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GAME MUSIC CDS REVIEWS

PART 1

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| Album     : Chrono Cross                                                     |
| Reference : SSCX-10040                                                       |
| Publisher : Digicube                                                         |
| Released  : 12/18/99                                                         |
| Composers : Yasunori Mitsuda                                                 |
+--------------------------------------+---------------------------------------+
| Disc One :                           | Disc Two :                            |
|                                      |                                       |
| 01 Chrono Cross - Time's Scar        | 01 Beginning of a Dream               |
| 02 Edge of Death                     | 02 Dimension Breach                   |
| 03 Home Aruni Village                | 03 Home Termina                       |
| 04 Plains of Time - Home World       | 04 Dragon Knight                      |
| 05 Dancing the Tokage                | 05 Voyage - Home World                |
| 06 Reminiscence                      | 06 Home Galdove                       |
| 07 Dream of the Shore                | 07 Home Mabuure                       |
| 08 Another Aruni                     | 08 Zerubess                           |
| 09 Singing Emotions                  | 09 The Astonishing Magic Group        |
| 10 Lost Pieces                       | 10 Doze                               |
| 11 Drowning Valley                   | 11 Chronomantique                     |
| 12 Another Termina                   | 12 Dilemma                            |
| 13 Quitting the Body                 | 13 Optimism                           |
| 14 Forest of Cutting Shadows         | 14 Island of the Dead                 |
| 15 Snake Remains Chamber             | 15 Dead Sea - Ruined Tower            |
| 16 Triumph                           | 16 People Imprisoned by Destiny       |
| 17 Lost Child of Time                | 17 Lost Before, Light                 |
| 18 Another Galdove                   | 18 Earth Dragon's Island              |
| 19 Swamp of Hidora                   | 19 Navel of the World                 |
| 20 Dream Fragments                   | 20 Hurricane                          |
| 21 Voyage - Another World            | 21 Victory                            |
| 22 Ghost Ship                        | 22 Another Mabuure                    |
| 23 Death Volcano                     | 23 Fairies Yield Magic                |
| 24 Ancient Dragon's Stronghold       | 24 Etude 1                            |
| 25 Pathetic                          | 25 Etude 2                            |
|                                      | 26 Magical Dreamers                   |
+--------------------------------------+---------------------------------------+
| Disc Three :                                                                 |
|                                                                              |
| 01 Garden of God                       09 Star Tower                         |
| 02 Chronopolis                         10 Frozen Flame                       |
| 03 Fates                               11 Dragon God                         |
| 04 Jellyfish Sea                       12 In the Time of Disorder            |
| 05 Orphanage of Flame                  13 Life                               |
| 06 Star-Stealing Girl                  14 Reminiscence                       |
| 07 Dreamwatch of Time                  15 Radical Dreamers                   |
| 08 Dragon's Wish                       16 Dream Fragments                    |
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| Comments :                                                                   |
|                                                                              |
| I don't don't really like playing  RPG, simply because, even if these  games |
| are generally marvelous  ones, i don't  like their long  turn-battle systems |
| ... I prefer real time battles like Zelda or Secret of Mana. But these games |
| mostly have  great soundtracks  and as  i allready  loved the  one in Chrono |
| Trigger on SNES when my brother was playing Chrono Cross (cos he like RPG ;) |
| i was  once  again  astonished  about  the soundtrack.  The game  have  been |
| produced by Square (responsible of the all the best RPG and adventure games, |
| Final Fantasy series, Secret of Mana series and also Chrono Trigger series). |
| The soundtrack  has been composed by  Yasunori  Mitsuda,  who also  composed |
| Chrono Trigger and Xenogear (another RPG) musics.                            |
|                                                                              |
| First, there are  more relaxing pieces  of musics than  fast ones. The  fast |
| ones being present during intro, battles and rare others moments.            |
|                                                                              |
| The tracks are ordered like they could be discovered in the game, also  each |
| CD got  a specific  name :  CD 1 is  "Cause", CD 2  is "Unveiling"  and CD 3 |
| is "Change".                                                                 |
|                                                                              |
| Also most of these musics  (expecting intro and ending ones)  are originally |
| played on PSX like ... "mod" files, or better should i say midis files  with |
