The opening ceremony for theOlympicsthis year welcomed its athletes with iconic video game music. During the Parade of Nations, each country walked out to songs from video games. Many recognizable songs were used from games such asFinal Fantasy,Sonic the Hedgehog, andChrono Trigger.
The2020 Olympicskicked off today in Tokyo after being delayed due to the pandemic. The opening ceremony featured a suite of gaming music, which had users on social media on an Easter egg hunt to identify each track.
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The first song that played during the ceremony wasOverture: Roto’s Theme,a song originally found inDragon Quest III. Dragon Quest is one of themost popular video game seriesin Japan where many people will take time off of school and work to purchase and play the newest installment in the series.Dragon Quest IIIis considered the game that helped solidify the series into the hearts of the culture, so it is only fitting that the Olympics would use its version of the memorable opening theme for its opening ceremony.
There were 19 songs that were included for this opening event from over 15 different Japanese video games.Star Light ZonefromSonic the Hedgehogand theMain ThemefromFinal Fantasymight be the most recognizable songs and games that were played during the ceremony.
Tokyo Olympics now genuinely rocking the Sonic Star Light Zone theme 🔥pic.twitter.com/BAxs0b8eDE
— Andy Robinson (@Andy_VGC)July 28, 2025
Square Enix was the most represented company in the list of songs. At least seven of its video games were included in the opening ceremony with certain games likeKingdom HeartsandFinal Fantasyhaving multiple songs played. Capcom and Sega both had multiple songs played in the ceremony as well.
Interestingly, the Olympics did not include any first-party games made by Nintendo. There were no songs from Super Mario, the Legend of Zelda, or even from the Pokémon series.
