#1
Song: Still Alive
Artist: Ellen McLain
Game: Portal
While the end game song for Portal 2 is pretty good, I honestly remember nothing about it despite listening to it a few times already. The final song for the first game has stuck with me for a long time, and might honestly make my top 100 songs in all genres. It’s gorgeous. It’s creepy. It’s catchy.
Death By Troggles 
I knew what this was going to be when this list was announced. Solid choice.
I’m surprised no comment from you on how the end credits song from Portal 2 should be here instead :)
I’m sure there are many awesome songs I’ve never heard from modern video games I haven’t played.
…and I’ll probably hit a quick top 15 next week to educate you on these things. (I tried to do ten, but wound up missing some songs that i really liked).
Ditto.
Heh. I just heard this one! I didn’t know it existed, so it was a nice creepy surprise.
Now you just need to play the sequel!
That was the unfortunate part of my playthrough. I had heard this song a thousand times by the time I finally got my hands on Portal, so a little bit of the magic was lost – it could very well be why I like the second game’s ending song better.
Whoa whoa whoa — the artist is Jonathan Coulton! Ellen was just the singer.
I heard Jonathan perform it live when he opened for TMBG here in St. Louis. Wouldn’t be my top pick, but certainly a very high one.
Yeah, I probably should have differentiated the composer from the singer.
I need to give his other stuff a good solid listen. I’ve heard some of it, but none of it has resonated quite like the songs he did for the Portal games.
He’s a very clever lyricist, but he hasn’t grown on me much. “Code Monkey” and “Mr. Fancy Pants” are faves.
I saw him perform live with John Hodgman long before either of them were anyone. Hodgman had just released his first book, and gave a reading to roughly 50 people crammed in a room that fit 30. Coulton played songs. They passed a bottle of whisky around to the crowd. It was not a professional tour. But it was a pretty magical night.
I’ve listened to the songs that end both games about a jillion times since you posted this. So, they’ll be completely ruined for me when I finally play the Portal games.
Ha ha! Made you look