New Moderator
Liberal Arts Major
This vaguely gets better closer to the end, but ehh... 4.5.
Blue Radiance
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xMDoh4174Y&hd=1
Another one of my favorite 2D FF Battle Themes, although in this case I identify it more with SMRPG since it plays in the bonus boss battle there and that's where I heard it first... by quite a large margin too. In general, I prefer the first part of the song (fairly certain this loops once) to the second half, but even the second half has a section I like a fair bit.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlrbMOUj6_Y&hd=1
One of my favorites from Super Mario Galaxy, which is itself one of my favorite soundtracks. This song played on Purple Comet levels, which were basically variations of previous levels with the new challenge of collecting a certain number of purple coins. They... sucked, mostly, at least compared to the rest of the game. They were really hard a lot of the time and some of them could be really tedious, especially when you had to collect 100 coins and were forced to start over from 0 if you fell off the stage or something. But as is often the case, really awesome music makes everything better, and this song certainly made Purple Comet stages a lot better! Not sure if I'd qualify it as being inspirational, but it certainly imparts that sort of feeling on me, personally. Definitely a song for me to remember to listen to whenever I'm feeling like there's no way I can do something!
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Liberal Arts Major
Another "classic" from Galaxy. Although, truthfully, this may be the best song from Galaxy I've heard. Maybe. I dunno. Parts of this song seem determined to make me take this back. 5.5
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e95W4zumNI&hd=1
Oh, Square and their putting some of the best KH songs in non-NA releases. Rage Awakened is the boss theme for the bonus boss fight in KH2 Final Mix, well, one of them. What I understand to be the strongest of them all, but there's like 20 of them, so for all I know another one is "actually" harder. Pretty sure this fight is intended to be the hardest though. I think over time I've begun to get marginally better at identifying styles, in that I went from "not able to do this at all" to "could pick out a Touhou song, but nothing else" to "fairly decent." So, yeah, I like this song for a lot of reasons I like other Shinomura songs, and particularly the KH ones. Just love some of the effects. Rage Awakened has a remix in Birth By Sleep, but definitely not on the same level as the Final Mix original, IMO. As for my favorite part of the song, I guess I'd say 0:59 - 1:33, particularly towards the end of that section.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
New Moderator
Hey, a Final Fantasy IV piece I recognize!
This is actually one I am sort of fond of despite it seeming short. It has to be the catchy nature, I have no idea why else I would like it. I prefer the first half too. Had no idea it showed up in Super Mario RPG though. Learn something new every day. So yeah, this gets an above average ranking.
Rating: 6/10
Super Mario Galaxy - Purple Comet
Wait, this plays every time you try to get a purple coin? Aren't there a lot of those? Which means this plays a lot?
Okay, this has some good sections that sound sort of upbeat. The rest? It sounds like standard fair space music to me, which never ranks all that highly with me. This one in particular is sort of straining. I would prefer the upbeat parts make up a greater portion rather than sliding into the, uh, space ones. Those just annoy me because they are inferior to everything else. It does not install that same optimism on me that Kenri mentions, but I guess it jumps over the okay line.
Rating: 6/10
Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix - Rage Awakened
Nope. Again.
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
New Moderator
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loW11_8mzuc&fmt=18
Trivia: I just learned of Sigma Harmonics tonight and did some research on why I had never heard of it, because the soundtrack made me want to get it. Answer? It was never brought out of Japan. Flipping heck. Apparently this was composed by the same guy who did some of Final Fantasy X's music and Final Fantasy XIII's soundtrack, so no surprise this work is good too. I stumbled on this piece first out of its soundtrack. Lots of pieces with that "Dance of" title, as a side note, though whether you find it interesting sounding (like me) or ridiculous sounding (like a lot of other people) is your call. Anyhow, finding it led me to listen to some of its other pieces, but I ultimately decided to post this one despite liking a lot of what I heard. Why? Great pace, really like the changes the piece makes as it goes, and any section involving the strings is fantastic. Seriously, 0:24-0:36 and anything like it would be ranked so, so high on its own. The rest is darn good too, so it still gets a high score, but dang, that section. Amazing.
