Pokémon Pinball Music and Sounds: Composers and Tracks

People often play Pokémon Pinball with the sound off, on a bus or in class. That’s a shame: the game’s soundtrack is a little treasure for fans of the series, with familiar tunes rearranged and even two melodies that wouldn’t be heard in the mainline games until later. Here’s who composed it, where its tracks come from and how to enjoy the Sound Test.

The sound team

Junichi Masuda, the longtime composer of Pokémon Red and Blue, thus supervises the work of Gō Ichinose, who would go on to write many tracks for the main series. This continuity explains why the soundtrack feels so consistent with the Game Boy games of the era.

Familiar tunes, revisited

The Red Field

The Red Field’s main theme reuses the melody heard in Viridian City, Saffron City and Pewter City in every mainline game set in Kanto (and in Cerulean City in the second-generation games). This table’s Catch’em Mode draws on the bicycle theme from Pokémon Red, Green, Blue and Yellow, a lively tune that suits the race against the clock.

The Blue Field

The Blue Field holds the real surprise: its main theme shares its melody with the themes of Ecruteak City and Cianwood City in Pokémon Gold and Silver, released seven months later in Japan. Players therefore heard this tune on a pinball table before meeting it again in the cities of Johto. The Blue Field’s Catch’em Mode is an instrumental version of the anime’s first opening theme, “Aim to Be a Pokémon Master” in Japan.

The other tracks

• The Seel Bonus stage reuses the first-generation Surf theme, which suits a watery stage perfectly.
• The name-entry music, after a high score, is a variation on the ending theme of Pokémon Gold and Silver: a second melody heard here as a preview.

The Sound Test

The Options menu contains a sound effects test, which lets you listen to the game’s sounds one by one: bumper bounces, flippers, Pokémon cries, the capture signal, Bonus stage jingles. The Japanese version has 77; the American and European versions add one, for a total of 78 (see differences between regions).

Sound and rumble

Pokémon Pinball is designed to be felt as much as heard: with every impact of the ball, the rumble motor built into the cartridge takes over from the Game Boy Color’s speaker. On Super Game Boy, this vibration is disabled and only the sound remains. The whole story of this unusual cartridge is told in the rumble feature and the cartridge.

Listening well today

The Game Boy Color’s mono speaker flattens some of the arrangements. To get the most out of them, plug headphones into the console’s jack: the tracks gain depth, especially the Blue Field’s bass lines. On Game Boy Advance, a console compatible with Game Boy Color cartridges, the sound is slightly different but just as pleasant.

See also: the game’s history and development, our Pokémon Pinball review.