Final Fantasy XII Limited Edition OST now available for preorder.

Originally Posted by Shoeless

The silence is deafening.

Does this mean that everyone is underwhelmed as I am

No. Just means that the link to the download was taken down before I (and I presume others) could get to it. Hard to comment if you have nothing to listen to.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Dr. Uzuki

Was it?

Oh yes... something about 70 GB or so downloaded, *LOL*

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Figured I should share seeing how a lot of people are probably drooling over this and I have it and haven't even touched it yet. Enjoy!

:superhappy: Thanks, I'll try and give it a good listen!

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Listened to about 1/3 of the tracks so far, and my thoughts are that the music is very reminiscent of FF Tactics... but I'm not really sure if it's the right sort of style for an RPG. It's lovely music, certainly, but none of it so far is what I'd call memorable. Memorable, as in, I can take a ride on my bike, think of a game, and start whistling some of the tunes. Of cours, some songs will become more stuck in my mind when I've heard them a couple of times more, but that's not just it. A lot of Sakimoto's music just sounds a bit too similar. Probably okay pieces for large dungeons, good background music, but nothing that comes to the front and shouts "Here I am, character theme song, hear me, remember me!"

I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing; it's just a very different style than most traditional RPG OSTs, but for me it'll be hard to think of this as RPG music. I'll have to play the game to fully appreciate these songs. It was the same with FF Tactics (+ Advance) for me, and I never actually managed to care for the Vagrant Story OST (probably because I never got further than half an hour into the game).

Some uses of the instruments just feel wrong. At times Sakimoto uses instruments where I think the music would've sounded better with slightly less instrusive sounds from 'softer' instruments instead of brass and percussion. At other times I really wish I could break that flute and some of those strings in two. Also, I get the feeling he really restricted himself to the kind of instruments he included in these compositions. Would it really harm to have, say, a piano play a bit of music sometime? Or get rid of all those layers of instruments, just use one instrument to play a melody. Music doesn't require ten instruments to sound good. That flute would do fine on its own sometime without all that backing.

Anyone remember the Legaia Duel SaGa OST? I'd been hoping that Sakimoto would use more of those styles (and use of instruments), but I guess that's not to be.

I don't want to sound too negative. I am enjoying hearing these songs, and a couple of pieces do rather stand out in terms of melody. But the majority of the songs, I probably won't be able to appreciate fully until I've played the game. As music for the game, this is probably really good. As stand-alone music... I'm not convinced yet.

020 & 047 are my favorites so far. They sound like they'd make decent music for battles.

edited to add: whoops, just saw the discussion about the music over at the other thread. Me bad.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Spinal Tap

Imo, the primary objective of the music in an epic, movie-like game as FF12 is to set the scene for the events in the game, and this music does a great job at that.

Yes, I see what you mean. I watched a couple of videos of FF XII this afternoon, and I understand how this style may fit the scenes better. They are clearly different from the other FF single-player RPGs, more 'vast', if that's the right word.

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I think that's a problem of FF10, which had similar awesome cinematics, but in which the music didn't nearly fit as well with the scenes as it does in this game.

It felt fine to me, but then, I'm not much of a FF music critic (even liked FF X-2!). I'm not going to give FF XII a bad mark, either. It sounds decent enough, except for some gripes I have about the sound itself (which might change with the release of the actual OST).
Like I said, I just find it difficult to really appreciate Sakimoto's usual style without having played the game. I severely disliked the Tactics Advance OST... until I played the game, and now I love it. I have no reason to assume this time around it'll be any different.

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And there are far better battle tracks than 047 (one of the few tracks which I personally can't stand), such as 069, 051, 091, 036, 057, 070, and others.

Yes, well... I'll get back to you on that when I've had a chance to actually give the whole soundtrack a proper listen (meaning a bunch of times, *LOL*). Until I've played the game, though, I probably won't put any of his battle themes on a pedestal...
I know there's a very clear pattern here, and I cannot change that. Sakimoto is just about the only VGM composer who requires me to play the actual game to be able to really like his music. His work on Legaia DuelSaga is the only exception (it just feels more stand-alone).
To me, his music needs to be *experienced*. It's no comment on the good or bad of his compositions or his skills, it's just something that's become abundantly clear to me today.

BTW Just heard the chocobo theme. Cuteness.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?