Rating: 8.5/10
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
New Moderator
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZ79RStxFTQ&fmt=18
So the guy who did this, Yasunori Mitsuda? Also did Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, Xenogears, and Shadow Hearts. No wonder I wound up liking this. I have stressed many times I love horns, and here it comes into play. The harp section a bit further in is really nice too. This keeps a great pace, and what makes it good to me is the dominate portion of the piece. I can understand why others might not enjoy it, but I really think it sounds good, even if it is not on the same level as Blue Radiance and Hope Given "Dance of the Dog's Howl" (that name still amuses/intrigues me).
Rating: 7/10
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioLkStYNjJk&hd=1
Shamelessly stolen from VGMotD. Die Hard Trilogy, for whatever reason, has a really killer soundtrack, thanks in part to a lot of creatively used non-musical sound effects. For example, in this track, there's the sound of people chattering and an announcement on the PA system, which is not something I'd have said would lend itself to good music before listening to this track, but here we are! That's definitely my favorite part of Dulles Airport, but I really like the rest of it, too; it almost reminds me of Every Day, being similarly chilled out (until a little over a minute in, when it picks up the pace substantially). Definitely one of the most unique and creative pieces I've heard in a long time, and besides that, just a really good song overall.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
New Moderator
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9aCnQcM_EI&fmt=18
I found this game listed under the Crowning Music of Awesome section in tvtropes with a few links. I am not sure if I would go so far as to call them Crowning Music of Awesome, but I did find two pieces I like. This one edged out a bit over the other. Once again, my weakness for bells is exploited, but I also like the horns. Still, I think the introduction part is my favorite, but any of the bell sections is fair game for that.
Rating: 6.5/10
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih8c6I1zH7I&hd=1
Not one of my favorites from the Genesis Sonic games, but probably one of my favorites from Sonic 2, honestly. I think it's underrated, in any case. The vaguely Arabian or Egyptian feel to the music doesn't really match the actual Oil Ocean Zone at all, but hey, I think it's pretty neat anyway, and it becomes a bit less prevalent as the piece goes on, so I guess that helps. I actually do think this one improves quite a bit as it goes on and introduces more elements, though it doesn't improve as much as it goes on as does the remix I'm about to post!
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Oil Ocean (WT-40 Mix) (OCRemix)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qsr-9-6h2Dc&hd=1
I woulda thought you woulda thought, but I guess you don't think...
Possibly my favorite fan remix of any video game song... after the first 53 seconds, at least. To me those are sort of a throwaway. But yeah, after that, it's pretty much a complete transformation of Oil Ocean Zone into something that's totally new and different, but which is still recognizable. It even has the odd distinction of probably working better for the level in question than the original does, though I can see there being an argument against that too. The lyrics are also great; I can't even really claim that they're good, but they're definitely great, where great means hilarious and fairly clever.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
New Moderator
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nh2kSs89Xxw&HD=1
A cool song from a game that seems to be reviled by nearly all of existence. It's also day 1 of my 7 day long "Ominous Bulgarian Chanting" theme week. (No, that is a lie.)
Now... I think a lot of songs that try to pull off both "creepy" and "intense" just fail at one, the other, or both, because for me at least, creepy is a wholly passive feeling, whereas intense is active. This is one of the rare songs that I think can manage it; to me this song is just screaming "escape!", which nicely bridges that gap between creepy and intense. It's also appropriate for the scene in the game in which it plays, which I now present to you, o interested reader, entirely out of context and probably full of spoilers. I dunno about you, but I think that scene's pretty damn cool, and this song only makes it better.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebIcX1G-_3I&hd=1
'Nother chiptune. Least I think GBC tracks count as chiptunes... but let's not get into that discussion again. Star Ocean Blue Sphere's soundtrack is actually notable to me for a couple reasons:
A) Blue Sphere just beats the pants off the music I've heard from other Star Ocean games, by which I mean main series games. Kind of impressive.
