Have you ever bought a game's soundtrack?

[ZedClampet]

I've got a ton of music on Steam. I'm not exactly sure where it all came from because I haven't specifically purchased a game's soundtrack before; however, I was going to change that with NASCAR Heat 5, but when I went to buy it, I discovered it wasn't for sale *sad face*. Another one I wouldn't mind having is Wasteland 3 (which my wife bought).

I don't actually want them on Steam. Their music setup is wonky. I just want these soundtracks somewhere.

Which raises another question. If you were going to buy a soundtrack, where would you buy it from?

 

[Rolfil]

I've got the Death Stranding soundtrack . Although I think it came with the actual game it's a separate install on Epic.
You can't actually buy even the base game through Epic at the moment
However you can listen to the soundtrack through Spotify .
In fact you can probably find a lot of game music this way.

 

[Pifanjr]

I would never buy a soundtrack, I'll just look it up on YouTube if I happen to want to listen to it.

 

[Zloth]

I've got some soundtracks. I started saving a few off in that brief period of time when space for entire soundtracks was cheap enough to make it worth saving them forever and the time when publishers figured out they could make some extra cash by selling them to us instead of just leaving them as MP3's.

But yeah, because I tend to buy games late, I tend to get the "complete" editions which include the soundtracks. I got Wasteland 3's music that way, for instance. Once I get them, I shove them over to a special Game Music directory. They end up in my car eventually.

Every once in a blue moon, a game will let me put my own MP3s in some sort of juke box or radio station inside the game. I love that!!

I've got the Death Stranding soundtrack . Although I think it came with the actual game it's a separate install on Epic.

WHAAAA!?!? I just re-downloaded, there's nothing in the director's cut version.

P.S. This topic encouraged me to look at my Steam music. I found the music for two DLCs for Mechwarrior 5 in there. Surprising, given I never bought the DLC or even upgraded my game version!

 

[ZedClampet]

I would never buy a soundtrack, I'll just look it up on YouTube if I happen to want to listen to it.

That's the practical thing to do, but I like to slide some money to the developer and musical artists from time to time. After posting, I did find the NASCAR soundtrack on YouTube, but the sound quality is pretty poor. I may look it up on Spotify.

 

[Zimbaly]

There's some I would buy. I've bought individual songs though.
Also some games have come with the album/mp3s, so I don't know if that counts.

 

[Hitobat]

I don't usually buy the soundtrack separately, but I have sometimes bought a game + soundtrack on steam. Or perhaps it comes as part of a "collector release" or similar.

Short FYI you don't need to play it inside steam. You can go to the game/soundtrack options and open the folder, and it's usually just MP3 files you can copy to wherever you want and play how you want.

As others have also noted, they are sometimes also available on YouTube or Spotify or other music services too. So there's many different options.

 

[Brian Boru]

I eventually figured out where to see soundtracks…
Steam Client > Library > change dropdown from GAMES to SOUNDTRACKS
…and discovered I have 5 there, no idea why. "Installed" 'em and got 4 folders of MP3s, and a couple of FLACs, in…
G:\Steam\steamapps\music
…from where I promptly moved them to my HDD Music folders—no point leaving them lost somewhere I'd never look for them.

I've never knowingly bought a soundtrack. Or artwork, or interview with dev, or etc etc… Which is maybe odd, as when I had spare cash I used to buy complete games I knew I'd never play, just to support devs or say 'Thank you' for another game I'd gotten hundreds of hours of pleasure from.

 

[ZedClampet]

I eventually figured out where to see soundtracks…
Steam Client > Library > change dropdown from GAMES to SOUNDTRACKS
…and discovered I have 5 there, no idea why. "Installed" 'em and got 4 folders of MP3s, and a couple of FLACs, in…
G:\Steam\steamapps\music
…from where I promptly moved them to my HDD Music folders—no point leaving them lost somewhere I'd never look for them.

I've never knowingly bought a soundtrack. Or artwork, or interview with dev, or etc etc… Which is maybe odd, as when I had spare cash I used to buy complete games I knew I'd never play, just to support devs or say 'Thank you' for another game I'd gotten hundreds of hours of pleasure from.

Counted mine up, and I have 21 soundtracks. With only a couple of exceptions, they were simply given to me when I bought the regular game as opposed to a special edition. I guess some devs just put it out there as an add-on.

I have 18 videos. 15 are from Oats Studios who released a "Black Mirror" type season of video shorts onto Steam in order to help fund their next indie movie. The others are indie movies during Steam's brief foray into hosting movies.

Speaking of that, when Steam first started with movies it was literally the best place to buy movies online. They were all indie movies, movies made with love, artistry and intelligence. And then the flood gates opened and huge movie studios poured their entire backlogs on their, and you could no longer find the, you know, interesting movies. If only they had stuck to only indie movies, I think it could have amounted to something. As it is, the whole experiment failed, not in small part due to movie studios having an inflated notion as to how much their movies are worth. 40 year old movies for $24.99? Yeah, no thanks. They need to take a hint from the gaming industry.

(ps. I'm so thankful for this site. At least a couple of people will read my story about Steam movies. I just told this to my wife, but she never looked up from her Netflix binge and said, "I didn't know you could buy movies on Steam" after I just finished telling her that they didn't sell movies on Steam anymore At least Guido still listens to me, but he's in his room studying to retake the ACT and shoot for a perfect score. I told him he already beat me by 3 points and that now he's just going to rub it in )

 

[Brian Boru]

indie movies, movies made with love, artistry and intelligence

See here.

 

[DXCHASE]

The only way i have ever gotten a soundtrack is when its just been apart of the edition i bought, i have never once bought a games soundtrack on its own.

If were counting music "packs" in games that deal with music, then yes ive done that, but never have i bought a soundtrack seperately from a game i play.

 

[McStabStab]

It doesn’t really count as much as buying an album but with my Apple Music subscription I’ve downloaded many including soundtracks from:

Offworld Trading Company
Divinity: Original Sin 2
Death Stranding
Elden Ring
Max Payne 3
Rollerdrome
DOOM 2016
Cyberpunk 2077
Into the Breach

and others that don’t have an official listing but I grabbed the songs from like:

RUINER
Hotline Miami

 

[SWard]

I have some on vinyl

 

[Kborom]

I've never purchased an OST off Steam but have 7 in my collection, probably part of a game bundle I bought.

I have bought 2 game OST CD's though, Morrowind and Oblivion, and still listen to the Morrowind one occasionally.

 

[Colif]

Not intentionally. I may have over the last 20 years but I don't have any on Steam. Perhaps got soundtrack to Age of Conan.
Most of the games I play end up being in 2 categories. Either I hate the music by end or I can't listen to it without wanting to play game. Depends how often I play game I guess. Parts of Grim Dawn's soundtrack drives me nuts whereas Journey just makes me want to play it... so I don't listen outside game.