The title is 1990 in Roman numerals, and this compilation album is a who's-who snapshot of Japanese PC game music composers at the dawn of the decade. The roster is absolutely stacked. You have got a young Yuzo Koshiro contributing "SPACE FIGHT" (fresh off his Ys and ActRaiser fame), Shinji Hosoe with "Arrian1" before he became a prolific arcade and fighting game composer, and a collection of PC-88/PC-98 scene veterans all flexing on FM synthesis hardware.
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Every track is credited to its composer, giving this a showcase feel. Tetsukazu Nakanishi's "Hightway Night" opens with driving nighttime energy, Kenichi Arakawa's "MIDORIX" dives into something experimental, and TENTEKO's wonderfully named "Counterattack of the Sightseeing Association" is exactly the kind of offbeat creativity the Japanese PC scene thrived on.
Hideaki Sato's "TeChNOiD" delivers on its name with mechanical precision. This is essentially a time capsule of the Japanese home computer music community circa 1990 -- a scene that was producing some of the most technically impressive FM synth music in the world while Western audiences had barely heard of half these composers.
Yoshihiko Fujii's "The Wind Crossing Over the Plains" and MIU's "White Illusion" show the melodic side, while tracks like "Scrap's Beat" and "Midnight Illusion" go darker. Essential listening for anyone interested in the roots of Japanese game music.