November 10, 2024

During Olympic Opening Ceremony, Fans Hear Their Favorite Video Game Soundtracks

Kingdom Hearts #KingdomHearts

This story originally appeared on LX.com

Gamers across the world started flooding social media with joy Friday as they watched the Opening Ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics — and recognized songs from their favorite video games.

As athletes from over 200 countries entered the Olympic Stadium for the Parade of Nations, an orchestra played hits from video games like Sonic the Hedgehog, Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Kingdom Hearts, Nier and Monster Hunter.

The opening theme of Dragon Quest got the parade started, but before long viewers and athletes heard the victory theme from the Final Fantasy video game series too.

The music is easily recognizable to fans of the Japanese series, which has 15 main games since 1987. A version of it plays when the main characters win a battle.

The performance got some love from Masahiro Sakurai, the creator of the popular Super Smash Bros. series, where the all-star game characters battle for glory.

According to a translation of Sakurai’s tweets, he was on an exercise bike watching the ceremony and the music was keeping him motivated to keep pedaling!

NikkanSports.com identified several other video games that are part of the orchestral score during the ceremony, including Gradius, Ace Combat, Soul Calibur, Phantasy Star Universe, Saga and Pro Evolution Soccer.

Anyway….let us know when this album is dropping on vinyl.

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