JRPG OST thread

[abnaxus]

PC98 tunes that stayed with me

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Everything Kenji Ito does is great but this one sticks out for being off-type and still really good. Plays whenever you fight the Minions of Saruin, who are pretty interesting bosses in a game with great boss fights.

Spoiler

Game is trash but this song owns

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I can't post this song enough times

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Almost all these Xenogears tunes still hit me right in the feels

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Bonus! Not an RPG but I love the wailing guitars in this. first it seems boring, then it gets awesome, then it somehow gets even more awesome.

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[Grampy_Bone]

Persona 2 EP have a really good map theme:

It's the credits song. Not bad.

Spoiler

However, its final battle ost is amazing:

I prefer Nyarlathotep's theme:

Spoiler

 

[Urthor]

Game is trash but this song owns

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[/spoiler]

No joke I was severely tempted to ingore all the reviews play this game instantly after seeing this OP when it was released.

One of the most insane OPs of any anime/JRPG

 

[HeatEXTEND]

Lufia 2 had some great tunes, Yasunori Shiono


Very obvious this-is-it/all-or-nothing vibes, nothing too extravagant, just the logical culmination of what everything has been leading up to.


Really nailing dire victory with a dash of melancholy, fitting the scene perfectly.

As for the greatest boss theme EVAR

Spoiler

except maybe dancing mad

 

[Damned Registrations]

Still amazes me that songs like this were possible on these old systems:

 

[Sigourn]

Sure, them battles took a lot of time to load, but the music was worth it. I gets real on 0:45.









I was honestly impressed with the SMT soundtracks. Absolutely nailed the atmosphere of the game.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Few more that deserve a spotlight:

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I feel like I could post basically the entire CT soundtrack here, but I'll limit myself to just this one, which is my favourite song in any game, period:

 

[duanth123]

 

[boot]

 

[Ash]

I'm gonna aim for lesser-known titles, at least not the uber popular ones anyway.

If you haven't played Parasite Eve 2 yet, you'd better rectify that. One of Squaresoft's best games that doesn't have "Final Fantasy" in the title.



The best sound to have ever come out of a gameboy:



Game is p. fun if you're a gameplayfag, but not amazing:

 

[Sigourn]

Game is p. fun if you're a gameplayfag, but not amazing:

I don't care what the average FF fan has to say: I really enjoyed Dirge of Cerberus. Alongside Vagrant Story, it's one of the few games I kept replaying because of the gameplay, despite not being "big" games (as opposed to New Vegas and Morrowind, for instance). Then again, I was a completionism autist back then.

 

[Great Deceiver]

The best sound to have ever come out of a gameboy:

Cool song, but I think the Genesis version is vastly superior (Bloodlines Stage 2 music):



There's a N64 version which is pretty cool too but a lot slower and orchestral (was in Legacy of Darkness):

 

[Ash]

CotM version is clearly the best, sorry.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I can't hear you guys over the sound of Bloody Tears (the best version)...

Spoiler

 

[Hyperion]

As for the greatest boss theme EVAR

Spoiler

except maybe dancing mad

Forgot about that tune, thanks. Shame the boss wasn't awesome, but transforming that pussy Wil into Shadow is one of my favorite SNES moments as a kid. Song reminded me of 7th Saga's boss theme a bit in the beginning.

Given the challenge of some parts of this game, and the fact most enemies could 2, or even 1 shot you with a poorly timed critical, when you hear this song you knew shit was about to hit the fucking fan. Death costing you half your cash, and making you walk back through a usually hellish dungeon made you REALLY not wanting to lose.

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I see quite a few links to FFIX's OST, but there's two songs missing that's quite upsetting...

This is listed as Freya's Theme, but it's just as ubiquitous as your first entrance into Burmecia. Cloaked in permanent rainfall, your first glance at this city is not a happy one. As soon as you set foot, you know something has gone terribly, terribly wrong. Oddly, I think it encapsulates as much Vivi's condition as it does Freya's melancholy, with both intertwined rather intimately

Spoiler

Not too long after, when things keep getti g worse and worse, you come across this song. I guess it could be considered Beatrix's theme, but it does come at a time of major exposition and character development - Brahne is too far gone, has just wiped out an entire settlement, views her daughter as nothing but a tool, and is willing to kill her once she's done. On the other hand, we see Beatrix is more than just a mindless follower of the Crown, happening at a similar time to everyone's favorite Rust Bucket, Steiner, who also hits like a freight train, which coincides nicely with the seemingly upbeat melody that pervades the song.

Spoiler

 

[Nathir]

Sigourn Good stuff, I'd give you a Brofist if I could. You forgot the ''reason'' boss battle theme though:



Also my absolute favourite piece from Nocturne has got to be this:



Just always gets me teary eyed.

 

[eric__s]

Falcom released a platformer RPG called Sorcerian in the late 80s that eventually got ported to DOS in the West in 1990 by Sierra. What the West didn't get was almost a dozen Sorcerian expansions that all had complete soundtracks.

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This is one of the songs Mieko Ishikawa wrote for Sorcerian Utility Disk Vol. 1. It's pretty unremarkable.

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Falcom regularly released arrangement albums of their music, and this is one of the arrangements of that song. Something about it feels so melancholy to me. The actual song that appeared in the game is just okay, but this is really nice. Mieko Ishikawa wasn't able to make the song she wanted because she didn't have the technology, or maybe the time, and so the only people who ever heard the song the way it was meant to be are the people who owned this obscure arrangement of an obscure game's obscure expansion.

 

[eric__s]

Most people are probably familiar with Mieko Ishikawa through her music for the Ys series. She did music for the first three games, which get remade constantly. She did music for a lot of other Falcom series, too, like Dragon Slayer (Legend of Heroes) and Brandish, too.

Spoiler

This is my favorite song by her. The Sega CD allowed for both Redbook audio and 16 frequency modulation sound channels, so she was able to get a really rich sound out of the music she wrote for it.

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Another really good song by her from the SNES Popful Mail, which is an entirely different game but has a lot of the same music for some reason. The SNES version of the song is the best, I think.

 

[abnaxus]

 

[aweigh]

that reminds me... are any of the Valkyrie profile sequels worth downloading illegally and playing on illegal emulation software?

 

[eric__s]

Suikoden 2 - Miki Higashino - Outskirts of Tinto

Miki Higashino is one of the great Konami composers. I always thought the music in Suikoden 2 was a big step down from Suikoden 1. Suikoden 2's music is all Playstation MIDI while Suikoden 1's is Redbook audio. This is one of the songs I never really thought much about. It's kind of catchy and has a European folk sound to it, but it doesn't really stand out and the MIDI instruments are just kind of bad.

Suikogaiden 2 - Miki Higashino - Outskirts of Tinto

The song was rearranged for the Suikogaiden 2 intro and it's amazing, probably one of the best songs in the entire series.

Miki Higashino did the music for the first two Suikoden games and the Suikogaiden visual novels. She joined Konami in the early 80s and did soundtracks for games like Gradius and Contra 3, but she's definitely best known for the work she did on the Suikoden series. She left Konami shortly after the Suikogaiden games and has worked freelance on a few games since. Here's a pretty cool interview with her where she says her favorite soundtrack she ever made was Premiere Soccer, which I've never even heard of.

 

[Great Deceiver]

 

[Okagron]

Spoiler

More Final Fantasy music, but this one kicks ass, so i don't care.

 

[Dorarnae]