| a sound-font .. But a great one  !!! First time i heard these, i  thought it |
| was streamed music, like an MP3.  To compare it with something that  lots of |
| people  know,  let's compare  it  with Final  Fantasy  (only for  the  sound |
| quality, not for the music itself even if i don't really like Final  Fantasy |
| musics, particulary  recent ones).  In Final  Fantasy it  sounds really like |
| midi shit, i  mean midi played  on a PC  with a cheap  soundcard, u get  the |
| point ? But here, the instruments  are so realistic ! For exemple,  when the |
| acoustic guitar is playing, you can even hear the fast sliding sound when  a |
| note is on a case far from  another (the "sweak" sound ;). Also the  quality |
| of  these is  ten times  better. The  only instrument  which doesn't  render |
| realistic is the disto guitar of course ...                                  |
|                                                                              |
| The style is  mostly fairy with  celtic, arabic or  even "religious" touchs. |
| But even being relaxing pieces, the musics got great themes. And u can  feel |
| the style of Chrono Trigger in lots of these.                                |
|                                                                              |
| There are also some themes which  were present in Chrono Trigger but  with a |
| more complex composition  and orchestration (sure,  as Chrono Trigger  was a |
| SNES game ...  But once again  there isn't such  a difference between  Final |
| Fantasy SNES musics and PSX ones  in term of orchestration :). For  exemple, |
| the track 7 on CD 3 is a cover of the main Chrono Trigger theme.             |
|                                                                              |
| There's also  a track  with lyrics,  it's number  15 on  CD 3,  this song is |
| wonderful. It's a cover of the main theme of a "sequel" to Chrono Trigger on |
| SNES named Radical Dreamers (yes, like  the song) but which was a  text only |
| game and  only released  in Japan.  The only  instrument in  this song is an |
| acoustic guitar and  the singer got  a nice and  sweet voice. In  the middle |
| there is a choral and at the end a guitar solo. Nice, that's the word. :)    |
|                                                                              |
| All these  points make  this album  a definitively  great piece  of relaxing |
| music (some tracks could fit perfectly on an "ambient" compil)  and the best |
| RPG and adventure  games soundtrack  i've ever heard.  Better than  the well |
| know Final Fantasy series ...                                                |
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| Album     : Dracula Battle Perfect Selection 1 & 2                           |
| Reference : KICA-1145 & KICA-1162                                            |
| Publisher : King                                                             |
| Released  : 07/21/94 & 06/21/95                                              |
| Composers : Various                                                          |
+--------------------------------------+---------------------------------------+
| Dracula Battle Perfect Selection 1 : | Dracula Battle Perfect Selection 2 :  |
|                                      |                                       |
| 01 Beginning                         | 01 Beginning                          |
|    (Castlevania 3)                   |    (Dracula X)                        |
| 02 Bloody Tears                      | 02 Theme of Simon                     |
|    (Castlevania 2)                   |    (Castlevania 4)                    |
| 03 Ripe Seeds                        | 03 Road of Enemy                      |
|    (Castlevania Adv 2)               |    (Castlevania Adv 2)                |
| 04 Cross a Fear                      | 04 Den                                |
|    (Dracula X)                       |    (Dracula X)                        |
| 05 Requiem for the Nameless Victims  | 05 Theme from Legend of Dracula       |
|    (Castlevania Bloodlines)          |    (Castlevania Adv 1)                |
| 06 Opus 13                           | 06 In The Castle                      |
|    (Dracula X)                       |    (Demon Castle Dracula)             |
| 07 Vampire Killer                    | 07 Thrashard in the Cave              |
|    (Castlevania 1)                   |    (?)                                |
| 08 Calling from Heaven               | 08 Reincarnated Soul                  |
|    (Castlevania Bloodlines)          |    (Castlevania Bloodlines)           |
| 09 March of the Holy Man             | 09 Iron Blue Intention                |
|    (Dracula X)                       |    (Castlevania Bloodlines)           |
| 10 Don't Wait Until Night            | 10 Illusionary Dance                  |
|    (Demon Castle Dracula AC)         |    (Dracula X)                        |
+--------------------------------------+---------------------------------------+
| Comments :                                                                   |
|                                                                              |
| Some of the best game musics  are without any doubt the various  Castlevania |
| soundtracks.  These  are allways  powerful  and got  great  themes wich  fit |
| perfectly the mood of the game,  surely because Konami is perhaps the  first |
| japanese game  company which  thought that  the music  was one  of the  most |
