Megalopolis - SimCity SNES (1991) - NJGSO Spring 2023 Concert

Composed by Soyo Oka Arranged by Nick Carlson Video Editor: Dave Hall (No, not Megalovania.) The original “software toy,” Will Wright’s SimCity is the progenitor of the “city builder” genre of games. SimCity gives players the freedom to plan, build and manage a city and watch it grow without any imposed goals, aside from the player’s own preferences and desires. Despite publishers fearing gamers had no interest in open-ended, nonviolent games, SimCity quickly became a best-seller, soon being licensed out to other developers and released on half a dozen other platforms over the next few years. In particular, the version developed and published by Nintendo for the SNES incorporated new elements to make the game friendlier for a younger audience. Most notably, this included the introduction of the green-haired advisor “Dr. Wright,” a cheerful city planner who frequently appears to give the player advice on how to plan their city to avoid urban blight and reach new development milestones. Soyo Oka, composer of many iconic SNES soundtracks like Pilotwings and Super Mario Kart, provided the all-new soundtrack (the original game was silent). As the city grows, the music changes to match. The final development milestone in the SNES version is the “Megalopolis,” a city with over 500,000 residents. The Megalopolis theme is that of a vibrant, fast-paced city on the go, with every section of the orchestra contributing its unique motif as the music builds to its overall climax. It begins to taper away to the slow contemplative “Village” theme heard at the beginning of the game, evoking a city with a proud history that still finds the time to remember its roots. #njgso #vgm #orchestra #simcity #megalopolis