Doing my research for the Final Fantasy Retrospective, I keep coming across screen grabs of the NES and SNES games in super high resolution. I'm assuming that these are taken from someone playing on a ROM with the settings tweaked. My question is-why can't we get this on our systems? I certainly wouldn't mind playing 8 and 16 bit games in high resolution at the original aspect ratio.
Uematsu's last complete FF soundtrack was X. He worked on some tracks for XI, but the only involvement he has with his compositions for Square Enix now is the Distant Worlds concert (which is amazing). SE controls the rights and ownership of all that music.
You know what I'm realizing? My apathy for game soundtracks is directly related to the fall of Japanese development. Most of the games I play these days are made in the West, and they opt for the generic-but-epic orchestrated scores. Japanese composers still try to write their music with the theme of the game and characters in mind. For example, two of my favorite soundtracks this generation that I would want to own are Bayonetta and Asura's Wrath. I remember the music from those games distinctly. Western soundtracks that I consider memorable tend to be from licensed music, like GTA IV and Alan Wake.
Thanks for helping me realize this! I never really thought about it before.
But Final Fantasy XIII-2 is an embarassment of a soundtrack. If you need proof:
Sounds like I'm quite a bit higher on it than you based on your blog post. I'm frustrated that I won't be playing this one, because I really dig what I played and what I've seen beyond the demo. I literally haven't had time to play anything lately, besides the game I'm reviewing. Busy with writing and personal stuff, not to mention the podcast.
Still need to finish Mass Effect 3, and Amalur is sitting on the shelf with 7 hours logged. Xenoblade is here, too, and I want to play Demon's Souls before the servers go down at the end of the month. Sigh.
Sorry, I heart them big time. Must be that little bit of Irish I talked about.
That's why I usually listen to orchestrated versions of those older soundtracks. But it's not rose tinted glasses when I say that many of those compositions were simply more interesting. When you play the theme of Cyan's castle with a full orchestra it sounds amazing and is far more notable than, say, most of the music in Dragon Age.
Oh sure, there's exceptions to every rule. But is the music in Nier and Xenoblade the type of music where you hear a track and can easily pinpoint where it sits within the game? That's the point I'm making. I enjoy the music in Fable, Mass Effect, and Portal, but have me listen to music from any one of those games and I'd be hard pressed to tell you exactly where the tracks came from.
The Soul Edge cinematic theme song is in my workout mix. :)
I own over 40 game soundtracks. And by "own", I mean just that. It's a collection I've put together over the past 14 years, and I don't even own some of the obvious titles like the FF VII-IX OSTs. Some of the gems in my collection are the American release of the Secret of Mana OST, the Super Metroid soundtrack, and Soul Edge: Khan Super Sessions. I love game music, and when I ran my store we would crank it all day long to advertise our soundtracks for sale. I regularly listen to my music even now.
It's funny, because I feel like game music has declined as the audio quality has increased. In the 8 and 16 bit days, composers had to work hard to make each level sound unique. Think about The Legend of Zelda. That game has, what, three tracks? Title screen, overworld, underworld. But who got tired of hearing those songs? I know I didn't. Each town in Final Fantasy IV has its own personality, and the characters in most of the FF games have their own themes. It's not unlike Star Wars, where everyone thinks of Vader with the Imperial March, or Leia to that song that plays when Luke finds her.
Music in games today tends to be very orchestral but lacking in personality. It truly has become background music. I see the same problem in movies, with most films having just a score with no personality. Although the Marvel Avenger movies each have a very distinct score.
The Tri-Force crew has a music show planned, but it's going to be a lot different. Please look forward to it!
At this point, I think the only one holding BG&E 2 is Michel Ancel. The last time he talked about it, he said the game was too ambitious for current consoles. Which is insane if true. Putting that much work into a sequel to a game that was a huge failure at retail is a bad move. A sequel will sell better than the original of course, but it won't be the multimillion seller they seem to need it to be.