| important part of a game. For  information, Dracula is the japanese name  of |
| the Castlevania series.                                                      |
|                                                                              |
| But before writing about  these two albums, let's  have a chronology of  the |
| differents generations of Castlevania soundtracks.                           |
| - The first  game was  an MSX  game (of  course, as  Konami was  the main or |
|   perhaps even the only developper on MSX ! :), the musics weren't very good |
|   because  of the  poor sound  processor of  this computer  but it  allready |
|   featured THE Castlevania theme, knows as Vampire Killer.                   |
| - In NES and Gameboy episodes, these have been the pioneers in stunning game |
|   musics. The first episode was the  NES one which was adaptated of  the MSX |
|   and one of the first games on this console, the musics were also converted |
|   of the  MSX but  sounded lot  better (probably  because the  NES got  more |
|   voices than  the MSX  ? I  don't really  know ...).  The sequel on NES was |
|   introducing kind of ... digi-drums (eheh ;) on this console and the  third |
|   episode get improved composition. For the Gameboy games (Adv. 1 & 2) these |
|   were some of the rare games which featured a real elaborate soundtrack  on |
|   this machine.                                                              |
| - Parallel,  came the  arcade Castlevania  game, but  it hasn't  been a  big |
|   success, however, it featured some  of the well known themes  like Vampire |
|   Killer (from Castlevania 1), Bloody  Tears (from Castlevania 2) and  Theme |
|   of Simon (from the future Castlevania 4).                                  |
| - With the 16bits consoles (SNES  and Sega Genesis) sound capabilities,  the |
|   composer(s) get the possiblity to  add better orchestration (as these  had |
|   more voices than  8bits consoles) and  non-synthetic instruments (for  the |
|   SNES, not the Genesis which had only synthetic capabilities but with three |
|   sound processors :). The SNES episode  was a sequel to the NES  series and |
|   named Castlevania  4, it  featured mainly  knew themes  like the well know |
|   Theme of Simon or The Cave (not  to mistake with Thrashard in the Cave  on |
|   Dracula  Battle  Perfect  Selection  2).  The  Genesis  game,  Castlevania |
|   Bloodlines, was appart from others and the soundtrack was composed of  the |
|   best  themes  from  the  previous NES  and  SNES  games  with more  punchy |
|   synthetic instruments and also new great themes.                           |
| - The first console  equiped with a  CD-Rom was the  TG16 (also knows  as PC |
|   Engine).  Konami converted  Castlevania Bloodlines  on this  console (but  |
|   renamed as Dracula X)  and used the CD  streaming capabilities to put  the |
|   same musics than Genesis version  but with high quality instruments  (even |
|   if these weren't  real ones) and  that resulted with  the best Castlevania |
|   soundtrack  (in  my  so  humble  opinion  :).  After,  it  was  the 32bits |
|   generation of video  games with the  Sega Saturn and  the Playstation. The |
|   Saturn Castlevania was named Dracula X  but i don't think it was  the same |
|   one than the Genesis and  TG16 episode, because the soundtrack  wasn't the |
|   same. And, even if it  also featured mytical themes, these  were performed |
|   by  real  musicians  in  various  styles  (jazz,  funk  and  techno).  The |
|   Playstation game, Castlevania X -  Symphony of the Night, introduced  real |
|   symphonic musics but these weren't as powerful as the previous soundtracks |
|   ...                                                                        |
| - The Nintendo 64 Castlevania series  soundtracks were (as the games  and as |
|   the N64 sound  capabalities) PURE SHIT.  Why ? Simply  because these cames |
|   have been developped by Konami America  who doesn't care at all about  the |
|   game soundtrack. Better  forget these ...  Also forget the  recent Gameboy |
|   Color episode, Adv. 3, which was a  kind of renewal of Adv. 2 but  poorer, |
|   once again Konami America are the ones to blame.                           |
| - Now, even if new games are planed on the Dreamcast, X-Box and  Playstation |
|   2, i'm a bit affraid of the soundtracks of these ... I hope these will  be |
|   great.                                                                     |
|                                                                              |
| Anyway, as the two albums (Dracula Battle Perfect Selection 1 & 2) have been |
| released after the 16bits series  and before the 32bits ones,  these feature |
| the best themes. But  not in orginal sound  version, in rock arrangements  ! |
| Better  say  ...  progressive  or symphonic  metal  style.  That  means hard |
| guitars, hard drums, agressive synthetiser. But that's the definitively  the |
| best style for the Castlevania musics  ! The themes are mostly extended  and |
| performed  by  disto   guitars,  that  results   in  wonderful  solos.   The |
| accompaniments are also basting. Power music at its best !                   |
|                                                                              |
| I'm not a hard-rock  or metal addict and  expecting some rare bands  (mostly |
| progessive metal groups, like Angra,  Dream Theater or Symphony X),  i don't |
| like these kind of music. But these two albums could really be performed  by |
