LC-1949~56: GRADIUS ULTIMATE COLLECTION

[strugglepoo]

----------------------------------------
Gradius (AC):
[No credits]
Well documented that Miki Higashino was the composer. Not sure of the exact source(s).

Gradius II ~GOFER no Yabou~ (AC):
[Sound Editor] S. Tasaka, M. Furukawa, K. Matsubara, S. Hukami
[-->] Shinji Tasaka, Motoaki Furukawa, Kenichi Matsubara, Seiichi Fukami

Gradius III ~Densetsu kara Shinwa e~ (AC):
[Sound Editor] J. Kaneda, S. Fukami, M. Higashino, K. Nakamura, M. Izumi
[-->] Junichiro Kaneda, Seiichi Fukami, Miki Higashino, Keizou Nakamura, Mutsuhiko Izumi
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Gradius Gaiden (PS):
[Music Compose] Nories 三浦
[-->] Norikazu Miura

Gradius IV ~Fukkatsu~ (AC):
[Music Composer] Harumi Ueko, Atsuki
[-->] Harumi Ueko, Atsuki Watanabe
*Note* I have not confirmed this myself. Credits taken from arcade-history. Official soundtrack entry here only seems to credits Atsuki.
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Gradius V (PS2):
[Music] Hitoshi Sakimoto

Gradius III & IV ~Fukkatsu no Shinwa~ (PS2):
Akira Yamaoka

Gradius Deluxe Pack (PS/SS/W95):
Gradius
[Op. Movie BGM] Motoaki Furukawa
[Staff Roll BGM] Miki Higashino

Gradius II
[Title Music] Motoaki Furukawa
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Gradius (MSX):
[No credits]

Gradius 2 (MSX):
[?] Furukawa Motoaki, IKACHAN
[-->] Motoaki Furukawa, Masahiro Ikariko
*Note* I have not confirmed this myself. Credits taken from here.

Gofer no Yabou ~Episode II~ (MSX):
[?] Piston Uehara, Furukawa Motoaki, ChiruChiru Yamane, Morimoto Yukie, [Kinuyo Yamashita]
[-->] Kazuhiko Uehara, Motoaki Furukawa, Michiru Yamane, Yukie Morimoto, Kinuyo Yamashita
*Note* I have not confirmed this myself. Credits taken from here.
----------------------------------------
Gradius (FC):
[No credits]

Gradius II (FC):
[Sound Design] H. Maezawa, Y. Morimoto [Special Thanks] M. God Furukawa
[-->] Hidenori Maezawa, Yukie Morimoto

Gradius III (SFC):
[Sound Editor] K. Muraoka, K. Uehara, H. Ueko, Y. Morimoto
[-->] Kazuki Muraoka, Kazuhiko Uehara, Harumi Ueko, Yukie Morimoto

Gradius (PCE):
[Sound Designer] H. Muraoka
[-->] ?

Gradius II ~GOFER no Yabou~ (PCE CD):
[Sound Editor] Metal . Yuhki, K-Mu, Sanoppi
[-->] Mikio Saito, Kiyoshi Murai, ?
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Nemesis (GB):
[Sound Design] S. Sakamoto, M. Yamane, Y. Technouchi, T. Tomita
[-->] ?, Michiru Yamane, Yuji Technouchi, Tomoya Tomita

Nemesis II (GB):
[Sound] Yansan, Minako, Yuko, Haggy
[-->] ?, ?, Yuko Kurahashi, Yoshiyuki Hagiwara

Gradius ReBirth (WiiWare):
[Sound Editor] Manabu Namiki
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Detana!! Twinbee (X68000):
[Unconfirmed]

Gradius (X68000):
[No credits]

Gradius II ~GOFER no Yabou~ (X68000):
[Sound Editor] H. Inoue, M. Ikariko
[-->] Hideto Inoue, Masahiro Ikariko

