Mixing and Mastering for Video Games Thread

I'm sorry to break up then never ending string of "Musicians Looking for Work" threads but I've been thinking about mixing and mastering as it pertains to videogames. How does everyone else go about it?

I've recently been having this conversation with one of my friends and I'm just curious what the general thought it here. Besides the obvious (avoiding dialog, keeping sfx and music apart, etc). When you are mixing a piece of music do you prefer to mix it as if it was going to be released on an album and have it sound spot on or do you account for the fact that it's going to be turned down, bombs will be exploding over it, and the player will likely be yelling at their computer screen while your epic symphony plays. I suppose this same idea ties in your thoughts on overall quality. Do you go in with the idea that people with amazing sound systems will be blown away by your work or do you mix and master for the people (which, sadly, is most people) who have sub par sound systems (or worse, awful built in computer speakers)

I've heard arguments for both schools of thought. Just wondering what your thoughts are.

Both?

if you mean eqing it so the bass can be heard on the bad systems, then no. but if you mean mixed so you can hear everything on a bad system, then yes. one of the points of listening to it through lots of different systems during mixing/mastering is to make sure it sounds good no matter what system you play it on. sure your not gonna get subbass rumbles through the built in speakers, but that dosent mean you cant have all the parts of your music shine through it, even if the speakers suffer abit tonally.

a good mix will always get the best out of a bad speaker system, and any eq to correct bad speakers should be applied at the users end. otherwise the music gets fatiguing to listen to because of excessive bass etc on the good systems.

fact is not everyone cares about good sound, but the people who do and will appreciate a good mix, are also likely to have speakers that can reproduce it proplery.