Nintendo has released a new streaming service for their game music called Nintendo Music. It’s only available on smart devices (Android, iOS) and requires a Nintendo Switch Online membership to use.
At first glance after opening the app:
Albums seem to be games or console apps (for example: “Super Mario Bros.”, “Tomodachi Collection”, “Wii Channels”).
Each song has its own cover art.
No artists are listed for songs. Only the name of the song and the game it’s from is shown. There’s an “Intellectual Property Notices” button, but this only displays the copyright information.
It seems to be region-free (like the Switch); the DS game “Tomodachi Collection” was only released in Japan and I can listen to the music in the UK just fine.
Games use their region-specific name if the Nintendo account is in that region (for example: “Star Fox” is named “Lylat Wars”). Cover art is not affected by regions.
This is a really interesting thing that Nintendo made. It would’ve been much easier for them to release their music onto platforms like Spotify and Apple Music.
I just wonder how difficult it would be to add the metadata to MusicBrainz…
They did exactly that prior to the release of this app. Now all that music is gone from those services.
It’s not the first time I’ve seen a Japanese company make this move. The talent agency Smile-Up (formerly Johnny & Associates) has its own streaming service for its 60+year catalog of music. To my knowledge it’s only available in Japan.
It’ll be interesting to see how long this app lasts. Back in 2017, several anime studios and their associated record companies banded together and founded a streaming service called ANiUTa that streamed purely anime music. It was ultimately unsuccessful: the app launched internationally in 2018 but shut down internationally after less than 2 years, and the app shuttered in Japan in 2022.
The lack of album/artist metadata and original artwork make it hard to justify creating separate releases, since the rest of the metadata is already represented by Work relationships.
I think the static playlists could be added as Work series and any differences in track or game names from the released soundtracks could be added as aliases. Maybe we get official names to previously unreleased tracks out of this?
from what I’ve heard so far, I believe these are proper official releases, just exclusive to Nintendo Music. it seems we’ve even got multiple versions of each release, since different regions have different titles and whatnot
as to the artist credits (notably missing on the streaming service), we could follow the general soundtrack guidelines and use the composers (when known)
(I didn’t try the app, only saw the trailer and website)
Like soundtrack albums?
They could, it’s digital and owned by Nintendo, and that would be a new release.
But why would they? I don’t think they would make new music for already released games (in most cases, unless there’s a DLC which might get it’s own release)
Would it be that different if they released the albums to spotify (etc.), under the artist name “Nintendo Music” (since they don’t want to list the actual artists ). Because it looks like that to me, a spotify with a very limited selection of music.
Some things do look like playlists though, like the “Match your mood” or “Set the scene” sections. Do they look similar to spotify playlists? As in, does every track in that playlist link back to the original album (/game)?
If they do belong in MusicBrainz, I have a few questions.
What should be entered as streaming link? The app store or homepage?
And the “extended” versions of songs, are they part of the same release or standalone recordings?
Thanks! Yeah those don’t exactly look like releases to me-
Hmm that’s right, I was just thinking about a way to connect every release on this app on MusicBrainz. A series doesn’t seem right either, and tags and collections aren’t part of the core database(?).
That’s what I had in mind! I didn’t know about the “selection” part though, is that just a Nintendo employee’s favourites?
Well… today?
Quick!! add everything, then somebody can look at the app everyday to check for new releases just to get the date right
Trying to share the All Numbers (211) page from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Well… It didn’t work for me.
It opens the Android shop, then I have to click open the app, again.
It opens where I was last time, not this specific Tous les morceaux page.
Oh but that was directly on mobile, that it didn’t work good, paradoxically.
Now if I click this share link on PC, a QR Code appears, if I scan that with my same mobile, there it works!
However, it should be noted that I have no idea if there are tracks in those above games that were never released on CD. The Check Mii Out channel playlist has 15 songs, yet only one appears in the “Touch! Generations CD” (that being the Submission Plaza).
There are more and more playlists changing each day and each week.
You can activate an option that will loop several tracks longer than their default duration / loop count (en: Extended / fr: Extension de piste : Aucune, 15 min, 30 min, 60 min).
I’d say don’t add them to MB, for the sake of not wasting your time.
I now have the app, so I’ll weigh in a bit more now
I don’t know that I’d add every single playlist (especially since I don’t know if they’re static or not, maybe the character playlists tho?), but I would at least add the game releases, including the extended recordings somehow
it appears they do send out announcement notifications with each game release, so that might make it slightly easier to add release dates
as for the artist fields, I’d say credit them to the composers (if known), or to Nintendo (if not known), following the soundtrack guidelines
). Because it looks like that to me, a spotify with a very limited selection of music.