Nemesis' 90 Kai (X68000):
[No credits]

Gradius (PC-8801):
[Unconfirmed]

Gradius (X1):
[No credits]
----------------------------------------
Solar Assault / Solar Assault Revised (AC):
[Sound Designer] Hideaki Shikama, Shinji Tasaka, Mutsuhiko Izumi, Seiko Kobuchi

Gradius NEO / Gradius NEO -Imperial- (Mobile):
[Unconfirmed]
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Still a work in progress. Feel free to correct any mistakes or give information.
[Unconfirmed] = I haven't been able to check for a staff roll or research possible soundtrack releases yet.
[No credits] = No in-game staff roll as far as I can tell. It's possible that they might exist after the second loop; I only checked after the first loop. This might be the case with the two MSX games.

[Chris]

Gradius III & IV ~Fukkatsu no Shinwa~ (PS2): Akira Yamaoka

Gradius Deluxe Pack (PS/SS/W95): Miki Higashino, Motoaki Furukawa

I think both packs have about two exclusive compositions each.

Pity no Salamander music on this box.

[Dag]

Gradius (AC): Miki Higashino is credited in a couple of interviews at least, and liner notes (Gradius III, Gradius Arcade). There is no mention of other people doing Gradius 1 so I guess she did all.

Furukawa lists in his site and interviews Gradius 2 MSX.

Gradius III liner notes give these credits
- Prophet FUKAMI (Seichi Fukami): leader
- La Nakamoor (sp?) (Keizou Nakamura): new member, did "Underground" and "Mechanical Base" only.
- MIKI-CHANG (Miki Higashino): did "Dead End Cell", "Cosmo Plant" and "King of Kings" (only, I think)
- J_KANE (Junichiro Kaneda): doesn't say. Since Fukami talks about Higashino and Nakamura's music, but not this man, maybe he didn't compose?
- Mutsuhiko Izumi doesn't talk in the liner notes. S.E.?

Gradius IV only credits Atsuki, though Harumi Ueko performs and comments in the liner notes.

I'll see if I can find credits for the bonus tracks and other credits in liner notes.

[Reg]

Nice to see the home versions of Gradius II & III get official soundtracks at last. When this album was first announced, I thought for sure Konami would just go with the usual arcade releases.

[strugglepoo]

Originally Posted by Chris

Gradius III & IV ~Fukkatsu no Shinwa~ (PS2): Akira Yamaoka

Gradius Deluxe Pack (PS/SS/W95): Miki Higashino, Motoaki Furukawa

Thanks. Do you have the exact credit for Yamaoka? For completions sake.
Gradius Deluxe Pack further backed by this source.

I guess the MSX credits come from SCC Snatcher liner notes?

IKA: And the next one we made was "Gradius II".
Tommy: Ah, that was the masterpiece.
Piston: Yeah. At that time it really was the new chip so everyone gathered around it and did trials and errors, and selected the good ones out of what we did and incorporated them, that was how things went. Entire MSX team was working on it.

Not sure how much of an exaggeration that is. That's probably my favourite Gradius OST, so I wouldn't be surprised at the amount of talent working on it. Ikariko confirms for sure that he worked on it and we know Furukawa from his website. Are there others or were they cut? Who knows.

Piston: We did "Gopher no yabou" by pretty huge labor force.
Mansan: That was terrific as well. The members were so glittering.... Morimoto Yukie chan who now belongs to Kukeiha Club, and Furukawa was there as well, and there was Chiruchiru Yamane who did "Detana! Twinbee".
IKA: Wasn't there Pekito's tune as well?
Pekito: What? No, that was...
Piston: Yes you were making the tunes.
Pekito: Please, don't ask me about that. That was an ice age for me...
Piston: How many tunes of yours happened to be included in the end?
Pekito: All was refused. (Everyone sheds tears)

[Chris]

I watched the game credits some time ago when I was compiling a still-unreleased games database.

