Community Service is a monthly article we do with out fans at Level Up Entertainment. Every month a question will be posed to YOU our loyal community and if you send in a response, you have a chance to be featured prominently here for all the world to see. Also you can win a print based on your idea from one of a our stable of artists!

Music makes the world go 'round! It's doubley so when it helps define an entire world. Music in video games goes a long way to establish mood and atmosphere and many games would not be as effective or memorable without it! We recently delved into this discussion in our podcast, but we left out many great soundtracks and are interested in your favorites!

This month we ask: What is your favorite video game soundtrack?

Jeff Payne

I remember learning the bassline to the Super Mario Bros. underworld theme (heard first in the original SMB World 1-2). I later did the same thing with the over world theme from Dungeons & Dragons: Warriors of the Eternal Sun on Sega Genesis. Neither, however, are my favorite themes despite being able to remember them note for note. The original Sonic the Hedgehog opening music has a certain “Christmas morning nostalgia,” but that isn’t my favorite either.

A few others come close. All the music from Crystalis is pretty wonderful. The opening theme to Megaman 3 has a melancholy lilt, and I love the ghost notes in every phrase. The map music in SMB3 World 7 is a fun Hip Cat kind of strut. And of course there is the primal and catchy percussion of the Battletoads pause music.

But, as far as choosing an absolute favorite I have to go with the music that plays over the password entry screen in Faxanadu on NES. It goes very easily from haunting to hopeful, but remains sad and foreboding. Even as the melody seems to want to resolve to rapture, drawing on somewhat uplifting motifs, a single voice breaks the orchestration and descends in trills down a scale where the theme begins again. This part of the music always gave me the feeling of tripping down a staircase where at the bottom I was forced to begin the climb once more. Anyone who has ever played Faxanadu knows how this relates to the story and the frustration of ascending the World Tree. Aside from being a pretty piece of music that mimics the game play, its brooding quality supports the dark and damp production design and dreary color palette of the entire game.

Note: I’m sure there are a lot of music pieces in modern games that are beautiful and rousing, but I don’t know any. I’m limited to 16-bit systems and before.

Bill Lott

My favorite video game soundtrack of all time is the Legend of Zelda: Windwaker soundtrack. It is thoroughly engaging and pulls you in for every moment of the game. Every note perfectly fits the beautiful cel shaded world around you and flows so well. Whether it is going from day to a stormy night on the seas or from a dungeon floor to it's boss room this soundtrack transitions perfectly and gives you just that much more a feeling of being part of the game's intense and vast world.

The Windwaker soundtrack never gets old either. You can sail the seas or revisit the same town 100 times and still be completely engaged every time, enjoying every score. It is not a soundtrack to be overlooked or underestimated, and if you haven't listened to it start to finish, I highly suggest you start now!

Dennis Welsh

I wanted to immediately put Symphony of the Night solely on Dracula's castle since it's flat out perfect. However to pick an entire soundtrack I could listen to for hours on end would be the game I am now replaying, Sonic Adventure 2 Battle. Sonic Team is definitely known for making amazing tracks along side Crush 40 who I would go to see live if they performed Live and Learn. Every level theme felt perfect fitting the theme and even as goofy as Knuckles' level raps were, they were great at the same time. Perhaps it's nostalgia, but this soundtrack never gets old. Even as I sit in Chao Garden I never want to mute my TV. Did I mention how epic Live and Learn is?

Justin Fenico

I've been playing games since I was six years old. After digesting 26 years of first person shooters, RPGs, MMOs, and more, I still keep going back to the same soundtrack year after year. While the Final Fantasy series is beautiful, and the Legend of Zelda theme is memorable, Chrono Trigger is my vote of best video game soundtrack. It's all about diversity. Chrono Trigger features beautiful orchestral tunes, a bit of jazz, and soothing piano melodies. The complexity that was included in the game was far beyond what gamers were accustomed to during that era or what prior systems were able to create.

Let's not forget that the game itself was one of the first to feature multiple endings, complex characters, and a time traveling story that didn't turn into a mess. Part of it might be nostalgia, but with tracks like Memories of Green, Schala's Theme, Frog's Theme, the eerie beginning of the Battle with Magus track, and more all wrap up into one incredible 16-bit soundtrack that can still be listened to today. The soundtrack, like the game, is beautiful, warm, powerful, and epic.

Frank Sicurella

Without a doubt, Nobou Uematsu hits home with one of the most moving musical scores I have ever heard. From the "Main Theme" to the "Boss Battle" to "JENOVA" and especially "One Winged Angel". He continued to work wonders in FFX but that game had support from amazing voice work. But back on the original PlayStation the was no voice acting support and ALL emotion and atmosphere had to be produced from the music and Nobou nailed it. Even to this day, these songs hit home.

Travis Beard

Video game music has been catching my ear ever since I could remember playing video games. From sticky 8 bit tunes to lovely, orchestrated pieces, to out of this world, jumbled up excellence, only one title stands atop of my throne. It has followed me everywhere I’ve gone, provided relief for countless emotion filled encounters, and even fueled rage filled ones. Parasite Eve is, without a doubt, the soundtrack to my life. What makes this soundtrack so special is that I didn’t understand, what I had back in x-mas of 98’. I understood that I had a cool game, with sparkly graphics, that kind of scared me a lot, but through out the years, and growing, the music kind of just melded with me, and now to this day I can not think of a major event of my life where I have not turned to this soundtrack.

