Tag: Nintendo

Weekly Game Music: Deep Red Pastures (Baten Kaitos Origins)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music.  We start this year with a little-known JRPG game.  The genre is full of audio surprises.  Anyway, here’s Deep Red Pastures, composed by Motoi Sakuraba.  It fits with the windy setting of the game, Baten Kaitos Origins.

Baten Kaitos Origins starts with our hero, Sagi, tasked to commit murder by his boss.  Yeah….no, Sagi doesn’t fall for this one, but another unknown being takes care of the job for him.  Sagi, of course, gets blamed for it, and has to uncover the case behind this problem to clear his name.

Baten Kaitos Origins is a card game, where every weapon, equipment, magic, and items are represented as a card.  It’s quite an explorer-happy game where a card could be hidden at any nook and cranny.  All battles are turn-based, where in each turn, the player has a hand of cards (and thus, moves) to choose from before attacking or defending.

Baten Kaitos Origins was released on the Gamecube in 2006.

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Weekly Game Music: Sweet Memories of Earth (DuckTales)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music.  Here’s a rock-and-roll remix of the The Moon Theme from DuckTales, Sweet Memories of Earth.  The remixer, CarboHydroM, successfully adds adrenaline to Hiroshige Tonomura’s dreamy 8-bit composition.  Many of you will undoubtedly feel nostalgic about it!

DuckTales narrates Scrooge McDuck’s treasure hunting journey.  Much like any platformers in the heydays, Scrooge would jump, climb, and waltz his way through the dangerous caves, villages, and even the moon.  Somewhat unique to the game was the ability to use you cane not only as a weapon, but also a pogo stick to reach higher locations.  It even allowed Scrooge to bounce through spiked floors!  Rather surprisingly, especially in comparison to today’s standards, DuckTales ended up being a critically appraised IP-based game.

DuckTales  was released on the NES in 1989.
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Weekly Game Music: Title Screen (Animal Crossing)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music.  Here’s yet another piano composition from the famed Nintendo music composer, Kazumi Totaka.  The calm, jazzy Title Screen music is quite appropriate for this laid back game, Animal Crossing.

The story behind Animal Crossing is very simple, if lacking.  You (yes, you) decide to leave home and travel to a town full of animals.  As you set yourself for a new, independent life, you encounter the main plot of the game: the local shopkeeper, Tom Nook.  Or, more precisely, the debt you owe for buying one of his houses.  Thus begins your quest for trying to pay-off this sneaky businessman, as he slowly inflates the haunting debt.

Fortunately for you, though, Tom Nook is in no hurry.  As a communication RPG, that’s rather critical.  The majority of the time is spent on talking with your randomly-generated neighbors and taking care of their errands.  The main draw of the game are its collectibles.  It allows you to customize your house with various furniture and accessories.  Since the game grades you on your content, it’s implied that you make it look as pretty as possible!

Animal Crossing was released on the Gamecube in 2001.  Its sequels were released on the Nintendo DS and Wii.  A sequel for the Nintendo 3DS is currently in the works.
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Weekly Game Music: Wind Waker Unplugged (Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music.  Late again this week, but I’m currently checking out SIGGRAPH 2012, and it’s quite a bit exhausting.  Anyways, lets go with something special this week.  Here’s Fredrik Larsson’s medley, Wind Waker Unplugged , which quite predictably blends together various tunes from Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.  It does great justice to the original compositions by Kenta Nagata, Hajime Wakai, Toru Minegishi, and Koji Kondo.

Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker begins with a common formula in the recent Zelda series: as a young boy named Link, you’re unsuspectingly thrown into an epic adventure when someone very close to him — his sister, Aryll — gets kidnapped by a gigantic bird.  Determined to save his sister, Link gets dropped square into the plot of a growing, evil force.

Sticking with the series’ tradition, Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker plays like an action-adventure.  Sword combat is executed through a simple control-stick, B-button combination.  New to the series is the introduction of countering and using dropped weapons against your enemies.  Wind Waker also strongly focuses on its wind physics, where gliding and sailing becomes essential.  Of course, no Zelda game is complete without complex dungeons and many creative tools to conquer them!

Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker was published by Nintendo on the Gamecube in 2003.  No other port exists.

Extra!

Title: Hyrule Field Theme
Game: Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Remixer: Yutaka Iraha
Original Composer: Koji Kondo

Title: Saria’s Song
Game: Super Smash Bros. Melee
Remixer: Hirokazu Ando, Tadashi Ikegami, Shōgo Sakai, Takuto Kitsuta
Original Composer: Koji Kondo


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Weekly Game Music: Some Like it Red Hot (Viewtiful Joe)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music. This week’s music is Some Like it Red Hot, baby!  Two cool dudes, Masakazu Sugimori and Masami Ueda, manage to capture the exciting and flashy nature of a city.  It best fits the rad superhero action game, Viewtiful Joe.

Viewtiful Joe, is, like, an action game about a stupid nobody named Joe.  The loser is such a hopeless fanboy of Captain Blue, man!  Even ends up being the only audience in a movie re-run, with his, you know, hot girlfriend Silvia.  Poor girl.  Anyway, Silvia totally gets kidnapped into the movie world, and Joe gets sucked into it by force.  But wait, it gets better!  Joe gets this rad V-Watch, turning him into a red-suited action hero.  Man, those pants are tight!

Anyhoo, Viewtiful Joe is this action-packed 2.5D beat’em-up all the cool kids are talking about.  To spice up his action, Joe can make time run slower or faster, allowing him to solve puzzles, cream enemies, or just look plain wicked.  On top of that, the game has this sweet cell-shaded graphics that totally makes it look like a cartoon.  It’s just how Joe rolls.

Viewtiful Joe was originally released on the Gamecube in 2009. It has also been ported to the PS2 as well.  It’s hardcore, dude!
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Weekly Game Music: The Angarian Journey (Golden Sun)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

New week, new music. Let’s get those nostalgic glands running, shall we? Here’s The Angarian Journey by Motoi Sakuraba. It’s an amazing and epic overworld music for the equally sophisticated game, Golden Sun. Despite the hardware limitation on the Gameboy Advance, this music still proves that composition really is the king.

Golden Sun starts with a traumatic childhood memories of Isaac, Garet and Jenna. During a big storm, the three attempts to help and save a few lives around their town. During these heroic risks, they learn of a plot of two mysterious figures attempting to steal a certain gem from their temple, who’s trap system triggered the storm. Unfortunately for the trio, Jenna’s brother and parents gets caught in a terrible flood, followed by a gigantic boulder. A few years later, shaken but still strong, the trio attempt to retrieve the jewel the two villains tried to steal, and learn of an interesting plot that turns into a long journey.

Golden Sun plays like an old-school turn-based RPG, complete with random encounters. What the game did different, however, was the introduction ofDjinns, elemental creatures that, combined with the element of its magic user, creates new abilities. Equipping a water Djinn on the rock magic user, Isaac, for example, allowed him to use plant-based magic. Similarly, using a rock Djinn on fire-based Garet allowed him to use lava-based magic. Unequipped Djinns can be used for summoning as well, leading to screen-filling, glorious special effects that obliterates the on-screen enemies. For its time, the game had spectacular 3D sprites and special effects.

Golden Sun was released on the Gameboy Advance in 2001. One of it’s sequel can be played on the Nintendo DS.

Extra!

Title: Forest’s Requiem
Game: Golden Sun
Composer: Motoi Sakuraba


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