Genesis

The Thunder Force series is one of the best series of shooters ever released on Genesis, or on any video game system or computer for that matter. A friend from junior high named Makio had this, along with a couple hundred other genesis games ( he was "the kid who had all the cool systems and newest games"; the one who existed in everyones' childhood). I'd go to his house to play video games, and he'd be playing Thunder Force 3(also composed by Toshiharu Yamanishi and Tomomi Ootani) from time to time. The reason why i was reminded of these games is because of an episode of Airwaves (monthly podcast of chiptunes and retro game music) that focused on Genesis (aka Mega Drive) composers. You can find this episode at the Airwaves Archives(episode 18).

Thunder Force 4 was composed by a trio of composers: Toshiharu Yamanishi (last fm), Takeshi Yoshida, Tomomi Ootani. Tomomi Ootani worked on the soundtracks for part 2, and 3 along with Toshiharu Yamanishi. Unfortunately I cant seem to find any other games scores that Takeshi Yoshida has worked on. They have a number of original works of their own, in collaboration, and on their own, that even to this day are being released. The Thunder Force 4 soundtrack is easily the most awesome among the entire series; granted I've never heard Thunder Force 1, though i can only assume it gets better, not worse. With its bass and guitar heavy tracks, with a futuristic twang , they're quite"Metal" and go along well with the theme of destroying giant intergalactic machines enslaving random planet in some far off galaxy. Despite being heavy, there are some Jazzy and J-Pop overtones (more on some tracks than others) and some beautiful synth work that make this score very hard to get sick of.

There are a number of great tracks of note for this game, with goofy names to boot:

• Metal Squad
• Don't Go Off
• Fighting Back
• Space Walk
• The Sky Line
• Silvery Light of the Moon
• Count Down
• Because You Are The Number One
• Remember of Knight of Legend
• Omake 4
• Omake 7
• Omake 9
• Omake 10

These should be listened to, religiously! The rest of the tracks also deserve to be explored, so dont be shy.

Thunder Force 4 Soundtrack