Video Game Music
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50 free Video Game Music trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Video game music began as a handful of bleeps squeezed out of tiny chips, and it has grown into something people buy tickets to hear symphony orchestras perform. Along the way it produced some of the most recognisable tunes of the past half-century, many written by composers who had only a few notes to work with at once. This quiz covers the whole story: the themes everyone can hum, the people who wrote them, the 16-bit era when rival consoles competed on how good they could sound, and the modern age of licensed pop hits, rhythm games, live concerts and major awards. There is no audio to identify here. Every question is about the facts and stories behind the tunes. It is written for VGM fans, retro gamers and anyone who has ever had a level theme stuck in their head. Each answer comes with a short explanation, so you can play straight through or print the questions for a game night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which puzzle game's best-known Game Boy tune is an arrangement of the Russian folk song Korobeiniki?
Tetris
Tetris got its Game Boy 'Type A' tune in 1989, when Nintendo's Hirokazu Tanaka rearranged a song about a peddler haggling with a girl. The folk song grew out of an 1861 poem.
Q 02Which pop star composed music for Sonic the Hedgehog 3 but left the project and went uncredited?
Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson's part was only a fan rumour until a Sega studio director mentioned it in a 2005 interview. Sources still disagree on how much of his music stayed in the finished 1994 game.
Q 03Which strategy game's theme, Baba Yetu, became the first piece of video game music to win a Grammy Award?
Civilization IV
Civilization IV opens with Christopher Tin's setting of the Lord's Prayer in Swahili. The Grammy came in 2011, six years after the game, once Tin had re-released the piece on his debut album.
Q 04Which British music legend wrote and recorded the song Hope for the Future for the 2014 shooter Destiny?
Paul McCartney
Paul McCartney also worked with composer Martin O'Donnell on Music of the Spheres, an eight-movement symphonic suite written for the game and finished in 2013.
Q 05Which sandbox game has a gentle ambient soundtrack by the German musician known as C418?
Minecraft
Minecraft's composer, Daniel Rosenfeld, met creator Markus Persson on an indie developers' forum and made the sound effects too. His albums Volume Alpha and Volume Beta collect the score.
Q 06Which composer's Super Mario Bros. theme was the first video game tune in the US National Recording Registry?
Koji Kondo
Koji Kondo wrote six pieces for the 1985 game and said this one took him the longest. The Library of Congress added it in 2023 for its cultural significance.
Q 07Which company designed the Super Nintendo's sound chip, years before launching a rival console of its own?
Sony
Sony engineer Ken Kutaragi took on the chip in secret and was nearly fired when his bosses found out. He is now known as the father of the PlayStation.
Q 08Which arcade game inspired a novelty hit by Buckner & Garcia that reached the US top ten in 1982?
Pac-Man
Pac-Man Fever peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in March 1982. The duo's follow-up single, Do the Donkey Kong, stalled at number 103.
Q 09Which PlayStation game was scored by Gustavo Santaolalla, a two-time Oscar-winning composer from Argentina?
The Last of Us
The Last of Us was Gustavo Santaolalla's first game score, after Oscars for Brokeback Mountain and Babel. He had refused other developers' offers, wanting a project focused on story and characters.
Q 10Which Xbox launch game opens with a theme of chanting monks co-written by composer Martin O'Donnell?
Halo: Combat Evolved
Halo: Combat Evolved got its monks from O'Donnell, his writing partner and three colleagues they had recorded jingles with. The theme was first heard at the game's 1999 Macworld unveiling.
Q 11Which Final Fantasy composer was working in a Tokyo music rental shop when a Square employee offered him work?
Nobuo Uematsu
Nobuo Uematsu took the job as a way to make some money on the side and kept his part-time shift at the shop. Classic FM has since called him the Beethoven of game music.
Q 12Which 2005 rhythm game from Harmonix was sold in a bundle with a miniature Gibson SG controller?
Guitar Hero
Guitar Hero came from Harmonix and publisher RedOctane, who wanted to bring a game like Japan's Guitar Freaks to the United States. The launch bundle cost $69.99.
Q 13Which Japanese company created both the arcade dance hit Dance Dance Revolution and the DJ game Beatmania?
Konami
Q 21One-Winged Angel, with Latin lyrics drawn from Carmina Burana, is the theme of which Final Fantasy villain?
Sephiroth
Sephiroth grows a single black wing in the game's final battle, echoing the title of his theme. The designers kept players chasing him so they would not face him until very late.