B) It has the rare distinction of being an entirely chiptune soundtrack that I really like. Personally, I think it's pretty easy to find a lot of good chiptunes out there, but I'd say that finding a really good soundtrack from the NES/GB/PC-88/C64 eras is hard. Bad chiptunes tend to be really bad. So the fact that this soundtrack can stay consistently within the 5.5-6.5 range is, to me, impressive; some of my favorite soundtracks would not be able to manage that (though they'd probably have a lot more songs in the 7+ range as well).
Anyway, I'm not sure if this is my favorite track from the soundtrack, but it is up there, and I feel like my favorite would not go over as well. To me this track is absolutely beautiful, and that's not a word I apply to chiptunes very often. I'm also not really sure how to qualify this track, emotionally speaking. Melancholy, maybe? Ah well, if you can figure it out, you can let me know.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Editor
It plays on the Purple Comet variants of normal stages. Which is to say, it plays instead of the normal stage music. ...As far as I know, at least. Definitely not every time you collect a purple coin though.
Ys Origin - Termination
This might be one of the hardest songs to rate that's come up in the entire topic series so far. It's got a lot of elements that are good enough individually but don't really come together to create a coherent whole; instead they kind of fight each other. Occasionally there are moments when you can kind of see what they were going for, and those moments are really good, but they don't occur often enough.
5/10
Blue Radiance
New Moderator
Koe - Fatal Frame III: The Tormented
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-cGXS2XooEs&fmt=18
Just found this tonight after stumbling on a recommendation for it alongside Chou on the Fatal Frame tvtropes page (and two others, for IV, which I will listen to later and decide on whether they are worth posting after; they probably will be). The ending theme in Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly was Chou, which translates to Butterfly. I learned of that one from watching two Let's Plays for it, but I never got to seeing III or IV. Koe apparently means Voice, but I failed to get absolute confirmation on that. This is the same singer who did Chou/Butterfly, and she is fantastic in my opinion. I also like these translated lyrics. The instrumentals are sort of questionable though, it really falls completely on how good the vocals are. That said, they are, in my mind, so good that they get a really high score on their own. I prefer Chou/Butterfly a bit, but I would gladly listen to either. I can definitely see people thinking less of this due to that sort-of-obnoxious electric guitar solo section that thankfully lasts a short time. The chorus more than makes up for it to me.
Rating: 8/10
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
New Moderator
Battle with the Devil - Tsugunai: Atonement
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0kpLbsa8wg&fmt=18
Then I ran into this piece looking at the tropes page for Yasunori Mitsuda, who did Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, Xenogears, and others. This piece has some vocals, and they are nice. The instrumentals are what mostly carry this for me, but I definitely prefer it with the vocals. As some who know me might have guessed, 0:44-0:53 is my favorite part along with any like it. But dang, a lot of it is good. There is some down time near the end that I sort of wish was not there, but that takes me more to a neutral level than a disliking one.
Rating: 7.5/10
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
Liberal Arts Major
"That section" might be the worst part of the whole song. It's the rest of the song, by which I mean like the entire second half (before what feels like a loop) that tries to save this. ...It's a good effort at least. 6.5.
Boss Battle - Sands of Destruction
This has like one good section surrounded by a bunch more not-that-good sections. And the latter just overpower the rest of this for me. 4.5.
Die Hard Trilogy - Dulles Airport
This is pretty good, yes. ...No idea how in the world the PA chatter is the best part of this, because it's not, but it doesn't detract from this in any way either. 6.0.
