Enter the Game Music Thunderdome

Yeah I think it’s US-only. I had to turn my US VPN on.

FYI the first two entries this round are by the same composer (Yasunori Mitsuda)!

And my apologies for more Alba Cavanich; this is the version that plays at night and I couldn’t pick between them so nominated both… :)

I liked all these but my vote would be Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Treasure of the Rudras.

Yeah, I didn’t dislike any of the choices in this round. While I prefer the daytime XC2 themes to the nighttime versions across the board, Alba Cavanish is pretty good in either form. Treasure of the Rudras gave me Golden Sun vibes that managed to bump it just above Chrono Trigger. Getting to hear the track from Life is Strange finally taught me where said track was actually from, but it wasn’t on the same level as the other entrants.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Treasure of the Rudras.

These are my votes as well. Good stuff!

Treasures of the Rudras
and
[ahem] Life is Strange: Before the Storm

Aye, same as krok. Glass isn’t working for me and I have no VPN software for US access!

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Glass

Treasure of the Rudras
Life is Strange: Before the Storm

It’s the longer one.

Treasure of the Rudras
and Before the Storm

Chrono Trigger and Before the Storm

My wife turned her ears 180 degrees like some rabbit from the other side of the appartment on the first four notes of Chrono Trigger. And for her to ramble on and on about some “medieval age” and other nonsensical stuff. Then proceed to sing it for half an hour. Good thing it isn’t her voting.

I choose Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and trGKR’)"t)zekge Chrono Trigger
yes, I am weak.

Perfectly put. I had an urge of nerd-rage earlier when somebody referred to YU-NO as “MIDI”.

Speaking of which, Chrono Trigger is pretty much the perfect example of that phenomenon for me. The orchestral arrangement album To Far Away Times was a mainstay on my study playlists in college, and going back to the original in-game version makes me sad that I’m not hearing this instead:

Oh yeah, this version too:

All the Square SFC games seem to use roughly the same “MIDI set” of sort, and it is one that is really unappealing to me and makes me impossible to appreciate them… unless under durress.

Bear in mind, I have next to zero idea of how the SFC sound system actually works: I just heard it was a MIDI box with really small sized samples.

Funny thing about that remix: it didn’t provoke the same reaction in the house that playing the original of the previous track did. Weirdness of the human taste :O
Is that track Uematsu work? Sounds a lot like some of the phrases in one of the SaGa 2 tracks he composed that I can recall.

@Thraeg wow, that To Far Away Times version sounds lovely. The SNES strings are quite shrill but the main melody still holds despite the uncanny valley effect.

Will vote tomorrow. I really like three of this group’s tracks so it’s going to be difficult.

Oh I hear you. We’re it allowed I would nominate literally any Black Mages version of FF songs for that reason, or Metroid Metal versions of the original Metroid tracks, or Vangough’s Game On versions like this

The composition exceeds the capabilities often. But this is a good group of songs, and hold up better than the hardware says they should.

Your wife sounds like an objectively good person.

Those 16-bit soundtracks had such a profound effect on me that I prefer the originals in almost every case (except for Dancing Mad, which I already brought up). Is it actually the strength of the composition or nostalgia that gets me? No idea, and I don’t think there will ever be a way to know.

I kind of go the opposite way from most of you – the fact that these people were able to make these instruments sound anything like real-world instruments makes them more impressive to me than an orchestral arrangement of the same music.

More interesting? Perhaps. More enjoyable? Mostly not.

I played most of them long after the fact, most of them 2003 onwards, so while I have nostalgia for some, it is a different nostalgia than those who grew up playing them 25 years ago. So I tend to have a stronger preference for real instrumental versions.

Life is Strange: Before the Storm is the clear winner for me this round. And I guess Xenoblade Chronicles 2 gets my second vote? I’m starting to come to the realization that maybe I just don’t like the music in most Japanese games.

Definitely the hardest group to decide, by far. I can make a case for all of them. Chrono Trigger gets a lot of points for the memory of that moment and music, none of the other three I’ve played. Treasure of the Rudras has this cool neoclassical vibe that wouldn’t be out of place with Yngwie Malmsteen or Vitali Kuprij playing it, and I love some Yngwie and Vitali. Life is strange has the soothing post rock thing going, and Xenoblade Chronicles is a solid adventuring song. Again.

Ultimately I liked the other Xenoblade song better, and Chrono Trigger just doesn’t quite have enough to it.

Treasure of the Rudras and Life is Strange

Chrono Trigger and Life is Strange: Before the Storm