are still absent, including most of the Fire Emblem catalog and the Advance Wars series. Third-party representation remains thin, though Nintendo has indicated that licensing negotiations are ongoing. The absence of Rare's legendary N64 scores, likely a rights issue given the studio's current ownership by Microsoft, is felt keenly. No Banjo-Kazooie, no GoldenEye 007, no Perfect Dark. It is a reminder that game preservation extends beyond the games themselves to the music, art, and cultural artifacts surrounding them.
A Step in the Right Direction
Despite the gaps, this is easily the best official way to experience classic Nintendo music outside of playing the games themselves. The app supports offline downloads, background playback, and curated playlists organized by mood and era. Nintendo has historically been protective of its musical catalog to a fault, issuing takedowns of fan uploads and cover arrangements with aggressive regularity. If this app represents a new philosophy of making that music legitimately accessible, it is a welcome change, even if it is overdue by about two decades.
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