Return - Radiant Silvergun
...Kenri is absolutely correct regarding this song. That opening is downright horrifying in a "oh man could this really be 3 minutes of this" way. ...And then the rest of the song happens and I'm left thinking, "...You know, it feels like a push." 3.5.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Oil Ocean Zone
Sonic 2 is just totally outclassed by S3&K in terms of songs, IMO. ...And Oil Ocean is not a credit to the team really. 4.0.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Oil Ocean (WT-40 Mix) (OCRemix)
...Oh man. This sure is... quite something. I think it's to your advantage that I don't generally care what the lyrics actually are here. It's really hard for me to say which I'd rather listen to out of these two. So I guess I'll just say 4.0 again and dodge the issue.
Fireworks Factory
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmy6rcn_v3A&hd=1
So, this is the boss theme to the stage in which Fires of Hokkai plays. I feel like this song does go on a bit too long, but I really can't tell if it loops in there, it might, it might not. Nevertheless, it never ends up feeling bad or a chore to listen to or anything for me so I don't mind it too much, but I could see it being a negative for some people. In general, my favorite parts are ones like 0:14 - 0:37, I really wish the whole song was like that.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIgfwsOph4I&hd=1
Hey, remember when I said during Deep Crimson Foe's commentary about how I couldn't discern any pattern to the boss themes that one boss had its own unique boss theme that I had no idea why it was unique to that boss? This is it. This plays in what I at least consider a fairly "minor" boss in the grand scheme of things, and yet as far as I know, it's the only time in the entire game it plays. It's a fairly neat battle though. Anyway, in my opinion this is probably the most "unique" of the NieR boss themes, if only for (or perhaps because of) the non vocal sections. I also prefer those sections to the vocals, so that probably helps it out some. The percussion is solid, but that's pretty typical for NieR, IMO. I find some of the more "unique" effects to be the more interesting parts of the song. The vocals are okay, but I don't feel like they bring the piece up or anything. Don't think they bring it down either though. My favorite sections are ones like 3:44 - 4:09.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SebCouS8_ms&hd=1
I have no idea how I found this thing. I imagine I was trying to navigate through all the hilariously awful Pop'n Music music that people like and somehow stumbled on this, but that could be my 1 AM Inner Cynic talking. In any case, this is a pretty cool song that hits a lot of the same high notes, for me, that DORCHADAS and Demon Vesper do, though it never quite peaks out as high as those two do. It also goes on a bit long and ends kind of abruptly, but there are a good three or so minutes of quality in the middle there.
For whatever reason, this sort of music... I guess you'd call it traditional, or at least tradition-influenced? Reminds me of Okami's soundtrack, which is another point in its favor. And that has made me realize how kickass an Okami-ish game based on European mythology would be. But I digress. I have to think it's the string instruments that remind me of Okami, but I wouldn't say those are my favorite part otherwise; all of the instruments pretty much pull their own weight here.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Liberal Arts Major
For the first 40 seconds I was thinking, "Is this really going to be 5 minutes of this?" Thankfully it gets significantly better. 6.0.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNVCD1dsnJI&hd=1
No one expects the MGS3 Main Theme! Actually, originally I intended on siding with the more popular (at least I'm pretty sure) MGS2 Main Theme, and even had one of the longer write-ups I've done in recent memory... but part of the problem was as that write-up went on I literally started going, "Well, actually, I think I like the MGS3 version more..." and basically went "Then why am I going with MGS2 here?" And so here we are. MGS2 Main Theme, MGS3 Main Theme, and MGS4's Metal Gear Saga (which may or may not be the Main Theme, I don't know) are all fairly close for me in terms of how much I like them. I think if you made me rank them, more often than not it'd end up MGS3 > MGS2 > Metal Gear Saga. All of them are pretty good though, overhyped IMO, but still good. My favorite and least favorite sections are basically constant between them all and so it's really a matter of which versions I feel do the respective areas best. By far my favorite parts of the MGS Main Theme are the faster parts (except, in a bit of an amusing twist, here in the MGS3 Main Theme, more on that later). However, by the end, all 3 of the mentioned songs here decide to become very slow at times. This is basically my biggest issue with the songs, I feel like those transitions are just very out of place. I do think the MGS3 Main Theme is a bit unique among the three though. I feel it does the faster parts and the slower parts better than the other two, but it alone has a "middle" part that for the most part itself seems like a bit of a weird transition. It doesn't bother me too much, but I do think it's kind of unnecessary. As for my favorite parts in this version specifically, I actually really like the very beginning. 0:00 - 0:33 (I just really love that effect at 0:32-0:33) the song remains absolutely solid for a while after that too, of course, I just feel that beginning is particularly notable. Another part I like is actually in that "weird" middle part at 3:50 - 4:01.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Editor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IEZl0Jq-TM&hd=1
So if you had told me a year ago that I'd be posting music in this topic from Oregon Trail, I'd have probably been like:
"You're a goddamn liar.