Matrix (China Town Theme) gave me hope during s***** living situations, a little after I first got the game and there after. This theme in particular, was always uplifting to me, and must have kept me optimistic at times. Mystery Notes (Central Park Theme) was my universal upset theme, but really got worn out during a situation between my cousin, and, at the time, girlfriend. Ultimate Being’s theme set the stage for an epic fight between two brothers, in an idea that is not only very dear to me, but I believe to also be fueled by a little resentment to my cousin. To this day, we still talk, and joke about the past, but we have never been the same since.

These are only a few instances, but the point is for so many real life problems, it’s amazing we can look to video games for comfort in different ways, and a lot of people are not, and will never understand that.

Kevin Barrett

While it was very difficult to narrow it down to one (overlooking classics like Castlevania, Mega Man, Super Mario, etc) I'd have to go with the Neverhood. Ultimately what I looked at was what soundtrack really added the most to the game's overall experience and had a memorable lasting impression. If you have played the Neverhood then you know that it is quite out of the ordinary, and the music is taken from the same page. The Neverhood's zany soundtrack compliments the bizarre and surreal world with the perfect tones of humor and catchy melodies, with elements of suspense at the right moments. This may sounds cliche, but the soundtrack is truly an extension of the game.

The man responsible for the music is Terry S. Taylor. Not exactly a household name, but the music he created for this game just fits so perfectly. Tracks like "Homina Homina" and "Everybody Way Oh" are great examples of Taylor's cleverness. A majority of the tracks are composed of acoustic guitar and lyrics that are mostly gibberish and nonsense. The rest of the soundtrack incorporates other "instruments" which include but are not limited to humming, mouth noises, scatting, and even some gargling! All these elements combine to form one of the most unique video game soundtracks I've ever heard. The music of the Neverhood stands great on it's own, but to really see why i love this soundtrack so much you have to experience the game!

Dennis Hopp

My favorite video game soundtrack is from the cult classic Conker's Bad Fur Day. It is the "Windy Over World Theme" I was 8 when the game came out and, yes, I know that is far to young to play that game but it didn't matter, for the simple reason that when I played I wasn't very good and spent hours in that over world and never progressed, so I always heard that one song. No matter how many times I hear the theme it will never get old to me. It pushed the limitations of what a cartridge was capable of. It sounds old-timey and lighthearted and keeps you in the mood to keep playing.

And this month's winner is:

Jon Ledford

With the distinct memories and scenes attached to almost every song on the soundtrack, I wholeheartedly choose Final Fantasy 6's OST as the greatest video game soundtrack of all time. From a technical standpoint, this was probably the pinnacle of audio for 16-bit gaming. If you’re one of the people that started playing every Final Fantasy from 7 onward and never tried 6, you are missing on what I believe to be the greatest RPG of all time; and its soundtrack does nothing but echo my opinions of its beauty as a game.

The aesthetics of FF6's world welcomed players to the first instance of a reoccurring theme for almost every future final fantasy game to come: taking a world filled with magic (well, technically magic was thought to be extinct in FF6) and arming the chocobo-riding, medieval-like world with steam-powered machinery and the boom of industrialization. As a result, we have a soundtrack that reflects this change in the franchise. Every character has a theme that instantly hints at what that character is like: “Shadow’s theme” is mysterious and reflects the whistled tune of a wanderer going from bar to bar, the song of Edgar Figaro is one that evokes a sense of regal majesty empowered with the wonders of technology, “Terra’s theme” inspires a sense of exploration in retrospect to the young soldier’s journey to find out who she truly is in the world, and finally (skipping about 10 other characters each with their own personal, unforgettable tune), we have the song of Celes.

Saying “Celes’ theme” is a bit of a double meaning since her actual theme is a variation of, in my opinion, the greatest song in the history of gaming: Aria di Mezzo Carattere, aka Celes’ opera song. The opera song, though unforgettable in its melody and its unique 16 bit capturing of Celes’ voice, is also one of video gaming’s greatest plot devices ever utilized. Though I believe it is the GREATEST song in the history of gaming, the opera scene of Celes singing is a giant foreshadowing of Celes’ fate with Cid on the deserted island. When you think about how Aria di Mezzo Carattere was used in such a beautiful way, just to have it foretell her fate later on, wow.

It seems as if Hollywood has a fixation with the number three. Whenever a film is successful they try to turn it into a trilogy. This has lead to some great and... interesting collections of movies. Our Next topic will be: What's your favorite movie trilogy?

We're going to talk about this subject in an upcoming podcast this month, so if you get your entry in early, you might get mentioned!

Write up a paragraph or two description and send it to communityservice.lvlup@gmail.com.

The more well written your entry is, the more likely it will be chosen. The best entry will win a print of their idea done by Arie Monroe! Deadline is 5/31/13 at midnight EST.