| one of these  progressive metal groups,  the musicians here  got really high |
| level.                                                                       |
|                                                                              |
| There aren't any bad  track on the two  albums, both are entirely  great. My |
| favorites tracks are number 1 to 10 on each CD. Nothing more to say. :)      |
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| Album     : Einhander                                                        |
| Reference : SSCX-10015                                                       |
| Publisher : Digicube                                                         |
| Released  : 12/21/97                                                         |
| Composers : Kenchiro Fukui                                                   |
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| 01 Assault                             16 Impatience                         |
| 02 Take Off                            17 Thermosphere                       |
| 03 Capital                             18 Afterimage                         |
| 04 Street                              19 Advent                             |
| 05 Ruins                               20 Rebellion                          |
| 06 Chase                               21 Zero Gravity                       |
| 07 Machine Beat                        22 Shudder                            |
| 08 Badlands                            23 Bloody Battle                      |
| 09 Silence                             24 Muddle                             |
| 10 Warning                             25 Moonlight                          |
| 11 Breakthrough                        26 Judgment                           |
| 12 Factory                             27 Earthlight                         |
| 13 Dawn                                28 Metempsychosis                     |
| 14 Madness                             29 Beginning                          |
| 15 Conflict                                                                  |
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| Comments :                                                                   |
|                                                                              |
| Einhander, beside this  german name hide  one of the  best shoot'em up  game |
| ever created (for  me, it's the  best ! :)  and a must  have on Playstation. |
| It's produced  by Square,  who mainly  develop RPG  games (see  Chrono Cross |
| album review) but also succeded in this quite unfamiliar style.              |
|                                                                              |
| The soundtrack itself  is also a  success. Composed by  Kenchiro Fukui, it's |
| the best music  for this style  of game. "What  kind of music  is that", you |
| wonder  ? Pure  electro/techno of  course !!!  That's the  genre which  fits |
| perfectly for shoot'em up. For  exemple, could you play Stardust  with other |
| musics than the great techno tunes ?  No, of course ! And even the  oldskool |
| shoot'em up like Lethal Xcess on ST or Soldier Blade on TG16 got great  fast |
| -electro-musics out of their synthetic sound chips.                          |
|                                                                              |
| The  soundtrack  is mainly  ordered  like the  game,  expecting some  bosses |
| musics. Most of the musics are  really fast and blasting, some tracks  could |
| even be perfect for a movie like Mortal Kombat (i think it's a good exemple, |
| mhh ? ;) but  also some others are  more slow and cool.  By the way none  of |
| these musics features long solos.                                            |
|                                                                              |
| All tracks are great but some stand out the rest :                           |
| - Track 8 beguns with a short break intro and then a fast bass enters with a |
|   quite common techno beat, then a short melody looping right & left  comes, |
|   followed by  dark choir  voices and,  after a  break, there  are only long |
|   accords melodies accompagned  by a simple  beat, and then  it "loops" (one |
|   time :) the music is also filled with robotic samples (not too much by the |
|   way).                                                                      |
| - Track 14 got the  right name "Madness" as  it beguns with a  really brutal |
|   theme  performed  by  an  industrial  instrument  then  the  beat arrives, |
|   followed by  long accords  and finally  at 2/3  of the  music the  accords |
|   "flow", so nice ! :)                                                       |
| - Track 22 which beguns as brutal as the precedent one and which features at |
|   the middle a fast rap in english, Yes a rap ! And it fits perfectly to the |
|   music.                                                                     |
|                                                                              |
| Most of the tracks are 2-4mins long, some are short (1min) and few are  only |
| transitions (10-30sec) but the whole album is more than 1hour long.          |
|                                                                              |
| A great album which show that there are allways great techno music  in video |
| games and not only fast made techno shits. :)                                |
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