There is no way that Oregon Trail even has music."
And yet, if this topic and my subsequent forays into the thick of the VG music scene have taught me nothing else, it's that you can find some really good music in some really unexpected places. Oregon Trail 2's Main Theme succeeds for me because, not only does it somehow work perfectly as the theme for an Oregon Trail game (something that by all rights should not be possible), it's actually pretty rockin' regardless of context. I think it could easily fit into just about any JRPG, action/adventure game, or the daily life of you, my reader, should you allow it!
It's hard for me to pin down a favorite part, but easier for me to pin down a least favorite part; that would be the section near the middle that meanders about slowly, as if unsure of what to do next. While I wouldn't call for the complete excision of that section, I definitely think it could do to be about half as long.
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Liberal Arts Major
...Well, I suppose I can't quite say I was disappointed, because that would imply I had actual expectations for Oregon Trail music. 4.0.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BIwP5DH_n0&hd=1
Back to what can be expected from me roughly 70-80% of the time - JRPG Battle Themes! Hari-Hara is the battle theme for the first phase of DDS1's Final Boss, and it's pretty great IMO. It does a lot of things I like a lot, though it does have one section I don't like so much that holds it back from being really great. First is that opening, when I first heard this in game, I did not expect something like that to be the beginning of the boss theme, it's also a very nice section, and my second favorite in the song. However, the true peak of Hari-Hara for me is (you'll never guess) - the electric guitar (!) section at 1:03 - 1:23, especially that part at 1:16 - 1:19, that part practically makes the entire song for me. Unfortunately right after this section ends, it enters a zone that I kind of wish the song avoided and stays there until the loop kicks in and you're brought back to the nice sounding beginning. That's my only real problem with the song though, otherwise it's great.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3NtGrZ_RpQ&hd=1
Another one of my favorite Castlevania songs, and probably quite high up there on my favorite chiptunes as well. It's definitely Top 4 from Castlevania, if I'm remembering everything correctly, and probably Top 3, but since I'm just pretty inconsistent and my rankings are generally changing even as I type, it could even end up as my favorite Castlevania song at times I'm sure. There's no particular section I feel that just stands out far away from the rest, it's just very good all around.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-om0g-hTcY&hd=1
This might be my favorite battle theme from FFVII. It's this or Fighting, depending on when you ask me. I have no idea why J-E-N-O-V-A seems to be the more popular Jenova Battle Theme, because there's just no comparison! I mean, I guess it plays more, but that's about it really. Anyway, while I do like Jenova Absolute, it's not amazing or anything, just a fairly good battle theme.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6BZXz6q9_g&hd=1
So, this was something that introduced to me through VGMusicOfTheDay, and it's quite good IMO (they usually are). "Unfortunately" I can't think of anything but my stock generic comments on this, you know, classics like, "I really like the tempo and the percussion." Basically, the same kind of comments that if you went back and counted (please don't do this) I've probably said like a hundred times over the course of these topics. I don't really have any particular favorite sections here either, it maintains about the same level of quality all throughout, IMO.
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?