I was wondering why ghostlightning had suddenly brought FFX:III up to me the other day. His question was whether FF:XIII was going to be coming out on 360 too. Yes…..yes it is. Then I found out that the demo had been released in Japan on the PS3 yesterday and went to look at some clips. Truthfully I hadn’t been that psyched about FFX:III until I saw that they were going to be going with the whole cyberpunk theme for it’s characters and part of it’s setting. IMO FF: VIII had the most fascinating settings in the history of the franchise and I had been waiting a long long time for them to go back to that. Lightning’s Gunsword helps in getting back to that level of awesomeness too, because if I haven’t already been clear, my policy when it comes to games is “to hell with realism, do what you have to do to maximize the fun factor, then if you have to worry about realism”. I guess that means I’ve grown accustomed to Square’s late tendencies towards zazz factor (not so much cutscene porn, which they admittedly not quite as bad for as Konami’s Metal Gear Solid franchise) as long as it doesn’t interfere with gameplay. Of course if the realism is tied to the fun factor like it with such game franchises as Infinity Ward’s Call of Duty then by all means……
Anyway, I digress. What I am really here to talk about was the music during one of the early sequences in the Demo. Specifically this masterpiece in the waiting:
Final Fantasy XIII Boss Theme – By Masashi Hamauzu
Holy mother…..maybe it’s just me, but this is probably the best Final Fantasy song I’ve heard since FF: X, though maybe that’s because Masashi Hamauzu was one of the FFX composers. Nevertheless I didn’t expect to get completely blown away by one of the first tracks I heard from the demo and I swear to god it actually brought a tear to my eye because it sounded so much like the FF music I remember getting into back in my high school days and not the solid but merely passable stuff we’ve been getting since FF: X-2. I just love how it builds the tension in the early bits only to slam you full force with the piano player going all Elton John on us (that’s how I picture him anyway, slamming down on the keys like Elton John once he really gets going in a concert) as well as those lovely violins. Music to fight bosses by…..this is what I want. And yeah come to think of it the boss music in FF: XII was pretty good too, but I wouldn’t put it on this level and I certainly hope this doesn’t just mean that the boss music will be the highlight piece for all of FF:XIII as now that I know Hamauzu is the FF: X guy I expect great things from this games score. Continue reading ‘Final Fantasy XIII Demo (Is Masashi Hamauzu Square’s Next Nobuo Uematsu? Has Tetsuya Nomura Finally Evolved?)’
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