[Album] Tales of Legendia Original Soundtrack (AVCD-17741)

Just gettin this one back on the list.

I didnt know what to expect when i picked this up. An almost unheard of composer doing the soundtrack to a game that Sakuraba did so well to convey the emotion needed in the Tales series. My fears have rested, and this soundtrack is now at the top of my list. Shiina Masaru has a very diverse pallet of ideas up his sleeve, and i found myself repeating almost every song on this OST during my run-through, out of utter amazement. The orchestration is damn near perfect, and most synth is barely noticable. (im sure im not the only one who thought Enemy Attack was done with live instruments).

My final thoughts? Anyone who enjoys game music should at least give this a try, if you already havent. Maybe after this success we'll see more solo from Masaru-San......


P.S. I may get smacked for this, but 120 my tales, is the best game vocal ive ever heard in my life.

My Score: 5/5

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I said this on another board, but Go Shiina composes about half the tracks that Sakuraba/Shinji Tamura does, but they are 2x the quality.

The average Tales track is about a minute long and easily forgettable. There are plenty of exceptions, of course, and Legendia's the exact opposite of this. Most tracks are of nice length and sound like a lot of effort was put into them, with a few exceptions.

I find Legendia's soundtrack much easier to listen to outside of the game than other Tales soundtracks. The instruments are great, the composition is great, Go Shiina is great. What can I say.

Oh, for anyone else who likes this and wants to hear more from the same composer, look up "Mr. Driller Sound Tracks".

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Personally, I'm not quite so fussed about ToL's soundtrack, in that a lot of it seems to be compositionally unremarkable, but elevated beyond proportion by the huge number of live instrumentalists involved (see here). Considering many of the tracks were arranged for the album and others were cut, I'm not going to go all the way out and say 'this was the best Tales score ever' when I haven't most of it or reflected upon its in-game use.

Don't get me wrong; this is a fine score, with lots of interesting ideas, pleasant fusions of jazz/pop/orchestral/electronic, and great development, but does seem a little sugarcoated and slightly overhyped when it's pretty simplistic overall. I'd rate it highly, but not quite as much as most.

4 stars for me.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Listening to this, the thing that kept coming to mind was how utterly, unmistakably *different* it is from what I'm used to from the Tales series. Sakuraba's contributions have been consistently good, though declining in quality somehwat over the years.

But when I listen to "March," which combines a live choir, guitar, strings, and brass, I can't help but be stunned. The innovation on display is a nice surprise, but it's not without its drawbacks.

The predominence of classical-type strings, especially in the earlier portions of the album, and the tracks that mix electronics, rock, and orchestra are further markers of this difference. Sakuraba worked well in all genres but tended to segregate; one track would be all orchestra, one would be all rock, etc. (witness the two Star Ocean 3 albums). Mixing things up here is something of a refeshing break.

The downside is that the songs' melodies are not as strong as what I'm used to. They have melody, to be sure, but it's not as impressive or catchy as the best Tales songs of the past, and suffers a bit because of it. I wasn't able to hum any of the themes after the music stopped.

The verdict? A worthy effort for a newcomer to the series, and a breath of creative fresh air, but still lacking in enough areas to prevent me from fully enjoying or endorsing.

3/5

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