[Judge Ito]

Oh my, this is a nice box. The booklet is nice too, but it's tightly bound. I'm not willing to mangle my copy for proper scans.

There's a two-page introduction by this person or group:


After this the format is 4 pages for each disc in the set. One full page of art with a tracklist on the opposite page, followed by a 2-page breakdown of the games and music featured on that disc with screenshots scattered throughout. I can't tell what POV the breakdowns are written from, nor is anybody specifically credited or mentioned. They do reference a lot of track titles, though. Here are some blurry photos.


(click for bigger) (old lady hands)

There's a note on the tracklist for disc 8 (that's also repeated on disc 8's insert) which seems to relate solely to Solar Assault / Solar Assault Revised.


Here are the production credits for the box itself. There are no specific composer credits.


(click for bigger)

Mastered by quad from luvtrax

[Xenofan 29A]

There's a note on the tracklist for disc 8 (that's also repeated on disc 8's insert) which seems to relate solely to Solar Assault / Solar Assault Revised.

It says that the order on disc is that in Solar Assault Revised, and gives you the track ordering for Solar Assault as an alternative.

[Judge Ito]

Thanks Xenofan.

Also of note: The tracklist for Gradius ReBirth differs from the stand-alone release. It's been updated to reflect a WiiWare title update that contained new music, all of which came from the "Another ReBirth" medleys on the stand-alone release.

[Xenofan 29A]

Originally Posted by Judge Ito

There's a two-page introduction by this person or group:

It seems like it's a person, but I may be wrong. Whoever "he" is, he also wrote the introduction to the Akumajo Dracula Box, as well as this book.

[PerfectZer0]

I scaned the first three artworks you'll see in the booklet (also front and back). This thing is tough to get proper scans of. Like Judge Ito said it is tightly bound.

[Carl]

Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A

It seems like it's a person, but I may be wrong. Whoever "he" is, he also wrote the introduction to the Akumajo Dracula Box, as well as this book.

Oh yeah, I bought that book (OK! Let's Hear the Game Music!) on my first trip to Tokyo: It was like having JGML in printed form, and with about a dozen composer interviews too. Here's the Cover and Contents scans

I'm pretty sure it's a journalist who wrote columns about game music for magazines. (A guy like baddy)

[PerfectZer0]

Scaned the rest of the artwork from the booklet....it's hard not to have the previous pages overlaping on the left side...*ugh*

[CHz]

Nice work compiling those composers. Just a quick correction for you.

Originally Posted by strugglepoo

Gradius II ~GOFER no Yabou~ (PCE CD):
[Sound Editor] Metal . Yuhki, K-Mu, Sanoppi
[-->] Mikio Saito, Kazuki Muraoka, ?

K-Mu should be Kiyoshi Murai, not Kazuki Muraoka. Kiyoshi's credited in Animaniacs for the Genesis as Kiyoshi "K-Mu" Murai. I wrote some stuff about him and how he's possibly Seiya Murai here: http://vgmdb.net/forums/showthread.php?t=6090.

[strugglepoo]

Fixed, thanks.

To be honest, I probably won't be checking the rest of the PC ones any time soon. Kind of lost steam.

[Zhane Masaki]

Gradius NEO & Gradius NEO IMPERIAL : Off Course Takeuchi
taken from bgr44.speedgamer.net

[Dag]

Kinuyo Yamashita uploaded a YT video saying she did five tracks in Gofer no Yabou 2 (MSX):

The Universe of Blackness (4-33), Feel Pleasure to the Death (4-38), Space Traveler (4-40), Galactic Desert (4-47), Trust me I will save you. (4-52)

EDIT2: Technouchi posted Nemesis GB: Music composed by M. Yamane & TECHNOuchi


EDIT: I rejected some changes:

Spoiler:

Aerial Battle > Air Battle
- In Gradius some tracks are called 空中戦 and others 空中戦闘. To separate them I translated as Air Battle and Aerial Battle, respectively.