Q 22Which monster-catching series got its first Game Boy music from the composer and programmer Junichi Masuda?
Pokémon
Pokémon's first games had Masuda writing the music, the sound effects and even the program that played them. He counts the Russian composer Shostakovich among his inspirations.
Q 23In which Nintendo series does a musical dog named K.K. Slider perform for the villagers once a week?
Animal Crossing
Konami launched Beatmania in Japanese arcades in December 1997 and renamed its music-game division Bemani in the hit's honour. The controller copies a DJ's mixer and turntable.
Q 14Which 2007 game ends with the song Still Alive, sung over the credits by the villainous computer GLaDOS?
Portal
Portal's closing song was written by Jonathan Coulton and sung by Ellen McLain, who voices GLaDOS. Two Valve developers commissioned it from Coulton, himself a fan of the studio's Half-Life games.
Q 15Which wind instrument does Link play with the controller's buttons in his 1998 Nintendo 64 Zelda adventure?
An ocarina
An ocarina gives the game its title, and Link learns 12 melodies on it to solve puzzles and teleport. The Nintendo 64 controller's button layout resembles the instrument's holes.
Q 16Which role-playing game has a main theme sung by a choir in a fictional dragon language?
Skyrim
Skyrim composer Jeremy Soule recorded a choir of 30 men and layered three takes to sound like 90 voices. The game's director had pictured the series theme sung by barbarians.
Q 17Which Grand Theft Auto game filled its car radios with licensed 1980s hits, also sold as a seven-album box set?
Vice City
Vice City is a fictional Miami in 1986, so the developers researched the decade's music to fill its stations. It also has about three times as much talk radio as Grand Theft Auto III.
Q 18Which rock band's logo decorates ammo boxes in the 1996 shooter Quake, a nod to the group that made its soundtrack?
Nine Inch Nails
Nine Inch Nails and frontman Trent Reznor built the score from ambient soundscapes and synthesized drones. The logo sits on the ammunition for the Nailgun, and Reznor voices the protagonist.
Q 19Which Britpop band licensed its hit Song 2 as the theme music for FIFA: Road to World Cup 98?
Blur
Blur agreed to the deal on condition that the band got free tickets to the 1998 World Cup final. Guitarist Graham Coxon has said the song began as a joke on their record company.
Q 20Which fighting series inspired the dance track Techno Syndrome, built on a shout sampled from a TV advert?
Mortal Kombat
Mortal Kombat lent its name to the scream, sampled from the 'Mortal Monday' advert for the home console release. The Immortals' track grew more famous still through the 1995 film.
Animal Crossing's travelling musician is a caricature of Nintendo composer Kazumi Totaka. His Japanese name, Totakeke, is a contraction of Totaka K.
Q 24Which band got its own Rock Band game in 2009, sold with a controller modelled on a Höfner bass?
The Beatles
The Beatles: Rock Band grew out of a chance meeting between an MTV president and George Harrison's son Dhani. A Ludwig drum controller was sold in the bundle too.
Q 25Which Hollywood film composer provided the main theme for the 2009 shooter Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2?
Hans Zimmer
Hans Zimmer wrote only the theme, and Lorne Balfe composed the rest of the score. The soundtrack's iTunes page wrongly listed him as its sole composer.
Q 26Which battle royale game hosted an in-game Marshmello concert in February 2019 that drew over 10 million players?
Fortnite
Fortnite followed the Marshmello set with in-game shows by Travis Scott, Ariana Grande and Metallica. The events often bring themed outfits for players' characters.
Q 27Which 1978 arcade shooter has a looping four-note bassline that speeds up as the player destroys the enemies?
Space Invaders
Space Invaders owes its sound to Michiyuki Kamei, who spent four to five months on the audio circuitry while also working on another game. The aliens speed up along with the bassline.
Q 28What name is given to electronic music made with the sound hardware of vintage consoles and home computers?
Chiptune
Chiptune is also called 8-bit music, though not all of it is 8-bit. Early sound chips had so few voices that producing rich harmony was one of its composers' main challenges.
Q 29Which 1993 shooter has a Bobby Prince soundtrack inspired by bands such as Alice in Chains and Pantera?
Doom
Doom designer John Romero asked for techno and heavy riffs, while Prince argued for ambient music and wrote both. He composed the tracks before the levels were finished.
Q 30Which indie game has a big band score that topped a Billboard jazz chart?
Cuphead
Cuphead's 51 tracks were performed by jazz and big band musicians under composer Kristofer Maddigan. Guinness lists it as the first game to reach first place on a Billboard chart.