Your favorite "boss" music

I'm a big fan of battle themes (from RPGs particularly). Not much of a surprise but my favourite boss battle music is the excellent "Summoned Beast Battle" from FF10. I've always liked the intensity and energy of the track, as well as the great build-up.

Coming a close second would be "Femmes Fatales" and "UB" from Parasite Eve (tied). Wonderful electronica by Shimomura on these two tracks with her usual touch of sophistication and elegance. "Someone Calls Me" is also pretty high on my list though it's a kind of unconventional for a boss theme. Love the piano (and the "Eve vocals" :P).

Other notable boss battle tracks include:

1) "Premonition" and "The Extreme" from FF8 - Very cool and satisfying. Always thought "Premonition's" rendition of "Liberi Fatali" was one of the better versions on the soundtrack.

2) "China Ogre," "Hardcore to the Brain," "Astaroth" (the arranged version is also very neat), "Glint of Light" and "Light Crossing Boder" from various Shadow Hearts games. They're all pretty creative and refeshing as far as boss themes go. My favourite has got to be "Light Crossing Boder"; it's incredibly catchy and has a great sense of urgency to it.

3) "Unite, Descent" from FF: Crystal Chronicles. A lot of people don't really appreciate the FF:CC soundtrack but I like it enough. And this boss theme is fantastic. Very rhythmic and percussive, with a great ominous atmosphere to complete the package.

4) "Fight, Chocobo!" from Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon. Very spunky and catchy, this short track captures much of what I adore in boss themes.

5) "Battle with the Devil" from Tsugunai. A lot of Mitsuda's pieces from this era sound fairly similar but one that kind of stood out was this boss theme. In some ways, it feels like an extension of "China Ogre" thanks to the percussion line.

6) "Point of No Return" from Sailing to the World. The game this track came from (The Seventh Seal) was very mediocre but there were some excellent pieces of music like this one. This boss theme uses a similar vocal sample as "Astaroth" but the track as a whole is tighter and more exciting. Pity the track plays only once, and in an optional boss battle at that.

7) "Boss F," "Fight02" and "Boss Z2" from various Sword of Xuan Yuan games. My fascination with Taiwanese wuxia games has led me to some great game music finds. Of which, the aforementioned boss themes are terrific, with very nice oriental touches. Some of you might remember the "chaotic" (and thus unlistenable :P) "Boss F" from SotW and "Fight02" from the BSC 2006 preliminaries. "Boss Z2" comes in two flavours, a rock-like final boss theme and a more conventional RPG-esque boss battle track.

8) "DA Boss 1 Modern" and "DA Boss 2" from Vampire: The Masquerade - Redemption. A lot of the boss themes from this game are very nice and both of these tracks are among my favourites. They're very high on the gothic factor and have ominous choral work to boot. :P

Could go on even more but I guess I'll just stop now.

How ya doing, buddy?