BALANCE TEST (MIDI Synchronization Balance Test BGM) > BALANCE TEST (MIDI Sync Balance Test for BGM)
- Rather than "balance test for BGM", it should be "BGM for balance test"

Gradius - Boss BGM > Gradius Boss BGM
- I don't see a reason to ignore the - when there are other tracks called plainly "Gradius Boss" without the dot.

Gradius 1st. BGM > Gradius 1st BGM
- Kept the . as in the JP.

Vic Viper, Dispatched! > Vic Viper Launch!, Assault to Crab Core > Assault Crab Core
- I don't think the second one conveys the way it's written in JP, sounds less grammatical.

Vestigial Star Moai > Ruin Star Moai
- I think Ruin Star may be interpreted as 'Star of Ruin' ('that ruins'). The original is more like 'star of vestige/ruins'

Baroque Evening > An Evening of Baroque
- Doesn't seem like baroque is normally used as a noun in English.

[Kapow]

Originally Posted by Dag

Aerial Battle > Air Battle
- In Gradius some tracks are called 空中戦 and others 空中戦闘. To separate them I translated as Air Battle and Aerial Battle, respectively.

The "Battle" part is what's different, though. How about "Air Fighting" or "Air Combat"?

Originally Posted by Dag

Gradius - Boss BGM > Gradius Boss BGM
- I don't see a reason to ignore the - when there are other tracks called plainly "Gradius Boss" without the dot.

The middle dot is just a space, though. バッド・エンディング is "Bad Ending", not "Bad - Ending". There's nothing like a dash there.

Originally Posted by Dag

Vestigial Star Moai > Ruin Star Moai
- I think Ruin Star may be interpreted as 'Star of Ruin' ('that ruins'). The original is more like 'star of vestige/ruins'

How about "Ruins Star" or "Ancient Ruins Star"? That sense of "vestigial" is pretty obscure, it doesn't really fit with the other track names.

[Dag]

Thanks, I've incorporated your suggestions.

[Secret Squirrel]

I've rejected an edit that added a couple of composers to the album. I'm not sure what we should do with this album, since it's so vast, but as long as it's careful and thorough I think it'll be fine.

[Phonograph]

catalogues like this -> GFCA-302~9 (4988602161304, 2012.1.18, 12600yens) must be parent or child?
I always (more or less) saw LC-XXXX catalogues as sub-releases (only sold at konami site no?)
so I wonder

[Hellacia]

The GFCA prints are reprints, not the LC prints. I own the GFCA-129 print of the Quiz Magic Academy V Original Soundtrack, and the disc actually has LC-1701 printed on its inner ring, while it has GFCA-129 printed on all the packaging/artwork. Also, the release dates on the LC prints are earlier anyway...

[CHz]

"Burning Heat" from Gradius II AC confirmed as Motoaki Furukawa's composition by, of all things, a beatmania soundtrack: http://vgmdb.net/album/1336.

It's not even credited as his composition on UNDER THE BLUE SKY!

[Datschge]

Originally Posted by Carl

Oh yeah, I bought that book (OK! Let's Hear the Game Music!) on my first trip to Tokyo: It was like having JGML in printed form, and with about a dozen composer interviews too. Here's the Cover and Contents scans

Just found your post when googling for that book. lol How extensive are the interviews? The composer selection certainly is very nice, would be nice to have an idea of the content.

[CHz]

Originally Posted by Carl

Oh yeah, I bought that book (OK! Let's Hear the Game Music!) on my first trip to Tokyo: It was like having JGML in printed form, and with about a dozen composer interviews too. Here's the Cover and Contents scans

I'm pretty sure it's a journalist who wrote columns about game music for magazines. (A guy like baddy)

It is baddy, as a matter of fact. He goes by Baddy Yamazaki (山崎 罰帝) on occasion, like Facebook.